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Uilleann

an elbow

A bend; a measure taken from the body

Ogham glyphs are shown in Unicode, laid out left to right. On a standing stone the letters run bottom to top along the arris, so this row is a convenience rather than a facsimile.

Sound
ui /ui/
Position
23
Group
The forfeda
Root meaning
uilleann, elbow — the letter is named for its own shape
Medieval tree gloss
honeysuckle (imposed, to match a kenning about fragrance)
Unicode
U+1697
Timing
A cubit's worth; a hand's span of time
Yes / No
Yes, at an angle

Upright

  • an elbow
  • a bend
  • an angle
  • a measure
  • the forearm
  • a change of direction
  • the body as a ruler
  • a joint

In the rune poems

cubat oll

great cubit

Bríatharogam Morainn mac Moín · Uilleann
túthmar fid

fragrant tree

Bríatharogam Maic ind Óc · Uilleann
cubat n-oll

great cubit — the lists overlap here

Bríatharogam Con Culainn · Uilleann

The only self-describing letter

Uilleann means an elbow, and unlike every other letter in the alphabet it is named for what it looks like rather than for something in the world.

The letter is a bend: an angled form crossing the stemline. The name says so. Nothing else in Ogham does this — Beithe is not named for looking like a birch, Tinne is not named for looking like an ingot. Names elsewhere are acrophonic, chosen because they start with the right sound. This one is descriptive.

That is a clue about when it was made. Naming a letter after its own geometry is what you do when you are designing characters at a desk rather than inheriting them, and the forfeda were designed at a desk. It is a scribe's letter, and it says so.

The cubit

Cubat oll, great cubit, is the kenning two of the three lists give, and it follows directly from the elbow.

A cubit is the distance from elbow to fingertip, and it is one of the oldest units in use anywhere — Egyptian, Mesopotamian, biblical, and in Irish practice too. Early Irish law tracts use body-derived measures for building specifications and for land: the bass, a palm; the traig, a foot; the forrach, a rod. Ground was measured with a body.

Oll is great or large, so cubat oll is probably a specific extended cubit rather than the standard one, of the kind measurement systems accumulate.

What matters is that the kenning stays inside the name's own logic. Elbow, therefore forearm, therefore the length you measure with it. There is no leap here, which is unusual for a forfid.

Where the honeysuckle came from

Túthmar fid, fragrant tree, is the outlier, and it is the hook the tree tradition used.

Túth is a smell or scent and túthmar is fragrant. Given a kenning calling the letter a fragrant wood, the glossators assigned honeysuckle, edleand, which is strongly and characteristically scented and which twines — arguably echoing the letter's bend.

Whether túthmar fid was composed for this letter or drifted in from elsewhere is hard to say, given how unstable the forfeda kennings are generally. What can be said is that it sits oddly against two lists that both say cubit, and that the tree was chosen to match the odd one out rather than the pair.

In reading

Uilleann is a bend: a change of direction that does not break anything.

An elbow is a joint. It works precisely because it is not rigid, and it has a limited range — it goes one way and stops. In a spread the letter marks a turn in a situation that the structure can accommodate, as against a break that it cannot.

The cubit gives it a second and more practical sense: measurement taken from yourself. Early Irish surveying used the body as the ruler, and the letter carries that idea. What are you measuring this against, and is the standard your own?

That is a more useful reading than the honeysuckle one modern sets give, which arrives through a single unstable kenning and a scent.

Frequently asked questions

An elbow. It is the only letter in the alphabet named for its own shape rather than for something in the world — the character is a bend, and uilleann is the Old Irish word for the joint that bends.

Cubat oll. A cubit is the distance from elbow to fingertip, one of the oldest measures in use anywhere, and oll means great, so this is probably an extended version of the standard. Early Irish law used body-derived measures throughout: the bass, a palm, and the traig, a foot.

Because of one kenning. Túthmar fid, fragrant tree, gave the glossators a scented plant to reach for, and honeysuckle is strongly perfumed and twines, arguably echoing the letter's bend. It sits oddly against two lists that both say cubit, so the tree was matched to the outlier.

A bend that does not break anything. An elbow works because it is not rigid and has a limited range, so the letter marks a change of direction a structure can accommodate. The cubit adds a second sense: measurement taken from yourself, and whether the standard you are using is your own.

Ogham

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