Ancient Pagan Deities
Deities as Birds--Triads of Gaelic Goddesses--Shape-shifting
Goddesses--Black Annis of Leicestershire--The Scottish
Black Annis--Black Kali and Black Demeter--Cat Goddess and
Witches--A Scottish Artemis--Celtic Adonis Myth--The Cup
of Healing--Myths of Gaelic Calendar--Irish and Scottish
Mythologies Different--Scottish Pork Taboo--Eel tabooed in
Scotland but not in England--Ancient English Food Taboos--Irish
Danann Deities--Ancient Deities of England and Wales--The Apple
Cult--English Wassailling Custom--The Magic Cauldron--The
Holy Grail--Cauldron a Goddess Symbol--Pearls and Cows of
the Cauldron--Goddess--Romano-British Deities--Grouped
Goddesses--The Star Goddess--Sky and Sea Spirits.
Many of the old British and Irish deities had bird forms, and might
appear as doves, swallows, swans, cranes, cormorants, scald crows,
ravens, &c. The cormorant, for instance, is still in some districts
called the _Cailleach dubh_ ("the black old wife"). Some deities,
like Brigit and Morrigan, had triple forms, and appeared as three
old hags or as three beautiful girls, or assumed the forms of women
known to those they visited. In the Cuchullin stories the Morrigan
appears with a supernatural cow, the milk of which heals wounds and
prolongs life. When in conflict with Cuchullin, she takes alternately
the forms of an eel, a grey wolf, and a white cow with red ears. On
one occasion she changes from human form to that of a dark bird.
An old west of England goddess was remembered until recently in
Leicestershire as "Black Annis", "Black Anny", or "Cat Anna". She
frequented a cave on the Dane Hills,[182] above which grew an oak
tree. In the branches of the tree she concealed herself, so that
she might pounce unawares on human beings. Shepherds attributed
to her the loss of lambs, and mothers their loss of children. The
supernatural monster had one eye in her blue face, and talons instead
of hands. Round her waist she wore a girdle of human skins.
[182] It has been suggested that "Dane" stands for "Danann".
A Scottish deity called "Yellow Muilearteach" was similarly one-eyed
and blue-faced, and had tusks protruding from her mouth. An apple
dangled from her waist girdle. The Indian goddess Black Kali is
depicted as a ferocious being of like character, with a forehead eye,
in addition to ordinary eyes, and a waist girdle of human heads.
Greece had its Black Demeter with animal-head (a horse's or pig's),
and snakes in her hair. She haunted a cave in Phigalia. The Egyptian
goddess Hathor in her cat form (Bast) was kindly, and in her Sekhet
form was a fierce slayer of mankind.[183]
[183] A text states: "Kindly is she as Bast: terrible is she as
Sekhet."
Witches assume cat forms in Scottish witch lore,[184] and appear on
the riggings and masts of ships doomed to destruction. There are
references, too, to cat roasting, so as to compel the "Big Cat" to
appear. The "Big Cat" is evidently the deity. In northern India
dogs are tortured to compel the "Big Dog" (the god Indra) to send
rain. "Lapus Cati" (the cat stone) is referred to in early Christian
records. As a mouse was buried under an apple tree to make it
fruitful, a cat was buried under a pear tree.
[184] The Gaelic word for "witch" comes from English. Gaelic
"witch lore" is distinctive, having retained more ancient beliefs
than those connected with the orthodox witches.
The Scottish "Yellow Muilearteach" revels in the slaughter of human
beings, and folk poems, describing a battle waged against her, have
been collected. In the end she is slain, and her consort comes from
the sea to lament her death. A similar hag is remembered as the
Cailleach ("the old wife"). She had a "blue-black face" and one eye
"on the flat of her forehead", and she carried a magic hammer. During
the period of "the little sun" (the winter season) she held sway over
the world. Her blanket was washed in the whirlpool of Corryvreckan,
which kept boiling vigorously for several days. Ben Nevis was her
chief dwelling-place, and in a cave in that mountain she kept as a
prisoner all winter a beautiful maiden who was given the task of
washing a brown fleece until it became white. When wandering among
the mountains or along the sea-shore she is followed, like Artemis,
by herds of deer, goats, swine, &c. The venomous black boar is in
some of the stories under her special protection. Apparently this
animal was her symbol as it was that of the Baltic amber traders. The
hero who hunts and slays the boar is himself killed by it, as was
the Syrian god Adonis by the boar form of Ares (Mars). In Gaul the
boar-god Moccus was identified by the Romans with Mars.
