Supernatural and Practical: the duality of the blacksmith

Introduction

In this post, we take a pause from the time travel adventures into the Iron Age village of Glastonbury and the celebration of Lughnasadh. We are going to consider the blacksmith—the practical and supernatural attributes that the blacksmith has been accorded, and the EarthWise nature of both of these. In particular we are going to focus on the Celtic pantheon of gods and goddess. For there both female and male deities have the power of smithing.

The human fascination with fire and flame

There is a  human fascination with fire.  Even in the modern age, homes have fire places built in. Not for necessity but for pleasure. Staring into a fire brings a deep satisfaction and mysticism. And it is no wonder, for fire has had a special and transformative role in human society.  It provides warmth and heat. It also provides a means for cooking food, and for the transformation of rock materials into a form which can be used to form tools, weapons, ornaments. Fire can do all this, reaching into human lives on many levels. It also provides security, it would have kept away predators on a dark night, and could serve as a signal to alert others to human presence. There is little wonder that there is a seemingly hard wired human fascination with fire.

Who does not have a fond memory of sitting near a fire? This could be a wintertime activity, enjoying the heat the fire offers after a cold romp outside. Or it could be on a summer evening, in a back garden, enjoying a fire pit. Or even on a summer camping trip in the wilderness, enjoying the crackle and blaze of the flame. There is something deeply comforting in being near the scent and sight of a fire, in any season.  

There is also a fascination with a blacksmith—of gathering near the forge, watching the sparks fly as the smith plies a hammer to shape metal in a process transforming the metal into something else entirely.

Smiths in particular have special skill with fire. These skills have been recognized both in the social standing and role of the smith in daily life, and also in the skills of deities.  Somehow, culturally, the skill of smithing has somehow become vested into one that is masculine. But as we will see, women in the Celtic pantheon of gods and goddesses, also were recognized as having smithing skills and powers. The Celtic pantheon offers an egalitarian view of smithing that society did not and does not always mirror.

The social role of the village blacksmith

Smiths have a special skill and talent, used even in the modern era. In the days of horse transport, the village smith would have occupied a special place in the town or village. The smith would have provided key services, including the shoeing of horses.  

The blacksmith in medieval times

But the role of the blacksmith went beyond the shoeing of horses, in medieval times. The smith would have carried out a variety of tasks that were needed for everyday life:

“The blacksmith’s roles in a medieval village were diverse. Primarily, they crafted and repaired tools essential for agriculture, such as ploughshares, hoes, and scythes, vital for the sustenance of the village. The blacksmith also produced household items like cooking utensils, knives, and iron fittings for doors and chests.”

But despite providing practical necessities, the smith ocuppied a contradictory place in the social world. As this source comments:

“In medieval culture, the blacksmith was sometimes viewed with a mix of respect and superstition. The transformative nature of their work, coupled with the forge’s fiery environment, gave rise to various myths and legends. Blacksmiths were often featured in folk tales and were sometimes thought to possess mystical knowledge or powers.”

The reverence and awe associated with the smith can be seen to go back to prehistory times, where many gods featured as having the skills of a smith among their supernatural attributes.

The smith in Iron Age society

This source suggests that the smith would have occupied an elevated place in the hierarchy of Iron Age society.  Skilled craftsmen, the smith included, were given status just below that of the chieftain.

Thus, in both prehistory and medieval society, the smith occupied a role where they were accorded great respect, perhaps even imbued with special and magical powers. They also provided for the needs of daily life. So how then is this represented in the pantheon of Celtic deities who are also smith?

But what about the Celtic gods and goddesses who were also smiths?

Celtic deities who are smiths

There is a bewildering complex collection of deities in the Celtic pantheon and we are only going to cover a few of them here. The first is one I am not actually very familiar with, having only learned about him as I was researching to write this post.

The Celtic God of smiths is  Goibniu. He takes his place in the Celtic pantheon of the Tuatha De Danaan, and is associated with an iron ore forge in Derrynatuan in Ireland.

Then there is the Celtic god Lugh.  He is celebrated in the August harvest festival of Lughsnasadh. This may seem like a curious association for a god who is a smith. However, the harvest celebration does not focus on his smithing skills. Rather, “In the Irish version, Lugh dedicates the festival to his foster-mother Tailtiu as part of her funeral ceremony. Besides celebrating the ripening of grain and maturing of potatoes, the occasion was marked by horse races, weapons contests, and other sports. Adherents often climbed hills where they gathered berries and said prayers.”

This points out the complexity of Celtic deities—they are more than one dimension figures with a single skills or power.

But smithing interestingly is not reserved for male gods. Smithing may seem to be a very masculine pursuit, both in daily life and in the spiritual world. But in the Celtic patheon, this is not so. For there is Brigid, a female Celtic goddes, also associated with smithing.

The Celtic goddess Brigid is associated with many things, including poetry and healing, in addition to smithing. She is also closely associated with the festival of Imbolc.

Just as Lughnasadh marks the start of harvest and the subtle change of seasons, so does Imbolc represent a change in the year and seasons. Imbolc marks the beginning of spring.

So smithing among the Celtic deities is not limited to a particular season, or even to a particular god or goddess. It is a skill that many of the deities have—perhaps speaking to the impressive nature that smithing had and has. It also speaks to the importance placed on smithing, not only in daily life but in spiritual life. And in this way, the intertwining of smithing deities in different points of the year and different festivals shows just how deeply embedded the  awareness of the power of smithing would have been.

Conclusion

Smithing is a special expression of being Earthwise. It is both a practical skill of transformation and a divinely held power. A smith could be both in the body of a human person and in a variety of Celtic deities. This variety of recognition speaks to the reverence and the recognition of the importance of the smith and smithing powers in society, and in the deep human fascination that still exists today in the ability to transform rock to something else altogether.