BEL'TANE ( Scottish Gael. Bealltainno), BELLTAINE, or BELTINE. A pagan Celtic festival, traces of which have survived to this day. The name is still used for May-day in • Scotland. Gaelic cotland. The etymology and original meaning are uncertain. "Cormac's Glossary," an Irish text of the Tenth Century, contains the earliest mention of the institution (spelled bell taine and bc/tinc), and two different explana tions are there given of its meaning. In one place it is said to mean 'lucky tire,' and in another 'fire of Bel.' who is declared to be 'an idol god.' fhe second of these interpretations has been accepted, but without any sufficient evidence. The identification of bel as the name of a god is doubtful, and even the connection between the second element and Irish teinc. 'fire,' is open to question. In any case, however, the Semitic Baal has nothing to do with the nutter.
Cormac's description of Beltine is very brief. He simply says that the Druids used to make two fires with great incantations, and drive their cattle between them as a safeguard against dis ease. This custom of driving domestic animals
through fire is still known in Brittany and the islands of Arran: and in certain Slay-day festivi ties it was practiced until recently in Scotland. A young man, selected by a prescribed ceremonial, was similarly compelled to leap three times through fire. Both these ceremonies look like symbolical sacrifices, and there may have been a time when the victims were actually burned. The whole set of observances, like the German Johan visfrner at the summer solstice, is usually ex plained (and doubtless correctly) as a branch of sun-worship.
Consult, for the statement in Cormac, Glos sary, the edition by O'Donovan and Stokes (Lon don. 1862) for the Scottish Beltane, Jamieson, Scottish Dictionary (Edinburgh, 1SOS) ; for the significance of the ceremonies, A. Bertrand, La religion des Gaulois (Paris, 1S97). Rhys makes some comparisons with the Athenian Thargelia in his Hibbert Lectures (London, 1887).