In Gaelic stories the hero who hunts and slays the boar is remembered
as Diarmid, the eponymous ancestor of the Campbell clan. Apparently
the goddess was the ugly hag to whom he once gave shelter. She
transformed herself into a beautiful maiden who touched his forehead
and left on it a "love spot".[185]
[185] The "fairy" Queen (the queen of enchantment), who carried
off Thomas the Rhymer, appeared as a beautiful woman, but was
afterwards transformed into an ugly hag. Thomas laments:
How art thou faded thus in the face,
That shone before as the sun so bricht (bright).
When she vanished he followed her to the "Land-Under-Waves". There
he finds her as a beautiful girl who is suffering from a wasting
disease. To cure her he goes on a long journey to obtain a draught
of water from a healing well. This water he carries in the "Cup of
Healing".
The winter hag has a son who falls in love with the beautiful maiden
of Ben Nevis. When he elopes with her, his mother raises storms in
the early spring season to keep the couple apart and prevent the
grass growing. These storms are named in the Gaelic Calendar as "the
Pecker", "the Whistle", "the Sweeper", "the Complaint", &c. In the
end her son pursues her on horseback, until she transforms herself
into a moist grey stone "looking over the sea". The story tells that
the son's horse leapt over arms of the sea. On Loch Etiveside a
place-name "Horseshoes" is attached to marks on a rock supposed to
have been caused by his great steed. In the Isle of Man the place
of the giant son is taken by St. Patrick. He rides from Ireland on
horseback like the ancient sea god. He cursed a monster, which was
turned into solid rock. St. Patrick's steed left the marks of its
hoofs on the cliffs.[186]
[186] Wm. Cashen, _Manx Folk-lore_ (Douglas, 1912), p. 48.
In Arthurian romance King Arthur pursues Morgan le Fay, who likewise
transforms herself into a stone. A Welsh folk story tells that
Arthur's steed leapt across the Bristol Channel, and left the marks
of its hoofs on a rock.
It appears that Morgan le Fay is the same deity as the Irish
Morrigan. Both appear to link with Anu, or Danu, the Irish mother
goddess, and with Black Anna or Annis of Leicestershire. The Irish
Danann deities wage war against the Fomorians, who are referred to in
one instance as the gods of the Fir Domnann (Dumnonii), the mineral
workers or "diggers" of Cornwall and Devon, of the south-western and
central lowlands of Scotland, and central and south-western Ireland.
In Scotland the Fomorians are numerous; they are hill and cave giants
like the giants of Cornwall. But there are no Scottish Dananns and
no "war of the gods". The Fomorians of Scotland wage war against
the fairies (as in Wester Ross) or engage in duels, throwing great
boulders at one another.
The intruding people who in Ireland formulated the Danann mythology
do not appear to have reached Scotland before the Christian period.
An outstanding difference between Scottish and Irish beliefs and
practices is brought out by the treatment of the pig in both
countries. Like the Continental Celts, the Irish Celts, who formed a
military aristocracy over the Firbolgs, the Fir Domnann, and the Fir
Gailian (Gauls), kept pigs and ate pork. In Scotland the pig was a
demon as in ancient Egypt, and pork was tabooed over wide areas. The
prejudice against pork in Scotland is not yet extinct. It is referred
to by Sir Walter Scott in a footnote in _The Fortunes of Nigel_,
which states:
"The Scots (Lowlanders), till within the last generation,
disliked swine's flesh as an article of food as much as the
Highlanders do at present. Ben Jonson, in drawing James's
character,[187] says he loved no part of a swine."[188]
[187] King James VI of Scotland and I of England.
