In the Pre-Christian Irish Pantheon, Crom Cruach (alternative spellings Crom Crúaich, Cromm Crúaich, Crom Cróich, Cromm Cruach, Cenn Cruach, Crom Cruagh, Crom Crooach, Crom Cruaidh, Ceancroitihi, Crom Dubh, Black Crom and as Crom-cruaghair, the great Creator, he has, by some writers, been identified with the Persian Kerum Kerugher) was the chief god of Ireland. He was both a solar deity and a fertility deity. The Trundholm sun chariot pulled by a horse is believed to be a sculpture illustrating an important part of Nordic Bronze Age mythology. ...

The ancient texts tell us that there was an idol on Magh Slécht, which is the plain of adoration or prostration, in the Parish of Templeport, County Cavan, Ulster named Crom Cruach. His statue was an upright stone pillar coated in gold and silver (To symbolise the sun and moon) and surrounded by twelve smaller, stone statues that were of bare stone or covered in bronze (according to different sources). This alignment would have represented the sun surrounded by the signs of the zodiac. Magh Slécht (pronounced Maw shlaykht) is the name of an historic plain in Ireland. ... Ulster (Irish: Cúige Uladh, IPA: ) forms one of the four provinces of Ireland. ... General Name, Symbol, Number gold, Au, 79 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 11, 6, d Appearance metallic yellow Atomic mass 196. ... Sedimentary, volcanic, plutonic, metamorphic rock types of North America. ...

On the annual feast of Samhain (later renamed Halloween, November 1) his followers sacrificed one third of their firstborn to him in exchange for milk, corn, the fertility of cattle and a fertile growing season. The god horrified many because of his terrible demands. This article or section contains information that has not been verified and thus might not be reliable. ...

The tradition of offering the First-Born to a god was still continued by the christian priests, successors to the Crom priests, at least as late as the 8th century A.D. See "The Collection of Tithes in Ireland" at- http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/8Ctithes-ireland.html and also the poem of St.Grellan in "The Tribes and Customs of Hy-Many" (page 13) at- http://www.ucc.ie/celt/online/G105007/text001.html

His worship was said to have been introduced by King Tigernmas. One Samhain night, during prostration, the King and 4,000 of his followers died from a plague contracted there, called "The Seventh Plague of Ireland". Only about 1,500 survived. Tigernmas was a pre-Christian High King of Ireland, 13th in the Milesian line. ...

According to contemporary sources, St. Patrick cursed and destroyed the idol and stopped the worship of Crom Cruach. However it has been shown that the stones sunk in the Earth before the time of St. Patrick so this was probably just an anecdote. Statue of Saint Patrick Saint Patrick (died March 17, 462, 492, or 493), is the patron saint of Ireland. ...

The Masraige tribe were the inhabitants of Magh Slécht at the time of St.Patrick. It was this tribe who supplied the ancient Druids and High Priests of the god Crom Cruaich and their successors the Christian priests. Saint Dallan Forgaill, the Chief Ollamh or Poet of Ireland was a member of the tribe. History is vague as to what happened to them. They survived at least until the coming of the Ui Bhriuin in 700 A.D. who then dispossessed them and took control of Tullyhaw. The word Masraige means "Kings of Death", which may be related to their worship of Crom. The High King most connected with the worship of Crom was King Tighernmas. Again his name means "Lord of Death".

There is another standing stone also named Crom Crúaich in Drumcoo townland, County Fermanagh. It has the figure of a man walking engraved on it which either represents Saint Patrick or a druid, depending on when it was engraved.

Crom is mentioned in the Dinnshenchas in the Book of Leinster, as well as the Tripartite Life of Patrick and the 14th century Book of McGovern. The Metrical Dindshenchas, or Lore of Places, is probably the major surviving monument of Irish bardic verse. ... The Book of Leinster (Irish Lebor Laignech), formerly known as the Book of Noughaval (Lebor na Nuachongbála), is a medieval Irish manuscript compliled ca. ...

He may be the same as the Clogher idol Cermand Cestach.

