active, mighty-deeded, white-armoured, supreme King of the Gael, viz.,
the terror-striking, leopard-like, awful, sanguinary, opposing,
sharp-armed, fierce, attacking, ready, dexterous, powerful, steady,
illustrious, full-subduing, furious, well-prepared, right-judging
Earl, as he received on him the armour of conflict and strife against
every tumult, that is, his fine tunic, beautifully embroidered, of
fine textured satin, ingeniously woven by ladies and their daughters;
and that good tunic was put upon him.
A silk jerkin which was handsome, well-fitting, rich,
highly-embroidered, beautiful, many-coloured, artfully-done, gusseted,
corded, ornamented with the figures of foreign birds, with branches of
burnished gold, with a multiplicity of all kinds of embroidery on the
sides of the costly jerkin. That jerkin was put upon him to guard him
against dangers.
A coat of mail which was wide, well-meshed, light, of substantial
steel, beautifully-wrought, gold-ornamented, with brilliant Danish
gems. Such a mail coat as that was possessed by the lithe Luga of Long
Arms.
We may conclude this brief account of the Book of Clanranald by a
specimen of its poetry—an elegy for Sir Norman Macleod, which Nial
Macvurich made. It illustrates how to the Gael, when in grief, all
nature seems to suffer and reciprocate his feelings; and the mighty
portents associated in the olden days with the birth or demise of a
chief.
A death of the deepest anguish it is
To his friends and his followers;
Over his grave as they perform a _neachd_
They have their turn at the tomb which we cannot get.
The women of every country are in sadness,
Also their heroes and ecclesiastics;
Their faithful freemen are in grief,
The extremity of severe affliction is among them.
The hospitality, the pure generosity,
The joyous exclamation, the ready welcome,
They have all gone with him into the earth,
For an age after him there will be but lamentation.
We are in want of gold and cattle,
Since the Chief of Rushgarry died;
The learned men since the hour of his death,
Have forsaken their havens of watching.
Flaming troubles pervaded the stars of heaven,
They poured forth the showers of lightning;
The hills are not illumined by day,
Their grief for him mastered them.
The rivers are rising over the woods,
There is a scarcity of fish in the bays;
The fruitage is not found in the land,
The roaring of the sea is very coarse.
At the last hours of his death,
Dreadful tokens appeared to us;
Foreboding clouds which denoted grief,
Were of gold colour in the Northern region.
Such is our heritage of Celtic MSS. in this country, and, in view of the
paucity of these existing relics, may we not reiterate the lines of
Horace?—
Full many a chief and warrior lived
Ere Agamemnon saw the day,
Of whom no record hath survived
The glories that have passed away.
Unwept, unsung, unknown they lie,
For want of hallowed Poesy.
CHAPTER VIII
THE MYTHOLOGICAL CYCLE
A rich and abundant saga literature—Three leading periods or
cycles—The myths and folk-tales—Problems to men of science—The
philologists and anthropologists take opposite sides—Their
theories—Attitude of the annalists and romancists of Ireland—Their
craze for genealogy—Early settlers in Erin—Advent of the Milesians
or Gaels—The Three Sorrows of Gaelic Storydom: (1) “The Tragedy of
the Children of Tuireann”; (2) The fascinating “Aided of the
Children of Lir”; (3) Story of “Deirdre and the Sons of
Uisneach”—Extraordinary interest evinced in this saga—Marvellous
output of texts and translations.
With the arrival of Christianity and its literary promulgators, St.
Patrick and St Columba, authentic history may be said to have begun,
first in Ireland, and then in Scotland. Before the fifth century there
existed a rich and abundant saga literature transmitted by oral
tradition. But even the very oldest of the tales we now have, could
hardly have been written down in MS. form before the seventh or eighth
century. Such is the general belief of scholars who have sifted and
examined the earliest records.
The mass of saga carried over from pagan times, goes back over ages
untold and immemorial. And yet it is found to sort out under great
leading periods or cycles, three of which seem to stand out distinct and
pre-eminent. These are known as the Mythological, the Heroic, and the
Ossianic.
Roughly speaking, the Mythological cycle, beginning away back in the
vague and dim past, stretches to near the beginning of the Christian
era. The other cycles follow, filling up the 400 odd years that elapse
before the dawn of written history.
The mythological stories are fewer than the rest, and of course more
absurd and unintelligible. Most of them are found in O’Clery’s _Leabhar
Gabhala, or Book of Invasions_, 1630, of which the more important MSS.
are the Books of Leinster and Ballymote. Their chief interest lies in
the light they throw upon the early religious ideas of the Celt.
In a practical age like our own, most people are impatient of ancient
myth and fairy tales. They seem so utterly unreal, absurd, and
impossible, that it is hard to conceive how any sane mortal could have
given them credence for one moment. And yet so universal are such
stories among every race of mankind, and so credible and far-reaching in
their influence in early times, that they have survived when multitudes
of recorded facts have perished. They show that men, and especially
primitive men, have the same kind of thoughts, desires, fancies, habits,
and institutions all the world over.
The myths and folk-tales have a wonderful similarity, reappearing in
different guise but in substance the same, among the most varied races
and peoples, so that savages to-day in different continents and islands
have beliefs and customs corresponding to those which stagger us in the
sagas of our own Celtic ancestors, and quite as fantastic.
It is this which lends the fascination to students of comparative
mythology and to the folk-lorist. What seems arrant nonsense and the
height of absurdity to ordinary intelligence, lures them on to seek in
these wild stories for the origins of belief, for the early conceptions
which influenced men in their religion and in their life. Removed from
primitive man by centuries of progress, and ruled as we are by a
scientific view of the world, it is hard for us to put ourselves at the
centre of vision and standpoint of our early ancestors, to whom the
facts of life were more confused than they appear to us, and in a manner
more uncanny and mysterious. Like the savage of to-day, judging from
their myths, they conceived all things as animated and personal, capable
of endless interchange of form. Men might become beasts, beasts might
change into men. Even the gods appeared in human or bestial forms.
Animals, plants, stones, earth, winds and waters, spoke and acted like
human beings, changing their shapes accordingly.
This is the very essence of myth and fairy tale. Or as Professor Max
Müller has expressed it, “What makes mythology mythological in the true
sense of the word is what is utterly unintelligible, absurd, strange, or
miraculous.”
What appears most incredible and repugnant, the ugly blots and scars of
these narratives are just the problems to men of science. How to account
for them? How to explain their origin? Over this, contending schools are
constantly engaged in a kind of guerilla warfare. Leaving the
archæologists to pursue their own studies among the material
“survivals,” the philologists and anthropologists take opposite sides
each in defence of his own particular theory.
Briefly stated, the difference between them is this: the philologists
maintain that language—language as it were in a state of disease—is the
great source of the mythology of the world. Professor Max Müller held
this view and gave it a widely accepted vogue. The ugly scars he
explained as due to the old words and popular sayings lingering on in a
language after their original harmless and symbolic meanings had been
lost. Thus what might have been originally a poetical remark about
nature, might in process of time be interpreted colloquially and become
an obscene, brutal, or vulgar myth. To go no further afield than the
Hebrew sacred writings, when we think of an impassioned apostrophe to
the sun, and the subsequent popular legend that the sun and the moon
stood still, we see that the philologist argument is not without force
and cogency.
Yet the anthropologists are more in the line of evolution, for they
maintain that mythology on the whole represents an old stage of thought,
from which civilised men have slowly emancipated themselves. This is
also the view of Mr. Andrew Lang, who recently contributed a work on the
subject. The scars so-called are the remains of that kind of taste,
fancy, customary law, and incoherent speculation that prevail in human
nature in its primitive barbarian state. And indeed when we contemplate
the credulity, superstition, and readiness to accept the grotesque and
fabulous, that dominate such inhabitants even of a civilised country as
are kept ignorant and isolated, this theory seems to point to the main
source of myth and fairy tale.
As in the early literature of Greece the gods and heroes are mixed up,
so in the records of the Gael. But the annalists and romancists of
Ireland, who had a passion for writing history, evidently had no inkling
of this. The thought of mythology was far enough removed from their way
of thinking, and such floating tales and personages and events as they
found wafted towards them on the stream of tradition they took for
actual fact. At any rate, they wove them into the story of the past of
their nation in such a way as to lead us to believe that the mythical
beings were as real to them as the kings and warriors of their own age.
And these historians had quite a craze for genealogy; never satisfied
unless they could trace their chiefs or heroes and ancestors up to Adam,
which they invariably succeed in doing, bridging the gaps with very
fertile ingenuity.
Thus the last great chasm to be spanned in the line of pedigree is the
Deluge—to surmount which was a work more intricate and needing more
skill in a manner than the Forth Bridge; for if they could once connect
with Noah, the Bible record does the rest.
The feat is accomplished, set down by the annalists of the Middle Ages
with all the plausibility of sober fact. Forty days before the Flood,
the Lady Cæsair, niece or granddaughter of Noah—it is immaterial
which—with fifty girls and three men came to Ireland. This, we are to
understand, was the first invasion or conquest of that country. All
these were drowned in the Deluge, except Finntan, the husband of the
lady, who escaped by being cast into a deep sleep, in which he continued
for a year, and when he awoke he found himself in his own house at Dun
Tulcha. It is charming to note with what precision and _sangfroid_ names
are quoted in this legended history. At Dun Tulcha he lived throughout
many dynasties down to the sixth century of our era, when he appears for
the last time with eighteen companies of his descendants engaged in
settling a boundary dispute. Being the oldest man in the world, he was
_ipso facto_ the best informed regarding ancient landmarks.
After the Flood various peoples in succession stepped on to the platform
of Irish history. First the Partholans; then the Nemedians, Firbolgs,
Tuatha de Danann, and last of all the Milesians, thus carrying the
chronology down to the time of Christ. From the arrival of the earliest
of these settlers, the Fomorians or “Sea Rovers” are represented as
fighting and harassing the people. Sometimes in conjunction with the
plague, at other times with the Firbolgs and Gaileoin and Fir-Domnann,
they laid waste the land. The Partholans and Nemedians were early
disposed of. And then appeared from the north of Europe, or from heaven,
as one author says, the Tuatha de Danann, who at the great battle of
Moytura South overcame the Firbolgs, scattering them to the islands of
Aran, Islay, Rathlin, and the Hebrides, and afterwards defeating the
Fomorians at Moytura North, thus gaining full possession of the land.
Much of this fabulous history is taken up with these early struggles
between the Fomorians and the Tuatha de Danann, of whom Breas and Lugh
of the Longhand, and Dagda are the great heroes.
At length from Spain and the East came the last invaders, known under
various names, as the Milesians, the Scots, or Gaels. They are the
ancestors of our modern race, called Milesians from an ancestor Milé,
and Gaels or Gaidels from an ancestor Gadelus. When they arrived at
Tara, a vast army from over the seas, they met the three kings and
queens of the Tuatha. The latter complained that they were taken by
surprise, and entreated the Milesians to embark again on their ships
that they might have a fair chance of opposing them. This they did,
retreating for “nine waves” on the sea. But on facing about, lo! Ireland
was not to be seen. The Tuatha de Danann by their enchantment had made
the island as small as a pig’s back, and therefore invisible from the
ships. Besides, they raised a violent storm with clouds and darkness.
Many Milesian ships were wrecked, and a crisis was only averted by their
leader, Amergin, who was also a Druid, pronouncing a Druidic prayer or
oration, addressed it would seem to the Tuatha, when the storm
immediately ceased and they landed in peace. After some skirmishes, the
Tuatha eventually retire to the Land of Promise, the country of the
_Sìdh_—fairy mounds, where in the popular lore they were till lately,
taking considerable interest in the affairs of their quondam conquerors.
Druidism, it will be seen, enters largely into all these ancient
contests, the opposing parties using spells as well as blows.
The Milesians we are supposed to have some knowledge of—with more or
less of their blood in our veins. They are regarded as the main body of
the Gaelic people. But who were the Tuatha de Danann and the Fomorians?
Personifications of the forces of nature, or the Gaelic gods of the
upper and lower worlds, argue writers on mythology. As Zeus, Poseidon,
Pluto, and the rest of the Greek deities rule over the heavens, the
earth, the sea, and the shades, so do the Tuatha, the pagan gods of the
Gaelic people; while the Fomorians, vicious and troublesome as they
were, may in their origin be none other than the sea powers—the rough
chaotic tumult of the Atlantic Ocean, against which in the west of
Ireland the various settlers had to contend.
But the early introduction of Christianity, throwing the pagan gods and
traditions, as it did, into the limbo of perdition, renders it very
difficult for us now to arrive at any definite and certain conclusions
on these matters.
The literary interest of the mythological cycle centres largely in the
“Three Sorrows of Story-telling,” two of which belong exclusively to it,
the third to the Cuchulinn cycle. Though connected with the period of
the Tuatha de Danann, it is well to remember that these two as well as
the third were actually written later than the earliest of the heroic
tales.
First comes the “Aided or Tragedy of the Children of Tuireann.” It is
mentioned by Cormac in his Glossary (ninth or tenth century), and by
Flann of Monasterboice (ob. 1056). The story is partially told in the
Book of Lecain (cir. 1416), and is found in several MSS., including No.