[188] Ben Jonson's reference is in _A Masque of the Metamorphosed
Gipsies_.
Dr. Johnson wrote in his _A Journey to the Western Highlands in 1773_:
"Of their eels I can give no account, having never tasted them,
for I believe they are not considered as wholesome food.... The
vulgar inhabitants of Skye, I know not whether of the other
islands, have not only eels, but pork and bacon in abhorrence;
and, accordingly, I never saw a hog in the Hebrides, except one
at Dunvegan."
"In the year 1691 a question was put, 'Why do Scotchmen hate swine's
flesh?' and", says J. G. Dalyell,[189] "unsatisfactorily answered,
'They might borrow it of the Jews'." As the early Christians of
England and Ireland did not abhor pork, the prejudice could not
have been of Christian origin. It was based on superstition, and as
the superstitions of to-day were the religious beliefs of yesterday,
the prejudice appears to be a survival from pagan times. An ancient
religious cult, which may have originally been small, became
influential in Scotland, and the taboo spread even after its original
significance was forgotten. The Scottish prejudice against pork
existed chiefly among "the common people", as Dr. Johnson found when
in Skye. Proprietors of alien origin and monks ate pork, but the old
taboo persisted. Pig-dealers, &c., in the Highlands in the nineteenth
century refused to eat pork. They exported their pigs.[190]
[189] _The Darker Superstitions of Scotland_ (London, 1834), p.
425, and _Athenian Mercury_, V, 1, No. 20, p. 13.
[190] The south-western Scottish pork trade dates only from the
latter part of the eighteenth century. There was trouble at
Carlisle custom house when the Lowland Scots began to export
cured pork, because of the difference between the English and
Scottish salt duty. "For some time", complained a Scottish writer
on agriculture, in June, 1811, "a duty of 2s. per hunderweight
has been charged." Dublin was exporting pork to London in the
reign of Henry VIII. A small trade in pork was conducted in
eastern Scotland but was sporadic.
Traces of ancient food taboos, which were connected evidently with
religious beliefs, have been obtained by archæologists in England.
In some districts pork appears to have been more favoured than the
beef or mutton or goat flesh preferred in other districts. Evidence
has been forthcoming that horse flesh was eaten in ancient England.
A reference in the _Life of St. Columba_ to a relapsing Christian
returning to horse flesh suggests that it was a favoured food of a
Pagan cult.
As the devil is called in Scottish Gaelic the "Big Black Pig" and in
Wales is associated with the "Black Sow of All Hallows", it may be
that the Welsh had once their pig taboo too. The association of the
pig with Hallowe'en is of special interest.
In Scotland the eel is still tabooed, although it is eaten freely
in England. The reason may be that an ancient goddess, remembered
longest in Scotland, had an eel form. Julius Cæsar tells that the
ancient Britons with whom he came into contact did not regard it
lawful to eat the hare, the domestic fowl, or the goose. In Scotland
and England the goose was, until recently, eaten only once a year
at a festival. The tabooed pig was eaten once a year in Egypt. It
was sacrificed to Osiris and the moon. An annual sacrificial pig
feast may have been observed in ancient Scotland. It is of special
interest to find in this connection that in the _Statistical Account
of Scotland_ (1793) the writer on the parishes of Sandwick and
Stromness, Orkney, says: "Every family that has a herd of swine,
kills a sow on the 17th day of December, and thence it is called
'Sow-day'." Orkney retains the name of the Orcs (Boars), a Pictish
tribe.
There are still people in the Highlands who detest "feathered flesh"
or "white flesh" (birds), and refuse to eat hare and rabbit. Fish
taboos have likewise persisted in the north of Scotland, where
mackerel, ling,[191] and skate are disliked in some areas, while in
some even the wholesome haddock is not eaten in the winter or spring,
and is supposed not to be fit for food until it gets three drinks of
May water--that is, after the first three May tides have ebbed and
flowed.