Alternative: Cromm Cruac ("bloody crescent"), Cenn Cruaic ("bloody head"), rid-iodal h-Eireann ("the king idol of Ireland")

The Crom stone was rediscovered in 1921 buried in the ground beside a stone circle on a nearby mound from where it had been moved. It had been smashed into several pieces, some of which lay nearby, probably by St.Patrick with a sledgehammer, as stated in the ancient texts. When excavated and placed upright on its flat base it was found to lean obliquely to the left from the vertical. This is why it was named Crom Cruaich = Irish for "bent or crooked one of the mound". It was decorated in the 1st century B.C. with "La Tène" symbols called the 'Waldalgesheim Style' but the stone circle was erected much earlier in the Early Irish Bronze Age c.2000 B.C. The stone was a phallic symbol like the similar Turoe Stone in County Galway (see photo at http://homepage.eircom.net/~williamfinnerty/protest/turoe_f1.jpg). Although now much damaged it can be reconstructed from the different surviving pieces. At the base of the stone there were four rectangular adjoining panels measuring 90 cm each in width giving a circumference of 3m 60 cm when it was first carved. The height of each panel was about 75 cm. These panels represented the foreskin of the penis. (See the panels at http://www.irishmegaliths.org.uk/zKillycluggin1.htm). The top of the stone (Representing the glans of the penis) was carved in parallel lines (See it at http://www.irishmegaliths.org.uk/zKillycluggin2.htm) and connecting the top with the panels was a blank triangular section representing the triangular piece of skin attaching the foreskin to the penis. So it was no surprise that the Christian church destroyed the stone as it represented the two things most abhorrent to them, a pagan idol and public sexuality. The stone was named the Killycluggin Stone after the townland where it was found and is now in Cavan Museum. A replica is situate at the roadside in Killycluggin. Beside the mound is Kilnavert Church which was founded by St.Patrick to eradicate the worship of Crom in the area. It was originally named Fossa Slécht or Rath Slécht and it is from this small location that the wider Magh Slécht area received its name. There is also a Tobar Padraig (St.Patrick's Well) nearby, as also described in the ancient manuscripts. The 14th century "Book of McGovern", written in Magh Slécht, contains a poem which states that Crom was situate at Kilnavert beside the road and that the local women used to tremble in fear as they passed by. There is still a local tradition in the area that the Killycluggin stone is the Crom stone and all the manuscript sources confirm this.

The symbols on the stone have been variously interpreted as (1)the Sun and Moon (2) as sperm (3) as channels for the blood from sacrifices, human or animal, to flow down with the path of the blood being read as an oracle by the druids (4) as a penile tattoo.

The Turoe and Killycluggin stones were modelled on the Omphalos Navel Stone at the Delphi Oracle in Greece.

The cult of Crom is still fashionable today. A street in Belcoo, County Fermanagh is named Crom Crúaich Way in his honour. There is even a mountain in Australia named after him "Mount Cenn Cruaich" in Warrumbungle National Park. A popular novel was published about modern human sacrifice in Cavan, entitled "Cromm" by Kenneth Flint, Doubleday 1990. John Montague the poet has a poem "The Plain of Blood" about Crom. Thomas D'Arcy Magee wrote a famous poem in the 19th century called "The Celts", which mentions Crom. A type of Scottish harp is named crom-chruit because of its shape.

Notes to the text:-

The following sources may be consulted for further information-

(a) Saint Tirechan's memoir of Saint Patrick, written in 670 A.D. known as the "Breviarium." which is preserved in the "Book of Armagh. Tirechan used notes given to him by his teacher Saint Ultan of Ardbraccan who died in 657 A.D. and who lived a very long life. Ultan probably would have known people who lived in the time of St.Patrick so his notes on the saint would be pretty accurate.

(b)The Tripartite Life of Patrick written c.895 A.D. from older sources.

(c) The Metrical Dindshenchas. The first recension is found in the twelfth century manuscript the Book of Leinster with partial survivals in a number of other manuscript sources. The text shows signs of having been compiled from a number of provincial sources and the earliest poems date from at least the eleventh century. The internal evidence suggests the majority of the poems have a Pre-Christian origin. Two poems (7 & 71) on Magh Slécht can be found online at- http://www.ucc.ie/celt/published/T106500D/index.html

(d) The Book of McGovern written in the 13th century by poets actually living in Magh Slécht, who would have local knowledge now lost.

(e) Excavations at Killycluggin- (1. Ó Ríordáin, S.P. 1952. Fragment of the Killycluggin Stone. J. Roy. Soc. Antiq. Ireland 82, 68. (2. 1974 by B. Raftery, Department of Archaeology, University College, Dublin. (A short synopsis of the full report can be found at http://www.excavations.ie/Pages/Details.phpYear=1974&County=Cavan&id=5535 )

(f) Geoffrey Keating's History of Ireland 1632 (online at-

 http://celt.ucc.ie/published/T100054/text035.html , (Section XXV, 25) 

(g) Annals of the Four Masters

(h) For the continued worshipping of Crom up to the 20th century in Ireland, see "Festival at Lughnasa" Oxford Univ. Press, 1962 by Máire Mac Neill.

(i) "Killinagh Church and Crom Cruaich" by Oliver Davies in Ulster Journal of Archaeology, Volume 2, 1939.

Texts

• Mag Slecht from the Metrical Dindshenchas Vol 4