Craobh nan Ubhal: A Gaelic Panegyric

Abstract

Craobh nan Ubhal forms part of the well-known corpus of Gaelic waulking songs. Drawing on the idea of the chief as a miraculously fecund apple tree, through fulsome praise, the female speaker bears witness to her patron’s prosperity, with exhortations to the elemental powers for his continued success. Both singers and audiences implicitly understood inherent concepts of kingship, sovereignty, charismatic personhood and leadership. Using nineteenth and twentieth century printed and audio texts, this paper examines links with early Irish tree lore, which continued to inform a Gaelic worldview for over a millennium. Popularised by the renowned Flora MacNeil, her family's views on ‘Craobh nan Ubhal’ testify to the song’s separate categorisation apart from other work songs. The exploration concludes that ‘Craobh nan Ubhal’ is an exceptional example of the continuity and dynamism of Gaelic tradition, continuously adapting to new and varied contexts.