Crossword-Solution: BELTEIN 7 letters, 1 clue 🏆 scrabble score: 9

The Druidic rites and the festival of Beltein in Scotland and Ireland, she found traced to their source in the worship of Phrygian Baal.

The Phrygian festivals were also arranged on the theory that the deity was asleep during the winter and awake during the summer; in the autumn they celebrated his retiring to rest, and in spring with mirth and revelry they roused him from his slumbers.[7] The seasonal character of the Teutonic Ostern, the Celtic Beltein and the Scandinavian Yule is obvious.

The latter is cited by Leslie as a Gaelic scholar of the last century, who in regard to the expression, "He is betwixt two Beltein fires," gives as an explanation that the Celtic tribes in their sacred enclosures offered sacrifices, commonly horses, that were burnt between two large fires, and Leslie adds, "On this it may be remarked that horses were sacrificed to the sun by the Arian race from the earliest times; and this continued to be practised by Hindus, Persians, and other nations.

Under "BELTANE, Beltein, the name of a sort of festival observed on the first day of May, O.S.;" we have:--"A town in Perthshire, on the borders of the Highlands, is called _Tillie-_ (or _Tullie_) _beltane_, _i.e._ the eminence or rising ground of the fire of Baal.

After that they use the same ceremony to the noxious animals; _This I give to thee, O Fox! spare thou my lambs; this to thee, O hooded Crow! this to thee, O Eagle!_"[25] Further on the same traveller writes:--"The Beltein, or the rural sacrifice on the first of May, O.S., has been mentioned before.