Irish Keening and Wakes: Traditional Mourning Rituals with Mary McLaughlin | EOLU Podcast
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- Опубліковано 19 вер 2024
- My guest Mary McLaughlin is a singer/songwriter and teacher who studies and teaches workshops about Irish singing and technique and Gaelic song and culture. She has recorded five CD's to international acclaim, written two song books and completed a PhD in Irish Otherworld Song. Today she teaches us about Irish wakes and the ancient funeral ritual of keening. Learn more at her website:
www.marymclaug...
This episode includes:
🍃 The ancient tombs found in Ireland and what we can learn from them
🍂 Many contemporary funeral traditions have been influenced by both Christian and Pagan customs
🍃 Wakes thrived during the Middle Ages in the early Celtic Church but were later forbidden
🍂 "Professional waking" used to take place in small Irish villages
🍃 The purpose of the wake is to help people cry and mourn, sometimes through laughter and games
🍂 Keeners had to be good singers and specially trained to provide this ritual for wakes
🍃 The benefits of having keeners be outsiders to help the family express emotion, move into their grief, and create a sense of awe
🍂 The keen would continue from the wake through to the burial ground
🍃 The three stages of ritual: separation, liminality, and re-incorporation
🍂 How the keen addresses the 5 stages defined by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Links mentioned in this episode:
🍃 Recommended Book: My Father's Wake by Kevin Toolis - amzn.to/3O7IPsV
🍂 Sign up for Mary's newsletter here: www.marymclaug...
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Both my parents and my brother were waked. My young niece too. I will be waked. Ive been to lots of wakes. Cover the mirrors, take out the whiskey. Everyone comes to the house and stays and chats. People bring food, make sandwiches. Poetry is read. Songs sung. The body is never left alone. Neighbours come in and stay overnight with the body so the family can sleep (but they dont). It goes on for two days or so. Theres a lot of laughter, a lot of tears. Sometimes on the same breath.
The family dont do anything like make tea or cut cake. The friends/neighbours do all that.
You HAVE to go to local wakes to represent your family and support the deceaseds family regardless of whether you knew them or not.
The other benefit of wakes is that everyone the family knows comes, work colleagues, friends, old schoolfriends, everyone. Local politicians come. Everyone. Hundreds of people. So the family dont have to worry about bumping into someone who doesnt know. And noone has to avoid them feeling they dont know what to say. All they have to say is “how are you now.”. (At the wake you just say “Sorry for your loss/troubles”. It makes it easy to know what to say and do. And the family can open conversations in the weeks following the funeral by thanking people for coming/the food they brought. Or recounting the funny/interesting things that happened at the wake. It removes all awkwardness that might otherwise exist.
One of the functions of a wake is to prepare kids for the reality of death so they are brought to see and touch the dead body. It also makes clear to everyone that loss and grief are normal and everyone suffers loss at some point. People talk about the deceased but about their own losses too and how they coped. It allows a release of emotion not just for the family of the deceased.
The neighbours set up the room for the coffin (no mirrors, no painting, no ornaments, curtains closed. When the body is buried the neighbours rush back to the house before the family and put everything back to rights so that the house is cleaned and back to normal when the family come home. I have to say that is moving and emphasises the loss to the family. And the support is palpable. It does make it easier.
Btw its unusual to NOT be waked where i live in ireland. Everyone is waked. Ive never heard a keener tho. But ive come here because i want to find someone who can show me exactly the rhythms and patterns of keening.
One last thing. There are always a group of older women who turn up (sometimes me) and dont leave so the family have someone to talk to, to tell the story of the life and death of the deceased to over and over. The ladies meet old friends, the kids meet their school friends. Noone wants to leave. And while there all have a licence to talk about loss, suffering, grief, sorrow - subjects you wouldnt bring up otherwise.
Ive never been to a wake without an open coffin. One of the topics of conversation at wakes is how well the deceased looks.
Jsyk what we believe is that the soul of the deceased is still with the body for about three days. (They are at the wake). At about 7pm in the evening of the third day of the wake the coffin is screwed closed in private by the family and then brought to the church. (The removal ceremony). Prayers are said and more wider community show up and sympathise with the family. The coffin is left in the church overnight. Alone. Thats when the soul passes over. The following day is the funeral. But its only a body that is being buried. The soul of the person has gone. It does make it easier. However when children or young people die they arent left alone in the church overnight. Theres no removal.Who would leave a child in a dark church overnight? So they are brought straight from the house to the funeral ceremony. Thats becoming more common for all ages. After the burial the family are kept busy all evening, usually just close friends andfamily. To distract them from the darkness falling.
Just saying: Im in the midlands of ireland- the wake never went away here. Im in my 50s and the way wakes are done now is the same as when i was a child. My children, bless them, have been to lots of wakes. Only ppl who live in towns (and dont know their neighbours) are viewed in funeral homes (not waked). Its an insult to the deceased not to wake them imo.
Does anyone know the spelling of the name of the master of ceremonies she mentioned, the masculine counterpart to the bean caointe? I've searched both barachan and barachán and found little to nothing. GRMA
I found this article that mentions “borekeen” as the masculine role but I don’t know if that spelling is correct. irishfolklore.wordpress.com/2017/10/13/the-irish-wake-and-its-gender-roles/
IDC if people think I'm weird I just wanted my Daddy figure also known to me as aka Grandad BFFL I did weeping wailing right through and still 33 Years later I was just about to turn 15 3 months later and I couldn't care less I was letting him know how I felt betrayal hurt pain anger fear heartbreak 💔 🥺😧😰😨😥😭😭💔💔💔🥀🥀
These Yanks 👀🙄