LVI. of the Scottish collection. O’Curry, O’Duffy, and Joyce have each
at various times edited and published it with translation; the first in
the _Atlantis_, vol. iv.; the second for the Society for the
Preservation of the Irish Language in Dublin, 1888; and the third in his
_Old Celtic Romances_, London, 1879.
The scene opens near the ramparts of Tara, in the reign of Nuada of the
silver arm. Two handsome, young, and well-formed men are seen
approaching. Accosted by the doorkeeper, who had only one eye, they
announced themselves as physicians, and subsequently offered to put his
cat’s eye in the place of the one he had lost. This done, the substitute
proved convenient and inconvenient, for when he desired to take sleep or
repose, then the eye would start at the squeaking of the mice, the
flying of the birds, and the motion of the reeds; whereas, when he
wished to watch a host or an assembly the same organ continued in deep
sleep. Similarly, but to better effect, the king was fitted with a new
arm, namely, that of the swineherd, of equal length and thickness with
his own. The bones only were removed from its original owner and set by
the one leech, while the other sought herbs to put flesh and muscle upon
it.
This introduction apparently has no bearing upon the story proper, which
now begins.
The Fomorians who dwelt in Lochlann laid Ireland under heavy tribute.
Whoever paid not the tax had his nose cut off. One day, when the King of
Sire held a fair upon the hill of Balar, the Tuatha de Danann, who were
there assembled, saw a goodly host coming towards them. This was Lugh
Lamhfhada and the fairy cavalcade from the Land of Promise. Lugh was
mounted on a steed which was as swift as the bleak, cold wind of spring,
and sea and land were equal to her, and her rider was not killed off her
back. When the troop came where the king was they presently saw a grim
and ill-looking band advancing towards them—eighty-one Fomorian
ambassadors come to lift the tax. Lugh arose and slaughtered them,
leaving only nine to bring back the news. Incensed, the Fomorians, under
Breas, the son of Balor of the mighty blows, resolved to invade Ireland
and take revenge on Lugh. “And after ye have overcome him and his
people,” said Balor to the departing warriors, “put your cables round
this island of Erin which gives us so much trouble, and tie it to the
stems of your ships; then sail home, bringing the island with you, and
place it on the north side of Lochlann, whither none of the Tuatha will
ever follow it.” Thus the Irish difficulty is not of yesterday, and
Balor proposed to settle it in a very drastic way.
Lugh heard of their arrival and sent to assemble the fairy cavalcade
from every place where they were. Cian, his father, traversing the plain
of Muirtheimhne on this quest suddenly encountered three warriors—the
sons of Tuireann, with whom, though relatives, he was at deadly feud.
The only ruse he could think of for defence in this awkward plight was
to strike himself with a Druidical wand into the shape of a pig, and
join the herd of swine he saw feeding near him. But the brothers
detected the trick, and Brian the eldest, with one swift stroke of a
magic wand transformed the others into two slender fleet hounds, who
gave tongue ravenously upon the trail of the Druidical pig. While the
latter made for a wooded grove Brian’s spear transfixed her in the
chest, and the pig screamed in human speech, imploring quarter. The only
concession granted the unhappy beast was that she might return into her
original shape and therein get killed. In this Cian had his revenge,
for, instead of the _eric_ of a pig, he assured them they would now be
liable for an _eric_ altogether oppressive, because of his rank.
Six times they buried the body and the earth refused it, but the seventh
time they put it under the sod the earth took to it.
Meanwhile Lugh had joined issue with the Fomorians and got the victory.
And after the slaughter and triumph of the battle, missing his father,
he set out with the fairy cavalcade to find out what had befallen him.
When lo! as he crossed the scene of his sire’s sad fate, the earth spoke
to him and said:—
“Great was the jeopardy in which your father was here, O Lugh, when he
saw the children of Tuireann, for he was obliged to go into the shape of
a pig; nevertheless they subsequently killed him in his own shape.”
The body was thereupon dug up and examined. Lugh kissed it three times,
uttering words of lamentation, and ending with a mournful lay.
“Cian was again placed in the grave after that, his tombstone was
erected over his tomb, his dirge was sung, and his name inscribed in
Ogam.”
And now it will be ill with the sons of Tuireann. Having reached Tara,
and as he sat in honourable position next the King of Erin, Lugh looked
round on the miscreants and ordered the Chain of Attention of the Court
to be shaken, that all present might listen. Of the entire company the
children of Tuireann were the best in agility and dexterity; they were
the handsomest as well as the most honoured. So Lugh approached the
subject of the death of his father and the vengeance due with
circumspection and inquiry. Brian denied: “Nevertheless,” he said,
speaking for himself and his brothers, “we shall give _eric_ for him to
thee, as though we had done the act.”
Thereupon, in presence of all, Lugh announced the compensation required,
“namely, three apples, the skin of a pig, a spear, two steeds, a
chariot, seven pigs, a whelp, a cooking spit, and three shouts on a
hill.” A mere trifle this eric may seem, but it turned out afterwards,
when the special items demanded were characterised, that there was as
much hazard involved in getting any one of them as there was for the
youthful David in another Court, and for another king, to get one
hundred foreskins of the Philistines. Brian suspected treachery, but he
accepted the bill, and with his two brothers went forth to seek the
payment. Daring feats of valour have to be faced to get those wonderful
apples from the Garden of Hesperides, and the skin of the pig of the
King of Greece, and the well-poisoned spear of the King of Persia, and
all the rest. But they got a loan of Lugh’s curach to ferry them over
the wave wherever they wished, and their sister Eithne, going down to
the harbour, uttered a lay over them as the warrior band put out from
the beautiful and clearly-defined borders of Eire.
Success crowned their extraordinary adventures, much to the chagrin of
Lugh, who sent a spell of magic after them to bring them back. They
present him with their spoils, taken in strange and distant lands, only
to be reminded that the full measure of the _eric_ has yet to be
discharged. On the morrow they went to their ship, and the maiden, with
moist eyes, sees them off once more. Again they are successful.
Thereafter, in attempting the last feat of all, namely, to give three
shouts on the hill of Midkena in Lochlann, they got severely wounded by
the spears of its champion guardians. And on their return they
despatched their aged father, Tuireann, to Tara with all haste to seek
from Lamhfhada the gifted skin to relieve them, but Lugh refused; and
the life went forth from the brothers three at the same time.
Their father sang their death song, and “after that lay, Tuireann fell
upon his children and his soul left him;” and they were interred, parent
and sons, and, it is even alleged, sister too, all in one grave.
The “Tragedy of the Children of Lir” is the second in order of the Three
Sorrows. Though set in the earliest cycle, it is not represented in any
of the ancient MSS. The oldest as yet known to contain it is No.
XXXVIII. of the Scottish collection, written at the latest in the early
seventeenth century. There is a copy also in MS. LVI. All the other
copies, which are pretty numerous, belong to the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries, and are in the MSS. of Dublin and the British
Museum. Monsieur H. d’Arbois de Jubainville in his survey noted no less
than seventeen of these. The comparative lateness of the records has led
Mr. Alfred Nutt to surmise that this story may simply be the Gaelic
version of the “Seven Swans” _märchen_, once common in the country, and
worked up by a monk of the sixteenth century—a suggestion Professor
Mackinnon thinks not at all unlikely. O’Curry published the tale with a
translation in the _Atlantis_, and Dr. P. W. Joyce included it in his
_Old Celtic Romances_.
The incidents of this once very popular tale are as follows: In a
conflict with the Milesians the Tuatha de Danann were defeated, and
found it necessary to deliberate on the policy they must pursue and the
king they should elect. Various candidates are eligible, but Bodhbha
Dearg is ultimately chosen. In high dudgeon, Lir, who sought the exalted
position for himself, left the assembly and returned to his own _Sìdh_.
So far from retaliating, the new ruler, when Lir’s wife died, sent for
him and offered him his choice of three of the most beautiful and
best-instructed maidens in all Erin. He took the eldest of these sisters
and married her. But she died, leaving four handsome children, a
daughter and three sons. A second time Lir had his choice, and Eva,
sister number two, came as spouse to his home at _Sìdh_ Fionnachaidh. A
devoted stepmother she proved to the children, till by and by green-eyed
jealousy infected her. She saw that their father would often rise from
his bed in the dawn of the morning and go to theirs to fondle them. And
fancying herself slighted, “she lay in bed a whole year filled with gall
and brooding mischief.”
The outcome of this passion was a plot to do away with the children,
whom for the purpose she enticed to a lonely spot and bribed her
servants to slay. This they refused to do, and although she made the
attempt herself she had not the nerve to execute it. “Her woman’s
weakness prevented her.” Yet she had her revenge in a curious way. She
got the children to bathe in Lake Dairbhreach, and once there, by
Druidical enchantment she transformed them into four beautiful
snow-white swans. As such for 300 years they swim back and fore on the
smooth lake, then for 300 in the Sruth na Maoile (off Kintyre), and 300
more at Iorus Domnann and Innis Gluaire, in the Western Sea. And in no
way could they escape their bird life “until the union of Larguen, a
prince from the north, with Becca, a princess from the south,” or as the
Irish version adds, “until Talchend Adzehead (that is, St. Patrick)
shall come to Erin, bringing the light of a pure faith, and until ye
hear the voice of the Christian bell.”
The vindictive Eva repented her evil deed, but could not undo the
mischief. To ameliorate their lot, she granted her enchanted victims the
use of their Gaelic speech, of their human reason, and the power of
singing sweet, plaintive, fairy music, surpassing all known in the world
in its harmony and soothing influence.
Swift retribution ultimately overtook this once beautiful woman; for
when the king heard of her cruel deed, he asked her “what shape of all
others on the earth, or above the earth, or under the earth she most
abhorred?” To which she replied, “A demon of the air.” “A demon of the
air you shall then be to the end of time,” said the angry Bodhbha Dearg.
Meanwhile the centuries roll over the children of Lir on the peaceful
Lake Dairbhreach, not altogether without sunshine, since the
people—Milesians and Tuatha de Danann alike—were wont to crowd on its
shore to hear their music and watch their graceful movements. But the
time came when they found themselves in “the current of Mull,” tossed on
the stormy seas twixt Erin and Alba, and here they had to dree their
weird with much suffering for another cycle; sometimes separated from
each other in the storm and darkness; at other times almost frozen to
death on Carraig-nanròn. Hapless birds! the slow moving ages bring them
to the third stage, which is pretty much a repetition of their
experiences in the second. For in the Western Ocean round Glora Isle
they are still tormented by the restless wave and the cold and vicious
winds of winter, till their three hundred years therein are
accomplished.
And then at last St Kemoc comes; they hear the sound of the Christian
bell and their spell is broken. Thereafter the children of Lir, no
longer swans, receive Christian baptism and die. For rashly attempting
to take the birds prematurely away from his protection one of the MSS.
asserts that St. Kemoc cursed King Larguen with righteous energy. And
after their death, in the manner of the previous interments, he buried
these ill-starred children all in one grave, sang their death-song,
performed their funeral rites, raised their tomb, and wrote their names
in Ogam. Thus ended their chequered career, which lasted well-nigh a
millennium.
The third Sorrow of Gaelic storydom, that of “Deirdre and the Sons of
Uisneach,” does not belong, strictly speaking, to the mythological
cycle; yet it is prehistoric and mythical in every other respect, though
devoid of the absurd and fantastical elements so characteristic of the
other two. Indeed it may have sprung, as Mr. J. F. Campbell maintains,
from some Indo-European romance, the common heritage in one form or
other of the Aryan family from India to Ireland. The tale is at once the
oldest and most famous of the three Aideds, and must have had a wide
vogue in early times, for it is mentioned in so ancient an authority as
the Book of Leinster, that it was one of the _primscela_ that the bards
were bound to know. Many versions of the saga exist, but chiefly in
ballad form.
The oldest and shortest is that in the Book of Leinster, twelfth
century, with which may be classed one in the Yellow Book of Lecain,
fourteenth century, and in the Egerton MS., British Museum. The best and
fullest version, now published, is generally held to be that obtained
from MSS. LIII. and LVI. of the Scottish collection, the former a vellum
of the fifteenth century. In addition to various other documents in the
Advocates’ Library, such as Nos. V. and XLVIII., which contain
fragments, Monsieur H. d’Arbois de Jubainville found seventeen copies of
the legend in later MSS. in London and Dublin.
The extraordinary interest evinced in this saga is not confined to
ancient or medieval times, but continues unabated down to our own day,
if we may judge by the attention it has received at the hands of
authors, editors, and translators. Nearly every foremost scholar of the
nineteenth century has dealt with it in text, or notes, and translation.
Of many and various publications in modern times, the following will
suffice to show the place it holds in Celtic literature. The texts,
printed sometimes with notes and translation, are usually of different
versions.
O’Flanagan, _Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Dublin_, 1808;
O’Curry, _Atlantis_, vol. iii. 1860, from Yellow Book of Lecain;
Campbell, _Leabhar na Feinne_, 1872; Windisch, _Irische Texte_, vol. i.
Leipzig, 1880; Dr. Whitley Stokes, _Irische Texte_, vol. ii. Leipzig,
1887, the former from Book of Leinster, the latter from MSS. LIII. and
LVI., Advocates’ Library. Dr. Cameron’s _Reliquiæ Celticæ_, also from
MS. LVI. Windisch, O’Curry’s and O’Flanagan’s texts, reprinted _Gaelic
Journal_, Dublin, 1882–84. Carmichael, _Transactions of the Gaelic
Society of Inverness_, vol. xiii. 1887, an admirable folk-lore version
taken down in the Western Isles from oral recitation. Angus Smith, in
his _Loch Etive and Sons of Uisneach_, treats it fictionally in dialogue
form, 1879.
