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In
Celtic tradition the Cock has chthonic associations as a bird of the underworld.
Sacred in early Britain, the cock had the chthonic aspect of the Gallo-Roman
Mercury, was an attribute of the gods of the underworld and of the Celtic Mother
Goddess; the cock was sacrificed on Bride's Day.
The cock has ever been the bird of dawning whose call dispels the horrors of the night. Numerous folk-songs and stories attest to this understanding, and in many night-visiting songs where by a dead lover comes to his woman's bed by night, his ghost is dispelled by the cock crowing.
