Lughnasadh Meaning: The Celtic Harvest Festival of Lugh on 1 August

What Lughnasadh means, how to say it, the story of Lugh and his foster mother Tailtiu, how it relates to Lammas, and a simple bread and gratitude ritual for 1 August

By the start of August the fields have turned gold. The first grain is ready, the hedgerows are heavy with fruit, and the long evenings are just beginning to draw in. In Ireland this turning was marked with Lughnasadh, the festival of the god Lugh, with games, gatherings on the hills and the first bread of the new harvest. In England the same day became Lammas, the loaf mass. Here is what Lughnasadh means, where its customs come from, and a gentle way to give thanks at home.

Lughnasadh at a Glance

• What: the Celtic festival of the first harvest, one of the four fire festivals of the old Irish year
• When: 1 August, beginning on the evening of 31 July
• How to say it: LOO·nah·sah. The gh and dh are silent. Modern Irish spells it Lúnasa, which is also the Irish name for August
• Meaning: “the assembly of Lugh”
• Who it honours: Lugh, the many skilled god of light and craft, and his foster mother Tailtiu
• Other names: Lammas in England, Gŵyl Awst in Wales
• Symbols: the first loaf, the last sheaf, grain, bilberries, hilltops, games and fairs, Lugh’s spear
• Season: the sun in Leo, at the height of late summer

What Does Lughnasadh Mean?

Lughnasadh is usually explained as “the assembly of Lugh” or “the gathering of Lugh”. It names the great fairs and games held in his honour at the start of the harvest. In the old Irish calendar it was one of four great festivals, along with Samhain, Imbolc and Beltane, and it opened the harvest season.

This was a farming festival, a celebration of crops and grain rather than of herds. August days are still warm, but they are noticeably shorter than at midsummer. People knew the harvest ahead would decide whether the winter was comfortable or hungry, so Lughnasadh carried both joy and a quiet seriousness. It was a time to give thanks for what the land had given, and to ask that the rest of the harvest would come in safely.

How to pronounce Lughnasadh

Say LOO·nah·sah, with the stress on the first syllable. The letters gh and dh are silent in Irish, which is why the spelling looks so different from the sound. You may also see Lúnasa, the modern Irish spelling, and Lughnasa, used by the playwright Brian Friel in Dancing at Lughnasa.

Who Is Lugh?

Lugh is one of the most celebrated figures in Irish mythology. He is a bright, young god of light, skill and kingship, known as Lugh Lámhfhada, Lugh of the Long Arm, and Lugh Samildánach, Lugh of the many skills. His father was Cian of the Tuatha Dé Danann and his mother was Ethniu, sometimes described as a goddess and sometimes as a Fomorian princess. He was raised in fosterage, a common custom in early Ireland, and the stories give him more than one foster parent. The sea god Manannán mac Lir taught him many of his skills.

The god of every skill

The best known story about Lugh tells of his arrival at Tara, the royal seat of the gods. The doorkeeper would only let in someone who brought a skill the court did not already have. Lugh said he was a smith. They had a smith. A warrior? They had a warrior. A harper, a poet, a healer, a craftsman? They had all of these. Then Lugh asked whether anyone at the court had every one of those skills at once. No one did, and Lugh was welcomed in.

He went on to lead the Tuatha Dé Danann against the Fomorians at the second battle of Mag Tuired, with his famous spear and his gift for strategy. He is also linked with kingship, justice and the fertility of the land. His name is shared with the Welsh Lleu and the Gaulish Lugus, and in some seasonal calendars he is honoured as the sun god of high summer, from midsummer into the harvest.

Tailtiu and the Funeral Games

At the heart of Lughnasadh is a story about love and loss. Lugh’s foster mother was Tailtiu. In the old telling she cleared the great plains of Ireland of forest so that they could be farmed, and the work was so hard that it cost her life. As she was dying she asked that games be held every year in her memory.

Lugh honoured her wish. He established funeral games at the place named for her, Tailtiu, now Teltown in County Meath, and they became one of the great gatherings of early Ireland, with races, contests of skill, music, trading and matchmaking. So Lughnasadh is a festival of the first harvest and also a remembering. The food on the table rests on the labour of someone who gave everything to the land.

The memory of those games was strong enough that Ireland revived them as the Tailteann Games in 1924, with further games in 1928 and 1932.

Lammas: The Loaf Mass

In England, 1 August was Lammas, from the Old English hlāfmæsse, the loaf mass. Bread baked from the first wheat of the harvest was taken to church to be blessed, and in some places the blessed loaf was then broken and its crumbs scattered in the corners of the barn to protect the grain stored there. Some English towns still have Lammas lands, fields once opened for common grazing after the hay had been gathered on Lammas Day.

Lammas and Lughnasadh come from different traditions, one Christian and English, one Irish and older, but they mark the same moment and share the same heart: the first bread of the new harvest. In the modern Wheel of the Year the two names are often used for the same festival, and it is kept by people of many paths.

In Wales the time is Gŵyl Awst, the August festival. Welsh harvest custom included the cutting of the last sheaf, plaited into a harvest mare, which the reaper would try to carry into the farmhouse without being caught and soaked with water by the household.