Keating tells the tale in his _History of Ireland_. It is found in part
in the Welsh story of Peredur, taken apparently from a fifteenth century
MS. Mr. Joseph Jacobs has given in English dress, in _Celtic Fairy
Tales_, an abridged account from Carmichael’s version. Of French
translators, H. d’Arbois de Jubainville, M. Georges Dottin, and M. Louis
Ponsinet may be mentioned. Of poetical English versions there is no
lack. Macpherson treated it specially in Darthula, Sir James Ferguson
dramatised it, Dr. Joyce published it in America (Deirdre: Boston and
Dublin), and Drs. Todhunter and Douglas Hyde have given other
renderings. Mr. T. W. Rolleston made it the subject of the Prize Cantata
of the Fèis Ceoil in Dublin in 1897.
Truly a marvellous output of texts and translations, rivalling any in
the whole range of our Gaelic literature. And the above catalogue does
not by any means exhaust the list. The wonder is that the saga should be
found in remote and outlying corners of the Highlands floating by oral
tradition down to our own time. Fletcher got a version about 1750,
Irvine took down part of the verse about 1801 from a fox-hunter on
Tayside, Carmichael from an old Macneill in Barra in 1871. The story is
of additional interest to us because it is laid partly in Ireland and
partly in Scotland, among that beautiful scenery around Loch Etive so
well known to native and tourist.
The story opens at Emain Macha, or Emania, where, with the nobles of
Ulster, King Conchobar is feasting in the house of Feidhlim the bard.
During the entertainment Feidhlim’s wife gave birth to a daughter; and
Cathbad the Druid forthwith prophesied that the child would grow up “a
maiden fair, tall, long-haired, for whom champions would contend.” Her
lips would be cherry-red over pearly teeth; her lovely form the envy of
high queens. Deirdre, the Druid named her, and thrilled the company by
announcing that her queenly beauty would yet involve the province in
heavy woes.
All the nobles present, instantly wished to circumvent such destiny by
having the child put to death. Conchobar intervened: “Let not that be
done,” said he; “I will take her with me and send her to be reared that
she may become my own wife.” Deirdre was accordingly removed and kept
apart in a fortress, seeing no one but her tutor and nurse and
Lebarcham, the king’s _banchainte_ or conversation woman. Shot up at
length into the fair maiden of Cathbad’s prediction, she happened one
snowy day to be looking out, when she observed her _oide_ (tutor)
killing a calf, and a raven came to drink the blood. “Dear to me” she
exclaimed, “would be the man who would have the three colours yonder on
him, his hair like the raven, his cheek like the blood, and his body
like the snow.” “Such an one is Naois, son of Uisneach,” suggested the
_banchainte_.
They met, Deirdre and he. A kinsman of the king and one of three gifted
brothers, this Naois stood head and neck taller than any man in Erin,
and peerless in strength, courage, and manly beauty. When he or his
brothers sang, the cows gave two-thirds additional milk and people were
enchanted. Their prowess was such that the three together could meet all
Ulster in arms.
Deirdre adored Naois, and proposed that they twain should elope. At
first he refused, but bewitched by her charms and entreaties he yielded.
The brothers went off, taking their followers, 150 men with their wives
and greyhounds. For a time they were pursued round Erin to Ballyshannon,
Howth, Rathlin, till they sought refuge in Alba and sailed for Loch
Etive. From that beautiful centre they made many excursions inland,
living in hunting booths, chasing the deer on the mountains, assisting
the King of Alba, who needed their help, and living joyous and free; a
most romantic life, full of incident and full of happiness.
After a time Conchobar hatched a plot to lure them back. First he
approached Cuchulinn and Conall Cearnach to undertake a mission. But
these champions, suspecting treachery, gave blunt refusal. At length
Fergus Mac Roich was induced to go, not without misgivings. When he
arrived with his two sons and bargeman, Naois and Deirdre were sitting
together in their hunting booth playing at chess. Fergus went into the
glen and raised his sweet-voiced warning cry, after the manner of a
hunter. Naois heard the sound and said, “I hear the cry of a man of
Erin.” Deirdre dissimulated at first, “That was not the cry of a man of
Erin but the cry of a man of Alba.” Afterwards she explained it was
because of a dream she had had, which she felt foreboded evil. The
emissaries spend the night with them and win over Naois.
Next morning they all sail away, returning to Erin, and as the land
fades from her view, Deirdre with mingled regret and presentiment, sings
or recites a beautiful lay, describing the shores of Loch Etive and the
charms of the life she led in the glens. The following rendering is from
Dr. Skene, the few verses here quoted indicating the feeling and passion
of the old lyric:—
Glen Etive! O Glen Etive!
There I raised my earliest house;
Beautiful its woods on rising
When the sun fell on Glen Etive.
Glen Orchy! O Glen Orchy!
The straight glen of smooth ridges;
No man of his age was so joyful
As Naois in Glen Orchy.
Glenlaidhe! O Glenlaidhe!
I used to sleep by its soothing murmurs;
Fish and flesh of wild boar and badger,
Was my repast in Glenlaidhe.
Glendaruadh! O Glendaruadh!
I love each man of its inheritance,
Sweet the noise of the cuckoo on bended bough,
On the hill above Glendaruadh.
Glenmasan! O Glenmasan!
High its herbs, fair its boughs;
Solitary was the place of our repose,
On grassy Invermasan.
The upshot of this fateful voyage was that Fergus, their guardian, was
unwittingly decoyed to a feast through the King’s strategy, his son
Buinne Borb was bribed to act the traitor, and the sons of Uisneach were
slain. But not before they had done mighty execution against the hosts
of Conchobar, and kept them at bay till his Druid put a sea with high
waves across the plain before them, while their foes had the benefit of
dry land on which to attack from behind.
Deirdre was distracted at the loss of her lover. Taken to the King’s
palace, for the space of a whole year even the raising of her head or
the giving of a smile she did not concede, till Conchobar, chagrined
with such moping, resolved to send her away for a time with Eogan who
slew Naois. On the way the evil man flung her a brutal taunt, suggestive
of her defencelessness, which when Deirdre heard she gave a start, made
a wild leap from the chariot, and her brains were dashed in fragments
against a pillar stone that stood opposite. But the manner of her death
is otherwise told in the popular version, apparently with more romantic
effect and less probability. All through, the narrative is interspersed
with touching lays, expressive of the heroine’s feelings at various
times. Thus after her loss:—
Long is the day without Uisneach’s children,
It was not mournful to be in their company,
Sons of a king by whom pilgrims were rewarded;
Three lions from the hill of the cave.
Thou that diggest the tomb,
And that puttest my darling from me,
Make not the grave too narrow;
I shall be beside the noble ones.
Cathbad, the Druid, in retaliation for Conchobar’s dissimulation, curses
Emain Macha; and Fergus Mac Roich, resenting the dastardly treachery
that brought the noble sons of Uisneach to an untimely grave, took
service under Queen Meve of Connaught and harassed Ulster for years. At
length Nemesis overtook the guilty Conchobar. Emania is levelled to the
ground, never again to be rebuilt. None of his race inherit the proud
walls of that ancient citadel.
Thus, like Helen of Troy, was Deirdre the unhappy cause of strife and
calamity to the land and its people, to the lover and friends she held
so dear—fateful Deirdre and hapless sons of Uisneach!
CHAPTER IX
THE HEROIC CYCLE
The golden age of Gaelic romance—Number of the tales—Cuchulinn—His
early adventures—The Wooing of Eimer—Training in Skye—The Bridge
of the Cliffs—Tragedy of Conlaoch—Elopement—The “Táin Bó
Chuailgné,” and exploits of Cuchulinn—Ferdia at the ford—The two
champions of Western Europe—Cuchulinn in the Deaf Valley—Death—The
Red Rout of Conall Cearnach—Instruction of Cuchulinn to a
prince—His “Phantom Chariot”—Modern translations of these rare
sagas.
The Heroic, or, as it is sometimes called, the Cuchulinn, or Red-Branch
cycle, corresponds with the period immediately before and after the
opening of the Christian era.
This was really the golden age of Gaelic romance, at once the most
complete, productive, and brilliant of the three traditional epochs. And
happily of it almost all the larger and more important tales have been
preserved. What a world of human interest is conjured up even by the
names and titles of these old-world sagas. Among them we find the “Táin
Bó Chuailgné”; Deirdre and the Sons of Uisneach; Conchobar’s Vision; The
Battle of Rosnaree; Conchobar’s Tragedy; The Conception of Cuchulinn;
His Training; The Wooing of Eimer; Death of Conlaoch; Cuchulinn’s
Adventure at the Boyne; Intoxication of the Ultonians; Bricriu’s
Banquet; Eimer’s Jealousy; Cuchulinn’s Pining; Conall’s Red Rout and the
Lay of the Heads; The Capture of the Sìdh; The Phantom Chariot of
Cuchulinn; and that hero’s Death; The Recovery of the Táin through the
Resurrection of Fergus. These and many other episodes, quaint and
suggestive, give us curious glints into the past.
In her recent book on the Cuchulinn saga, Miss Eleanor Hull has
classified the tales of this cycle under eight heads, which may be
briefly summarised as follows:—
I. Tales personal to Conchobar 5
II. „ „ Cuchulinn 16
III. „ „ Fergus Mac Roich 5
IV. „ „ Conall 4
V. „ „ Celtchar 2
VI. „ „ Curigh 4
VII. „ prefatory to “Táin Bó Chuailgné” 24
VIII. Miscellaneous 36
——
Total 96
==
A goodly aggregate, indeed, to survive the dim forgetfulness of time!
These narratives now constitute the main body of early Celtic tradition.
They breathe the spirit of the race in the long distant past, and
consequently are of unique value and import.
It is evident they bear marks of pre-Christian origin, but we must
remember they have reached us through the transcription of monks, and
hence be prepared to find in them many interpolations, suppressions, and
alterations. Indeed one very old legend represents the longest—the
“Táin,” as having been taken down by St. Ciaran at the grave of Fergus
Mac Roich, and to the dictation of that hero, who, it appears, was
conjured up from the dead for the purpose. St. Columba and the other
chief saints of Ireland are reported as witnesses of this proceeding,
and on their departure with the coveted writing, after they had offered
up thanksgiving, Fergus also retired to his lone tomb.
There are Scotch versions of some of the sagas, but the vast majority
are Irish. The earliest written copies are those in the Leabhar Na
h’Uidhre and Book of Leinster—the latter the fullest of all the saga
documents.
Ulster was the chief theatre of the Heroic drama. In that province,
under the patronage of King Conchobar, arose the renowned order of
knighthood which included such celebrities as Conall Cearnach,
Cuchulinn, and the sons of Uisneach. Yet of all the knights of the Royal
Branch, the second, above-named, was _facile princeps_, the most
outstanding and representative man; in fact, a kind of demigod, round
whom whole armies and many champions fatefully gyrated.
_Fortissimus heros Scotorum_, says the Annals of Tighernach, “vii years
was his age when he took arms, xvii when he was in pursuit of the ‘Táin
Bó Chuailgné,’ xxvii when he died.” The Book of Ballymote, a later MS.,
gives him a much longer career, asserting that the year of the “Táin”
was the fifty-ninth of Cuchulinn’s age, from the night of his birth to
the night of his death.
To get at once a direct and luminous glimpse into the literature of his
cycle, we have only to follow this champion in his varied fortunes and
exploits. And so we turn to the story of his extraordinary career,
recognising that the Celtic imagination has here full play, untrammelled
by the limitations of physical science or modern thought, and that in
these rich and varied creations of fancy we have fact and fiction so
intricately commingled that it is vain to try to differentiate between
them.
Some of the sagas tell us that Cuchulinn was supernaturally descended
from the god Lugh. But later versions with more restraint affirm that
his father’s name was Sualtam, his mother’s Dechtine, and that she was a
sister of King Conchobar. When a boy he was known as Setanta, till he
got the name Cuchulinn, which came to him in a manner quite
characteristic and worthy of mention.
Culand, a smith and Ulster retainer, it appears, had asked the king and
his retinue to spend a night and a day with him. In response to this
invitation “all the Ultonian nobles set out: a great train of
provincials, sons of kings and chiefs, young lords and men-at-arms, the
curled and rosy youth of the kingdom, and the maidens and fair-ringleted
ladies of Ulster. Handsome virgins, accomplished damsels, and splendid
fully-developed women were there; satirists and scholars were there; and
the companies of singers and musicians, poets who composed songs and
reproofs, and praising-poems for the men of Ulster. There came also with
them from Emania, historians, judges, horseriders, buffoons, tumblers,
fools, and performers on horseback. They all went by the same way behind
the king.”
Late that evening Culand inquired if any more were expected, and on
receiving a reply in the negative, he closed the doors and let loose the
house-dog. No sooner was the place thus shut up for the night than the
boy Setanta arrived, and was set on by the dog. A fierce struggle
followed, but the youth got the better of his canine assailant and laid
him lifeless. For this loss Culand demanded _eric_. Unable to pay,
Setanta offered to watch the house himself until a pup of its slain
guardian grew up. Hence the name Cu-Chulaind, that is, Culand’s dog, by
which he was subsequently known. So runs the myth.
