|
THE RELIGION
OF THE
ANCIENT CELTS
BY
J.A. MACCULLOCH
HON. D.D.(ST. ANDREWS); HON. CANON OF CUMBRAE CATHEDRAL
AUTHOR OF "COMPARATIVE THEOLOGY"
"RELIGION: ITS ORIGIN AND FORMS" "THE MISTY ISLE OF SKYE"
"THE CHILDHOOD OF FICTION: A STUDY OF FOLK-TALES AND PRIMITIVE THOUGHT"
Edinburgh: T. & T. CLARK, 38 George Street
1911
Printed by
MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED,
FOR
T. & T. CLARK, EDINBURGH.
LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT, AND CO. LIMITED.
NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS.
TO
ANDREW LANG
PREFACE
The scientific study of ancient Celtic religion is a thing of recent
growth. As a result of the paucity of materials for such a study,
earlier writers indulged in the wildest speculative flights and
connected the religion with the distant East, or saw in it the remains
of a monotheistic faith or a series of esoteric doctrines veiled under
polytheistic cults. With the works of MM. Gaidoz, Bertrand, and D'Arbois
de Jubainville in France, as well as by the publication of Irish texts
by such scholars as Drs. Windisch and Stokes, a new era may be said to
have dawned, and a flood of light was poured upon the scanty remains of
Celtic religion. In this country the place of honour among students of
that religion belongs to Sir John Rh[^y]s, whose Hibbert Lectures _On
the Origin and Growth of Religion as illustrated by Celtic Heathendom_
(1886) was an epoch-making work. Every student of the subject since that
time feels the immense debt which he owes to the indefatigable
researches and the brilliant suggestions of Sir John Rh[^y]s, and I
would be ungrateful if I did not record my indebtedness to him. In his
Hibbert Lectures, and in his later masterly work on _The Arthurian
Legend_, however, he took the standpoint of the "mythological" school,
and tended to see in the old stories myths of the sun and dawn and the
darkness, and in the divinities sun-gods and dawn-goddesses and a host
of dark personages of supernatural character. The present writer,
studying the subject rather from an anthropological point of view and in
the light of modern folk survivals, has found himself in disagreement
with Sir John Rh[^y]s on more than one occasion. But he is convinced
that Sir John would be the last person to resent this, and that, in
spite of his mythological interpretations, his Hibbert Lectures must
remain as a source of inspiration to all Celtic students. More recently
the studies of M. Salomon Reinach and of M. Dottin, and the valuable
little book on _Celtic Religion_, by Professor Anwyl, have broken fresh
ground.[1]
In this book I have made use of all the available sources, and have
endeavoured to study the subject from the comparative point of view and
in the light of the anthropological method. I have also interpreted the
earlier cults by means of recent folk-survivals over the Celtic area
wherever it has seemed legitimate to do so. The results are summarised
in the introductory chapter of the work, and students of religion, and
especially of Celtic religion, must judge how far they form a true
interpretation of the earlier faith of our Celtic forefathers, much of
which resembles primitive religion and folk-belief everywhere.
Unfortunately no Celt left an account of his own religion, and we are
left to our own interpretations, more or less valid, of the existing
materials, and to the light shed on them by the comparative study of
religions. As this book was written during a long residence in the Isle
of Skye, where the old language of the people still survives, and where
the _genius loci_ speaks everywhere of things remote and strange, it may
have been easier to attempt to realise the ancient religion there than
in a busier or more prosaic place. Yet at every point I have felt how
much would have been gained could an old Celt or Druid have revisited
his former haunts, and permitted me to question him on a hundred matters
which must remain obscure. But this, alas, might not be!
I have to thank Miss Turner and Miss Annie Gilchrist for valuable help
rendered in the work of research, and the London Library for obtaining
for me several works not already in its possession. Its stores are an
invaluable aid to all students working at a distance from libraries.
J.A. MACCULLOCH.
THE RECTORY,
BRIDGE OF ALLAN,
_October_ 1911.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] See also my article "Celts" in Hastings' _Encyclopaedia of Religion
and Ethics_, vol. iii.
[TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Throughout this book, some characters are used
which are not part of the Latin-1 character set used in this e-book. The
string "[^y]" is used to represent a lower-case "Y" with a circumflex
mark on top of it, "[=a]" is used to represent a lower-case "A" with a
line on top of it, and "[oe]" is used to represent the "oe"-ligature.
Numbers in braces such as "{3}" are used to represent the superscription
of numbers, which was used in the book to give edition numbers to
books.]
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. INTRODUCTORY 1
II. THE CELTIC PEOPLE 8
III. THE GODS OF GAUL AND THE CONTINENTAL CELTS 22
IV. THE IRISH MYTHOLOGICAL CYCLE 49
V. THE TUATHA DE DANANN 63
VI. THE GODS OF THE BRYTHONS 95
VII. THE CUCHULAINN CYCLE 127
VIII. THE FIONN SAGA 142
IX. GODS AND MEN 158
X. THE CULT OF THE DEAD 165
XI. PRIMITIVE NATURE WORSHIP 171
XII. RIVER AND WELL WORSHIP 181
XIII. TREE AND PLANT WORSHIP 198
XIV. ANIMAL WORSHIP 208
XV. COSMOGONY 227
XVI. SACRIFICE, PRAYER, AND DIVINATION 233
XVII. TABU 252
XVIII. FESTIVALS 256
XIX. ACCESSORIES OF CULT 279
XX. THE DRUIDS 293
XXI. MAGIC 319
XXII. THE STATE OF THE DEAD 333
XXIII. REBIRTH AND TRANSMIGRATION 348
XXIV. ELYSIUM 362
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE NOTES THROUGHOUT THIS WORK
(_This list is not a Bibliography._)
BRAND: Rev. J. Brand, _Observations on the Popular Antiquities of Great
Britain._ 3 vols. 1870.
BLANCHET: A. Blanchet, _Traite des monnaies gauloises._ 2 vols. Paris,
1905.
BERTRAND: A. Bertrand, _Religion des gaulois._ Paris, 1897.
CAMPBELL, _WHT_: J.F. Campbell, _Popular Tales of the West Highlands._ 4
vols. Edinburgh, 1890.
CAMPBELL _LF_: J.F. Campbell, _Leabhar na Feinne._ London, 1872.
CAMPBELL, _Superstitions_: J.G. Campbell, _Superstitions of the
Highlands and Islands of Scotland._ 1900.
CAMPBELL, _Witchcraft_: J.G. Campbell, _Witchcraft and Second Sight in
the Highlands and Islands of Scotland._ 1902.
