P.W. Joyce 1903

In the following passage, we find a 1903 assertion that in 1847 nothing was known of a Celtic new year, but "some years later" it was found to fall on February 1st (which corresponds to Oimelc/Imbolg at springtime). The extract is of interest of its own accord to see the development of celticism a century ago. Below the first extract is an account of Samhain as a frightening night, where demons roam the land.

From: A Social History of Ancient Ireland
P.W. Joyce
1903: Longmans, Green and Co., London

page 390, Part III, Chapter XXVII:

"Samain, Samuin, or Samhuin [sowin], the first of November, was the first day of Gemred or Winter. The name is compounded of the two words, sam, which was an old word for Samrad or Summer, and fuin, an ancient word for end: that is to say, the end of Summer: "for, " the old authority adds, " the whole year was [originally] divided into two parts - Summer from Ist May to Ist November, and Winter from Ist November to Ist May."(1) The name samain is still used even among the English-speaking people in Scotland and the north of Ireland, in the form of sowin or sowins, which is the name of a sort of flummery usually made about the Ist November. The term gemred for winter is a derivative from the older and simpler word geim, meaning the same thing.

For certain legal purposes connected with grazing and trespass, the ancient Irish had another division of the year into two unequal parts:- the Summer division from the Ist March to the 31st July, five months; and the Winter division from Ist August to the 28th of February, seven months.(2)

O'Donovan stated in 1847 (Book of Rights 1ii) that the season with which the Pagan Irish began their year could not be (then) determined. Some years later O'Curry asserted that according to the authority of an ancient Irish poem, of which he had a copy, the year began on the Ist February. (3) We must presume that this is correct; but he has not given the stanza in which the statement is made, and I have never seen the poem."

(1) Sick Bed, Atlantis, I. 370, note 2: & Book of Rights, 1iii.
(2) Brehon Laws, IV. 79, 89, 91.
(3) Sick Bed, Atlantis, I. 370, note 2

On the point of the February 1st date, an interesting point to note (also from Joyce, 1903) is that the destruction of the Cromm Dubh (stone structure) in western Connought was celebrated on the Sunday before February 1st, on a day called variously Domnach Cruimm Duibh 'Cromm Dubh's Sunday', and 'Garland Sunday' (Part II, chapter IX, p. 276).

This is what Joyce reports about Samhain, elsewhere in his work:

From: A Social History of Ancient Ireland
P.W. Joyce
1903: Longmans, Green and Co., London

pages 264-266, Part II, Chapter IX:

"Shees open at Samain. - On Samain Eve, the night before the Ist of November, or, as it is now called, All Hallows Night, or Hallowe'en, all the fairy hills were thrown wide open; for the Fe-fiada was taken off:- "The shees of Erin were always open at Samain," says the ancient tale of "The Boyish Exploits of Finn"; "for on [the eve of] that day it was impossible to keep them in concealment": and we read in the story of "Echtra Nerai":- "They [the fairy host] will come on Samain next; for the shees of Erin are always open at Samain (1). While the shees remained open that night, any mortals who were bold enough to venture near might get a peep into them:- "On on Samain Night [ie Samain Eve] Finn was near two shees: and he saw both of them open, after the Fe-fiada had been taken off them: and he saw a great fire in each of the duns, and heard persons talking in them. "(2) No sooner was the Fe-fiada taken off, and the doors thrown open, than the inmates issued forth, and roamed where they pleased all over the country: so that, as we are told in the story of Echtra Nerai, people usually kept within doors, naturally enough afraid to go forth; for "demons would always appear on that night."(3) From the cave of Cruachan or Croghan in Connaught, issued probably the most terrific of all those spectre hosts; for immediately that darkness had closed in on Samain Eve, a crowd of horrible goblins rushed out, and among them a flock of copper-red birds, led by one monstrous three-headed vulture: and their poisonous breath withered up everything it touched: so that this cave came to be called the "Hell-gate of Ireland." (4). That same hell-gate cave is there still, but the demons are gone - scared away, no doubt, by the voices of the Christian bells. The superstition that the fairies are abroad on samain Night exists at the present day, both in Ireland and in Scotland. Fairies - sometimes banshees or females, sometimes fershees or males - often kept company of mortals, and became greatly attached to them. Every Samain a banshee used to visit Fingin MacLuchta, king of South Munster in the second century, and bring him on a round of visits to the shees, to see all the precious things therein. (5) a banshee follower of a mortal was usually called a lennan-shee ('fairy lover'), and instances of such attachments are innumerable. Fiachna, king of Ulster, had a familiar fer-side, or 'fairy-man', who used to tell him future events."

(1) Rev. Celt., X. 225; (2) Boyish exploits, Rev. Celt., V. 202, par.24; (3) Kuno Meyer: Adventures of Nera, Rev. Celt., X. 215; (4) Rev. Celt., XIII., 449: Silva Gad., 353; (5) Stokes, Lives of SS., XXX