Chapter VIII: Myths and Tales of the Cymry (6)

55 See Sergi, _op. cit._ p. 290, for the _Ankh_ on a French dolmen.

56 “Bulletin de la Soc. d’Anthropologie,” Paris, April 1893.

57 “The Welsh People,” pp. 616-664, where the subject is fully
discussed in an appendix by Professor J. Morris Jones. “The
pre-Aryan idioms which still live in Welsh and Irish were derived
from a language allied to Egyptian and the Berber tongues.”

58 Flinders Petrie, “Egypt and Israel,” pp. 137, 899.

59 I quote from Mr. H.B. Cotterill’s beautiful hexameter version.

60 Valerius Maximus (about A.D 30) and other classical writers mention
this practice.

61 Book V.

62 De Jubainville, “Irish Mythological Cycle,” p.191 _sqq._

63 The etymology of the word “Druid” is no longer an unsolved problem.
It had been suggested that the latter part of the word might be
connected with the Aryan root VID, which appears in “wisdom,” in the
Latin _videre_, &c., Thurneysen has now shown that this root in
combination with the intensive particle _dru_ would yield the word
_dru-vids_, represented in Gaelic by _draoi_, a Druid, just as
another intensive, _su_, with _vids_ yields the Gaelic _saoi_, a
sage.

64 See Rice Holmes, “Cæsar’s Conquest,” p. 15, and pp. 532-536. Rhys,
it may be observed, believes that Druidism was the religion of the
aboriginal inhabitants of Western Europe “from the Baltic to
Gibraltar” (“Celtic Britain,” p. 73). But we only _know_ of it where
Celts and dolmen-builders combined. Cæsar remarks of the Germans
that they had no Druids and cared little about sacrificial
ceremonies.

65 “Rel. des Gaulois,” leçon xx.

66 Quoted by Bertrand, _op. cit._ p. 279.

67 “The Irish Mythological Cycle,” by d’Arbois de Jubainville, p. 6l.
The “Dinnsenchus” in question is an early Christian document. No
trace of a being like Crom Cruach has been found as yet in the pagan
literature of Ireland, nor in the writings of St. Patrick, and I
think it is quite probable that even in the time of St. Patrick
human sacrifices had become only a memory.

68 A representation of human sacrifice has, however, lately been
discovered in a Temple of the Sun in the ancient Ethiopian capital,
Meroë.

69 “You [Celts] who by cruel blood outpoured think to appease the
pitiless Teutates, the horrid Æsus with his barbarous altars, and
Taranus whose worship is no gentler than that of the Scythian
Diana”, to whom captive were offered up. (Lucan, “Pharsalia”, i.
444.) An altar dedicated to Æsus has been discovered in Paris.

70 Mont Mercure, Mercœur, Mercoirey, Montmartre (_Mons Mercurii_), &c.

71 To this day in many parts of France the peasantry use terms like
_annuit, o’né, anneue_, &c., all meaning “to-night,” for
_aujourd’hui_ (Bertrand, “Rel. des G.,” p. 356).

72 The _fili_, or professional poets, it must be remembered, were a
branch of the Druidic order.

73 For instance, Pelagius in the fifth century; Columba, Columbanus,
and St. Gall in the sixth; Fridolin, named _Viator_, “the
Traveller,” and Fursa in the seventh; Virgilius (Feargal) of
Salzburg, who had to answer at Rome for teaching the sphericity of
the earth, in the eighth; Dicuil, “the Geographer,” and Johannes
Scotus Erigena—the master mind of his epoch—in the ninth.

74 Dealgnaid. I have been obliged here, as occasionally elsewhere, to
modify the Irish names so as to make them pronounceable by English
readers.

75 See p. 48, _note_ 1.

76 I follow in this narrative R.I. Best’s translation of the “Irish
Mythological Cycle” of d’Arbois de Jubainville.

77 De Jubainville, “Irish Mythological Cycle,” p. 75.

78 Pronounced “Yeo´hee.” See Glossary for this and other words.

79 The science of the Druids, as we have seen, was conveyed in verse,
and the professional poets were a branch of the Druidic Order.

