Brat Bríde: Leaving Out Brigid's Mantle for Healing

The brat Bríde ("Brigid's mantle" or cloak) is a piece of cloth left outside on the eve of St Brigid's feast in the belief that the saint, passing through the country that night, would touch and bless it. Brought in before dawn, it was kept through the year and laid on the sick, on women in labour and on ailing animals as a source of comfort and healing. The custom is recorded across Ireland and in Gaelic Scotland and is still kept by many families.

How to do it§

1. Choose the cloth. Any clean strip of cloth will do: a ribbon, a length of linen, a scarf. Some families used the same cloth year after year, so that its blessing was thought to grow; others put out a new one each Brigid's Eve.
2. Prepare the house. Brigid's Eve was a night of welcome. Tidy the kitchen, lay the table, and light a candle in a safe holder if you wish. A little bread or butter was often set out for the saint.
3. Put it out at dusk. Lay or tie the cloth outside — on the windowsill, a bush, a gate or a clothes line — and weigh it with a stone if it is windy.
4. Say a blessing. In your own words ask Brigid to bless the cloth and the household: "Brigid, as you pass tonight, bless this mantle, and bless the health of all in this house."
5. Leave it overnight. Go to bed as normal; put out the candle first.
6. Take it in before sunrise. Early on 1 February, bring the cloth inside. Some families said a prayer of thanks and folded it three times.
7. Keep it safely. Store it in a drawer, a box or a press. When someone in the house is unwell, worried or in childbirth, it was laid across the forehead, wrapped around the hurting part, or placed on the pillow, with a prayer to Brigid.
8. Renew it. The next Brigid's Eve put the same cloth out again, or replace it and burn or bury the old one respectfully.

Origins and history§

St Brigid (died c. 525) was abbess of Kildare and one of Ireland's patron saints. Her early Lives, from the seventh century on, are full of miracles of healing and of abundance — milk, butter and food multiplied for the poor. A well-known legend tells how she asked a king for as much land as her cloak would cover, and the cloak spread to cover the plain of the Curragh; the story is told in later tradition and is a likely source of the mantle's importance.

The custom of putting out a cloth on her eve is recorded by the Irish Folklore Commission from many counties in the 1930s and after. Kevin Danaher's The Year in Ireland describes the brat Bríde and the related ribín Bríde (Brigid's ribbon), noting their use for headaches, sore throats, the protection of cattle and the safe delivery of children. Séamas Ó Catháin's The Festival of Brigit collects regional variations and argues for the antiquity of the festival complex. Similar customs existed in Gaelic Scotland, where Brigid (Bride) was also invoked as midwife, a role celebrated in legends that place her at the birth of Christ.

How old the practice is cannot be said with certainty. The folkloric evidence is modern, and while many writers connect the brat with a pre-Christian goddess Brigit and with the seasonal festival of Imbolc, others such as Ronald Hutton stress the thinness of that evidence and the Catholic character of the custom as recorded. In either case, it is in living use as a devotion to the saint. See Celtic religion and saints, relics and the Virgin Mary, and the companion entry on the St Brigid's cross.

Variations§

• Ribín Bríde: a ribbon rather than a cloth, sometimes tied around the head for headaches.
• Crios Bríde: a large straw girdle or belt through which people stepped on Brigid's Eve for health in the coming year, recorded mainly in the west of Ireland.
• Scottish Bride's bed: in the Hebrides a figure of Bride was laid in a bed with a wand beside it, and the ashes were checked in the morning for her mark.
• Modern use: some contemporary pagans and Christians keep the brat as a token of Brigid's care, using it in prayer or meditation rather than as a cure.

Safety and good sense§

• The mantle is a sign of prayer and comfort, not a medicine. Anyone who is ill, injured or in labour needs proper medical care; the cloth can accompany it, never replace it.
• Use a clean, washed cloth on wounds only over a proper dressing, and never on broken skin.
• Keep any candle on Brigid's Eve in a secure holder and put it out before sleeping.
• Food left outside overnight attracts animals; a small amount, or a donation to those in need, keeps the spirit of the custom.

Sources and further reading§

• The Year in Ireland: Irish Calendar Customs — Kevin Danaher, 1972
• The Festival of Brigit: Celtic Goddess and Holy Woman — Séamas Ó Catháin, 1995
• Carmina Gadelica: Hymns and Incantations — Alexander Carmichael, 1900
• Pagan Britain — Ronald Hutton, 2013
• The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain — Ronald Hutton, 1996