[191] King James I of England and VI of Scotland detested ling as
he detested pork. The food prejudices of the common people thus
influenced royalty, although earlier kings and Norman nobles ate
pork, eels, &c.
The Danann deities of Ireland were the children of descendants of the
goddess Danu, whose name is also given as Ana or Anu. She was the
source of abundance and the nourisher of gods and men. As "Buanann"
she was "nurse of heroes". As Aynia, a "fairy"[192] queen, she is
still remembered in Ulster, while as Aine, a Munster "fairy", she
was formerly honoured on St. John's Eve, when villagers, circulating
a mound, carried straw torches which were afterwards waved over
cattle and crops to give protection and increase.
[192] The Gaelic word _sidh_ (Irish) or _sith_ (Scottish) means
"supernatural" and the "peace" and "silence" of supernatural
beings. "Fairy", as Skeat has emphasized, means "enchantment".
It has taken the place of "fay", which is derived from fate. The
"fay" was a supernatural being.
A prominent Danann god was Dagda, whose name is translated as "the
good god", "the good hand", by some, and as "the fire god" or "fire
of god" by others. He appears to have been associated with the oak.
By playing his harp, he caused the seasons to follow one another in
their proper order. One of his special possessions was a cauldron
called "The Undry", from which an inexhaustible food supply could be
obtained. He fed heavily on porridge, and was a cook (supplier of
food) as well as a king. In some respects he resembles Thor, and,
like him, he was a giant slayer. His wife was the goddess Boann,
whose name clings to the River Boyne, which was supposed to have had
its origin from an overflowing well. Above this well were nine hazel
trees; the red nuts of these fell into the well to be devoured by
salmon and especially by the "salmon of knowledge". Here again we
meet with the tree and well myth. Brigit was a member of the Dagda's
family. Another was Angus, the god of love.
Diancecht was the Danann god of healing. His grandson Lugh
(pronounced _loo_) has been called the "Gaelic Apollo". Goibniu was a
Gaelic Vulcan.
Neit, whose wife was Nemon,[193] was a Fomorian god of battle. The
sea god was Manannán mac Lir. He was known to the Welsh as Manawydan
ab Llyr, who was not only a sea god but "lord of headlands" and a
patron of traders. Llyr has come down as the legendary King Lear, and
his name survives in Leicester, originally Llyr-cestre of Cær-Llyr
(walled city of Llyr). His famous and gigantic son Bran became, in
the process of time, the "Blessed Bran" who introduced Christianity
into Britain.
[193] From the root _nem_ in _neamh_, heaven, _nemus_, a grove,
&c.
Another group of Welsh gods, known as "the children of Don",
resemble somewhat the Danann deities of Ireland. The closest link
is Govannon, the smith, who appears to be identical with the Irish
Goibniu. As Irish pirates invaded and settled in Wales between the
second and fifth centuries of our era, it may be that the process of
"culture mixing" which resulted can be traced in the mythological
elements embedded in folk and manuscript stories. The Welsh deities,
however, were connected with certain constellations and may have
been "intruders" from the Continent. Cassiopea's chair was Llys Don
(the court of the goddess Don). Arianrod (silver circle), a goddess
and wife of Govannon, had for her castle the Northern Crown (Corona
Borealis). She is, in Arthurian romance, the sister of Arthur. Her
brother Gwydion had for his castle the "Milky Way", which in Irish
Gaelic is "the chain of Lugh". The Irish Danann god Nuada has been
identified with the British Nudd whose children formed the group of
"the children of Nudd".
There were three groups of Welsh deities, the others being "the
children of Lyr" and "the children of Don". Professor Rhys has
identified Nudd with Lud, the god whose name survives in London
(originally Cær Lud) and in Ludgate, which may, as has been
suggested, have originally been "the way of Lud", leading to his holy
place now occupied by St. Paul's Cathedral. Lud had a sanctuary at
Lidney in Gloucestershire, where he was worshipped in Roman times as
is indicated by inscriptions. A bronze plaque shows a youthful god,
with solar rays round his head, standing in a four-horsed chariot.
