At a glance

• Letter: UI
• Tree: honeysuckle
• Place: the third of the five forfeda, the later letters
• Also known as: Uilleand
• Keywords: honeysuckle, bonds, sweetness, entwining, love, flexibility, climbing vine, elbow

Lore and history

In the medieval Irish texts, Uilleann is counted among the forfeda, the five extra letters added after the original twenty of the four aicmi. It stands third in that later group, alongside Ébhadh, Ór, Ifín, and Eamhancholl. The Auraicept na nEces and In Lebor Ogaim name honeysuckle as its tree, a plant that does not grow tall and straight like the letters of the earlier aicmi but winds itself around whatever stands near it. The forfeda were woven into ogham after its first making, reaching beyond the original sounds and trees to hold new ground the alphabet had not yet covered.

In a reading

In modern ogham practice, Uilleann is drawn as a letter of binding and sweetness, the pull toward connection rather than standing apart. Honeysuckle does not grow alone; it reaches, wraps, and climbs, and many of us read that as a teaching about relationships, loyalty, and the ties that hold a life together. When Uilleann appears in a casting or a reading, it is often taken as a sign to lean into a bond that is forming, to trust something that wants to grow close to you, or to notice where your own life has quietly wound itself around another. We also carry honeysuckle's gift of sweetness in hard seasons: the reminder that softness and flexibility can be their own kind of strength.

A little more

The word uilleann means elbow in Irish, the same root found in uilleann pipes (the bellows-blown Irish bagpipes played with the elbow), a nice echo for a letter tied to the bending, looping vine of honeysuckle.

Keep exploring

• Before it: Oir
• After it: Ifin
• All 25 ogham letters