An Alder Stake
Searles

Sat Mar 24 14:34:17 2001
Dichetal Do Chennaibh *p*Dichetal Do Chennaibh has a parallel in present day technical methods of analysis and design. In modern engineering practice, such an operation would parallel vector analysis and the use of free body diagrams to identify and condense a matrix of variables to a single answer. In this case, the engineer uses vector calculus to resolve the many components of a problem into a single answer. To achieve the same resolution of many components into a single meaning, a Fili might have resorted to imbas through the use of Dichetal Do Chennaibh. This name translates as “cracking the pith” in Old Irish and alludes to the hazelnuts of wisdom at the Well of Segais. Dallan “cracked open the kernel” of the problem of finding Étain through the Ogham and his skillful use of Dichetal Do Chennaibh. It was through his keys of poetic art that he was able to reassemble the meanings of the answers that were revealed from the “meat” of the various Ogham components. Such a use of Ogham to place layers of meaning upon meaning, and to reveal hidden information from a combination of individual meanings, is one of the fundamental tools of the Draiothe and Filidh in the arts of imbas. Another example of the use of Ogham dig out meaning from an event is found in Lady Gregory's Gods and Fighting Men, Book 4, Huntings and Enchantments, in an epsiode known as Lomna's Head:*p*Lomna's Head*p*FINN took a wife one time of the Luigne of Midhe. And at the same time there was in his household one Lomna, a fool.*p*Finn now went into Tethba, hunting with the Fianna, but Lomna stopped at the house. And after a while he saw Coirpre, a man of the Luigne, go in secretly to where Finn’s wife was.*p*And when the woman knew he had seen that, she begged and prayed of Lomna to hide it from Finn. And Lomna agreed to that, but it preyed on him to have a hand in doing treachery on Finn. And after a while he took a four-square rod and wrote an Ogham on it, and these were the words he wrote:*p*"An alder stake in a paling of silver; deadly nightshade in a bunch of cresses; a husband of a lewd woman; a fool among the well-taught Fianna; heather on bare Ualann of Luigne."*p*Finn saw the message, and there was anger on hint against the woman; and she knew well it was from Lomna he had heard the story, and she sent a message to Coirpre bidding him to come and kill the fool.*p*So Coirpre came and struck his head off, and brought it away with him.*p*And when Finn came back in the evening he saw the body, and it without a head. "Let us know whose body is this," said the Fianna. And then Finn did the divination of rhymes, and it is what he said: "It is the body of Lomna; it is not by a wild boar he was killed; it is not by a fall he was killed; it is not in his bed he died, it is by his enemies he died; it is not a secret to the Luigne the way he died. And let out the hounds now on their track," he said.*p*So they let out the hounds, and put them on the track of Coirpre, and Finn followed them, and they came to a house, and Coirpre in it, and three times nine of his men, and he cooking fish on a spit; and Lomna’s head was on a spike beside the fire.*p*And the first of the fish that was cooked Coirpre divided between his men, but he put no bit into the mouth of the head. And then he made a second division in the same way. Now that was against the law of the Fianna, and the head spoke, and it said: "A speckled white-bellied salmon that grows from a small fish under the sea; you have shared a share that is not right; the Fianna will avenge it upon you, Coirpre." "Put the head outside," said Coirpre, "for that is an evil word for us." Then the head said from outside: "It is in many pieces you will be; it is great fires will be lighted by Finn in Luigne."*br*And as it said that, Finn came in, and he made an end of Coirpre, and of his men.*br*