The Lughnasadh Fairs & The Woodstock Fair

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There were Lughnasadh fairs held all over Ireland since the Middle Ages to the 18th century. Some of the most famous fairs were the Donnybrook Fair, the Puck Fair, and the Ould Lammas Fair. These August harvest fairs were an opportunity for a lavish display of all the arts under the Celtic god Lugh’s patronage, including poetry and music. It is said that the entertainment at these fairs was accompanied by all the cacophony of the modern fairground.

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The Donnybrook Fair was one of the most important of the Lughnasadh fairs in Ireland. It was very popular and immensely crowded. According to the reports, it attracted thousands of people and was chaotic and loud affair. The sounds of drums, bells, toy trumpets, fiddles, bagpipes and singing added to the pandemonium. The official history of the Doonybrook Fair says that it was established in the year 1204, and in 1252 was extended to fifteen days. Over the years, the terms of holding the fair changed slightly, until in the 18th century it was held on 26th August on Donnybrook Green for a fortnight (i.e., 14 days).

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Several other famous Lughnasadh fairs still survive in Ireland, like the Puck Fair, which takes place at Killorglin in County Kerry, since at least the 16th century, on the 10th of August, and is believed to be a survival of a Lughnasadh festival. This three-day festival involves, among other events, parades, dancing, arts and crafts. Another famous fair is the Ould Lammas Fair, which takes place at Ballycastle, in County Antrim on the last Monday and Tuesday in August. It is said to be one of the oldest festivals in Ireland. It draws a great number of tourists each year. In recent years, a number of other revival Lughnasadh fairs have sprung up in various towns around Ireland. Like the Puck Fair, these often include traditional music and dancing, arts and crafts workshops, traditional storytelling, and markets.

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And, today, because a few of these August Lughnasadh fairs still survive in Ireland and England, they serve as a reminder of the excitement which once attended the ripening of the corn across the ancient British Isles.

Although there is, of course, no traditional connection between these surviving August Lughnasadh festival fairs and the 1969 Woodstock music festival, it is an intriguing coincidence that the Woodstock festival took place around the same time as the Lughnasadh fairs and was billed as a fair—a “Music and Art Fair.” This coincidental timing (and the similar fair structure) may be chalked up to the unconscious workings of a deep ancestral memory of the seasonal rituals (based upon a solar vegetation mythology) that regularly took place for traditional agrarian peoples (in the Northern hemisphere) at harvest time in August.

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(The uptight Victorians banned these Lughnasadh fairs for being too rowdy. The Donnybrook Fair was particularly out of control and thus suppressed by the authorities in 1855. The Oxford English Dictionary defines “donnybrook” as “a scene of uproar and disorder.” It is noteworthy here that New York Governor Rockefeller was ready to call out the National Guard in order to shut down the "Woodstock Music and Art Fair.")