CORMAC: _Cormac's Glossary._ Tr. by J. O'Donovan. Ed. by W. Stokes.
Calcutta, 1868.
COURCELLE--SENEUIL.: J.L. Courcelle-Seneuil, _Les dieux gaulois d'apres
les monuments figures._ Paris, 1910.
_CIL_: _Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum._ Berlin, 1863 f.
_CM_: _Celtic Magazine._ Inverness, 1875 f.
CURTIN, _HTI_: J. Curtin, _Hero Tales of Ireland._ 1894.
CURTIN, _Tales_: J. Curtin, _Tales of the Fairies and Ghost World._
1895.
DALZELL: Sir J.G. Dalzell, _Darker Superstitions of Scotland._ 1835.
D'ARBOIS: H. D'Arbois de Jubainville, _Cours de litterature celtique._
12 vols. Paris, 1883-1902.
D'ARBOIS _Les Celtes_: H. D'Arbois de Jubainville, _Les Celtes._ Paris,
1904.
D'ARBOIS _Les Druides_: H. D'Arbois de Jubainville, _Les Druides et les
dieux celtiques a formes d'animaux._ Paris, 1906.
D'ARBOIS _PH_: H. D'Arbois de Jubainville, _Les premiers habitants de
l'Europe._ 2 vols. Paris, 1889-1894.
DOM MARTIN: Dom Martin, _Le religion des gaulois._ 2 vols. Paris, 1727.
DOTTIN: G. Dottin, _Manuel pour servir a l'etude de l'antiquite
celtique._ Paris, 1906.
ELTON: C.I. Elton, _Origins of English History._ London, 1890.
FRAZER, _GB_{2}: J.G. Frazer, _Golden Bough_{2}. 3 vols. 1900,
GUEST: Lady Guest, _The Mabinogion._ 3 vols. Liandovery, 1849.
HAZLITT: W.C. Hazlitt, _Faiths and Folk-lore: A Dictionary of National
Beliefs, Superstitions, and Popular Customs._ 2 vols. 1905.
HOLDER: A. Holder, _Altceltischer Sprachschatz._ 3 vols. Leipzig, 1891
f.
HULL: Miss E. Hull, _The Cuchullin Saga._ London, 1898.
_IT_: See Windisch-Stokes.
_JAI_: _Journal of the Anthropological Institute._ London, 1871 f.
JOYCE, _OCR_: P.W. Joyce, _Old Celtic Romances_{2}. London, 1894.
JOYCE, _PN_: P.W. Joyce, _History of Irish Names of Places_{4}. 2 vols.
London, 1901.
JOYCE, _SH_: P.W. Joyce, _Social History of Ancient Ireland._ 2 vols.
London, 1903.
JULLIAN: C. Jullian, _Recherches sur la religion gauloise._ Bordeaux,
1903.
KEATING: Keating, _History of Ireland._ Tr. O'Mahony. London, 1866.
KENNEDY: P. Kennedy, _Legendary Fictions of the Irish Celts._ 1866.
LARMINIE: W. Larminie, _West Irish Folk-Tales and Romances._ 1893.
LEAHY: Leahy, _Heroic Romances of Ireland._ 2 vols. London, 1905.
LE BRAZ: A. Le Braz, _La Legende de la Mort chez les Bretons
armoricains._ 2 vols. Paris, 1902.
_LL_: _Leabhar Laignech_ (Book of Leinster), facsimile reprint. London,
1880.
LOTH: Loth, _Le Mabinogion._ 2 vols. Paris, 1889.
_LU_: _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_ (Book of the Dun Cow), facsimile reprint.
London, 1870.
MACBAIN: A. MacBain, _Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language._
Inverness, 1896.
MACDOUGALL: Macdougall, _Folk and Hero Tales._ London, 1891.
MACKINLAY: J.M. Mackinlay, _Folk-lore of Scottish Lochs and Springs._
Glasgow, 1893.
MARTIN: M. Martin, _Description of the Western Islands of Scotland_{2}.
London, 1716.
MAURY: A. Maury, _Croyances et legendes du Moyen Age._ Paris, 1896.
MONNIER: D. Monnier, _Traditions populaires comparees._ Paris, 1854.
MOORE: A.W. Moore, _Folk-lore of the Isle of Man._ 1891.
NUTT-MEYER: A. Nutt and K. Meyer, _The Voyage of Bran._ 2 vols. London,
1895-1897.
O'CURRY _MC_: E. O'Curry, _Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish._ 4
vols. London, 1873.
O'CURRY _MS. Mat_: E. O'Curry, _MS. Materials of Ancient Irish History._
Dublin, 1861.
O'GRADY: S.H. O'Grady, _Silva Gadelica._ 2 vols. 1892.
REES: Rev. W.J. Rees, _Lives of Cambro-British Saints._ Llandovery,
1853.
REINACH, BF: S. Reinach, _Bronzes Figures de la Gaule romaine._ Paris,
1900.
REINACH, BF _Catal. Sommaire_: S. Reinach, _Catalogue Commaire du Musee
des Antinquitee Nationales_{4}. Paris.
REINACH, BF CMR: S. Reinach, _Cultes, Mythes, et Religions._ 2 vols.
Paris, 1905.
RC: _Revue Celtique._ Paris, 1870 f.
RENEL: C. Renel, _Religions de la Gaule._ Paris 1906.
RH[^Y]S, _AL_: Sir John Rh[^y]s, _The Arthurian Legend._ Oxford, 1891.
RH[^Y]S, _CB_{4}: Sir John Rh[^y]s, _Celtic Britain_{4}. London, 1908.
RH[^Y]S, _CFL_: Sir John Rh[^y]s, _Celtic Folk-Lore._ 2 vols. Oxford,
1901.
RH[^Y]S, _HL_: Sir John Rh[^y]s, _Hibbert Lectures on Celtic
Heathendom._ London, 1888.
SEBILLOT: P. Sebillot, _La Folk-lore de la France._ 4 vols. Paris, 1904
f.
SKENE: W.F. Skene, _Four Ancient Books of Wales._ 2 vols. Edinburgh,
1868.
STOKES, _TIG_: Whitley Stokes, _Three Irish Glossaries._ London, 1862.
STOKES, _Trip. Life_: Whitley Stokes, _The Tripartite Life of Patrick._
London 1887.
STOKES, _US_: Whitley Stokes, _Urkeltischer Sprachschatz._ Goettingen,
1894 (in Fick's _Vergleichende Woerterbuch_{4}).
TAYLOR: I. Taylor, _Origin of the Aryans._ London, n.d.