80 Meyer and Nutt, “Voyage of Bran,” ii. 197.

81 “Moytura” means “The Plain of the Towers”—_i.e._, sepulchral
monuments.

82 Shakespeare alludes to this in “As You Like It.” “I never was so
be-rhymed,” says Rosalind, “since Pythagoras’ time, that I was an
Irish rat—which I can hardly remember.”

83 Lyons, Leyden, Laon were all in ancient times known as _Lug-dunum,_
the Fortress of Lugh. _Luguvallum_ was the name of a town near
Hadrian’s Wall in Roman Britain.

84 It is given by him in a note to the “Four Masters,” vol. i. p. 18,
and is also reproduced by de Jubainville.

85 The other two were “The Fate of the Children of Lir” and “The Fate
of the Sons of Usna.” The stories of the Quest of the Sons of Turenn
and that of the Children of Lir have been told in full by the author
in his “High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances,” and that of
the “Sons of Usna” (the Deirdre Legend) by Miss Eleanor Hull in her
“Cuchulain,” both published by Harrap and Co

86 O’Curry’s translation from the bardic tale, “The Battle of Moytura.”

87 O’Curry, “Manners and Customs,” iii. 214.

88 The ancient Irish division of the year contained only these three
seasons, including autumn in summer (O’Curry, “Manners and Customs,”
iii. 217).]

89 S.H. O’Grady, “Silva Gadelica,” p. 191.

90 Pp. 104 _sqq._, and _passim_.

91 O’Grady, _loc. cit._

92 O’Grady, _loc. cit._

93 See p. 112.

94 Miss Hull has discussed this subject fully in the introduction to
her invaluable work, “The Cuchullin Saga.”

95 See the tale of “Etain and Midir,” in Chap. IV.

96 The name Tara is derived from an oblique case of the nominative
_Teamhair_, meaning “the place of the wide prospect.” It is now a
broad grassy hill, in Co. Meath, covered with earthworks
representing the sites of the ancient royal buildings, which can all
be clearly located from ancient descriptions.

97 A.H. Leahy, “Heroic Romances,” i. 27.

98 See p. 114.

99 I cannot agree with Mr. O’Grady’s identification of this goddess
with Dana, though the name appears to mean “The Great Queen.”

100 Gerald, the fourth Earl of Desmond. He disappeared, it is said, in
1398, and the legend goes that he still lives beneath the waters of
Loch Gur, and may be seen riding round its banks on his white steed
once every seven years. He was surnamed “Gerald the Poet” from the
“witty and ingenious” verses he composed in Gaelic. Wizardry,
poetry, and science were all united in one conception in the mind of
the ancient Irish.

101 “Popular Tales of Ireland,” by D. Fitzgerald, in “Revue Celtique,”
vol. iv.

102 “The Voyage of Bran,” vol. ii. p. 219.

103 In Irish, _Sionnain_.

104 Translation by R.I. Best.

105 The solar vessels found in dolmen carvings. See Chap. II. p. 71
_sqq_. Note that the Celtic spirits, though invisible, are material
and have weight; not so those in Vergil and Dante.

106 De Jubainville, “Irish Mythological Cycle,” p. 136. Beltené is the
modern Irish name for the month of May, and is derived from an
ancient root preserved in the Old Irish compound _epelta_, “dead.”

107 “Irish Mythological Cycle,” p. 138.

108 I follow again de Jubainville’s translation; but in connexion with
this and the previous poems see also Ossianic Society’s
“Transactions,” vol. v.

109 Teltin; so named after the goddess Telta. See p. 103.

110 Pronounced “Shee.” It means literally the People of the [Fairy]
Mounds.

111 Pronounced “Eefa.”

112 This name means “The Maid of the Fair Shoulder.”

113 The story here summarised is given in full in the writer’s “High
Deeds of Finn” (Harrap and Co.).

114 It may be mentioned that the syllable “Kill,” which enters into so
many Irish place-names (Kilkenny, Killiney, Kilcooley, &c.), usually
represents the Latin _cella_, a monastic cell, shrine, or church.