Afterwards, with the consent of his mother, he paid a visit to his uncle
the king. Happening to arrive at Emania when the boys were playing
shinty, the mischievous frolics began to throw their balls and _camags_
at him. Whereupon Cuchulinn’s “war-rage seized him,” and “he shut one
eye till it was not wider than the eye of a needle; he opened the other
till it was bigger than the mouth of a meal goblet.” No wonder that the
terrified youngsters fled in every direction.
Presently King Conchobar recognised his nephew when he presented himself
at the Court, and he introduced him to his youthful compeers. Suitable
arms, a suitable chariot and charioteer were given him, and he soon
proved himself a unique warrior.
The women of Ulster admired him “for his splendour at the feat, for the
nimbleness of his leap, for the excellence of his wisdom, for the melody
of his language, for the beauty of his face, and for the loveliness of
his look.” “There were seven pupils in his royal eyes, four in the one
and three in the other; seven fingers on each of his two hands, and
seven toes on each of his two feet.” “I should think,” says the writer
of one text, “it was a shower of pearls that was flung into his head.
Blacker than the side of a black cooking-spit, each of his two eyebrows,
redder than ruby his lips.”
He was too young, too daring, too beautiful, in the opinion of the
chiefs, to be a gallant unwed; for their women and maidens loved him
greatly. So they took counsel with the king to have him married.
Emissaries were sent to the courts and princes of all Erin in quest of a
partner whom it might please Cuchulinn to woo, but they returned after a
year unsuccessful.
Left to fend for himself, the hero got ready his chariot and set out for
the house of Forgaill of Lusk, whose daughter Eimer was renowned for the
six victories she had upon her: the gift of beauty, the gift of voice,
the gift of music, the gift of embroidery and all needlework, and the
gifts of wisdom and virtuous chastity. In the pleasure-ground of the
mansion, surrounded by the fair daughters of the neighbouring chiefs and
men of wealth, the lady descried the famous chariot in the distance, and
one of her maidens describes the appearance of the horses, the chariot,
charioteer, and hero. The latter she reports thus:—
Within the chariot a dark sad man, comeliest of the men of Erin.
Around him a beautiful crimson five-folded tunic, fastened at its
opening on his white breast with a brooch of inlaid gold, against
which it heaves beating in full strokes. A shirt with a white hood,
interwoven red with flaming gold. Seven red dragon gems on the ground
of either of his eyes. Two blue-white, blood-red cheeks, that breathe
forth sparks and flashes of fire. A ray of love burns in his look.
Methinks a shower of pearls has fallen into his mouth. As black as the
side of a black ruin each of his eyebrows. On his two thighs rests a
golden hilted sword, and fastened to the copper frame of the chariot
is a blood-red spear with a sharp mettlesome blade, on a shaft of wood
well-fitted to the hand. Over his shoulders a crimson shield with a
rim of silver, ornamented with figures of golden animals. He leaps the
hero’s salmon-leap into the air and does many like swift feats.
Such was Cuchulinn in the damsel’s eyes. Eimer declined his suit at
first on the plea that she was a younger daughter, and advised him to
approach her father for leave to pay court to her elder sister, whose
brilliant accomplishments she fully rehearsed. This suggestion the hero
spurned and love sprang up between them.
After he departed Forgaill heard of the visit of the remarkable unknown
stranger, and quickly divined who he was. Not wishing to have this
professional champion as son-in-law, the wily father disguised himself
as a Gaulish or Scandinavian envoy and set out for Emania. There he was
well received by the king, and while witnessing the feats of the knights
he took occasion to recommend the king to send his nephew to Skye to
complete his special training in arms, at the celebrated school of the
lady Scathach. His sinister idea was that so many dangers and
difficulties would beset Cuchulinn on the way that he would never
return. The latter vowed he would go. And on setting out he encountered
many perils. Among others he had to traverse “the plain of misfortune,”
which he did by the aid of a wheel and of an apple given him by a chance
acquaintance. He took instruction from the Albannach Donall by the way,
and declined the love of his ugly daughter. But departing from their
home he arrived in safety at Dun Scathach.
The Grianan or sunny house of his future instructress, “built upon a
rock of appalling height,” “had seven great doors and seven great
windows between every two doors of them, and thrice fifty couches
between every two windows of them, and thrice fifty handsome
marriageable girls in scarlet cloaks and in beautiful and blue attire,
attending and waiting upon Scathach.”
Here he met his one match in arms, Ferdia Mac Daman, the Firbolg
champion. Naois, Ardan, and Ainnle, the three sons of Uisneach, were
also pupils. To pass the “Bridge of the Cliffs” was the first great feat
to be learned. “Wonderful was the sight that bridge afforded when any
one would leap upon it, for it narrowed until it became as narrow as the
hair of one’s head, and the second time it shortened until it became as
short as an inch, and the third time it grew slippery as an eel of the
river, and the fourth time it rose up on high against you until it was
as tall as the mast of a ship.”
It was while practising the feat of the bridge that Scathach’s lovely
daughter Uathach fell in love with him as she spied the hero from one of
the windows of the Grianan. And then “her face and colour constantly
changed, so that now she would be as white as a little white flowret,
and again she would become scarlet.” Cuchulinn and she were afterwards
married. During his sojourn at the Dun, Scathach was carrying on war
against other tribes over whom her rival the Princess Aoife (Eva) ruled.
When the two hosts met, Aoife challenged Scathach to single combat, and
Cuchulinn went out instead to encounter the heroine. This was his chance
introduction to the lady who bore him his famous son Conlaoch. Before he
went back again to his native land, he left instructions with her that
the child to be born if a girl would be hers, if a boy she was to train
him In all hero feats, except the gaebolg or belly dart—a mysterious
weapon that could only be cast at fords on water. Then she was to send
him to Erin, bidding him tell no man who he was.
Conlaoch’s amazing exploits in his father’s country are related in a
special tale, which tells how he killed the Ulster warriors sent against
him, and how Cuchulinn himself unwittingly opposed him in arms till,
hard pressed by his skilful opponent, he called for his gaebolg and
despatched him.
It was then the unhappy father discovered that he had killed his own
son.
This is apparently the Gaelic version of the well-known Persian tale of
Sohrab and Rustum—a story of Aryan origin. Just as Cuchulinn recognised
when too late his kinship with Conlaoch, and mourned over him, so did
the father of the young Tartar, for the brief moments the latter
survived his mortal wound.
On his return from Skye, prior to the birth of his ill-fated son,
Cuchulinn had been joyously welcomed home by King Conchobar and his
knights. Losing no time he proceeded to Lusk to claim Eimer. The young
lady had in his absence become deeply enamoured of him, though her
father and brothers remained obdurate. Fortifying themselves against the
intrusion of the champion for a whole year, they denied him entrance, or
even a sight of his faithful lover, until Cuchulinn, getting desperate,
scaled the walls, overcame his opponents and carried off Eimer, her
maid, and much treasure in his chariot. All the way north to Emania he
had frequent combats with the men who followed to frustrate this heroic
elopement.
Commenting on the story, O’Curry makes the interesting remark that
“there is scarcely a hill, valley, river, rock, mound, or cave in the
line of country from Emania in the present county of Armagh to Lusk in
that of Dublin of which the ancient and often varying names and history
are not to be found in this singularly curious tract,” namely, the
Wooing of Eimer. “So that, if we look upon it even as a highly-coloured
historic romance, it will be found one of the most valuable of our large
collection of ancient compositions on account of the light which it
throws not merely on ancient social manners, and on the military feats
and terms of those days, but on the meaning of so vast a number of
topographical names. And it records, too, I may add, very many curious
customs and superstitions, many of which to this day characterise the
native Irish people.”
Other exploits of the wonderful Cuchulinn are related in the “Táin Bó
Chuailgné” or “Cattle Raid of Cooley”—the greatest and longest of the
heroic sagas. Here we encounter that remarkable Amazon, Queen Meve of
Connaught, and her third husband, Ailill. When at Rath-Cruachan it seems
they had spread their royal couch, and between them there ensued a
pillow conversation, ending in a controversy as to which of the two was
the richer. In this debate comparison was made between their mugs and
vats and iron vessels, their urns and brewers’ troughs, and kieves.
Their jewels also were brought out, such as finger-rings, clasps,
bracelets, thumb-rings, diadems, and gorgets of gold; their apparel of
crimson, blue, black and green, yellow and chequered and buff,
wan-coloured, pied and striped. Comparison was made between their flocks
of sheep and steeds and studs, and herds of swine and droves of cows.
But all were found to be exactly equal.
Then Ailill recollected that he had a young bull named “Finn-bheannach”
or “White-horned,” which had been calved by one of the Queen’s cows, but
which had left her herd and joined his own because the high-minded
animal did not “deem it honourable to be under a woman’s control.”
Meve’s disappointment was keen that no bull of hers was found to match
this one; so, when Fergus Mac Roth the herald assured her that Daré, in
Cuailgne, Ulster, possessed a brown one, the best in all Erin, she
immediately sent him with nine subordinates to fetch it, offering its
owner liberal terms for a year’s loan. Daré treated the messengers with
kindly hospitality, and agreed to the royal request. But, unhappily,
while the men were imbibing too freely that night, his steward overheard
one of them boasting that if the bull had not been willingly sent they
would have taken it by compulsion.
On this coming to Daré’s ears, he swore by the gods that now they would
not have his Donn Chuailgne either by force or consent.
Meve was not a woman to be thus lightly denied or insulted. _Nolens
volens_ she would have the bull, and summoned her native forces for
action. She also invited the men of Leinster and Munster to join her in
avenging past indignities received at the hands of the men of Ulster.
Fifteen hundred men from the latter province, who happened to be at feud
with King Conchobar for his treachery to the sons of Uisneach, were
prevailed upon to answer her summons, and a great army set out. At a
place near modern Louth, where they halted on the march, a feast was
held, at which the Queen contrived to promise to each of the leaders,
without the knowledge of the rest, the hand of her beautiful daughter
Finnamhair in marriage as a stimulus to valour and fidelity. “On one of
the nights the snow that fell reached to men’s legs and to the wheels of
the chariots, so that it made one plain of the five provinces of Erin,
and the men never suffered so much before in camp. None knew throughout
the whole night whether it was his friend or his foe who was next him
until the clear shining sun rose early on the morrow.”
Though the Ulster men had sufficient warning of the approach of this
host, they were not in readiness. A childish helplessness, to which they
were subject for an unmanly crime, had overtaken them and left them at
the mercy of their foes.
It was Cuchulinn’s country the enemy had invaded, and he kept them at
bay. Hovering around them unseen all day, he killed as many as a hundred
each night with his sling. In vain Meve tried to buy this boyish hero
off, first by a mutual conference, with the glen between them, and
second by sending an embassage with Mac Roth as messenger-in-chief. On
this occasion Cuchulinn discarded the twenty-seven cunningly prepared
undershirts which with cords and ropes were secured about him. And this
he did to escape the difficulty that would arise in throwing them off,
should his paroxysm come to boiling point and he in them still. Anon for
thirty feet all round the hero’s body the snow melted with the intense
heat generated in his system. His charioteer, we are told, durst not
come nigh him. From a safe distance he informed his master of Mac Roth’s
approach and described him.
Cuchulinn demands single combat, enjoining his opponents by the laws of
Irish chivalry not to pass the ford till he was overcome. Queen Meve
reluctantly consents, deeming it better to lose one warrior a day than a
hundred each night. With her messenger came a youth anxious to see the
renowned hero, and he, deceived by the boyish appearance of Cuchulinn,
determined to fight him. To warn the rash stripling of his danger, the
latter plays upon him two sword-feats. By the first, “the under-cut,” he
slices away the sod from under this Etarchomal’s soles and lays him
supine, with the sod upon his upturned chest. By the second, “the
vigorous edge-stroke,” he takes off all his hair from poll to forehead
and from ear to ear, as clean as though he had been shaven with a razor,
but without drawing blood. Finally, he despatches him with the “oblique
transverse stroke,” whereby in three simultaneously fallen segments the
youth reaches the ground.
Champion after champion falls in single combat, until Meve, getting
desperate, had at length to call in the aid of magic. So we read that
one warrior was helped by demons of the air in bird shape, but in vain;
and the great magician Cailatin and his twenty-seven sons, despite their
spells, also met their doom. Cuchulinn was further persecuted by the
war-goddess, the Morrigan, who appears in all shapes to plague him and
to frighten the life of valour out of his soul. He himself is not behind
in demoniac influence, for with the help of the Tuatha de
Danann—Manannan especially—he does great havoc among Meve’s troops,
circling round them in his chariot and dealing death with his sling.
It was during one of these exploits that he gave his chariot the heavy
turn, so that its iron wheels sank into the earth and their track was in
itself a sufficient fortification, for the stones and pillars and flags
and sand rose back high on every side round the wheels.
His foes are baffled. Impatient Meve cannot forget that the Ulster men
will soon be rid of their childish feebleness, and then the game is up.
So she approaches Ferdia, the only warrior fit to match Cuchulinn, with
the view of arranging a combat whereby the latter may be laid low.