_TSC_: _Transactions of Society of Cymmrodor._
_TOS_: _Transactions of the Ossianic Society._ Dublin 1854-1861.
_Trip. Life_: See Stokes.
WILDE: Lady Wilde, _Ancient Legends and Superstitions of Ireland._ 2
vols. 1887.
WINDISCH, _Tain_: E. Windisch, _Die altirische Heldensage Tain Bo
Cualgne._ Leipzig, 1905.
WINDISCH-STOKES, _IT_: E. Windisch and W. Stokes, _Irische Texte._
Leipzig, 1880 f.
WOOD-MARTIN: Wood-Martin, _Elder Faiths of Ireland._ 2 vols. London,
1903.
_ZCP_: _Zeitschrift fuer Celtische Philologie._ Halle, 1897 f.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
To summon a dead religion from its forgotten grave and to make it tell
its story, would require an enchanter's wand. Other old faiths, of
Egypt, Babylon, Greece, Rome, are known to us. But in their case
liturgies, myths, theogonies, theologies, and the accessories of cult,
remain to yield their report of the outward form of human belief and
aspiration. How scanty, on the other hand, are the records of Celtic
religion! The bygone faith of a people who have inspired the world with
noble dreams must be constructed painfully, and often in fear and
trembling, out of fragmentary and, in many cases, transformed remains.
We have the surface observations of classical observers, dedications in
the Romano-Celtic area to gods mostly assimilated to the gods of the
conquerors, figured monuments mainly of the same period, coins, symbols,
place and personal names. For the Irish Celts there is a mass of written
material found mainly in eleventh and twelfth century MSS. Much of this,
in spite of alteration and excision, is based on divine and heroic
myths, and it also contains occasional notices of ritual. From Wales
come documents like the _Mabinogion_, and strange poems the personages
of which are ancient gods transformed, but which tell nothing of rite or
cult.[2] Valuable hints are furnished by early ecclesiastical documents,
but more important is existing folk-custom, which preserves so much of
the old cult, though it has lost its meaning to those who now use it.
Folk-tales may also be inquired of, if we discriminate between what in
them is Celtic and what is universal. Lastly, Celtic burial-mounds and
other remains yield their testimony to ancient belief and custom.
From these sources we try to rebuild Celtic paganism and to guess at its
inner spirit, though we are working in the twilight on a heap of
fragments. No Celt has left us a record of his faith and practice, and
the unwritten poems of the Druids died with them. Yet from these
fragments we see the Celt as the seeker after God, linking himself by
strong ties to the unseen, and eager to conquer the unknown by religious
rite or magic art. For the things of the spirit have never appealed in
vain to the Celtic soul, and long ago classical observers were struck
with the religiosity of the Celts. They neither forgot nor transgressed
the law of the gods, and they thought that no good befell men apart from
their will.[3] The submission of the Celts to the Druids shows how they
welcomed authority in matters of religion, and all Celtic regions have
been characterised by religious devotion, easily passing over to
superstition, and by loyalty to ideals and lost causes. The Celts were
born dreamers, as their exquisite Elysium belief will show, and much
that is spiritual and romantic in more than one European literature is
due to them.
The analogy of religious evolution in other faiths helps us in
reconstructing that of the Celts. Though no historic Celtic group was
racially pure, the profound influence of the Celtic temperament soon
"Celticised" the religious contributions of the non-Celtic element which
may already have had many Celtic parallels. Because a given Celtic rite
or belief seems to be "un-Aryan," it need not necessarily be borrowed.
The Celts had a savage past, and, conservative as they were, they kept
much of it alive. Our business, therefore, lies with Celtic religion as
a whole. These primitive elements were there before the Celts migrated
from the old "Aryan" home; yet since they appear in Celtic religion to
the end, we speak of them as Celtic. The earliest aspect of that
religion, before the Celts became a separate people, was a cult of
nature spirits, or of the life manifested in nature. But men and women
probably had separate cults, and, of the two, perhaps that of the latter
is more important. As hunters, men worshipped the animals they slew,
apologising to them for the slaughter. This apologetic attitude, found
with all primitive hunters, is of the nature of a cult. Other animals,
too sacred to be slain, would be preserved and worshipped, the cult
giving rise to domestication and pastoral life, with totemism as a
probable factor. Earth, producing vegetation, was the fruitful mother;
but since the origin of agriculture is mainly due to women, the Earth
cult would be practised by them, as well as, later, that of vegetation
and corn spirits, all regarded as female. As men began to interest
themselves in agriculture, they would join in the female cults, probably
with the result of changing the sex of the spirits worshipped. An
Earth-god would take the place of the Earth-mother, or stand as her
consort or son. Vegetation and corn spirits would often become male,
though many spirits, even when they were exalted into divinities,
remained female.
With the growth of religion the vaguer spirits tended to become gods and
goddesses, and worshipful animals to become anthropomorphic divinities,
with the animals as their symbols, attendants, or victims. And as the
cult of vegetation spirits centred in the ritual of planting and sowing,
so the cult of the divinities of growth centred in great seasonal and
agricultural festivals, in which the key to the growth of Celtic
religion is to be found. But the migrating Celts, conquering new lands,
evolved divinities of war; and here the old female influence is still at
work, since many of these are female. In spite of possessing so many
local war-gods, the Celts were not merely men of war. Even the _equites_
engaged in war only when occasion arose, and agriculture as well as
pastoral industry was constantly practised, both in Gaul and Britain,
before the conquest.[4] In Ireland, the belief in the dependence of
fruitfulness upon the king, shows to what extent agriculture flourished
there.[5] Music, poetry, crafts, and trade gave rise to culture
divinities, perhaps evolved from gods of growth, since later myths
attributed to them both the origin of arts and crafts, and the
introduction of domestic animals among men. Possibly some culture gods
had been worshipful animals, now worshipped as gods, who had given these
animals to man. Culture-goddesses still held their place among
culture-gods, and were regarded as their mothers. The prominence of
these divinities shows that the Celts were more than a race of warriors.
The pantheon was thus a large one, but on the whole the divinities of
growth were more generally important. The older nature spirits and
divine animals were never quite forgotten, especially by the folk, who
also preserved the old rituals of vegetation spirits, while the gods of
growth were worshipped at the great festivals. Yet in essence the lower
and the higher cults were one and the same, and, save where Roman
influence destroyed Celtic religion, the older primitive strands are
everywhere apparent. The temperament of the Celt kept him close to
nature, and he never quite dropped the primitive elements of his
religion. Moreover, the early influence of female cults of female
spirits and goddesses remained to the end as another predominant factor.