115 Cleena (_Cliodhna_) was a Danaan princess about whom a legend is
told connected with the Bay of Glandore in Co. Cork. See p. 127.

116 See p. 85.

117 “Omnia monumenta Scotorum ante Cimbaoth incerta erant.” Tierna, who
died in 1088, was Abbot of Clonmacnois, a great monastic and
educational centre in mediæval Ireland.

118 Compare the fine poem of a modern Celtic writer (Sir Samuel
Ferguson), “The Widow’s Cloak”—_i.e._, the British Empire in the
days of Queen Victoria.

119 “Critical History of Ireland,” p. 180.

120 Pronounced “El´yill.”

121 The ending _ster_ in three of the names of the Irish provinces is of
Norse origin, and is a relic of the Viking conquests in Ireland.
Connacht, where the Vikings did not penetrate, alone preserves its
Irish name unmodified. Ulster (in Irish _Ulaidh_) is supposed to
derive its name from Ollav Fōla, Munster (_Mumhan_) from King Eocho
Mumho, tenth in succession from Eremon, and Connacht was “the land
of the children of Conn”—he who was called Conn of the Hundred
Battles, and who died A.D. 157.

122 The reader may, however, be referred to the tale of Etain and Midir
as given in full by A.H. Leahy (“Heroic Romances of Ireland”), and
by the writer in his “High Deeds of Finn,” and to the tale of Conary
rendered by Sir S. Ferguson (“Poems,” 1886), in what Dr. Whitley
Stokes has described as the noblest poem ever written by an
Irishman.

123 Pronounced “Yeo´hee.”

124 I quote Mr. A.H. Leahy’s translation from a fifteenth-century
Egerton manuscript (“Heroic Romances of Ireland,” vol. i. p. 12).
The story is, however, found in much more ancient authorities.

125 Ogham letters, which were composed of straight lines arranged in a
certain order about the axis formed by the edge of a squared
pillar-stone, were used for sepulchral inscription and writing
generally before the introduction of the Roman alphabet in Ireland.

126 The reference is to the magic swine of Mananan, which were killed
and eaten afresh every day, and whose meat preserved the eternal
youth of the People of Dana.

127 See p. 124.

128 The meaning quoted will be found in the Dictionary under the
alternative form _geas_

129 I quote from Whitley Stokes’ translation, _Revue Celtique_, January
1901, and succeeding numbers.

130 Bregia was the great plain lying eastwards of Tara between Boyne and
Liffey

131 “The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel.”

132 Pronounced “Koohoo´lin.”

133 See p. 150.

134 See pp. 121-123 for an account of this deity.

135 It is noticeable that among the characters figuring in the Ultonian
legendary cycle many names occur of which the word _Cu_ (hound)
forms a part. Thus we have Curoi, Cucorb, Beälcu, &c. The reference
is no doubt to the Irish wolf-hound, a fine type of valour and
beauty.

136 Now Lusk, a village on the coast a few miles north of Dublin.

137 Owing to the similarity of the name the supernatural country of
Skatha, “the Shadowy,” was early identified with the islands of
Skye, where the Cuchulain Peaks still bear witness to the legend.

138 This, of course, was Cuchulain’s father, Lugh.

139 This means probably “the belly spear.” With this terrible weapon
Cuchulain was fated in the end to slay his friend Ferdia.

140 See genealogical table, p. 181.

141 Miss Hull, “The Cuchullin Saga,” p. lxxii, where the solar theory of
the Brown Bull is dealt with at length.

142 A _cumal_ was the unit of value in Celtic Ireland. It is mentioned
as such by St. Patrick. It meant the price of a woman-slave.

143 The cune laid on them by Macha. Sec p. 180.

144 Cuchulain, as the son of the god Lugh, was not subject to the curse
of Macha which afflicted the other Ultonians.

145 His reputed father, the mortal husband of Dectera

146 In the Irish bardic literature, as in the Homeric epics, chastity
formed no part of the masculine ideal either for gods or men.