Ferdia at first refuses to fight his former comrade, with whom he had
made a compact of undying friendship while attending the lady Scathach’s
school in Skye. The Queen then promises him Finnamhair for wife, with
land and riches. It is probable that even this bait would not have
fetched the unwilling warrior had she not further threatened that her
druids and ollamhs would “criticise, satirise, and blemish him,” enough
to “raise three blisters on his face,” if he refused. Thereafter he
consented, thinking it better to fall by valour and championship than by
druids and reproach.
Fergus was accordingly sent forward to tell Cuchulinn that his friend
Ferdia was coming to fight him. “I am here,” retorted the champion,
“detaining and delaying the four great provinces of Erin from Samhain
till Feill Brighde, and I have not yielded one foot in retreat before
any one during that time, nor will I, I trust, before him.” The
charioteer gets ready the chariot, and into it sprang “the
battle-fighting, dexterous, battle-winning, red-sworded hero, Cuchulinn,
son of Sualtam, and there shouted around him Bocanachs and Bananachs and
Genîtî Glindi, and demons of the air. For the Tuatha de Danann were used
to set up shouts around him, so that the hatred and the fear and the
abhorrence and the great terror of him should be greater in every
battle, in every battlefield, in every combat, and in every fight into
which he went.”
The heroes met at the ford. After the first day’s fight, “each of them
approached the other forthwith and each put his hand round the other’s
neck and gave him three kisses. Their horses were in the same paddock
that night, and their charioteers at the same fire; and their
charioteers spread beds of green rushes for them with wounded men’s
pillows to them. The professors of healing and curing came to heal and
cure them, and they applied herbs and plants to the stabs and cuts and
gashes and to all their wounds. Of every herb and of every healing and
curing plant that was put to the stabs and cuts and gashes and to all
the wounds of Cuchulinn, he would send an equal portion from him
westward over the ford to Ferdia, so that the men of Erin might not be
able to say, should Ferdia fall by him, that it was by better means of
cure that he was enabled to kill him.”
As the days pass the fighting becomes more serious. Early on the fourth
Ferdia arose and went forward alone to the ford. He knew that that day
would decide the contest, and that either or both of them would fall.
Having put on his wonderful suit of battle, he displayed many
extraordinary feats which he never learned from any other,—not from
Scathach, or Uathach, or Aoife, but which were invented by himself.
On seeing these, Cuchulinn said to his charioteer, “I perceive there, my
friend Laeg, the noble, varied, wonderful, numerous feats which Ferdia
displays on high, and all these will be tried on me in succession.
Therefore if it be I who shall begin to yield this day thou must excite,
reproach, and speak evil to me, that the paroxysm of my rage and anger
shall grow the more. If it be I who shall prevail then thou shalt laud
and praise and speak good words to me, that my courage may be the
greater.”
“It shall be so done indeed, O Cuchulinn,” replied the faithful Laeg.
The champions then arranged to try the ford feat. And the saga remarks:
“Great was the deed, now, that was performed on that day at the ford—the
two heroes, the two warriors, the two champions of Western Europe, the
two gifted and stipend-bestowing hands of the north-west of the world,
the two beloved pillars of the valour of the Gael, and the two keys of
the bravery of the Gael, to be brought to fight from afar through the
instigation and intermeddling of Ailill and Meve.”
First, they began to shoot with missive weapons, till, getting more
furious, Cuchulinn sprang at his opponent twice for the purpose of
striking his head over the rim of his shield, but each time Ferdia gave
the shield a stroke of his left knee or elbow, and cast Cuchulinn from
him like a little child on the brink of the ford.
Laeg perceived that act, and, true to the instructions of his master,
began taunting him. “Alas! indeed,” said he, “the warrior who is against
thee casts thee away as a lewd woman would cast her child. He throws
thee as a mill would grind fresh malt. He pierces thee as the felling
axe would pierce the oak. He binds thee as the woodbine binds the tree.
He darts on thee as the hawk darts on small birds, so that henceforth
thou hast not call, or right, or claim to valour or bravery to the end
of time and life, thou little fairy phantom.”
At that word up sprang the fallen hero with the rapidity of the wind,
and with the readiness of the swallow, and with the fierceness of the
dragon, and the strength of the lion, into the troubled clouds of the
air the third time, and he alighted on the boss of the shield of Ferdia,
but with the same humiliating result.
“It was then that Cuchulinn’s first distortion came on, and he was
filled with swelling and great fulness, like breath in a bladder, until
he became a terrible, fearful, many-coloured Tuaig, and he became as big
as a Fomor, or man of the sea, the great and valiant champion in perfect
height over Ferdia.”
So close was the fight they made now that the Bocanachs and Bananachs,
and wild people of the glens, and demons of the air screamed from the
rims of their shields, and from the hilts of their swords, and from the
hafts of their spears.
At length Ferdia found an unguarded moment upon his opponent and wounded
him sorely. Cuchulinn, unable to endure this, or Ferdia’s stout quick
strokes and tremendous great blows at him, called for the gaebolg. It
was a weapon that used to be let down the stream and cast from between
the toes. It made the wound of one spear in entering the body, but it
had thirty barbs to open, and could not be drawn out of a person’s body
until it was cut out. So Laeg set the gaebolg down the stream, and
Cuchulinn caught it between the toes of his foot and threw an unerring
cast of it at Ferdia.
“That is enough now indeed,” said the wounded man. “I fall of that.”
Thereafter a trance, a faint, and a weakness fell on Cuchulinn as he saw
the body of Ferdia. But Laeg roused him, and then he began to lament and
mourn, and to utter a panegyric over his slain rival as David did over
Jonathan:—
O Ferdia (he said) treachery hath defeated thee.
Unhappy was thy fate—
Thou to die, I to remain,—
Grievous for ever is our lasting separation.
When we were far away, yonder
With Scathath, the gifted Buanand,
We then resolved that till the end of time
We should not be hostile one to the other.
Dear to me was thy beautiful ruddiness,
Dear to me thy perfect form,
Dear to me thy clear grey-blue eye,
Dear to me thy wisdom and thine eloquence.
There hath not come to the body-cutting combat,
There hath not been angered by manly exertion,
There hath not borne shield on the field of spears
Thine equal, O ruddy son of Daman.
Never until now have I met,
Since I slew Aoife’s only son,
Thy like in deeds of battle,
Never have I found, O Ferdia.
Finnamhair, daughter of Meve,
Notwithstanding her excellent beauty,
It is putting a _gad_ on the sand or sunbeam
For thee to expect her, O Ferdia.
He continued to gaze on his fallen friend, and when at length, tempted
by his charioteer to come away and get healed of his grievous wounds, he
said, “We will leave now, O my friend Laeg, but every other combat and
fight that ever I have made was to me but as a game and a sport compared
to the combat and the fight of Ferdia.”
There is a most beautiful rendering of his further eulogy in Dr.
Sigerson’s _Bards of the Gael and Gall_. Here it is. The repetition and
rhythm have been adapted from the original:—
Play was each, pleasure each,
Till Ferdia faced the beach;
One had been our student-life,
One in strife of school our place,
One our gentle teacher’s grace,
Loved o’er all and each.
Play was each, pleasure each,
Till Ferdia faced the beach,
One had been our wonted ways,
One the praise for feat of fields,
Scathach gave two victor shields—
Equal prize to each.
Play was each, pleasure each,
Till Ferdia faced the beach;
Dear that pillar of pure gold,
Who fell cold beside the ford.
Hosts of heroes felt his sword
First in battle’s breach.
Play was each, pleasure each,
Till Ferdia faced the beach;
Lion, fiery, fierce, and bright,
Wave whose might nothing withstands,
Sweeping, with the shrinking sands,
Horror o’er the beach.
Play was each, pleasure each,
Till Ferdia faced the beach;
Loved Ferdia, dear to me;
I shall dree his death for aye,
Yesterday a mountain he,—
But a shade to-day.
Queen Meve with her army ravaged the province of Ulster and secured the
Donn Chuailgne. Ultimately, through the recovery of the Ultonians from
their temporary debility, she was thoroughly defeated. Yet,
notwithstanding the loss of so many warriors, the masterful woman
congratulates herself on having accomplished the two great objects of
her expedition—the securing of the brown bull and the chastisement of
her former husband, King Conchobar.
The story of the Táin ends in an anti-climax, relating in the most
ludicrous and fantastic manner the tragic fate of the bulls,[19] the
unwitting cause of all this frenzy.
But Queen Meve was determined to avenge herself on Cuchulinn, and in the
course of time collected another large army. Among all his foes none was
more venomous than were the descendants of the wizard Cailatin, who,
with his twenty-seven sons, had been killed at the ford combat. The
malignant efforts of these sorcerers to get the warrior into their power
are vividly described. For a time he was kept and entertained in the
royal palace by his wife Eimer and the ladies of Emania, and poets, and
musicians, and wise men. The wizards made noise as of battle, and when
Cuchulinn looked out he imagined he saw battalions drawn up upon the
plains smiting each other unsparingly. It was with difficulty he was
withheld from going out.
So, by Conchobar’s command he was taken at length by the druids and
ladies of the Court to a far away lonely glen, called the Deaf Valley.
Even here the wizards found him, and in consequence the very dogs were
terrified with the goblins, prodigies, and eldritch things with which
the place was haunted. A full account is given of the manner in which
they ultimately decoyed him from his retreat, and it is related how all
the omens were against him. For example, his brooch fell and pierced his
foot. His noble steed, the Liath Macha, refused to be yoked, and when
finally persuaded, let fall down his cheeks two large tears of dusky
blood.
But Cuchulinn met his foes in battle array. And as many as there were of
grains of sand in the sea, of stars in heaven, of dewdrops in May, of
snowflakes in winter, of hailstones in a storm, of leaves in a forest,
of ears of corn in Magh Breagh, of stalks of grass beneath the feet of
the herds on a summer’s day, so many halves of heads and of shields, so
many halves of hands and of feet, so many red bones, were scattered by
him throughout the plain of Muirtheimhne. Grey was that field with the
brains of his enemies, so fierce and furious the hero’s onslaught.
When he fell, he fell pierced with his own spear, which Lewy, the son of
Curigh, had hurled back upon him, but rising again, he went against a
pillar of stone that he might die standing up. And the Liath Macha
defended him with teeth and hoofs to the last, killing as many as thirty
in the struggle. So died the mighty Cuchulinn.
In the Red Rout of Conall Cearnach we read how that famous knight, who
had been previously sent for, came back from Pictland to avenge the
death of his friend, and how he brought the heads of the chief offenders
to Eimer.
Satisfied with this retribution, Eimer desired Conall to dig a grave for
Cuchulinn wide and deep; and she laid herself down in it with her mate,
saying, “Love of my soul, O friend, O gentle sweetheart, many were the
women who envied me thee until now, and I shall not live after thee.”
After she expired Conall performed the customary funeral obsequies,
wrote their names in Ogam, and raised the stone over their tomb.
In the Leabhar Na h’Uidhre there is a detached episode entitled, “The
Instruction of Cuchulinn to a Prince.” It occurs in the romance known as
“The Sickbed of Cuchulinn,” and on the authority of the Brehon Law we
know that many of the precepts therein enjoined were rules legally
incumbent on the chieftains in aftertimes.
The occasion was the election of a king to rule over Erin in Tara.
Lugaid, destined for this exalted office, was at the time the pupil of
Cuchulinn, sitting over his pillow as he lay ill. When news came,
suddenly the prostrate hero arose and began to instruct the young
prince. Among other precepts he gave voice to these, which show not only
the traditional estimate of the hero’s character, but also the high
moral qualities expected in the chief ruler of Erin and his satellites.
“Speak not haughtily. Discourse not noisily. Mock not, insult not,
deride not the old. Think not ill of any. Make no demands that cannot be
met. Receive submissively the instructions of the wise. Be mindful of
the admonitions of the old. Follow the decrees of your fathers. Be not
cold-hearted to friends; but against your foes be vigorous. Avoid
dishonourable disputes in your many contests. Be not a tattler and
abuser. Waste not, hoard not, alienate not. Submit to reproof for
unbecoming deeds. Do not sacrifice justice to the passions of men. Be
not lazy lest you become weakened, be not importunate lest you become
contemptible.”
“Do you consent to follow these counsels?” the distinguished tutor
asked.
To which the prince made answer, “These precepts without exception are
worthy to be observed. All men will see that none of them shall be
neglected. They shall be executed, if it be possible.”
Little wonder that in later Christian times the old pagan hero was held
in high esteem, and even exalted into a medium for the conversion of
King Laoghaire, whom the preaching of St. Patrick himself failed to
convince. In the “Phantom Chariot of Cuchulinn” it is related that
Patrick went to Tara to enjoin belief upon the King of Erin, that is,
upon Laoghaire, son of Nial, for he was King of Erin at the time, and
would not believe in the Lord, though he had preached unto him. “By no
means will I believe in thee, nor yet in God,” said the heathen monarch
to the saint, “until thou shalt call up Cuchulinn in all his dignity, as
he is recorded in the old stories, that I may see him, and that I may
address him in my presence here; after that I will believe in thee.”
Upon this St. Patrick conjured up the hero, so that he appeared to the
King in his chariot as of old. Laoghaire’s description of Cuchulinn as
thus seen in his phantom chariot is even more graphic than that of the
maid in the Wooing of Eimer.
The spectre proved a most earnest preacher, endeavouring to persuade his
royal hearer to believe in God and Patrick, and so escape the pains of
hell, of which it appears he had had some experience.