Most of the Celtic divinities were local in character, each tribe
possessing its own group, each god having functions similar to those of
other groups. Some, however, had or gained a more universal character,
absorbing divinities with similar functions. Still this local character
must be borne in mind. The numerous divinities of Gaul, with differing
names--but, judging by their assimilation to the same Roman divinity,
similar functions, are best understood as gods of local groups. This is
probably true also of Britain and Ireland. But those gods worshipped far
and wide over the Celtic area may be gods of the undivided Celts, or
gods of some dominant Celtic group extending their influence on all
sides, or, in some cases, popular gods whose cult passed beyond the
tribal bounds. If it seem precarious to see such close similarity in the
local gods of a people extending right across Europe, appeal can be made
to the influence of the Celtic temperament, producing everywhere the
same results, and to the homogeneity of Celtic civilisation, save in
local areas, e.g. the South of Gaul. Moreover, the comparison of the
various testimonies of onlookers points to a general similarity, while
the permanence of the primitive elements in Celtic religion must have
tended to keep it everywhere the same. Though in Gaul we have only
inscriptions and in Ireland only distorted myths, yet those testimonies,
as well as the evidence of folk-survivals in both regions, point to the
similarity of religious phenomena. The Druids, as a more or less
organised priesthood, would assist in preserving the general likeness.
Thus the primitive nature-spirits gave place to greater or lesser gods,
each with his separate department and functions. Though growing
civilisation tended to separate them from the soil, they never quite
lost touch with it. In return for man's worship and sacrifices, they
gave life and increase, victory, strength, and skill. But these
sacrifices, had been and still often were rites in which the
representative of a god was slain. Some divinities were worshipped over
a wide area, most were gods of local groups, and there were spirits of
every place, hill, wood, and stream. Magic rites mingled with the cult,
but both were guided by an organised priesthood. And as the Celts
believed in unseen gods, so they believed in an unseen region whither
they passed after death.
Our knowledge of the higher side of Celtic religion is practically a
blank, since no description of the inner spiritual life has come down to
us. How far the Celts cultivated religion in our sense of the term, or
had glimpses of Monotheism, or were troubled by a deep sense of sin, is
unknown. But a people whose spiritual influence has later been so great,
must have had glimpses of these things. Some of them must have known the
thirst of the soul for God, or sought a higher ethical standard than
that of their time. The enthusiastic reception of Christianity, the
devotion of the early Celtic saints, and the character of the old Celtic
church, all suggest this.
The relation of the Celtic church to paganism was mainly intolerant,
though not wholly so. It often adopted the less harmful customs of the
past, merging pagan festivals in its own, founding churches on the sites
of the old cult, dedicating sacred wells to a saint. A saint would visit
the tomb of a pagan to hear an old epic rehearsed, or would call up
pagan heroes from hell and give them a place in paradise. Other saints
recall dead heroes from the Land of the Blessed, and learn the nature of
that wonderland and the heroic deeds
"Of the old days, which seem to be
Much older than any history
That is written in any book."
Reading such narratives, we gain a lesson in the fine spirit of
Christian tolerance and Christian sympathy.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Some writers saw in the bardic poetry a Druidic-esoteric system and
traces of a cult practised secretly by the bards--the "Neo-Druidic
heresy"; see Davies, _Myth. of the Brit. Druids_, 1809; Herbert, _The
Neo-Druidic Heresy_, 1838. Several French writers saw in "Druidism" a
monotheistic faith, veiled under polytheism.
[3] Livy, v. 46; Caesar, vi. 16; Dion. Hal. vii. 70; Arrian, _Cyneg_.
xxxv. 1.
[4] Caesar, vi. 15, cf. v. 12, "having waged war, remained there and
cultivated the lands."
[5] Cf. Pliny, _HN_ xvii. 7, xviii. 18 on the wheeled ploughs and
agricultural methods of Gauls and Britons. Cf. also Strabo, iv. 1. 2,
iv. 5. 5; Girald. Camb. _Top. Hib._ i. 4, _Descr. Camb._ i. 8; Joyce,
_SH_ ii. 264.
CHAPTER II.
THE CELTIC PEOPLE.
Scrutiny reveals the fact that Celtic-speaking peoples are of differing
types--short and dark as well as tall and fairer Highlanders or
Welshmen, short, broad-headed Bretons, various types of Irishmen. Men
with Norse names and Norse aspect "have the Gaelic." But all alike have
the same character and temperament, a striking witness to the influence
which the character as well as the language of the Celts, whoever they
were, made on all with whom they mingled. Ethnologically there may not
be a Celtic race, but something was handed down from the days of
comparative Celtic purity which welded different social elements into a
common type, found often where no Celtic tongue is now spoken. It
emerges where we least expect it, and the stolid Anglo-Saxon may
suddenly awaken to something in himself due to a forgotten Celtic strain
in his ancestry.
Two main theories of Celtic origins now hold the field:
(1) The Celts are identified with the progenitors of the short,
brachycephalic "Alpine race" of Central Europe, existing there in
Neolithic times, after their migrations from Africa and Asia. The type
is found among the Slavs, in parts of Germany and Scandinavia, and in
modern France in the region of Caesar's "Celtae," among the Auvergnats,
the Bretons, and in Lozere and Jura. Representatives of the type have
been found in Belgian and French Neolithic graves.[6] Professor Sergi
calls this the "Eurasiatic race," and, contrary to general opinion,
identifies it with the Aryans, a savage people, inferior to the
dolichocephalic Mediterranean race, whose language they Aryanised.[7]
Professor Keane thinks that they were themselves an Aryanised folk
before reaching Europe, who in turn gave their acquired Celtic and
Slavic speech to the preceding masses. Later came the Belgae, Aryans, who
acquired the Celtic speech of the people they conquered.[8]
Broca assumed that the dark, brachycephalic people whom he identified
with Caesar's "Celtae," differed from the Belgae, were conquered by them,
and acquired the language of their conquerors, hence wrongly called
Celtic by philologists. The Belgae were tall and fair, and overran Gaul,
except Aquitaine, mixing generally with the Celtae, who in Caesar's time
had thus an infusion of Belgic blood.[9] But before this conquest, the
Celtae had already mingled with the aboriginal dolichocephalic folk of
Gaul, Iberians, or Mediterraneans of Professor Sergi. The latter had
apparently remained comparatively pure from admixture in Aquitaine, and
are probably the Aquitani of Caesar.[10]
But were the short, brachycephalic folk Celts? Caesar says the people who
call themselves "Celtae" were called Gauls by the Romans, and Gauls,
according to classical writers, were tall and fair.[11] Hence the Celtae
were not a short, dark race, and Caesar himself says that Gauls
(including Celtae) looked with contempt on the short Romans.[12] Strabo
also says that Celtae and Belgae had the same Gaulish appearance, i.e.
