Oghams

Oghams are named from the Irish-Celtic deity named Ogma, the god of eloquence and learning. The use of Oghams were primarily used by the Celts just as the Futhark were primarily used by the nordic-germanic people. The "letters" were a systems of strokes on or across a centered line. There was 3 sets of 5 constants and 1 set of 5 vowels. The order of Oghams are under heavy dispute, so in today's reference you may see it as Beth-Luis-Nion (BLN) or as Beth-Luis-Fearn (BLF).

It should be noted that the Oghams were not seen as an alphabet in the beginning but as a way to communicate non verbally. It was to open doors of hidden knowledge by the sound that Oghams invoked. This was commented on by Caesar as written in the book of The Conquest of Gaul "They commit to memory immense amounts of poetry. They consider it improper to commit their studies to writing, lest it should be vulgarised and lest the memory of scholars should be impaired."

Sources of earliest Oghams come from the scholar's Primer from Scotland which was transcribed from the oral tradition in the 17th century. Another source is from O'Flaherty's Ogygia from Ireland which was published in 1793 And The Book of Ballymote written in 14th century and transcribed by George Calder. The more modern reference is from Robert Graves book The White Goddess in 1948.

Oghams are believed to have been first used between the 1st and 3rd centuries AD as very boring and uneventful grave and boundary markers. The evidence of use came from Christian monks who translated Oghams to a more Latin alphabet as a part of a movement in coverting the local community. From this new alphabet, one more set of constants were added so the full alphabet would become 25 letters in all.

Before this, the Oghams were first used only by the learned of the tribe such as chiefs or Priests. With this tool, now only the monks and those of the religious community could dispher and understand Oghams. By making a very ancient custom accessible to the more common man, it became a strong lure to join the church. It is when the monks made laws against the use of Gaelic language and family traditional customs did the Oghams evolve into a more romantic form it is seen today.

With laws in place to prevent native language and culture from being used, it became necessary to find a way of stealth communication. Oghams began to evolve to be used in creating a network of subliminal messages that were left on fence post on the side of the road. If one meets another in a public place, they were used in complex hand signals of touching points on the face, elbow, ear or knee as one would talk about non threatening subjects such as family or weather. This system has grown to be used today in communication between players during a baseball game.

At the peak of the Oghams use, they were carved on wood wands called staves. These Staves were referred to as Taball-Lrog or Poets Staffs and read up and down left to right. The poets staffs were fastened together at the bottom to open into a fan shape and used by Poets to help in reciting tales of heroics such as the Voyage of Bran which is said to be 60 quatrains long.

Because Oghams were written on wooden staves there is very little evidence of these Poets Staffs existing prior to 5th centuries. Only abuot 370 verified inscriptions of Oghams in the form of standing stones called gallan are found in Ireland around this time. There are some artifacts that have been found scattered across Scotland, the isle of Man, South Wales, Devonshire and Silchester (which was the original roman city of Calleva Attrebatum). Even an area once known as Celtiberia which is found in Spain, Portugal and in the United States, West Virginia, have some carvings that look very close like Oghams, but these are under dispute of authenticity.

Learning the Oghams system, the person begins to understand each tree, numbers, deities, animals, bird, colors, minerals, stars, herbs or human principles that are part of the "alphabet." The object of this memory technique is so one can start to grow a grove of information. The structured work of memory and use will eventually bring about a subconscious associations that connects each storage point. This will start to communicate into wisdom that can be used in daily life. Each letter then speaks to the user and becomes an internal form of self divination. To understand and connect with the esoteric self and out side influences.

The magic comes in when signs that are learned come about repeatedly in daily life, giving clues to what should be observed or needed almost like a personal communication with the spirit. This allows you to become a tool of the spirit to help in either your own path or those around you. Because of the responsibility, it is not a wonder that to become "Druid" meant decades of study. Misinterpretations of the signs meant harm to others.

The Oghams divining is read in forms of threes, such as physical, mental and spiritual realms. To use Oghams as divination, each letter is cut into a single stave of about 4 inches long. These staves were thrown on the ground together and interpreted by the way they fell. This method is called colebreni