147 “The Ford of the Forked Pole.”

148 I quote from Standish Hayes O’Grady’s translation, in Miss Hull’s
“Cuchullin Saga.”

_ 149 Ath Fherdia_, which is pronounced and now spelt “Ardee.” It is in
Co. Louth, at the southern border of the Plain of Murthemney, which
was Cuchulain’s territory.

150 See p. 126.

151 In ancient Ireland there were five provinces, Munster being counted
as two, or, as some ancient authorities explain it, the High King’s
territory in Meath and Westmeath being reckoned a separate province.

152 “Clan” in Gaelic means children or offspring. Clan Calatin=the sons
of Calatin.

153 Together with much that is wild and barbaric in this Irish epic of
the “Tain” the reader will be struck by the ideals of courtesy and
gentleness which not infrequently come to light in it. It must be
remembered that, as Mr. A.H. Leahy points out in his “Heroic
Romances of Ireland,” the legend of the Raid of Quelgny is, at the
very latest, a century earlier than all other known romances of
chivalry, Welsh or Continental. It is found in the “Book of
Leinster,” a manuscript of the twelfth century, as well as in other
sources, and was doubtless considerably older than the date of its
transcription there. “The whole thing,” says Mr. Leahy, “stands at
the very beginning of the literature of modern Europe.”

154 Another instance of the survival of the oath formula recited by the
Celtic envoys to Alexander the Great. See p. 23.

155 “Rising-out” is the vivid expression used by Irish writers for a
clan or territory going on the war-path. “Hosting” is also used in a
similar sense.

156 See p. 130.

157 The sword of Fergus was a fairy weapon called the _Caladcholg_ (hard
dinter), a name of which Arthur’s more famous “Excalibur” is a
Latinised corruption.

158 The reference is to Deirdre.

159 See p. 211.

160 A.H. Leahy’s translation, “Heroic Romances of Ireland,” vol. i.

161 The cloak of Mananan (see p. 125) typifies the sea—here, in its
dividing and estranging power.

162 This Curoi appears in various tales of the Ultonian Cycle with
attributes which show that he was no mortal king, but a local deity.

163 This apparition of the Washer of the Ford is of frequent occurrence
in Irish legend.

164 See p. 164 for the reference to _geis_. “His namesake” refers, of
course, to the story of the Hound of Cullan, pp. 183, 184.

165 It was a point of honour to refuse nothing to a bard; one king is
said to have given his eye when it was demanded of him.

_ 166 Craobh Ruadh_—the Red Branch hostel.

167 The story is told in full in the author’s “High Deeds of Finn.”

168 Pronounced “Bay-al-koo.”

169 Inis Clothrann, now known as Quaker’s Island. The pool no longer
exists.

170 “Youb´dan.”

171 Dr. P. W. Joyce’s “Irish Names of Places” is a storehouse of
information on this subject.

172 P. 211, _note_.

173 The name is given both to the hill, _ard_, and to the ford, _atha_
beneath it.

174 Pronounced “mac Cool.”

175 Pronounced “Usheen.”

176 Subject, of course, to the possibility that the present revival of
Gaelic as a spoken tongue may lead to the opening of a new chapter
in that history.

177 See “Ossian and Ossianic Literature,” by Alfred Nutt, p. 4.

178 Now Castleknock, near Dublin.

179 In the King’s County.

180 The hill still bears the name, Knockanar.

181 Glanismole, near Dublin.

182 Talkenn, or “Adze-head,” was a name given to St. Patrick by the
Irish. Probably it referred to the shape of his tonsure.

183 Pronounced “Sleeve-na-mon´”: accent on last syllable. It means the
Mountain of the [Fairy] Women.

184 Translation by S.H. O’Grady.

185 See p. 105.

186 Examples of these have been published, with translations, in the
“Transactions of the Ossianic Society.”

187 Taken down from the recital of a peasant in Co. Galway and published
at Rennes in Dr. Hyde’s “An Sgeuluidhe Gaodhalach,” vol. ii. (no
translation).

