School: An Ghráinseach
- Location:
- Gransha More, Co. Monaghan
- Teacher: E. Nic Uaid
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0946, Page 033
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD.
See copyright details.
DownloadOpen data
Available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- XML School: An Ghráinseach
- XML Page 033
- XML “Lucky Days”
Note: We will soon deprecate our XML Application Programming Interface and a new, comprehensive JSON API will be made available. Keep an eye on our website for further details.
On this page
- There are lucky days and unlucky days for doing different things. People say it is unlucky to flit from one house to another on a Saturday or on any day in Lent. It is lucky to get married in August but not in May. Irish people never get married on a Saturday.
Long ago there was an old cow that became sick and everyone wished she was dead. The cold days of March were not able to kill her so March borrowed three days from April. April gave her first three days to March so as to kill the cow. These three days were very cold, stormy and wet, so that the cow was killed at last. Ever since these three days were called the "Borrowing Days."
The Irish farmers always sow their corn as soon after Saint Patrick's Day as possible. Corn sowed in April is called "Cuckoo corn" and is liable to be bad. Potatoes are set in the beginning of April.
Friday is an unlucky day to start ploughing. It is unlucky to start building a house on Monday. People do not like to give away anything on new Year's Day. if people (do) are going to a fair and they meet a red haired girl, it is said they will have bad luck that day.
People do not like to see anyone whistling while churning. it is unlucky for a man to light his pipe(continues on next page)
- Collector
- Patsy Meehan
- Gender
- Male
- Address
- Inishammon, Co. Monaghan
- Informant
- Michael Smyth
- Gender
- Male
- Age
- 70
- Occupation
- Farmer
- Address
- Kincorragh, Co. Monaghan
