The House Witch: Your Complete Guide to Creating a Magical Space with Rituals and Spells for Hearth and Home - Arin Murphy-Hiscock 2018

Brigid
Hearth and Home Deities

The much-loved Irish goddess of the home, Brigid is known by other names, such as Brid and Brigantia, in regions that later became Scotland and Britain. Brigid has three aspects: a smith, a healer, and a poet. She is strongly associated with the element of fire and, to a lesser degree, with the element of water.

All three of her aspects have bearing on the practice of hearthcraft. The smith works with the element of fire, which is, like the cauldron described in Chapter 4, an agent of transformation and transmutation. The smith also makes tools, many of them for home and homestead use such as cauldrons, hooks, nails, hearth sets (the tools for tending and cleaning the fireplace), fire irons (the metal supports that hold logs and other fuel to be burned), and so forth. Brigid’s healing aspect focuses on restoring and maintaining health, one of the areas hearthcraft also touches. And the poet’s inspiration is often symbolized by a flame.

Brigid has survived into the modern age as a Catholic saint whose areas of influence are certainly related to hearth and home. She is the patron saint of livestock such as sheep and cattle; dairy products such as milk and butter, as well as workers in the dairy industry (including milkmaids and dairy maids); children; poultry farmers; midwives; poets; and blacksmiths. Her many associations with house and home make her a very popular goddess with whom to work.

Brigid was worshipped, both as a goddess and later as a saint, by a circle of nineteen priestesses or nuns who tended an eternal flame. On the twentieth day the flame was said to survive without anyone visibly tending it, leading to the belief that the goddess herself tended the flame that day.