188 Now Athlone (_Atha Luain_).

189 How significant is this naïve indication that the making of forays
on his neighbours was regarded in Celtic Ireland as the natural and
laudable occupation of a country gentleman! Compare Spenser’s
account of the ideals fostered by the Irish bards of his time, “View
of the Present State of Ireland,” p. 641 (Globe edition).

190 Dr. John Todhunter, in his “Three Irish Bardic Tales,” has alone, I
think, kept the antique ending of the tale of Deirdre.

191 “Waifs and Strays of Celtic Tradition,” Argyllshire Series. The tale
was taken down in verse, word for word, from the dictation of
Roderick mac Fadyen in Tiree, 1868.

192 Here we have evidently a reminiscence of Briccriu of the Poisoned
Tongue, the mischief-maker of the Ultonians.

193 The Arans are three islands at the entrance of Galway Bay. They are
a perfect museum of mysterious ruins.

194 Pronounced “Ghermawn”—the “G” hard.

195 Horse-racing was a particular delight to the ancient Irish, and is
mentioned in a ninth-century poem in praise of May as one of the
attractions of that month. The name of the month of May given in an
ancient Gaulish calendar means “the month of horse-racing.”

196 The same phenomenon is recorded as being witnessed by Peredur in the
Welsh tale of that name in the “Mabinogion.”

197 Like the bridge to Skatha’t dūn, p. 188.

198 Probably we are to understand that he was an anchorite seeking for
an islet on which to dwell in solitude and contemplation. The
western islands of Ireland abound in the ruins of huts and oratories
built by single monks or little communities.

199 Tennyson has been particularly happy in his description of these
undersea islands.

200 Ps. ciii. 5.

201 This disposes of the last of the foster-brothers, who should not
have joined the party.

202 Tory Island, off the Donegal coast. There was there a monastery and
a church dedicated to St. Columba.

203 “One day we shall delight in the remembrance of these things.” The
quotation is from Vergil, “Æn.” i. 203 “Sacred poet” is a
translation of the _vates sacer_ of Horace.

204 This sage and poet has not been identified from any other record.
Praise and thanks to him, whoever he may have been.

205 “The Mabinogion,” pp. 45 and 54.

206 Pronounced “Annoon.” It was the word used in the early literature
for Hades or Fairyland.

207 “Barddas,” vol. i. pp. 224 _sqq_.

208 Strange as it may seem to us, the character of this object was by no
means fixed from the beginning. In the poem of Wolfram von
Eschenbach it is a stone endowed with magical properties. The word
is derived by the early fabulists from _gréable_, something pleasant
to possess and enjoy, and out of which one could have _à son gré_,
whatever he chose of good things. The Grail legend will be dealt
with later in connexion with the Welsh tale “Peredur.”

209 Distinguished by these from the other great storehouse of poetic
legend, the _Matière de Bretagne—i.e._, the Arthurian saga.

210 See p. 103.

211 “Cultur der Gegenwart,” i. ix.

212 A list of them is given in Lobineau’s “Histoire de Bretagne.”

213 See, _e.g.,_ pp. 243 and 218, _note_.

214 See p. 233, and a similar case in the author’s “High Deeds of Finn,”
p. 82.

215 See p. 232, and the tale of the recovery of the “Tain,” p. 234.

216 “Pwyll King of Dyfed,” “Bran and Branwen,” “Math Sor of Māthonwy,”
and “Manawyddan Son of Llyr.”

217 See p. 107.

218 “Hibbert Lectures,” pp. 237-240.

219 See pp. 88, 109, &c. Lugh, of course, = Lux, Light. The Celtic words
_Lamh_ and _Llaw_ were used indifferently for hand or arm.

220 Mr. Squire, in his “Mythology of the British Islands,” 1905, has
brought together in a clear and attractive form the most recent
results of studies on this subject.

221 Finn and Gwyn are respectively the Gaelic and Cymric forms of the
same name, meaning fair or white.

222 “Mythology of the British Islands,” p. 225.