tall and fair. Caesar's statement that Aquitani, Galli, and Belgae differ
in language, institutions, and laws is vague and unsupported by
evidence, and may mean as to language no more than a difference in
dialects. This is also suggested by Strabo's words, Celtae and Belgae
"differ a little" in language.[13] No classical writer describes the
Celts as short and dark, but the reverse. Short, dark people would have
been called Iberians, without respect to skulls. Classical observers
were not craniologists. The short, brachycephalic type is now prominent
in France, because it has always been so, eliminating the tall, fair
Celtic type. Conquering Celts, fewer in number than the broad and
narrow-headed aborigines, intermarried or made less lasting alliances
with them. In course of time the type of the more numerous race was
bound to prevail. Even in Caesar's day the latter probably outnumbered
the tall and fair Celts, who had, however, Celticised them. But
classical writers, who knew the true Celt as tall and fair, saw that
type only, just as every one, on first visiting France or Germany, sees
his generalised type of Frenchman or German everywhere. Later, he
modifies his opinion, but this the classical observers did not do.
Caesar's campaigns must have drained Gaul of many tall and fair Celts.
This, with the tendency of dark types to out-number fair types in South
and Central Europe, may help to explain the growing prominence of the
dark type, though the tall, fair type is far from uncommon.[14]
(2) The second theory, already anticipated, sees in Gauls and Belgae a
tall, fair Celtic folk, speaking a Celtic language, and belonging to the
race which stretched from Ireland to Asia Minor, from North Germany to
the Po, and were masters of Teutonic tribes till they were driven by
them from the region between Elbe and Rhine.[15] Some Belgic tribes
claimed a Germanic ancestry,[16] but "German" was a word seldom used
with precision, and in this case may not mean Teutonic. The fair hair of
this people has made many suppose that they were akin to the Teutons.
But fairness is relative, and the dark Romans may have called brown hair
fair, while they occasionally distinguished between the "fair" Gauls and
fairer Germans. Their institutions and their religions (_pace_ Professor
Rh[^y]s) differed, and though they were so long in contact the names of
their gods and priests are unlike.[17] Their languages, again, though of
"Aryan" stock, differ more from each other than does Celtic from Italic,
pointing to a long period of Italo-Celtic unity, before Italiotes and
Celts separated, and Celts came in contact with Teutons.[18] The typical
German differs in mental and moral qualities from the typical Celt.
Contrast an east country Scot, descendant of Teutonic stock, with a West
Highlander, and the difference leaps to the eyes. Celts and Germans of
history differ, then, in relative fairness, character, religion, and
language.
The tall, blonde Teutonic type of the Row graves is dolichocephalic. Was
the Celtic type (assuming that Broca's "Celts" were not true Celts)
dolicho or brachy? Broca thinks the Belgae or "Kymri" were
dolichocephalic, but all must agree with him that the skulls are too few
to generalise from. Celtic iron-age skulls in Britain are
dolichocephalic, perhaps a recrudescence of the aboriginal type. Broca's
"Kymric" skulls are mesocephalic; this he attributes to crossing with
the short round-heads. The evidence is too scanty for generalisation,
while the Walloons, perhaps descendants of the Belgae, have a high index,
and some Gauls of classical art are broad-headed.[19]
Skulls of the British round barrows (early Celtic Bronze Age) are mainly
broad, the best specimens showing affinity to Neolithic brachycephalic
skulls from Grenelle (though their owners were 5 inches shorter),
Selaigneaux, and Borreby.[20] Dr. Beddoe thinks that the narrow-skulled
Belgae on the whole reinforced the meso- or brachycephalic round barrow
folk in Britain. Dr. Thurnam identifies the latter with the Belgae
(Broca's Kymri), and thinks that Gaulish skulls were round, with
beetling brows.[21] Professors Ripley and Sergi, disregarding their
difference in stature and higher cephalic index, identify them with the
short Alpine race (Broca's Celts). This is negatived by Mr. Keane.[22]
Might not both, however, have originally sprung from a common stock and
reached Europe at different times?[23]
But do a few hundred skulls justify these far-reaching conclusions
regarding races enduring for thousands of years? At some very remote
period there may have been a Celtic type, as at some further period
there may have been an Aryan type. But the Celts, as we know them, must
have mingled with the aborigines of Europe and become a mixed race,
though preserving and endowing others with their racial and mental
characteristics. Some Gauls or Belgae were dolichocephalic, to judge by
their skulls, others were brachycephalic, while their fairness was a
relative term. Classical observers probably generalised from the higher
classes, of a purer type; they tell us nothing of the people. But the
higher classes may have had varying skulls, as well as stature and
colour of hair,[24] and Irish texts tell of a tall, fair, blue-eyed
stock, and a short, dark, dark-eyed stock, in Ireland. Even in those
distant ages we must consider the people on whom the Celts impressed
their characteristics, as well as the Celts themselves. What happened on
the Eurasian steppe, the hypothetical cradle of the "Aryans," whence the
Celts came "stepping westwards," seems clear to some, but in truth is a
book sealed with seven seals. The men whose Aryan speech was to dominate
far and wide may already have possessed different types of skull, and
that age was far from "the very beginning."
Thus the Celts before setting out on their _Wanderjahre_ may already
have been a mixed race, even if their leaders were of purer stock. But
they had the bond of common speech, institutions, and religion, and they
formed a common Celtic type in Central and Western Europe. Intermarriage
with the already mixed Neolithic folk of Central Europe produced further
removal from the unmixed Celtic racial type; but though both reacted on
each other as far as language, custom, and belief were concerned, on the
whole the Celtic elements predominated in these respects. The Celtic
migration into Gaul produced further racial mingling with descendants of
the old palaeolithic stock, dolichocephalic Iberians and Ligurians, and
brachycephalic swarthy folk (Broca's Celts). Thus even the first Celtic
arrivals in Britain, the Goidels, were a people of mixed race, though
probably relatively purer than the late coming Brythons, the latest of
whom had probably mingled with the Teutons. Hence among Celtic-speaking
folk or their descendants--short, dark, broad-beaded Bretons, tall, fair
or rufous Highlanders, tall chestnut-haired Welshmen or Irishmen,
Highlanders of Norse descent, short, dark, narrow-headed Highlanders,
Irishmen, and Welshmen--there is a common Celtic _facies_, the result of
old Celtic characteristics powerful enough so to impress themselves on
such varied peoples in spite of what they gave to the Celtic incomers.
