The Horned Women

: Celtic Folk And Fairy Tales

A rich woman sat up late one night carding and preparing wool, while

all the family and servants were asleep. Suddenly a knock was given at

the door, and a voice called, "Open! open!"



"Who is there?" said the woman of the house.



"I am the Witch of one Horn," was answered.



The mistress, supposing that one of her neighbours had called and

required assistance, opened the door, and a woman entered, having in

her hand a pair of wool-carders, and bearing a horn on her forehead,

as if growing there. She sat down by the fire in silence, and began to

card the wool with violent haste. Suddenly she paused, and said aloud:

"Where are the women? they delay too long."



Then a second knock came to the door, and a voice called as before,

"Open! open!"



The mistress felt herself obliged to rise and open to the call, and

immediately a second witch entered, having two horns on her forehead,

and in her hand a wheel for spinning wool.



"Give me place," she said; "I am the Witch of the two Horns," and she

began to spin as quick as lightning.



And so the knocks went on, and the call was heard, and the witches

entered, until at last twelve women sat round the fire--the first with

one horn, the last with twelve horns.



And they carded the thread, and turned their spinning-wheels, and

wound and wove, all singing together an ancient rhyme, but no word did

they speak to the mistress of the house. Strange to hear, and

frightful to look upon, were these twelve women, with their horns and

their wheels; and the mistress felt near to death, and she tried to

rise that she might call for help, but she could not move, nor could

she utter a word or a cry, for the spell of the witches was upon her.



Then one of them called to her in Irish, and said, "Rise, woman, and

make us a cake."



Then the mistress searched for a vessel to bring water from the well

that she might mix the meal and make the cake, but she could find

none.



And they said to her, "Take a sieve and bring water in it."



And she took the sieve and went to the well; but the water poured

from it, and she could fetch none for the cake, and she sat down by

the well and wept.



Then a voice came by her and said, "Take yellow clay and moss, and

bind them together, and plaster the sieve so that it will hold."



This she did, and the sieve held the water for the cake; and the voice

said again:



"Return, and when thou comest to the north angle of the house, cry

aloud three times and say, 'The mountain of the Fenian women and the

sky over it is all on fire.'"



And she did so.



When the witches inside heard the call, a great and terrible cry broke

from their lips, and they rushed forth with wild lamentations and

shrieks, and fled away to Slievenamon, where was their chief abode.

But the Spirit of the Well bade the mistress of the house to enter and

prepare her home against the enchantments of the witches if they

returned again.



And first, to break their spells, she sprinkled the water in which she

had washed her child's feet, the feet-water, outside the door on the

threshold; secondly, she took the cake which in her absence the

witches had made of meal mixed with the blood drawn from the sleeping

family, and she broke the cake in bits, and placed a bit in the mouth

of each sleeper, and they were restored; and she took the cloth they

had woven, and placed it half in and half out of the chest with the

padlock; and lastly, she secured the door with a great crossbeam

fastened in the jambs, so that the witches could not enter, and

having done these things she waited.



Not long were the witches in coming back, and they raged and called

for vengeance.



"Open! open!" they screamed; "open, feet-water!"



"I cannot," said the feet-water; "I am scattered on the ground, and my

path is down to the Lough."



"Open, open, wood and trees and beam!" they cried to the door.



"I cannot," said the door, "for the beam is fixed in the jambs and I

have no power to move."



"Open, open, cake that we have made and mingled with blood!" they

cried again.



"I cannot," said the cake, "for I am broken and bruised, and my blood

is on the lips of the sleeping children."



Then the witches rushed through the air with great cries, and fled

back to Slievenamon, uttering strange curses on the Spirit of the

Well, who had wished their ruin; but the woman and the house were left

in peace, and a mantle dropped by one of the witches in her flight was

kept hung up by the mistress in memory of that night; and this mantle

was kept by the same family from generation to generation for five

hundred years after.