Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
When we’re in times of stress and loss, what songs keep you feeling connected to the ancestors and to the spirits of nature?
This Scots-Gaelic song from the Hebrides, “Chraobh nan ubhal,” means “Apple tree.” The verses repeatedly praise the beauty of an apple tree, and heap blessings upon it, with phrases like “May the east and west be with thee,” and “May the sun and moon be with thee.” This apple tree of this song has often been seen as a metaphor for a youth of the McKay family from the Rhinns of Islay, but we can also see this song in its essential, animist essence. Apple trees (and many fruit trees in general) have long held a very special status in Celtic and Germanic cultures. They are associated with access to the Otherworld, connote eternal youth, and the great world tree itself that holds up the sky has sometimes been described as a fruit or apple tree: In the eddic poem Fjǫlsvinnsmál, the Mímameiðr (thought to be a name for Yggdrasil) is described as bearing a fruit called “aldin.” Aldin is an old Norse word referring to tree fruits including apples, acorns and nuts.
This song is also a waulking song from the Hebrides: It would have been sung as women massaged wet tweed in order to felt it and make it more watertight. A reminder of the cooperative nature of our historical labor- and how much we need one another to get anything of beauty accomplished in these hard times.
If you’re looking for ancestral and pagan songs that can fortify you and your community in these hard times, check out my upcoming cl ass Singing the Wheel of the Year! We start week after next! Go to saro sings . com and scroll down on the home pa-ge to learn more!
Thank you to @sinejeannie for teaching me this one!
Chraobh nan ubhal o,
Craobh nan ubhal, geug nan abhull
O chraobh nan ubhal, o
Chraobh nan ubhal, gu robh Dia leat o
Verse 2 line: Gu robh ‘n àird an ear ‘s an iar leat o
When we’re in times of stress and loss, what songs keep you feeling connected to the ancestors and to the spirits of nature?
This Scots-Gaelic song from the Hebrides, “Chraobh nan ubhal,” means “Apple tree.” The verses repeatedly praise the beauty of an apple tree, and heap blessings upon it, with phrases like “May the east and west be with thee,” and “May the sun and moon be with thee.” This apple tree of this song has often been seen as a metaphor for a youth of the McKay family from the Rhinns of Islay, but we can also see this song in its essential, animist essence. Apple trees (and many fruit trees in general) have long held a very special status in Celtic and Germanic cultures. They are associated with access to the Otherworld, connote eternal youth, and the great world tree itself that holds up the sky has sometimes been described as a fruit or apple tree: In the eddic poem Fjǫlsvinnsmál, the Mímameiðr (thought to be a name for Yggdrasil) is described as bearing a fruit called “aldin.” Aldin is an old Norse word referring to tree fruits including apples, acorns and nuts.
This song is also a waulking song from the Hebrides: It would have been sung as women massaged wet tweed in order to felt it and make it more watertight. A reminder of the cooperative nature of our historical labor- and how much we need one another to get anything of beauty accomplished in these hard times.
If you’re looking for ancestral and pagan songs that can fortify you and your community in these hard times, check out my upcoming cl ass Singing the Wheel of the Year! We start week after next! Go to saro sings . com and scroll down on the home pa-ge to learn more!
Thank you to @sinejeannie for teaching me this one!
Chraobh nan ubhal o,
Craobh nan ubhal, geug nan abhull
O chraobh nan ubhal, o
Chraobh nan ubhal, gu robh Dia leat o
Verse 2 line: Gu robh ‘n àird an ear ‘s an iar leat o