These peoples became Celtic, and Celtic in speech and character they
have remained, even where ancestral physical types are reasserting
themselves. The folk of a Celtic type, whether pre-Celtic, Celtic, or
Norse, have all spoken a Celtic language and exhibit the same old Celtic
characteristics--vanity, loquacity, excitability, fickleness,
imagination, love of the romantic, fidelity, attachment to family ties,
sentimental love of their country, religiosity passing over easily to
superstition, and a comparatively high degree of sexual morality. Some
of these traits were already noted by classical observers.
Celtic speech had early lost the initial _p_ of old Indo-European
speech, except in words beginning with _pt_ and, perhaps, _ps_. Celtic
_pare_ (Lat. _prae_) became _are_, met with in _Aremorici_, "the dwellers
by the sea," _Arecluta_, "by the Clyde," the region watered by the
Clyde. Irish _athair_, Manx _ayr_, and Irish _iasg_, represent
respectively Latin _pater_ and _piscis_. _P_ occurring between vowels
was also lost, e.g. Irish _caora_, "sheep," is from _kaperax_; _for_,
"upon" (Lat. _super_), from _uper_. This change took place before the
Goidelic Celts broke away and invaded Britain in the tenth century B.C.,
but while Celts and Teutons were still in contact, since Teutons
borrowed words with initial _p_, e.g. Gothic _fairguni_, "mountain,"
from Celtic _percunion_, later _Ercunio_, the Hercynian forest. The loss
must have occurred before 1000 B.C. But after the separation of the
Goidelic group a further change took place. Goidels preserved the sound
represented by _qu_, or more simply by _c_ or _ch_, but this was changed
into _p_ by the remaining continental Celts, who carried with them into
Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Britain (the Brythons) words in which _q_ became
_p_. The British _Epidii_ is from Gaulish _epos_, "horse," which is in
Old Irish _ech_ (Lat. _equus_). The Parisii take their name from
_Qarisii_, the Pictones or Pictavi of Poictiers from _Pictos_ (which in
the plural _Pidi_ gives us "Picts"), derived from _quicto_. This change
took place after the Goidelic invasion of Britain in the tenth century
B.C. On the other hand, some continental Celts may later have regained
the power of pronouncing _q_. In Gaul the _q_ of _Sequana_ (Seine) was
not changed to _p_, and a tribe dwelling on its banks was called the
Sequani. This assumes that Sequana was a pre-Celtic word, possibly
Ligurian.[25] Professor Rh[^y]s thinks, however, that Goidelic tribes,
identified by him with Caesar's Celtae, existed in Gaul and Spain before
the coming of the Galli, and had preserved _q_ in their speech. To them
we owe Sequana, as well as certain names with _q_ in Spain.[26] This at
least is certain, that Goidelic Celts of the _q_ group occupied Gaul and
Spain before reaching Britain and Ireland. Irish tradition and
archaeological data confirm this.[27] But whether their descendants were
represented by Caesar's "Celtae" must be uncertain. Celtae and Galli,
according to Caesar, were one and the same,[28] and must have had the
same general form of speech.
The dialects of Goidelic speech--Irish, Manx, Gaelic, and that of the
continental Goidels--preserved the _q_ sound; those of Gallo-Brythonic
speech--Gaulish, Breton, Welsh, Cornish--changed _q_ into _p_. The
speech of the Picts, perhaps connected with the Pictones of Gaul, also
had this _p_ sound. Who, then, were the Picts? According to Professor
Rh[^y]s they were pre-Aryans,[29] but they must have been under the
influence of Brythonic Celts. Dr. Skene regarded them as Goidels
speaking a Goidelic dialect with Brythonic forms.[30] Mr. Nicholson
thinks they were Goidels who had preserved the Indo-European _p_.[31]
But might they not be descendants of a Brythonic group, arriving early
in Britain and driven northwards by newcomers? Professor Windisch and
Dr. Stokes regard them as Celts, allied to the Brythons rather than to
the Goidels, the phonetics of their speech resembling those of Welsh
rather than Irish.[32]
The theory of an early Goidelic occupation of Britain has been contested
by Professor Meyer,[33] who holds that the first Goidels reached Britain
from Ireland in the second century, while Dr. MacBain[34] was of the
opinion that England, apart from Wales and Cornwall, knew no Goidels,
the place-names being Brythonic. But unless all Goidels reached Ireland
from Gaul or Spain, as some did, Britain was more easily reached than
Ireland by migrating Goidels from the Continent. Prominent Goidelic
place-names would become Brythonic, but insignificant places would
retain their Goidelic form, and to these we must look for decisive
evidence.[35] A Goidelic occupation by the ninth century B.C. is
suggested by the name "Cassiterides" (a word of the _q_ group) applied
to Britain. If the Goidels occupied Britain first, they may have called
their land _Qretanis_ or _Qritanis_, which Pictish invaders would change
to _Pretanis_, found in Welsh "Ynys Pridain," Pridain's Isle, or Isle of
the Picts, "pointing to the original underlying the Greek [Greek:
Pretanikai Nesoi] or Pictish Isles,"[36] though the change may be due to
continental _p_ Celts trading with _q_ Celts in Britain. With the
Pictish occupation would agree the fact that Irish Goidels called the
Picts who came to Ireland _Cruithne=Qritani=Pre-tani_. In Ireland they
almost certainly adopted Goidelic speech.
Whether or not all the Pictish invaders of Britain were called
"Pictavi," this word or Picti, perhaps from _quicto_ (Irish _cicht_,
"engraver"),[37] became a general name for this people. _Q_ had been
changed into _p_ on the Continent; hence "Pictavi" or "Pictones," "the
tattooed men," those who "engraved" figures on their bodies, as the
Picts certainly did. Dispossessed and driven north by incoming Brythons
and Belgae, they later became the virulent enemies of Rome. In 306
Eumenius describes all the northern tribes as "Caledonii and other
Picts," while some of the tribes mentioned by Ptolemy have Brythonic
names or names with Gaulish cognates. Place-names in the Pictish area,
personal names in the Pictish chronicle, and Pictish names like
"Peanfahel,"[38] have Brythonic affinities. If the Picts spoke a
Brythonic dialect, S. Columba's need of an interpreter when preaching to
them would be explained.[39] Later the Picts were conquered by Irish
Goidels, the Scotti. The Picts, however, must already have mingled with
aboriginal peoples and with Goidels, if these were already in Britain,
and they may have adopted their supposed non-Aryan customs from the
aborigines. On the other hand, the matriarchate seems at one time to
have been Celtic, and it may have been no more than a conservative
survival in the Pictish royal house, as it was elsewhere.[40] Britons,
as well as Caledonii, had wives in common.[41] As to tattooing, it was
practised by the Scotti ("the scarred and painted men"?), and the
Britons dyed themselves with woad, while what seem to be tattoo marks
appear on faces on Gaulish coins.[42] Tattooing, painting, and
scarifying the body are varieties of one general custom, and little
stress can be laid on Pictish tattooing as indicating a racial
difference. Its purpose may have been ornamental, or possibly to impart
an aspect of fierceness, or the figures may have been totem marks, as
they are elsewhere. Finally, the description of the Caledonii, a Pictish
people, possessing flaming hair and mighty limbs, shows that they
differed from the short, dark pre-Celtic folk.[43]
The Pictish problem must remain obscure, a welcome puzzle to
antiquaries, philologists, and ethnologists. Our knowledge of Pictish
religion is too scanty for the interpretation of Celtic religion to be
affected by it. But we know that the Picts offered sacrifice before
war--a Celtic custom, and had Druids, as also had the Celts.