My little body was scarred—
With Lugaid the victory:
Demons carried off my soul
Into the red charcoal.
I played the swordlet on them,
I plied on them the gae-bolga;
I was in my concert victory
With the demon in pain.
Great as was my heroism,
Hard as was my sword,
The devil crushed me with one finger
Into the red charcoal.
It is somewhat ludicrous to read that he practised the gaebolg even on
the spiteful units of the under world, though apparently with less
success than on Ferdia and the rest.
The tale consistently enough concludes that “great was the power of
Patrick in awakening Cuchulinn, after being nine fifty years in the
grave.”
To appreciate the vigour and spirit of these remarkable sagas as they
figure in the original, one requires to read them through. No
quotations, however well chosen, can do full justice to their wealth of
imagination and descriptive power, especially when depicting stirring
incidents, curious customs, men, horses, chariots, arms, ornaments,
vesture, and colours. Then they are profuse, fantastic, minute, and
boldly original, tedious, sometimes through the very prodigality of
their adjectival resources. In perusing them the reader feels that he is
in a fresh field of literature and breathing an atmosphere entirely
different to anything modern.
Though Homeric in form, there is always the Celtic tinge in the literary
style as well as in the facts seized on and made prominent. Within the
last half century these early tales have been frequently translated into
various languages, and excellent versions are now available from the
pens of such distinguished scholars as Eugene O’Curry, Dr. Whitley
Stokes and O’Flanagan, M. d’Arbois de Jubainville and M. Louis Duvan,
Dr. Ernst Windisch, Dr. Kuno Meyer, Standish Hayes O’Grady and O’Beirne
Crowe.
CHAPTER X
THE OSSIANIC CYCLE
The old order changes—Who were the Feinn?—Ossian, his name and
relation to the bardic literature—The Ossianic tales and poems
very numerous—Earliest references—First remarkable
development—Original home of the Ossianic romance—The leading
heroes—A famous tract—Legends regarding Fionn, and curious details
of his warrior-band—The literature divided into four classes—Most
ancient poems of Ossian, and the Feinn—Quotations—“The Dialogue of
the Ancients”—Ossian and Patrick—Story of Crede—Miscellaneous
poems—Prose tales—“Pursuit of Diarmad and Grainne”—“Lay of
Diarmad”—Norse Ballads—Dream figures, a remarkable Gaelic
tradition.
The Ossianic cycle brings us down to the middle of the third century
A.D. It is clearly much later than the Heroic. For in the interval the
old order peculiar to the days of Cuchulinn has passed away, and new
manners and customs are in vogue. No longer is our attention engrossed
with descriptions of chariots and war-horses and cow-spoils. The heroes
are an organised body of men, who engage in the peaceful pastimes of
hunting and feasting when not occupied with the more serious business of
warfare. They appear less mythical than the demi-gods and champions of
earlier times; yet they move in that dim background of history where
figures are always seen in chiaroscuro, and we cannot even be remotely
confident of their historical reality.
Indeed, it has long been a moot question who the Feinn[20] were, and we
still have the most conflicting opinions on the subject. For example,
the native Irish have always regarded them as an actual martial caste,
maintained during several reigns by the kings of Erin for national
defence. And there is documentary evidence to show that as early as the
seventh century Fionn[21] was generally looked upon as a quondam popular
hero. Eugene O’Curry shared the belief of his countrymen, for he says:
“I may take occasion to assure you that it is quite a mistake to suppose
Finn Mac Cumhaill to have been a merely imaginary or mythical character.
Much that has been narrated of his exploits is, no doubt, apocryphal
enough, but Finn himself is an undoubtedly historical personage; and
that he existed about the time at which his appearance is recorded in
the Annals is as certain as that Julius Cæsar lived and ruled at the
time stated on the authority of the Roman historians.” And O’Curry
supports this opinion with the statement that the hero’s pedigree is
fully detailed in the Book of Leinster, and his death is chronicled in
the _Annals of the Four Masters_, as having taken place in 283 A.D.
Yet more recent scholarship inclines to other and very different views.
Dr. Hyde fancies the school of Mr. Nutt and Professor Rhys would
recognise in the Feinn tribal deities euhemerised or regarded as men.
Dr. Skene and Mr. Macritchie believed they were a race distinct from the
Gaels, probably allied to, or even identical with, the Picts, the latter
venturing the opinion that they might be the _sìdh_ or fairy folk of the
mounds so frequently in evidence in Gaelic literature; while Dr.
Alexander Macbain speaks of Fionn as probably the incarnation of the
chief deity of the Gaels, and his band of heroes as a kind of
terrestrial Olympus.
From these latter the popular Ossian, son of Fionn, has been singled out
as the representative bard of early times. The most ancient forms of the
name were Ossin, Oisin, or Oisein, meaning “the little fawn.” It is
variously spelt in the Book of the Dean of Lismore. And only in
Macpherson’s time and through his usage did the word acquire its modern
familiar orthography.
In the same manner as the name of David is traditionally associated with
the Hebrew Psalter, or the name of Homer with the Homeric poetry, so is
that of Ossian the warrior bard with the classic poems of the Gael. His
will always be identified with the bardic literature that celebrates the
deeds of the Feinn, even though scholars cannot affirm with historic
certainty that he actually lived or was the real author of one of the
ballads attributed to him.[22]
The Ossianic tales and poems are very numerous. Indeed O’Curry says that
if printed at length in the same form as the text of O’Donovan’s edition
of the _Four Masters_ they would occupy as many as 3000 pages of such
volumes. And that statement was made before the publication of
Campbell’s Scottish collection, known as _Leabhar na Feinne_. Apart from
the tales, it is believed that the poetry alone extends to upwards of
80,000 lines.
Yet, compared with the wealth of ancient texts that represent the Heroic
saga, we have very few old vellum MSS. representing the Ossianic. Of
many of the pieces there are two redactions, one on vellum, the other on
modern paper—the latter usually the longer and more profuse. It would
seem as if the Ossianic tales took hold of the imagination of the Gael
much more powerfully than did those of the Heroic cycle, with the result
that they have been in process of evolution down almost to the present
day—certainly to the end of the eighteenth century, which witnessed that
wonderful recrudescence of production, associated in Scotland with the
names of Macpherson, Smith, Clark, Maccallum, and others.
The earliest references to Fionn occur in two Irish poets, one of the
tenth and the other of the eleventh century; in the Annals of
Tighernach, who died in 1088; and in the venerable Leabhar Na h’Uidhre
and Book of Leinster. So that as early as the origin of these latter two
MSS. we have written Ossianic or Fionn tales; and, seeing these literary
monuments were compiled from older documents it is at least possible, as
scholars affirm that some of the tales may have been written down in MS.
before the end of the seventh century.
The first remarkable development in the evolution of the saga took place
between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, the most characteristic
feature of the change being the prominence given to foreign invasion,
especially the invasion of Lochlanners. Fionn is no longer a tribal
chief in one locality, but the acknowledged leader of all Gaeldom
against the intruding aliens.
The stories of his own exploits and of those of his warrior band are
Gaelic variants of tales common to all Celtic, indeed to all Aryan
races. In his essay on the “Development of the Ossianic or Fenian Saga,”
printed in vol. ii. of _Waifs and Strays of Celtic Tradition_, Mr.
Alfred Nutt says that “in the redactions which substantially reach back
to the twelfth century, these tales are profoundly modified in two ways:
firstly, the euhemerising process begun in the ninth to tenth centuries
has fully developed, and the saga has been fitted into a framework of
tribal and personal conditions, which necessarily determine the growth
along certain lines; secondly, mythic features and incidents have been
translated, as it were, into historic terms, borrowed from the
comparatively recent history of the race, and the saga has in
consequence been enriched by a new series of personages, and by a wider
geographic horizon. At this stage it is taken up by the literary class
of the day, the professional story-tellers, and metrically fixed. It is
literary in so far as the form is artificial, that is, due to a given
man who did not hesitate to embellish and amplify out of his acquired
stock of knowledge; popular in so far as it is kept in close touch with
tradition. This semi-literary form continued to develop until the
eighteenth century in both divisions of Gael-land, but the guiding
impulse ever came from Ireland. During the last hundred years and more,
large fragments of it have been preserved in Scotland orally, and offer
the most instructive object lesson with which I am acquainted to the
student of traditional diffusion and transmission. Side by side with the
semi-literary development, the purely popular forms continued to exist
and grow. With regard to Scotland, the chief Ossianic problem is, how
far these may be looked upon as independent of the semi-literary twelfth
century forms, that is, as derived substantially from the earlier
traditions brought by the Gael to Scotland in the early centuries of the
Christian era. There is much to be said for and against this view. There
is practically nothing to be said in favour of the Fenian saga being
older on Scotch ground than the Dalriadic colonisation. Both Scotland
and Ireland have an equal claim to the saga in this sense—that both
countries were inhabited by Gaels, who told and localised it wherever
they went; but Ireland’s claim is so far superior that these tales were
told in Ireland earlier than in Scotland; that whatever admixture of
fact there is in them is Irish fact, and that the chief shapers of the
cycle have been Irish, and not Scotch Gaels. On the other hand, the
Gaels seem both to have preserved the popular form in a more genuine
state, and the semi-literary form orally with greater tenacity.”
Ireland we may therefore regard as the original home of the Ossianic
romance, which in time diffused itself to the west of Scotland, to the
Hebrides, and even to the Isle of Man. And it is significant that while
the theatre of the Cuchulinn drama was mainly the north of that
country—Ulster and Connaught, that of the Feinn was the south—Leinster
and Munster.
The leading heroes of this cycle were:—
1. Fionn, son of Cumhail, son of Trenmor, who is represented as having
been a druid.
2. Gaul Mac Morna, leader of the clan Morna in Connaught. The first name
of Gaul was Aedh Mac Morna, but in the battle of Cnucha he lost an eye
and was henceforth known as Gaul, that is, the _Blind_ Mac Morna. In
this battle he slew Cumhail, Fionn’s father, the leader of the Leinster
band, and though he afterwards served under Fionn, they had no great
love for each other.
3. Ossian, son of Fionn, who in later times became famous as the great
poet of the Celtic people.
4. Oscar, son of Ossian, and grandson of Fionn, who is represented as
handsome and kind-hearted, and generally one of the bravest of the
Feinn.
5. Diarmad O’Duibhne, with the beauty spot—“ball seirc”—which compelled
any woman who saw it to fall in love with him.
6. Caoilte Mac Ronan, a nephew (or cousin) of Fionn, the swiftest of all
the Fenian heroes.
7. Fergus Finne-bheoil, “the eloquent,” who figures as a wise counsellor
as well as a great warrior.
8. Conan Maol, the fool and coward of the party.
The greater number of the incidents of this cycle are represented as
having taken place during the reign of Cormac Mac Art Mac Conn of the
hundred battles, and that of his son, Cairbre of the Liffey. The former
reigned from 227 to 268 A.D., but it was during the reign of the latter
that the battle of Gabhra was fought, in the year 283 A.D., which for
ever put an end to the Fenian power.
In O’Flaherty’s “Ogygia” it is said, “_Cormac_ exceeded all his
predecessors in magnificence, wisdom, and learning, as also in military
achievements. His palace was most superbly adorned and richly furnished,
and his numerous family proclaim his majesty and munificence; the books
he published and the schools he endowed at Temor bear unquestionable
testimony of his learning; there were three schools instituted, in the
first the most eminent professors of the art of war were engaged, in the
second history was taught, and in the third jurisprudence was
professed.”
There is a famous tract entitled, “The Instruction of a Prince,”
ascribed to this king, which has evidently been redacted in Christian
times. It is preserved in the Book of Ballymote, and takes the form of
question and answer between the son Cairbre and his royal father.
“O Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,” said Cairbre, “what is good for a
king?”
“That is plain,” said Cormac, “it is good for him to have patience and
not to dispute, self-government without anger, affability without
haughtiness, diligent attention to history, strict observance of
covenants and agreements, strictness mitigated by mercy in the
execution of laws ... let him enforce fear, let him perfect peace.”
“O Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,” said Cairbre, “what is good for the
welfare of a country?”
“That is plain,” said Cormac, “frequent convocations of sapient and
good men to investigate the affairs, to abolish each evil and retain
each wholesome Institution, to attend to the precepts of the elders;
let the law be in the hand of the nobles, let the chieftains be
upright and unwilling to oppress the poor.”
“O Grandson of Conn, O Cormac,” said Cairbre, “what are the duties of
a prince at a banqueting house?”
“A Prince,” said Cormac, “should light his lamps and welcome his
guests with clapping of hands, procure comfortable seats, the
cup-bearers should be respectable and active in the distribution of
meat and drink. Let there be moderation of music, short stories, a
welcoming countenance, a welcome for the learned, pleasant
conversations, and the like.”
“O Grandson of Conn, what is good for me?” to which Cormac answers:—
“If thou attend to my command, thou wilt not mock the old although
thou art young, nor the poor although thou art well-clad, nor the lame
although thou art strong, nor the ignorant although thou art learned.
Be not slothful, nor passionate, nor penurious, nor idle, nor
jealous....”
