If you’re celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, then you deserve to know the TRUTH…no matter how shocking it is.
Several long-held belief about the man and the custom’s behind this holiday aren’t factual at all!
Let’s explore some of them….
The Myth: St. Patrick was Irish.
The Reality: He was actually born in Roman Britain (modern-day England, Scotland, or Wales) around 390 A.D. He didn’t arrive in Ireland until he was 16, when he was kidnapped by Irish raiders and sold into slavery./
The Myth: St. Patrick’s signature colour has always been green.
The Reality: Historically, St. Patrick was associated with blue. Several early Irish flags and even the order of the Knights of St. Patrick featured “St. Patrick’s Blue”. Green only became the dominant color in the 18th century as a symbol of Irish nationalism and independence.
The Myth: St. Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland.
The Reality: Ireland never actually had native snakes. Fossil records show the island has been snake-free since the Ice Age because it was too cold for reptiles to survive, and the surrounding ocean prevented them from migrating there later. Scholars believe the “snakes” in the legend are a metaphorfor driving paganism out of the country.
The Myth: Corned beef and cabbage is a traditional Irish dish.
The Reality: This is an Irish-American tradition, not an ancient Irish one. In Ireland, the traditional holiday meal was typically ham or Irish bacon with cabbage. Irish immigrants in the U.S. began using corned beef as a cheaper substitute they bought from their Jewish neighbors.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
