Old SymbolsWhere every symbol began

Plate 1 A cross woven from rushes: a square woven centre with four arms, each tied near its end

St Brigid’s cross

A small cross woven from rushes or straw on the eve of St Brigid’s Day, 1 February, and hung over the door or in the roof for the saint’s blessing and protection through the year. The four-armed form is the best known, but Irish crosses come in many shapes.

Celtic symbols. Also called brigid’s cross, brigids cross meaning, saint brigid cross, st bridget’s cross.

Meaning

St Brigid’s Day, Lá Fhéile Bríde, on 1 February, honours Ireland’s only female patron saint, a saint of the 5th century, and the crosses are made on its eve. Clodagh Doyle, keeper of the Irish Folklife Division at the National Museum of Ireland, explains the belief behind them: people held that St Brigid passed through the land on the eve of her feast, blessing and protecting the homes and farms where crosses hung in her honour. Families bless the rushes or straw with holy water, often with a prayer to welcome the saint into the house, and make the crosses together. Doyle writes that the cross, pinned above the front door or in the kitchen, is still a familiar sight in many Irish homes. It is a Christian household custom kept across the island, north and south: the Ulster Folk Museum in Northern Ireland collects crosses made today. Since 2023 Ireland has had a public holiday for Imbolc and St Brigid’s Day, on the first Monday of February, or on 1 February itself when that falls on a Friday; announcing it in 2022, the Tánaiste, Leo Varadkar, called it the first Irish public holiday named after a woman.

Origin and history

The custom belongs to the turning of the year. St Brigid’s Day was one of the old quarter days, Doyle writes: it began the spring, as Bealtaine on 1 May began the summer, Lúnasa on 1 August the harvest and Samhain on 1 November the dark season. Irish festivals were kept on their eve, a time when the otherworld was felt to be very close, so that appeals for protection and blessing were thought to work best then. The museum traces St Brigid’s Day to Imbolc, a festival of new life and fertility, and the government’s announcement of the holiday places Imbolc halfway between the winter solstice and the equinox.

The story told about the cross is a story about Brigid. Pupils collecting folklore for the Schools’ Collection, now in the National Folklore Collection at University College Dublin, wrote down versions of it from their families. At Kilcullen, County Kildare: “once St. Brigid visited the house of a dying man. The later had no crucifix and he desired to have one before he died. St. Brigid went outside and gathering rushes made a cross for him.” At Cill Tormóir, County Galway, the dying man is a pagan lying on straw in a barn, who asks for “the cross our Lord died on”. Brigid has none, so she makes one and lays it on his chest, “and it was supposed that it was that cross that converted him.” The Kilcullen account adds that the schoolchildren made their crosses of plaited rushes on St Brigid’s Eve.

Regional forms

The four-armed cross, a woven square at the centre with four arms tied near their ends, is only one form. Doyle writes that the traditional designs were diamond, interlaced or wheel-shaped, with two, three or four arms, and that in parts of the west coast two strips of wood were simply tied together into a cross. Straw, rushes and reeds were the commonest materials, but grass, hay, wood, goose quills, wire and fabric were all used. The four-armed form was the style favoured in the north of Ireland, and it became the best known after RTÉ took it as its television emblem when it began broadcasting in 1961. The Irish Folklife Collection at the National Museum of Ireland’s Turlough Park, Castlebar, holds an example of most of the regional styles.

What the cross is for

It is hung for St Brigid’s protection: over the door and around the house, and in the byre so that she would protect the animals as she passed. Leftover straw was sprinkled on the crops or worked into the animals’ bedding and spancels. Many households kept each year’s cross in the under-thatch, and the museum notes that you could tell how long a family had lived in a house by the number of crosses in the roof. A cross is also a gift for people moving into a new home and for newlyweds.

Made by hand today

In January 2023 Una Casey of Faughart, County Louth, made a four-armed cross of rushes picked near Kilcurry for the Ulster Folk Museum, tying its ends with elastic bands. The museum records that she has made crosses all her life and taught countless people to make them.

See also

Claddagh ring, Celtic knot, Triskele, Shamrock, Pictish symbols.

Sources

  1. St Brigid’s Day, Clodagh Doyle, Curator, Irish Folklife Division, National Museum of Ireland
  2. St Brigid’s Day was an important Irish festival in folk tradition, celebrating fertility, blessings and protection, Clodagh Doyle, Keeper of the Irish Folklife Division, National Museum of Ireland
  3. Government agrees Covid Recognition Payment and New Public Holiday, 19 January 2022, Department of the Taoiseach (gov.ie)
  4. Emblems and Objects of Value (Kilcullen Convent school), The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0780, Page 338, National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin (dúchas.ie)
  5. St Brigid’s Cross (Cill Tormóir girls’ school), The Schools’ Collection, National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin (dúchas.ie)
  6. Cross; St Brigid (HOYFM.2023.43), Ulster Folk Museum collection record, National Museums NI

The same shape elsewhere

Browse symbols formed from crosses, lines or squares and rectangles.

Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research

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