Again Cairbre asks how he is to conduct himself among the wise and among
the foolish, among friends and among strangers, among the old and among
the young, to which Cormac, his father, replies:—
Be not too knowing nor too simple; be not proud, be not inactive, be
not too humble nor yet haughty; be not talkative but be not too
silent; be not timid, neither be severe. For if thou shouldst appear
too knowing thou wouldst be satirised and abused; if too simple thou
wouldst be imposed upon; if too proud thou wouldst be shunned; if too
humble thy dignity would suffer; if talkative thou wouldst not be
deemed learned; if too severe thy character would be defamed; if too
timid thy rights would be encroached upon.
There are various versions of the story of Fionn’s birth. In Leabhar Na
h’Uidhre it is told shortly as follows: Tadg, chief druid of Conn, had a
beautiful daughter called Muirne. Cumhail, son of Trenmor, who was head
of the Militia in King Conn’s time, asked Muirne in marriage, but her
father Tadg refused to give her, because he knew from his druidical
knowledge that if Cumhail married her, he himself would lose his
ancestral seat at Almhain, now Allen, in Leinster. So Cumhail took
Muirne by force and married her. Tadg appealed to King Conn, who sent
his forces after the delinquent, resulting in the battle of Cnucha being
fought, in which Cumhail was killed by Aedh son of Morna, who in turn
lost his eye. Muirne fled to Cumhail’s sister, and gave birth to a son,
who was at first called Demni. When he grew up he demanded _eric_ of his
grandfather Tadg for the death of his father, and so, according to
druidical anticipation, he got possession of Almhain. He also made peace
with Gaul, who afterwards figured as one of his band of warriors.
In the Bodleian Library, Oxford, there is a MS. written about the
fifteenth century, in which is preserved a treatise entitled “Boyish
exploits of Fionn.” It is interesting to note here how he was reputed to
have come by the gift of seeing into the future. At that time on the
banks of the Boyne there lived a famous poet called Finn Eges, and young
Fionn was sent to him to complete his education. There was a prophecy
that if one of the name of Fionn ate a salmon caught in Fiacc’s pool on
the Boyne he should no longer be in ignorance of anything he might wish
to know. The poet had industriously fished the pool for seven years and
never landed a single fish. However, one was caught shortly after
Fionn’s arrival, and Finn Eges sent the lad to cook it, with strict
injunctions not to taste it. While turning the salmon on the fire Fionn
burnt his thumb, and instinctively thrust it into his mouth to cool. On
reporting the incident to his master, the poet asked him his name.
“Demni,” said the lad. “Your name is Fionn,” muttered the poet, “and it
is you who were destined to eat of the salmon of knowledge, you are the
real Fionn!”
Thus it was that knowledge came to the young hero. Through the chance
incident of suddenly inserting his thumb in his mouth, the hidden was
revealed to him.
The legend, as given in a vellum MS. in Trinity College, Dublin, is
somewhat different. It says that on a certain occasion Fionn was hunting
near _Sliabh nam Ban_, and while standing at a spring, presently a
strange woman came along, filled a silver tankard at the well, and
without saying a word walked away with it. The hero’s curiosity was
aroused. He followed, unperceived, until she reached the side of the
hill, where a concealed door opened to admit her. In by this entrance
she walked, and Fionn attempting to do likewise got his thumb trapped
between the door and doorpost as the former suddenly swung back. It was
with great difficulty he managed to extricate the _ordag_, but having
succeeded, he at once thrust it, bruised as it was, into his mouth to
ease the pain. And no sooner had he done this than he found himself
possessed of the gift of foreseeing future events. Hence the expression,
“ordag mhor an eolais” (the great thumb of knowledge).
Irish scholars invariably represent the Feinn as a band of Militia, or
kind of standing army, that fought battles, and defended the kingdom
from invasion. Before a soldier could be admitted into this select
corps, he had to promise, “first, never to receive a portion with a
wife, but to choose her for good manners and virtues; second, never to
offer violence to any woman; third, never to refuse any one in the
matter of anything he might possess, that is, he ought to be charitable
to the weak and the poor; and fourth, no single warrior should ever flee
before nine champions.” It was necessary that “both his father and
mother, his tribe, and his relatives should first give guarantees that
they would never demand an _eric_ or revenge from any person for his
death.”
In a fifteenth century MS. in the British Museum it is stated that (1)
Not a man was taken until he was a prime poet versed in the twelve books
of poetry. (2) No man was taken till in the ground a large hole had been
made such as to reach the fold of his belt, and he put into it with his
shield and a forearm’s length of a hazel stick. Then must nine warriors
having nine spears, with a ten-furrows’ width between them and him,
assail him, and in concert let fly at him. If he were then hurt past
that guard of his, he was not received into the Fian-ship. (3) Not a man
of them was taken until his hair had been interwoven into braids on him,
and he started at a run through Ireland’s woods, while they seeking to
wound him followed in his wake, there having been between him and them
but one forest bough by way of interval at first. Should he be overtaken
he was wounded, and not received into the Fian-ship after. (4) If his
weapon had quivered in his hand he was not taken. (5) Should a branch in
the wood have disturbed anything of his hair out of its braiding he was
not taken. (6) If he had cracked a dry stick under his foot, as he ran,
he was not accepted. (7) Unless that, at full speed, he had both jumped
a stick level with his brow, and stooped to pass under one on a level
with his knee, he was not taken. (8) Unless also without slackening his
pace he could with his nail extract a thorn from his foot, he was not
taken into the Fian-ship. But if he performed all this he was of Fionn’s
people.
Keating, who wrote about 1630, and who had access to documents now no
longer extant, gives some curious details:—
The members of the Fenian body (he says) lived in the following
manner. They were quartered on the people from November Day till May
Day, and their duty was to uphold justice and to put down injustice on
the part of the kings and lords of Ireland, and also to guard the
harbours of the country from the oppression of foreign invaders. After
that, from May till November, they lived by hunting and the chase, and
by performing the duties demanded of them by the kings of Ireland,
such as preventing robberies, exacting fines and tributes, putting
down public enemies, and every other kind of evil that might afflict
the country. In performing these duties they received a certain fixed
pay.... However, from May till November the Fenians had to content
themselves with game, the product of their own hunting, as this right
to hunt was their maintenance and pay from the kings of Ireland. That
is, the warriors had the flesh of the wild animals for their food, and
the skins for wages. During the whole day, from morning till night,
they used to eat but one meal, and of this it was their wont to
partake towards evening. About noon they used to send whatever game
they had killed in the morning by their attendants to some appointed
hill, where there were wood and moorland close by. There they used to
light immense fires, into which they put a large quantity of round
sandstones. They next dug two pits in the yellow clay of the moor, and
having set part of the venison upon spits to be roasted before the
fire, they bound up the remainder with _sugans_—ropes of straw or
rushes—in bundles of sedge, and then placed them to be cooked in one
of the pits they had previously dug. There they set the stones which
they had before this heated in the fire round about them, and kept
heaping them upon the bundles of meat until they had made them seethe
freely, and the meat had become throughly cooked. From the greatness
of these fires it has resulted that their sites are still to be
recognised in many parts of Ireland by their burnt blackness. It is
they that are commonly called _Fualachta nam Fiann_, or the Fenians
cooking spots.
As to the warriors of the Fenians, when they were assembled at the
place where their fires had been lighted ... there every man stripped
himself to his skin, tied his tunic round his waist, and then set to
dressing his hair and cleansing his limbs, thus ridding himself of the
sweat and soil of the day’s hunt. Then they began to supple their
thews and muscles by gentle exercise, loosening them by friction,
until they had relieved themselves of all sense of stiffness and
fatigue. When they had finished doing this they sat down and ate their
meal. That being over, they set about constructing their
hunting-booths, and preparing their beds, and so put themselves in
train for sleep. Of the following three materials did each man
construct his bed—of the brushwood of the forest, of moss, and of
fresh rushes. The brushwood was laid next the ground, over it was
placed the moss, and lastly rushes were spread over all. It is these
three materials that are designated in our old romances as the _Tri
Cuilcedha nam Fiann_ (the three beddings of the Fenians).
The literature of the Ossianic cycle is divided by O’Curry into four
classes—
1. The first consists of poems in ancient MSS., ascribed to Fionn Mac
Cumhail, to his sons Ossian and Fergus Finnbheoil, and his nephew
Caoilte. There are seven in Fionn’s name, five in the Book of Leinster,
and two in the Book of Lecain. Other two are attributed to Ossian in the
Book of Leinster, of which one is a description of the battle of Gabhra,
which took place in the year 283, and in which Oscar, the brave son of
Ossian, and Cairbre Lifeachair, the monarch of Erin, fell by each
other’s hands.
The original of this latter has both alliteration and assonance, which
we miss in the English version here given:—
An Ogam on a stone, and a stone on a grave,
Where once men trod;
Erin’s prince on a white horse
Was slain by a slender spear.
Cairbre made a cruel cast,
High on his horse good in the fray;
Shortly before they both were lamed—
He struck Oscar’s right arm off.
Oscar made a mighty cast,
Raging bold like a lion:
Killed Cairbre, grandson[23] of Conn,
Whom warriors bold obeyed.
Youths, mighty and daring,
They met their death in the strife;
Not long before their combat,
More heroes had fallen than lived.
I myself was in the fight,
Southward there of Gabor green;
Twice fifty men I slew—
With my own hand I slew them.
The Ogam is here on the stone,
Round which many ill-fated fell;
Were Finn, in prowess great, alive
Long in mind would be the Ogam.
The facts of Cairbre fighting on horseback and the Ogam on the stone
seem to point back to early times, though alternatively the ideas might
be used afterwards to give an air of antiquity to the piece.
Ossian’s second describes the great fair and festival games of Liffey,
and sketches a visit he paid with his father and accompanying warriors
to the court of the King of Munster. These are the only poems of the
bard that O’Curry knew, that could positively be traced as far back as
the twelfth century. The earliest written pieces superscribed with his
name that we have in Scotland are the nine in the Book of the Dean of
Lismore. Mr. J. F. Campbell was of opinion that the Dean regarded them
as actual compositions of the warrior-bard, contemporary with Cormac Mac
Art.
Of one of these, well known as a lament of Ossian in his old age,
Professor Blackie has given an English rendering from the Dean’s text,
and Dr. Douglas Hyde another more recently from a similar text in the
Belfast Museum. The latter runs thus:—
Long was last night in cold Elphin,
More long is to-night on its weary way.
Though yesterday seemed to me long and ill,
Yet longer still was this dreary day.
And long for me is each hour new-born,
Stricken, forlorn, and smit with grief
For the hunting lands and the Fenian bands,
And the long-haired, generous, Fenian chief.
I hear no music, I find no feast,
I slay no beast from a bounding steed,
I bestow no gold, I am poor and old,
I am sick and cold, without wine or mead.
I court no more, and I hunt no more,
These were before my strong delight
I cannot slay, and I take no prey;
Weary the day and long the night.
No heroes come in their war array,
No game I play, there is nought to win;
I swim no stream with my men of might,
Long is the night in cold Elphin.
Ask, O Patrick, thy God of grace, To tell me the place he will place me
in, And save my soul from the Ill One’s might, For long is to-night in
cold Elphin.
As in the beautiful poem entitled “Finn’s Pastimes,” so in the following
verses from the Dean’s Book, the bard shows that he is in intimate touch
with nature, revelling in her sights and sounds:—
Binn guth duine an tir an ôir,
Binn a ghlòir a chanaid na h’eoin;
Binn an nuallan a ni a chorr,
Binn an tonn am Bun-da-treoir,
Binn am fabhar a ni a ghaoth;
Binn guth cuach os Cas-a’choin,
Aluinn an dealradh a ni grian,
Binn a nithear feadail nan lon, etc.
Sweet is man’s voice in the land of gold,
Sweet the sounds the birds produce;
Sweet is the murmur of the crane,
Sweet sound the waves at Bundatreor,
Sweet the soft murmuring of the wind;
Sweet sounds the cuckoo at Cas-a’choin,
How soft and pleasing shines the sun,
Sweet the blackbird sings his song, etc.
There is one genuinely ancient poem ascribed to Fergus, the bard’s
brother. It was copied from the lost “Dinnsenchus” into the Book of
Lecain and Book of Ballymote. It tells of a remarkable adventure Ossian
once had. While out hunting with a few followers he was decoyed into a
mountain cavern by some of its fairy inhabitants, and detained there
with his companions for a whole year. During all that time the bard was
in the habit of cutting a small chip from the handle of his spear, and
casting it upon the stream that issued from his rocky prison. Fionn, who
had searched in vain for his missing men, happened one day to come to
this river, and observing a floating chip, picked it up, and knew at
once that it was from Ossian’s spear, and intended for a sign. He
thereupon followed the stream to its source, entered the cavern, and
rescued the captive hunters.
A poem by Caoilte Mac Ronan, found in the same two MSS. as the last, and
copied from the same source, is not a legend of the Feinn, but a love
story, in which Cliodhna, a fair-haired, foreign lady, figures as
heroine.
2. The second class of Ossianic literature consists of tracts made up of
articles in prose and poetry, attributed to one or other of the bards
already mentioned, but related by some other person. The most important
in this category, and perhaps the only genuine one now existing, is that
known as “Agallamh na Seanórach,” or “Dialogue of the Ancients,” the
latter being Ossian and Caoilte. Full of curious and really valuable
historical information, it is the largest Fenian or Ossianic tale, and
has recently been edited by Dr. Whitley Stokes. The text preserved in
the Book of Lismore, and more or less fully in other collections,
asserts that after the battle of Gabhra, the Feinn were so shattered and
diminished in numbers that they dispersed themselves over the country.
