Brigid's cross

What it is

The cross is a small woven object, made from straw or rushes, and named after Brigid of Kildare. What decides whether something counts as a Brigid's cross is the material rather than the outline: the finished shapes differ a great deal from place to place. Early examples were plain Latin or Greek crosses. Most crosses made now have a woven diamond, or lozenge, at the middle. Two sticks laid across each other form a frame, and straw is worked around the centre. It is one of Ireland's best-known emblems, along with the shamrock and the harp.

Shapes and designs

The National Museum of Ireland sorts the crosses into seven broad groups. The diamond type, with one woven lozenge or several, is the most common, and it dominates in Munster and Connacht. Another group, which the museum calls the swastika type, has arms leaving the middle at right angles, so the cross reads as a turning wheel; in parts of Ulster a three-armed version is made. Some crosses sit entirely inside a circle and are known as a wheel cross or Saint Brigid's Bow. The interlaced kind is usually of rushes and forms an ordinary Christian cross. The bare kind is simply two bound plaits or planks. In east Galway and Roscommon a sheaf cross uses unthreshed corn.

Origins and history

The cross takes its name from Brigid of Kildare, born around 450 in Leinster and remembered as Ireland's only female patron saint. No record survives from her own lifetime. Nearly everything told about her comes from a life written by the monk Cogitosus, about two hundred years after she died. One story says she wove rushes into a cross while sitting with a dying pagan chieftain, sometimes said to be her father, and that he asked for baptism. Another says she made the cross to undo poison in a drink. Crosses of this kind are first mentioned in the 1600s.

Sharing and sending

Crosses were not only made for the feast. Friends gave them to one another as a way of asking for good fortune and marking a friendship. A couple just married might be handed a small cross to fix over their door, since Brigid was also asked to help with fertility. When people left Ireland they often packed a cross, or posted one to family already settled elsewhere. In Glastonbury, England, crosses are still hung, following a local story that Brigid came to the town in 488. During the twentieth century fewer families made them, and some said new houses left no beam to hang one from.

A national symbol

After the Irish Free State was founded in 1922, artists used the cross, the shamrock and the harp to build a visual identity for the new state, separate from Britain's. The cross entered the logo of the Department of Health in the 1950s and, as of 2024, was still part of the Nursing and Midwifery Board's mark, a nod to Brigid's old association with midwives. It served as the first station symbol of Raidió Teilifís Éireann in 1962 and stayed in the logo until 1995. In 1942 the Irish Folklore Commission gathered several hundred crosses; 21 of them went on show in Castlebar in 2022, the same year the government announced a national holiday on 1 February.

How Brigid's cross is kept

On 31 January, the day before the feast, families went out and cut rushes. In the evening, after a meal, the head of the household directed the others as they wove the rushes into crosses. These were left outdoors overnight, and the family believed the saint would bless them before morning. The next day they were hung from the roof timbers or over a doorway, in the main house, in outbuildings and in stables. Some families replaced the crosses each year, others kept the old ones. Discarded crosses were burned or buried, and burial was preferred because Brigid was linked with farming.

When and where

It belongs to 1 February, the feast day of Saint Brigid of Kildare, which falls at the same point in the year as the older festival of Imbolc. Rushes were gathered on 31 January, the eve, and the crosses were made that evening and hung the following day.

Crosses are made all over Ireland, and were once especially common in the north and the midlands. In the twentieth century fewer households hung them, and some families blamed renovations that left nowhere to fix them. They are also customarily hung in Glastonbury, England, following a local legend that Brigid visited the town in 488.

What Brigid's cross means

For the households that made them, the crosses were a way of placing the home, the animals and the people in it under a saint's care for the year to come. Leaving them outside overnight let that care settle on them before they were carried in. Burial of old crosses, rather than burning, was thought fitting because of Brigid's ties to farming. The cross also stands for Ireland itself, and it is tied in to midwifery and nursing, the work Brigid is associated with.

Days Brigid's cross is marked

Questions people ask about Brigid's cross

See also

Christmas carolFestive songs and hymns sung during the Christmas season and door to doorSteelpanA tuned percussion tradition forged from industrial steel containers in TrinidadJack-o'-lanternA carved pumpkin lantern lit with a candle to brighten and protect Halloween nightsSweat lodgeA purification ceremony kept by Indigenous peoples of the Americas using a heated hut and steam.

Good reading and sources

• Meet St. Brigid, Ireland's Only Woman Patron SaintSmithsonian Magazine, Article
• The Story Behind Our TV SymbolRTE, Article
• Meet St. Brigid, Ireland's Only Woman Patron SaintSmithsonian Magazine, Article
• The Story Behind Our TV SymbolRTE, Article

• Brigid's cross on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.