Two winged genii and two Tritons accompany him. Apparently he was
identified with Apollo. The Arthurian Lot or Loth was Lud or Ludd.
His name lingers in "Lothian".
Gwydion, the son of Don, was a prominent British deity and has been
compared to Odin. He was the father of the god Lleu, whose mother was
Arianrod. The rainbow was "Lleu's rod-sling". Dwynwen, the so-called
British Venus, was Christianized as "the blessed Dwyn" and the patron
saint of the church of Llanddwyn in Anglesey. The magic cauldron was
possessed by the Welsh goddess Kerridwen.
[Illustration: BRONZE URN AND CAULDRON (_circa_ 500 B.C.)
(British Museum)
Vessels such as these are unknown outside the British Isles.]
A prominent god whose worship appears to have been widespread was
connected with the apple tree, which in the Underworld and Islands
of the Blest was the "Tree of Life". Ancient beliefs and ceremonies
connected with the apple cult survive in those districts in southern
England where the curious custom is observed of "wassailing" the
apple trees on Christmas Eve or Twelfth Night.[194] The "wassailers"
visit the tree and sing a song in which each apple is asked to bear
Hat-fulls, lap-fulls,
Sack-fulls, pocket-fulls.
Cider is poured about the roots of apple trees. This ceremony appears
to have been originally an elaborate one. The tom-tit or some other
small bird was connected with the apple tree, as was the robin or
wren of other cults with the oak tree. At the wassailing ceremony a
boy climbed up into a tree and impersonated the bird. It may be that
in Pagan times a boy was sacrificed to the god of the tree. That
the bird (in some cases it was the robin red-breast) was hunted and
sacrificed is indicated by old English folk-songs beginning like the
following:
Old Robin is dead and gone to his grave,
Hum! Ha! gone to his grave;
They planted an apple tree over his head,
Hum! Ha! over his head.
[194] Rendel Harris, _Apple Cults_, and _The Ascent of Olympus_.
In England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland a deity, or a group of
deities in the Underworld, was associated with a magic cauldron, or
as it is called in Gaelic a "pot of plenty". Heroes or gods obtain
possession of this cauldron, which provides an inexhaustible food
supply and much treasure, or is used for purposes of divination. It
appears to have been Christianized into the "Holy Grail", to obtain
possession of which Arthurian knights set out on perilous journeys.
Originally the pot was a symbol of the mother goddess, who renewed
youth, provided food for all, and was the source of treasure, luck,
victory, and wisdom. This goddess was associated with the mother
cow and the life-prolonging pearls that were searched for by early
Eastern prospectors. There are references to cows and pearls in Welsh
and Gaelic poems and legends regarding the pot. An old Welsh poem in
the _Book of Taliesin_ says of the cauldron:
By the breath of nine maidens it would be kindled.
The head of Hades' cauldron--what is it like?
A rim it has, with pearls round its border:
It boils not coward's food: it would not be perjured.
This extract is from the poem known as "Preidden Annwfn" ("Harryings
of Hades"), translated by the late Professor Sir John Rhys. Arthur
and his heroes visit Hades to obtain the cauldron, and reference is
made to the "Speckled Ox". Arthur, in another story, obtains the
cauldron from Ireland. It is full of money. The Welsh god Bran gives
to a king of Ireland a magic cauldron which restores to life those
dead men who are placed in it. A Gaelic narrative relates the story
of Cuchullin's harrying of Hades, which is called "Dun Scaith".
Cuchullin's assailants issue from a pit in the centre of Dun Scaith
in forms of serpents, toads, and sharp-beaked monsters. He wins the
victory and carries away three magic cows and a cauldron that gives
inexhaustible supplies of food, gold, and silver.
The pot figures in various mythologies. It was a symbol of the mother
goddess Hathor of ancient Egypt and of the mother goddess of Troy,
and it figures in Indian religious literature. In Gaelic lore the
knife which cuts inexhaustible supplies of flesh from a dry bone is
evidently another symbol of the deity.