Ossian and Caoilte survived their brethren in arms, and after wandering
for a time among the new and strange generation that had grown up, they
agreed to separate.
The former went to his mother in the enchanted mansion of Cleitech, as
some MSS. say, to “Tir nan Og.” The latter passed over Magh Breagh
southwards, and ultimately joined St. Patrick, who was delighted to add
so remarkable a convert to his following.
Nearly 150 years passed since their early warrior days, when Ossian
suddenly returned from “Tir nan Og” and the enchanted mansion to seek
his old friend and comrade Caoilte. On finding him, henceforth they both
became St. Patrick’s constant companions in his missionary journeys
through Erin. They give him the history and topography of every place
they visit and of numberless other places, all of which is noted down by
Brogan, the saint’s faithful scribe, for the benefit of future
generations. So says the wonderful “Colloquy of the Ancients.” As an
instance of this service, Patrick and his company were one day sitting
on the hill Finntulach, now better known as Ard-Patrick, in the county
of Limerick, when the saint inquired regarding the origin of the name.
Caoilte explained how it used to be called Tulach na Feinne until Fionn
altered it; and went on to relate how that great leader of men and his
following were once on this same hill when Cael O’Neamhain came to him,
and the conversation of the two heroes turned on Crede, the daughter of
Cairbre, King of Kerry.
“Do you know,” said Fionn, “that she is the greatest flirt of all the
women of Erin; that there is scarcely a precious gem in the land that
she has not obtained as a token of love; and that she has not yet
accepted the hand of any of her admirers.” “I know it,” said Cael, “but
are you aware of the conditions on which she would accept a husband?”
“Yes,” replied Fionn, “whoever is so gifted in the poetic art as to
write a poem descriptive of her mansion and its rich furniture will
receive her hand.” “Good,” said Cael, “I have with the aid of my nurse
composed such a poem, and if you will accompany me, I will now repair to
her court and present it to her.”
Fionn consented, and setting out on their journey they in due time
reached the lady’s mansion, which was situated at the foot of the
well-known Paps of Anann in Kerry. On their arrival, the lady asked
their business. Fionn answered that Cael came to seek her hand in
marriage. “Has he a poem for me?” queried she. “I have,” said Cael. And
he then recited his poem, of which the following are a few
characteristic verses:—
Happy the house in which she is,
Between men and children and women,
Between Druids and musical performers,
Between cup-bearers and door-keepers.
Between equerries without fear,
And distributors who divide (the fare);
And over all these the command belongs
To fair Crede of the yellow hair.
It would be happy for me to be in her _dùn_,
Among her soft and downy couches,
Should Crede deign to hear my suit,
Happy for me would be my journey.
A bowl she has whence berry-juice flows,
By which she colours her eyebrows black,
She has clear vessels of fermenting ale;
Cups she has and beautiful goblets.
The colour (of her _dun_) is like the colour of lime
Within it are couches and green rushes,
Within it are silks and blue mantles,
Within it are red, gold, and crystal cups.
Of its grianan the corner stones
Are all of silver and of yellow gold,
Its thatch in stripes of faultless order,
Of wings of brown and crimson red.
Crede seems to have been very well pleased with this song, for she
married Cael. But, sad to tell, on being called away soon after to the
battle of Finntraigh, he was there killed. His widowed partner gave vent
to her grief in an elegy replete with interest, because it exhibits the
Celtic characteristic of imputing to all nature—birds, deer, waves, and
rocks, one’s own mournful feelings; and because it contains allusions to
ancient customs. Her wail sounds like a Highland coronach of other days:
“A woeful note, and O a woeful note is that which the thrush in
Drumqueen emits, but not more cheerful is the wail which the blackbird
makes in Letterlee. A woeful sound, and O a woeful sound is that the
deer utters in Drumdaleish. Dead lies the doe of Drumsheelin, the mighty
stag bells after her sore suffering, and O suffering sore is the hero’s
death, his death, who used to lie by me. Sore suffering to me is Cael,
and O Cael is a suffering sore, that by my side he is in dead man’s
form; that the wave should have swept over his white body, that is what
hath distracted me, so great was his delightfulness. A dismal roar, and
O a dismal roar is that the shore’s surf makes upon the strand.... A
woeful booming, and O a boom of woe is that which the wave makes upon
the northward beach, butting as it does against the polished rock,
lamenting for Cael, now that he is gone.”
3. The third class of this literature consists of miscellaneous poems
attributed chiefly to Ossian, with a few also to his brother poets, and
a large number without any ascription of authorship. They are found
mostly in paper MSS. of the last 250 years, and are generally
transcripts from older books. In whole or in part they often take the
form of dialogues between Patrick and Ossian. Apparently following the
idea suggested by the “Colloquy of the Ancients,” the Gaelic dreamers
have instituted talks and debates between these representatives of
Paganism and Christianity. Such dialogues are to be found in earlier
MSS., like those of the Book of Lismore and the Book of the Dean of
Lismore, but more frequently in later ones. Besides dealing with the
exploits of the Feinn, they somewhat humorously accentuate the
antagonism between the pagan and ecclesiastical ideals. Specimens of the
more famous of these may be seen in the chapter dealing with the
influence of the Church on Celtic literature. Of the other poems of this
class, the best known is perhaps that entitled “Cath-Chnuic-an-Air,” or,
more shortly, “Cnoc-an-Air.” In addition to giving an account of the
battle, it describes the treasures of the Feinn hidden under Loch Lenè
(Killarney).
The delightful “Ossian and Evir-Alin” may also be noted here. Pattison
thought it possibly one of the oldest of all the Ossianic fragments, but
he was well aware that it is not easy to determine its age. These verses
from his English rendering suggest its peculiar charm:—
We came to the dark Lake of Lego;
There a noble chief came to meet
And conduct us with honour to Branno—
With honour and welcomings sweet.
· · · · ·
Branno inquired, “What is your purpose?
What would you have of me?”
And Cailta said, “We seek thy daughter,
Her would we have of thee.”
· · · · ·
“So high the place, O Ossian,
Do men’s tongues to thee assign,
If I twelve daughters had,” said Branno,
“The best of them should be thine.”
Then they opened the choice and spare chamber,
That was shielded with down from the cold;
The posts of the door were of polished bone,
And the leaves were of good yellow gold.
Soon as generous Evir-Alin
Saw Ossian Fingal’s son,
The love of her youth, by the hero
By me, young maid, was won.
Then we left the dark Lake of Lego
And homeward took our way;
But Cormac, fierce Cormac, waylaid us
Intent on the furious fray.
Ossian and Cormac fight for the lady. The personal combat is described,
and the victorious Ossian continues—
I swept the head from his shoulders
And held it up in my hand;
His troops they fled, and we came with joy
To Fingal’s mountain land.
4. The fourth class consists of prose tales, describing in a romantic
style the exploits and daring deeds of Fionn and of individuals of his
band. The two best known are the “Pursuit of Diarmad and Grainne,” and
the “Battle[24] of Ventry Harbour.” Of the former the leading details
are these:—
Fionn in his old age asked the monarch Cormac Mac Art for the hand of
his celebrated daughter Grainne in marriage. The king agreed to the
hero’s proposal, and invited him to Tara to obtain the princess’s own
consent, necessary in those days as in these to their union. Accepting
the invitation, he proceeded thither, attended by a chosen body of his
warriors, among whom were his son Ossian, his grandson Oscar, and a
chief officer Diarmad O’Duibhne. A grand feast was provided, over which
the monarch presided, and the Feinn were entertained with every mark of
favour and distinction.
It appears to have been a custom on such occasions in ancient Erin, says
O’Curry, for the mistress of the mansion or some other distinguished
lady to fill her own rich drinking cup with choice liquor, and send it
round by her maid-in-waiting to the leading gentlemen at the banquet,
who in turn passed it on to certain others next them, in order that
every guest might enjoy the distinction of participating in the special
favour. The lady Grainne in this instance did the honours of the
occasion, and all, with the exception of Ossian and Diarmad, had drunk
from her cup. But while the imbibing company were yet proclaiming their
praises of the liquor and their profound acknowledgments to the hostess,
they fell one by one into a heavy sleep.
The slim hostess had caused the drink to be drugged, and, as soon as she
recognised the effect, went and sat beside Ossian and Diarmad,
addressing the former, and complaining to him of the folly of his father
Fionn in expecting that a maiden of her youth and beauty should ever
consent to become the wife of so old and war-worn a veteran. Had it been
Ossian himself, gladly would she accept him; but since that could not be
in the circumstances, she saw no chance of escaping the evil her
father’s rash promise threatened to bring upon her than by flight.
Ossian could not dishonour his own sire by being partner to such a
course, so she conjured Diarmad, by his manliness and chivalry, to take
her away, make her his wife, and thus save her from a fate more tragic
in her eyes than death itself.
After much persuasion, for the step was serious in view of his leader’s
ire, Diarmad consented, and they both eloped, gaining the open country
before the somnolent company awoke.
But no sooner had Cormac and Fionn rallied than they perceived how they
were duped, and, raging desperately, they vowed vengeance against the
absent pair. Organising a party for pursuit, the jilted lover
immediately set out to scour the country. In this search he sent forward
advance parties of his swiftest and best men in every direction.
Apparently to little purpose at first, for Diarmad was a favourite with
his brethren-in-arms, and the peculiar circumstances of the elopement
invested it with such an element of romance, and of sympathy on the part
of the young heroes, that those in pursuit never could discover the
retreat of the lovers. Even if Fionn himself did happen to get on their
track, he was thwarted by means of some wonderful stratagem on the part
of Diarmad.
Such is the outline of “The Pursuit of Diarmad and Grainne,” a pursuit
which extended all over Erin. In the course of its narration in the
original a large amount of curious information on social manners,
ancient tales, superstitions, topography, and the natural products of
different parts, is introduced. The absconding pair were caught at last,
but the Fenian heroes would not permit Fionn to punish Diarmad.
Ultimately, the chief had his own peculiar revenge. When at the hunt of
the magic boar Diarmad killed that formidable quarry, and escaped
scatheless, with sinister intention Fionn asked him to measure its
length against the bristles. In doing so Diarmad’s foot, his only
vulnerable part, was pierced by one of the poisonous points. And
although Fionn could have restored him by a draught from his life-giving
shell, he would not. Thus died the hapless Diarmad O’Duibhne, an officer
of fine person and most fascinating manners. Famous in family annals
too, for from him the Campbells trace their descent. Not only does he
figure in their genealogical tree,[25] but the Dukes of Argyll still
have the boar’s head on their coat-of-arms.
The “Lay of Diarmad” has for generations been very popular. There are
various versions of it. Pattison’s English rendering is mainly from the
text in Maccallum’s collection. Fionn afterwards repenting that he did
not save his young rival, lamented thus:—
Alas, that, said Fionn, for a woman
I’ve slain my own sister’s son—
For an ill woman slain him! too noble
To be slain for the loveliest one.
Sad stood the heroes beside thee,
O youth of the noble race;
And dim grew the eyes of each maiden
When the mould went over thy face.
And now like the tree, I stand lonely—
Wither’d and wasted and sear;
With the rude howling tempest to tear me,
Where the shade of no green bough is near.
Quite a large collection of ancient Ossianic ballads are concerned with
the wars between the Feinn and the Norse invaders from Lochlann. They
are quite manifestly of dates posterior to the Viking age, and might
constitute a class by themselves. In “The Banners of the Feinn,” the
heroes are marshalled before us one by one. And here also Diarmad
O’Duibhne takes the lead. The ballad, in rollicking modern verse, has
been thus rendered by Dr. Macneill:—
The Norland king stood on the height
And scanned the rolling sea;
He proudly eyed his gallant ships
That rode triumphantly.
And then he looked where lay his camp
Along the rocky coast,
And where were seen the heroes brave
Of Lochlann’s famous host.
Then to the land he turn’d, and there
A fierce-like hero came;
Above him was a flag of gold,
That waved and shone like flame.
“Sweet Bard,” thus spoke the Norland king,
“What banner comes in sight?
The valiant chief that leads the host,
Who is that man of might?”
“That,” said the bard, “is young MacDoon,
His is that banner bright;
When forth the Feinn to battle go,
He’s foremost in the fight,” etc., etc.
Dream-figures of the dim and distant past, Fionn and his warriors have
not quite lost their sway over the Celtic imagination. Indeed, Gaelic
popular tradition has it that they are not dead, but sleeping under
great green knolls somewhere in the Highlands, and that one day they
will awake to restore the Gael to his ancient power, just as the Cymri
look for the return of Arthur. It is even related that once a wight
obtained entrance to their place of rest, and was asked to blow three
times on the _dudach_ or horn. This he did, and, after the first blast,
behold! the sleeping forms of men and dogs moved to life; after the
second, the Feinn warriors got up on their elbows and stared at him. The
sight so unnerved the rash intruder that, throwing down the instrument,
he fled in terror from the ghostly place; while after him came the awful
imprecation, “Milè mollachd, is miosa dh’fhag na fhuair” (“A thousand
curses on you; you left us worse than you found us”). These were the
last words he heard as he made good his escape—the last account of the
Feinn borne to the upper world.
CHAPTER XI
THE INFLUENCE OF THE NORSE INVASIONS ON GAELIC LITERATURE