Lughnasadh Traditions

Climbing the hills

One of the strongest Lughnasadh customs in Ireland was the gathering on hilltops on a Sunday at the end of July or the start of August. Families climbed together, picked bilberries, shared food, danced, held races and courted. The day had many local names, among them Garland Sunday, Bilberry Sunday and Fraughan Sunday, after fraochán, the Irish word for the bilberry. The folklorist Máire MacNeill gathered memories of these gatherings from all over Ireland in her book The Festival of Lughnasa, published in 1962.

The best known hill climb today is the pilgrimage up Croagh Patrick in County Mayo on Reek Sunday, the last Sunday in July. Thousands still climb it each year. It is a Christian pilgrimage, and many historians see in it the older pattern of gathering on the heights at harvest time.

Puck Fair

Every August the town of Killorglin in County Kerry holds Puck Fair, one of the oldest fairs in Ireland. A wild mountain goat is brought down from the hills and crowned King Puck, and for three days the town fills with music, horse trading and celebration. Its exact origins are unknown, but many see it as one of the last great Lughnasadh fairs still running.

The first bread

Bread is the true symbol of Lughnasadh. The first grain of the harvest was ground and baked into a special loaf, which was shared by the household and the community. It stood for the gifts of the land and the turning of life and death in the field, as the grain is cut so that people can eat.

Games and gatherings

Following Lugh’s funeral games for Tailtiu, Lughnasadh became a time for contests of strength and skill, races, fairs and matchmaking. It was a festival of community, of coming together after the long work of summer.

The Honest History

Lughnasadh is one of the genuinely old festivals. It appears among the four great feasts of the year in early Irish literature, written down in the medieval period from older tradition, and the story of Lugh and Tailtiu explains its origin. The fair at Tailtiu is recorded in the Irish annals. Much of what we know about how ordinary people kept the season, the hill climbs, bilberry picking and the harvest fairs, comes from folklore collected in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Lammas is a separate English Christian festival, with records going back to Anglo Saxon times. The eight festival Wheel of the Year that joins Lughnasadh, Lammas and the solstices and equinoxes into one cycle was shaped in the middle of the twentieth century. It is a lovely framework, and it helps to know which parts are ancient and which are new.

Crystals for Lughnasadh

• Tiger’s eye: gold and brown like ripe grain, a classic harvest stone
• Black obsidian: obsidian is one of Lugh’s traditional stones, a grounding stone for the start of the darker half
• Goldstone: made in fire and flecked with copper, a fitting stone for the god of every craft
• Mookaite: warm earth tones for the land and its gifts

For a full layout, see our Lammas crystal grid. If you like to work with the moon as well, our post on the full moon before Lughnasadh looks at how the two fit together.

A Simple Bread and Gratitude Ritual

This ritual can be done on the evening of 31 July or on 1 August. You will need a loaf of bread, homemade if you can or a good bakery loaf if not, a yellow, orange or white candle, a small plate and a pen and paper.

1. Set the table. Place the bread on the plate in the centre, with the candle beside it. Add a few ears of wheat, late summer flowers or a handful of berries if you have them.
2. Light the candle. As you light it, say: “Lugh of the many skills, Tailtiu who cleared the land, I give thanks for this harvest.”
3. Breathe. Take a few slow breaths and notice the smell of the bread and the warmth of the flame.
4. Write your harvest. List what has grown for you this year: work finished, skills learned, people who helped you, small things that went well.
5. Speak your thanks. Read the list aloud. Add a word of thanks for anyone whose hard work stands behind what you have, as Tailtiu’s stood behind the harvest.
6. Break the bread. Tear off the first piece and set it aside as an offering. Then share the rest with your household, or eat a piece yourself.
7. Close. Snuff the candle. Later, crumble the first piece onto the earth, under a tree or for the birds.

If you have a skill you have been meaning to practise, Lughnasadh is a good day to begin. Lugh honoured every craft, and many people dedicate a new piece of work to him at this time.

Questions People Ask

What is Lughnasadh?

Lughnasadh is the Celtic festival of the first harvest, held on 1 August. It is named after the god Lugh and remembers the games he held for his foster mother Tailtiu. It is one of the four fire festivals of the old Irish year.

How do you pronounce Lughnasadh?

Say LOO·nah·sah, with the stress on the first syllable. The gh and dh are silent.

Is Lughnasadh the same as Lammas?

They fall on the same day and both celebrate the first harvest, but they come from different traditions. Lughnasadh is Irish and named after Lugh. Lammas, the loaf mass, is English and Christian. Today many people use the names side by side.

What do you eat at Lughnasadh?

Bread made from the new grain is the main food of the festival. Bilberries, blackberries, new potatoes, apples and honey are also traditional, along with anything fresh from the garden or local farms.

Who was Tailtiu?

Tailtiu was Lugh’s foster mother. In the old story she cleared the plains of Ireland for farming and died from the effort, and Lugh founded the games at Teltown in County Meath in her memory.

What comes after Lughnasadh on the Wheel of the Year?

The autumn equinox in September, often called Mabon in the modern Wheel, follows Lughnasadh as the second harvest. See our guide to how to celebrate Mabon.

Keep reading: The Full Moon Before Lughnasadh · Wheel of the Year Crystal Grid for Lammas · Celtic Gods and Goddesses · Imbolc Meaning and Traditions