The talismans possessed by the Dananns were the cauldron, the sword
and spear of Lugh, and the Lia Fail (or Stone of Destiny)[195],
which reminds one of the three Japanese symbols, the solar mirror,
the dragon sword, and the tama (a pearl or round stone) kept in a
Shinto shrine at Ise. The goddess's "life substance" was likewise
in fruits like the Celestial apples, nuts, rowan berries, &c., of
the Celts, and the grapes, pomegranates, &c., of other peoples, and
in herbs like the mugwort and mandrake. Her animals were associated
with rivers. The name of the River Boyne signifies "white cow". Tarf
(bull) appears in several river names, as also does the goddess name
Deva (Devona) in the Devon, Dee, &c. Philologists have shown that
Ness, the Inverness-shire river, is identical with Nestos in Thrace
and Neda in Greece. The goddess Belisama (the goddess of war) was
identified with the Mersey.
[195] Called also _clach na cineamhuinn_ (the fatal stone).
Goddess groups, usually triads, were as common in Gaul as they were
in ancient Crete. These deities were sometimes called the "Mothers",
as in Marne, the famous French river, and in the Welsh _Y Mamau_, one
of the names of the "fairies".
Other names of goddess groups include Proximæ (kinswoman), Niskai
(water spirits), and Dervonnæ (oak spirits). The Romans took over
these and other groups of ancient deities and the beliefs about
their origin in the mythical sea they were supposed to cross or
rise from. Gaelic references to "the coracle of the fairy woman" or
"supernatural woman" are of special interest in this connection,
especially when it is found that the "coracle" is a sea-shell which,
by the way, figures as a canopy symbol in some of the sculptured
groups of Romano-British grouped goddesses who sometimes bear baskets
of apples, sheafs of grain, &c. When the shell provides inexhaustible
supplies of curative or knowledge-conferring milk, it links with the
symbolic pot.
Most of the ancient deities had local names, and consequently a
number of Gaulish gods were identified by the Romans with Apollo,
including Borvo, whose name lingers in Bourbon, Grannos of Aquæ
Granni (Aix la Chapelle), Mogounus, whose name has been shortened
to Mainz, &c. The gods Taranucus (thunderer), Uxell[)i]mus (the
highest), &c., were identified with Jupiter; Dunatis (fort god),
Albiorix (world king), Caturix (battle king), Belatucadros (brilliant
in war), Cocidius, &c., were identified with Mars. The name of
the god Cam[)u]los clings to Colchester (Camulodunun). There are
Romano-British inscriptions that refer to the ancient gods under
various Celtic names. A popular deity was the god of Silvanus, who
conferred health and was, no doubt, identified with a tree or herb.
It is uncertain at what period beliefs connected with stars were
introduced into the British Isles.[196] As we have seen, the Welsh
deities were connected with certain star groups. "Three Celtic
goddesses", writes Anwyl, referring to Gaul, "whose worship attained
to highest development were Damona (the goddess of cattle), Sirona
(the aged one or the star goddess), and Ep[)o]na (the goddess of
horses). These names are Indo-European." An Irish poem by a bard
who is supposed to have lived in the ninth century refers to the
Christian saint Ciaran of Saigir as a man of stellar origin:
Liadaine (his mother) was asleep
On her bed.
When she turned her face to heaven
A star fell into her mouth.
Thence was born the marvellous child
Ciaran of Saigir who is proclaimed to thee.
[196] There is evidence in the Gaelic manuscripts that time was
measured by the apparent movements of the stars. Cuchullin, while
sitting at a feast, says to his charioteer: "Laeg, my friend, go
out, observe the stars of the air, and ascertain when midnight
comes".
In the north and north-west Highlands the aurora borealis is called
_Na Fir Chlis_ ("the nimble men") and "the merry dancers". They are
regarded as fairies (supernatural beings) like the sea "fairies" _Na
Fir Ghorm_ ("blue men"), who were probably sea gods.
The religious beliefs of the Romans were on no higher a level than
those of the ancient Britons and Gaels.