Fairy raths such as this one pictured here, have been subject to myth and legend for centuries.
Fairy raths such as this one pictured here, have been subject to myth and legend for centuries.
October 1960
by Raymond C. Otto
At the town of Wexford, Ireland, one day in May, 1958, some men from the state electricity board began digging a hole in a little mound for erection of a light pole. As soon as the townspeople saw what was happening they told the men that no light pole ever would stay put in that particular spot.
The mound, they explained, was a fairy rath and everyone in Ireland knows that fairies who live in such raths resent being disturbed.
The electricity men just scoffed and finished the hole. They popped in the pole and carefully tamped the earth back in around it.
The next morning the pole was loose. “It was the little people,” the Wexford folks said, shaking their heads.
The workmen came back and reset the pole, but the next morning it was loose again. Then the scientific-minded electricity men dug a hole six feet wide, put the pole in the middle and rammed the earth around it so firmly they were certain nothing could shake it. The following morning the pole was as loose as ever.
Finally the electricity men gave up. They dug another hole four feet outside the rath and set the pole there. It is still standing and is as steady as a rock.
