King Puck reigns once more in Kerry – a ritual as important in Killorglin as Christmas

There are no pet goats in Killorglin – it’s the wild ones that are king. Brought down from the mountain and held incognito in a farm until the annual coronation day, King Puck has once again reigned for three days and three nights in Co Kerry.“Each year, it’s a different goat but it’s the same story,” long-time festival spokesman and organiser Declan Falvey observed on Wednesday, Scattering Day. He had just been interviewed by a Swedish TV channel.People flock to Killorglin – the returning emigrants and their children and grandchildren. Tourists fascinated by the rituals of the three-day festival come back year after year.READ MOREAs Declan Mangan, long-time chairman of Puck put it: “It is the only place in the world where the goat reigns and the people act the goat.” Puck is thought to endure from pre-Christian times, holding a charter from 1613 from King James I of the King James Bible.Animal welfare protesters as well as the heat of recent summers have dictated his majesty spends less time on his throne these days than in years past.The goat captured near Glenbeigh is paraded around the town of Killorglin accompanied by his queen – who this year is 12-year-old Scarlett Moriarty – and her ladies in waiting. Crowned, he “goes up” to spend just an hour or so on his throne on the 12m-high vantage point over the town on Gathering Day. King Puck looks out over Killorglin. Photograph: Dave Ryan, Dave Ryan Media Day Three, Scattering Day, sees him back up for the dethroning ceremony. The fair holds a goat welfare document from the Department of Agriculture and assigns its own vet to look after him.This year, for the first time in decades, he was not serenaded by Sean O’Sé singing An Poc ar Buile. O’Sé died earlier this year and was fondly remembered at this week’s festival. Falvey says he is again astounded by the numbers who have gathered, fulfilling the tradition of the emigrants’ return. Puck is a ritual as important in Killorglin as Christmas. To some it is even more significant, he says.While its origins are ancient, until the 1960s it was also a major hiring fair of south Kerry for people seeking farm or other work for a period of indenture of 12 months. Years ago, the emigrants would “put on the glad rags” and return for Puck, even if they were not doing that well in England.These days, they are returning from new emigration hot spots like Australia just for the fair.Falaveys says it is important that three things endure “the horse fair, in 20 years time will there be anything like it? The cattle fair and the whole concept of the goat being crowned are the other two.”