The earliest Celtic "kingdom" was in the region between the upper waters
of the Rhine, the Elbe, and the Danube, where probably in Neolithic
times the formation of their Celtic speech as a distinctive language
began. Here they first became known to the Greeks, probably as a
semi-mythical people, the Hyperboreans--the folk dwelling beyond the
Ripoean mountains whence Boreas blew--with whom Hecataeus in the fourth
century identifies them. But they were now known as Celts, and their
territory as Celtica, while "Galatas" was used as a synonym of "Celtae,"
in the third century B.C.[44] The name generally applied by the Romans
to the Celts was "Galli" a term finally confined by them to the people
of Gaul.[45] Successive bands of Celts went forth from this
comparatively restricted territory, until the Celtic "empire" for some
centuries before 300 B.C. included the British Isles, parts of the
Iberian peninsula, Gaul, North Italy, Belgium, Holland, great part of
Germany, and Austria. When the German tribes revolted, Celtic bands
appeared in Asia Minor, and remained there as the Galatian Celts.
Archaeological discoveries with a Celtic _facies_ have been made in most
of these lands but even more striking is the witness of place-names.
Celtic _dunon_, a fort or castle (the Gaelic _dun_), is found in
compound names from Ireland to Southern Russia. _Magos_, "a field," is
met with in Britain, France, Switzerland, Prussia, Italy, and Austria.
River and mountain names familiar in Britain occur on the Continent. The
Pennine range of Cumberland has the same name as the Appenines. Rivers
named for their inherent divinity, _devos_, are found in Britain and on
the Continent--Dee, Deva, etc.
Besides this linguistic, had the Celts also a political unity over their
great "empire," under one head? Such a unity certainly did not prevail
from Ireland to the Balkan peninsula, but it prevailed over a large part
of the Celtic area. Livy, following Timagenes, who perhaps cited a lost
Celtic epos, speaks of king Ambicatus ruling over the Celts from Spain
to Germany, and sending his sister's sons, Bellovesus and Segovesus,
with many followers, to found new colonies in Italy and the Hercynian
forest.[46] Mythical as this may be, it suggests the hegemony of one
tribe or one chief over other tribes and chiefs, for Livy says that the
sovereign power rested with the Bituriges who appointed the king of
Celticum, viz. Ambicatus. Some such unity is necessary to explain Celtic
power in the ancient world, and it was made possible by unity of race or
at least of the congeries of Celticised peoples, by religious
solidarity, and probably by regular gatherings of all the kings or
chiefs. If the Druids were a Celtic priesthood at this time, or already
formed a corporation as they did later in Gaul, they must have
endeavoured to form and preserve such a unity. And if it was never so
compact as Livy's words suggest, it must have been regarded as an ideal
by the Celts or by their poets, Ambicatus serving as a central figure
round which the ideas of empire crystallised. The hegemony existed in
Gaul, where the Arverni and their king claimed power over the other
tribes, and where the Romans tried to weaken the Celtic unity by
opposing to them the Aedni.[47] In Belgium the hegemony was in the hands
of the Suessiones, to whose king Belgic tribes in Britain submitted.[48]
In Ireland the "high king" was supreme over other smaller kings, and in
Galatia the unity of the tribes was preserved by a council with regular
assemblies.[49]
The diffusion of the Ambicatus legend would help to preserve unity by
recalling the mythic greatness of the past. The Boii and Insubri
appealed to transalpine Gauls for aid by reminding them of the deeds of
their ancestors.[50] Nor would the Druids omit to infuse into their
pupils' minds the sentiment of national greatness. For this and for
other reasons, the Romans, to whom "the sovereignty of all Gaul" was an
obnoxious watch-word, endeavoured to suppress them.[51] But the Celts
were too widely scattered ever to form a compact empire.[52] The Roman
empire extended itself gradually in the consciousness of its power; the
cohesion of the Celts in an empire or under one king was made impossible
by their migrations and diffusion. Their unity, such as it was, was
broken by the revolt of the Teutonic tribes, and their subjugation was
completed by Rome. The dreams of wide empire remained dreams. For the
Celts, in spite of their vigour, have been a race of dreamers, their
conquests in later times, those of the spirit rather than of the mailed
fist. Their superiority has consisted in imparting to others their
characteristics; organised unity and a vast empire could never be
theirs.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] Ripley, _Races of Europe_; Wilser, _L'Anthropologie_, xiv. 494;
Collignon, _ibid._ 1-20; Broca, _Rev. d'Anthrop._ ii. 589 ff.
[7] Sergi, _The Mediterranean Race_, 241 ff., 263 ff.
[8] Keane, _Man, Past and Present_, 511 ff., 521, 528.
[9] Broca, _Mem. d'Anthrop._ i. 370 ff. Hovelacque thinks, with Keane,
that the Gauls learned Celtic from the dark round-heads. But Galatian
and British Celts, who had never been in contact with the latter, spoke
Celtic. See Holmes, _Caesar's Conquest of Gaul_, 311-312.
[10] Caesar, i. 1; Collignon, _Mem. Soc. d'Anthrop. de Paris_, 3{me} ser.
i. 67.
[11] Caesar, i. 1.
[12] Caesar, ii. 30.
[13] Caesar, i. 1; Strabo, iv. 1. 1.
[14] Cf. Holmes, 295; Beddoe, _Scottish Review_, xix. 416.
[15] D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 175.
[16] Caesar, ii. 4; Strabo, vii. 1. 2. Germans are taller and fairer than
Gauls; Tacitus, _Agric._ ii. Cf. Beddoe, _JAI_ xx. 354-355.
