Aine Celtic Goddess Of Faeries And Fertility  

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Aine Celtic Goddess Of Faeries And Fertility Cover
The goddess Aine is an emotional maelstrom, presenting a fierce and strong feminine voice wrapped in delicate gossamer dresses. She is a sun diety and a moon goddess, bringer of abundant fertility and harbinger of death. She is a lover of many, yet a survivor of sexual abuse. She is a healer who is not afraid to take life or wound the uncaring individual. She is a magickal temptress, as comfortable with the powers of everyday objects as with fantastic feats. Aine's power is undeniable, for it is the power of feeling, of acknowledging and owning true emotions.

Aine, goddess of the sun and daughter of a faerie king, is intimately linked to the brightest day of the year, the summer solstice. Until the early nineteenth century, farmers and peasants created bonfires on Cnoc Aine (the "hill of Aine") in the province of Munster on Midsummer Eve, seeking to honor the sun goddess. Lighting torches from the bonfire, they would parade through the crop fields and around their houses in order to ensure a good harvest. One year, the procession was not held, due to the death of one of the townsfolk. Yet, late that night, flickering torches from the Otherworld were seen floating around the hill with Aine in the lead of the Faerie celebratory march. Another time, several teenage girls lingered at the bonfire until they were all alone, Aine was said to go to them and ask the girls to leave the hill so "they could have the hill to themselves." With a wave of her arm, she allowed them a glimpse into her Land of Faerie, indicating exactly who wanted to romp on the hillside.

All of the anient goddesses and gods of Ireland are linked, in one way or another, to the faeries, the fair folk, the Good Neighbors. One theory of the origin of the faeries states that the Tuatha de Danann(the "people of the Goddess Danu," otherwise known as the gods and goddesses of Celtic Ireland) left the surface of the land of Ireland when the Milesians came to live on the island. After losing a particularly bloody battle, the Tuatha de Danann merely melt into the mists, entering into the earth, where they continue to live. As Christianity spread across the land, these older gods and goddesses were demonized and transformed into the diminutive faeries of Renaissance and Victorian literature. While all of the Tuatha de Danann are linked to the fair folk, Aine is one of the goddesses most closely connected to the faeries. Her festival at Midsummer, her highly fae-friendly family lineage, and the activites at her mound at Cnoc Aine all combine to create a faerie goddess.

Invocation to Aine

Aine speaks:

I am in love with beauty.
I am in love with youth.
And the hunger for it fills me.

The rays of the sun warm me
The grass tickles my feet.
Faerie laughter chimes in the distance,
Greeting my soul.

And the time has come to move...
To shift...to change...to take action.
The time has come to be bold and strong
and fight with insistent paint.

For I have felt your pain
And I have known the heat of unwanted love.
I have pushed through the hard soil
To stand on top of my hill.

For I am Aine,
Sweet and fickle and proud.
I am the land and the sun that warms her.
I am love...desire...fear...anger.

I am emotion.
Feel me now.

by Michelle Skye



Keywords: moon mother  goddess persephone  goddess persephone  goddess image  charge goddess  being deity  praise image  deities witches  craft england  voodoo masters  practicing wicca  witch school  necromancy  

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