| 释义 |
ˈfire-cross
[See cross 13.]
A signal used anciently in Scotland, and more recently in the Highlands, to summon the men to a rendezvous on the sudden outbreak of war.
It was called in Gaelic cros-táraidh or crann-táraidh = cross or beam of gathering, and consisted of a cross or piece of wood burnt at one end and dipped in blood at the other—symbolical of fire and sword—which was handed from clansman to clansman, each man immediately on receiving it running with it to his nearest neighbour, so as to spread the alarm over a district in a short time. (Poetical references to it are often mere guesses founded on the name.)
1547in Reg. Privy Seal XXI. 45 (Jam.) The fire Croce being borne throw the hale Realme. 1548W. Patten Exped. Scotl. Pref. sig. a viii, Caused y⊇ fier crosse..to be caried: whearof the solempnitee is never vsed, but in an vrgent nede. 1641Milton Reform. ii. (1851) 51 To..proclaime a fire-crosse to a..perpetuall civill warre. 1826Lingard Hist. Eng. (ed. 4) VII. 16 Arran had dispatched the fire-cross from clan to clan. |