223 The sense appears to be doubtful here, and is variously rendered.

224 Lloegyr = Saxon Britain.

225 Rhys, “Hibbert Lectures,” quoting from the ancient saga of Merlin
published by the English Text Society, p. 693.

226 “Mythology of the British Islands,” pp. 325, 326; and Rhys, “Hibbert
Lectures,” p. 155 _sqq_.

227 In the “Iolo MSS.,” collected by Edward Williams.

228 See, _e.g._, pp. 111, 272.

229 We see here that we have got far from primitive Celtic legend. The
heroes fight like mediaeval knights on horseback, tilting at each
other with spears, not in chariots or on foot, and not with the
strange weapons which figure in Gaelic battle-tales.

230 Hēn, “the Ancient”; an epithet generally implying a hoary antiquity
associated with mythological tradition.

231 Pronounced “Pry-dair´y.”

232 Evidently this was the triangular Norman shield, not the round or
oval Celtic one. It has already been noticed that in these Welsh
tales the knights when they fight tilt at each other with spears.

233 The reader may pronounce this “Matholaw.”

234 Compare the description of Mac Cecht in the tale of the Hostel of De
Derga, p. 173.

235 Where the Tower of London now stands.

236 These stories, in Ireland and in Wales, always attach themselves to
actual burial-places. In 1813 a funeral urn containing ashes and
half-burnt bones was found in the spot traditionally supposed to be
Branwen’s sepulchre.

237 Saxon Britain.

238 This is a distorted reminiscence of the practice which seems to have
obtained in the courts of Welsh princes, that a high officer should
hold the king’s feet in his lap while he sat at meat.

239 “Hawthorn, King of the Giants.”

240 The gods of the family of Dōn are thus conceived as servitors to
Arthur, who in this story is evidently the god Artaius.

241 “She of the White Track.” Compare the description of Etain, pp. 157,
158.

242 There is no other mention of this Kenverchyn or of how Owain got his
raven-army, also referred to in “The Dream of Rhonabwy.” We have
here evidently a piece of antique mythology embedded in a more
modern fabric.

243 Like the Breton Tale of “Peronnik the Fool,” translated in “Le Foyer
Bréton,” by Emile Souvestre. The syllable _Per_ which occurs in all
forms of the hero’s name means in Welsh and Cornish a bowl or vessel
(Irish _coire_—see p. 35, note). No satisfactory derivation has in
any case been found of the latter part of the name.

244 “They are nourished by a stone of most noble nature ... it is called
_lapsit exillîs_; the stone is also called the Grail.” The term
_lapsit exillîs_ appears to be a corruption for _lapis ex celis_,
“the stone from heaven.”

245 The true derivation is from the Low Latin _cratella_, a small vessel
or chalice.

246 A similar selective action is ascribed to the Grail by Wolfram. It
can only be lifted by a pure maiden when carried into the hall, and
a heathen cannot see it or be benefited by it. The same idea is also
strongly marked in the story narrating the early history of the
Grail by Robert de Borron, about 1210: the impure and sinful cannot
benefit by it. Borron, however, does not touch upon the Perceval or
“quest” portion of the story at all.

247 Hades.

248 Caer Vedwyd means the Castle of Revelry. I follow the version of
this poem given by Squire in his “Mythology of the British Islands,”
where it may be read in full.

249 The combination of objects at the Grail Castle is very significant.
They were a sword, a spear, and a vessel, or, in some versions, a
stone. These are the magical treasures brought by the Danaans into
Ireland—a sword, a spear, a cauldron, and a stone. See pp. 105, 106.

250 The Round Table finds no mention in Cymric legend earlier than the
fifteenth century.

251 Vergil, in his mediæval character of magician.

252 Taliesin.

253 Alluding to the imaginary Trojan ancestry of the Britons.

254 I have somewhat abridged this curious poem. The connexion with ideas
of transmigration, as in the legend of Tuan mac Carell (see pp.
97-101), is obvious. Tuan’s last stage, it may be recalled, was a
fish, and Taliesin was taken in a salmon-weir.

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