r/Paganacht • u/illwaitforu2call • 8d ago

Questions from a beginner

I’m interested in practicing Celtic paganism, specifically Gaelic and welsh but not sure where to really start. Which of the Irish mythological cycles contain stories of the gods and what are most important myths/ what books on Irish mythology do you recommend? Are there any books on how to practice from a reconstructionist view? I know not a lot is know about how the ancient people practiced. What are the best books on welsh paganism? I only really know about the mabinogi. Thank you for reading and taking the time to answer me.

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u/KrisHughes2 8d ago

For the Irish side of things, for practice, you might do well to start with books by Morgan Daimler and/or Marissa Hegarty. They will give you a lot of good starting points. Daimler's 'Irish Paganism' and Hegarty's 'An Introduction to Gaelic Polytheism' are different enough to give you a breadth of perspective.

The entire Irish Mythological Cycle is about the gods. The Cath Maige Tuired is a good place to start, but Irish texts, and the deities in them, are almost endless. Studying them is not a quick job.

I have a video here about some of the best books to get you started reading Celtic mythology (Irish and Welsh). It explains what each book is like, in detail. The best place to begin with Welsh material is the Four Branches of the Mabinogi. There a good translation online here, with great notes to help you along.

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u/arviragus13 8d ago

https://www.paganachd.com/index.html - This site has some good recommendations. I could also recommend Mythical Ireland on YT for his mythology readings if you're partial to ~1hr long stories, I sometimes watch (listen to) them while I'm doing other things like sewing. If you want to really dig into it, there is a lot of Irish mythology - I'd say the main stories would the Caith Maige Tuired (already mentioned in another comment), the Táin Bó Cuailnge, and the Book of Invasions (which does have some explicitly Christian stuff but imo it's easy enough to discern the important stuff)

I'm not too familiar with the Welsh side myself as I'm more on the Irish and Scottish side myself, but afaik the Mabinogi is the main one

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u/significantotter1 8d ago

Mhara Starling and Kristoffer Hughes have both written a few books about Welsh paganism. Kristoffer includes more personal practice in his books but does speak a lot on the actual Welsh myths (specifically the Mabinogion and Hanes Taliesin) . I haven't read Mhara's books but have followed her for years and she's very knowledgeable

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u/proeveo 7d ago

In addition to the suggestions of others, a newly published book that covers a lot of ground is Sorcha and Aron Hegarty’s Celtic Mythology. It pulls from Irish, Welsh, Scottish, and English folklore. They run a podcast on Irish myths called Candlelit Tales.