[17] D'Arbois, _PH_ ii. 374. Welsh Gwydion and Teutonic Wuotan may have
the same root, see p. 105. Celtic Taranis has been compared to Donar,
but there is no connection, and Taranis was not certainly a thunder-god.
Much of the folk-religion was alike, but this applies to folk-religion
everywhere.
[18] D'Arbois, ii. 251.
[19] Beddoe, _L'Anthropologie_, v. 516. Tall, fair, and highly
brachycephalic types are still found in France, _ibid._ i. 213;
Bortrand-Reinach, _Les Celtes_, 39.
[20] Beddoe, 516; _L'Anthrop._, v. 63; Taylor, 81; Greenwell, _British
Barrows_, 680.
[21] _Fort. Rev._ xvi. 328; _Mem. of London Anthr. Soc._, 1865.
[22] Ripley, 309; Sergi, 243; Keane, 529; Taylor, 112.
[23] Taylor, 122, 295.
[24] The Walloons are both dark and fair.
[25] D'Arbois, _PH_ ii. 132.
[26] Rh[^y]s, _Proc. Phil. Soc._ 1891; "Celtae and Galli," _Proc. Brit.
Acad._ ii. D'Arbois points out that we do not know that these words are
Celtic (_RC_ xii, 478).
[27] See pp. 51, 376.
[28] Caesar, i. 1.
[29] _CB_{4} 160.
[30] Skene, i. ch. 8; see p. 135.
[31] _ZCP_ iii. 308; _Keltic Researches_.
[32] Windisch, "Kelt. Sprachen," Ersch-Gruber's _Encylopaedie_; Stokes,
_Linguistic Value of the Irish Annals_.
[33] _THSC_ 1895-1896, 55 f.
[34] _CM_ xii. 434.
[35] In the Isle of Skye, where, looking at names of prominent places
alone, Norse derivatives are to Gaelic as 3 to 2, they are as 1 to 5
when names of insignificant places, untouched by Norse influence, are
included.
[36] Rh[^y]s, _CB_{4} 241.
[37] D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 22.
[38] Bede, _Eccl. Hist._ i. 12.
[39] Adamnan, _Vita S. Col._
[40] See p. 222.
[41] Dio Cass. lxxvi. 12; Caesar, v. 14. See p. 223.
[42] Isidore, _Etymol._ ix. 2, 103; Rh[^y]s, _CB_ 242-243; Caesar, v. 14;
Nicholson, _ZCP_ in. 332.
[43] Tacitus, _Agric._ ii.
[44] If _Celtae_ is from _qelo_, "to raise," it may mean "the lofty,"
just as many savages call themselves "the men," _par excellence_.
Rh[^y]s derives it from _qel_, "to slay," and gives it the sense of
"warriors." See Holder, _s.v._; Stokes, _US_ 83. _Galatae_ is from _gala_
(Irish _gal_), "bravery." Hence perhaps "warriors."
[45] "Galli" may be connected with "Galatae," but D'Arbois denies this.
For all these titles see his _PH_ ii. 396 ff.
[46] Livy, v. 31 f.; D'Arbois, _PH_ ii. 304, 391.
[47] Strabo, iv. 10. 3; Caesar, i. 31, vii. 4; _Frag. Hist. Graec._ i.
437.
[48] Caesar, ii. 4.
[49] Strabo, xii. 5. 1.
[50] Polybius, ii. 22.
[51] Caesar, i. 2, 1-3.
[52] On the subject of Celtic unity see Jullian, "Du patriotisme
gaulois," _RC_ xxiii. 373.
CHAPTER III.
THE GODS OF GAUL AND THE CONTINENTAL CELTS.
The passage in which Caesar sums up the Gaulish pantheon runs: "They
worship chiefly the god Mercury; of him there are many symbols, and they
regard him as the inventor of all the arts, as the guide of travellers,
and as possessing great influence over bargains and commerce. After him
they worship Apollo and Mars, Juppiter and Minerva. About these they
hold much the same beliefs as other nations. Apollo heals diseases,
Minerva teaches the elements of industry and the arts, Juppiter rules
over the heavens, Mars directs war.... All the Gauls assert that they
are descended from Dispater, their progenitor."[53]
As will be seen in this chapter, the Gauls had many other gods than
these, while the Roman gods, by whose names Caesar calls the Celtic
divinities, probably only approximately corresponded to them in
functions. As the Greeks called by the names of their own gods those of
Egypt, Persia, and Babylonia, so the Romans identified Greek, Teutonic,
and Celtic gods with theirs. The identification was seldom complete, and
often extended only to one particular function or attribute. But, as in
Gaul, it was often part of a state policy, and there the fusion of cults
was intended to break the power of the Druids. The Gauls seem to have
adopted Roman civilisation easily, and to have acquiesced in the process
of assimilation of their divinities to those of their conquerors. Hence
we have thousands of inscriptions in which a god is called by the name
of the Roman deity to whom he was assimilated and by his own Celtic
name--Jupiter Taranis, Apollo Grannus, etc. Or sometimes to the name of
the Roman god is added a descriptive Celtic epithet or a word derived
from a Celtic place-name. Again, since Augustus reinstated the cult of
the Lares, with himself as chief Lar, the epithet Augustus was given to
all gods to whom the character of the Lares could be ascribed, e.g.
Belenos Augustus. Cults of local gods became cults of the genius of the
place, coupled with the genius of the emperor. In some cases, however,
the native name stands alone. The process was aided by art. Celtic gods
are represented after Greco-Roman or Greco-Egyptian models. Sometimes
these carry a native divine symbol, or, in a few cases, the type is
purely native, e.g. that of Cernunnos. Thus the native paganism was
largely transformed before Christianity appeared in Gaul. Many Roman
gods were worshipped as such, not only by the Romans in Gaul, but by the
Gauls, and we find there also traces of the Oriental cults affected by
the Romans.[54]
There were probably in Gaul many local gods, tribal or otherwise, of
roads and commerce, of the arts, of healing, etc., who, bearing
different names, might easily be identified with each other or with
Roman gods. Caesar's Mercury, Mars, Minerva, etc., probably include many
local Minervas, Mars, and Mercuries. There may, however, have been a few
great gods common to all Gaul, universally worshipped, besides the
numerous local gods, some of whom may have been adopted from the
aborigines. An examination of the divine names in Holder's
_Altceltischer Sprachschatz_ will show how numerous the local gods of
the continental Celts must have been. Professor Anwyl reckons that 270
gods are mentioned once on inscriptions, 24 twice, 11 thrice, 10 four
times, 3 five times, 2 seven times, 4 fifteen times, 1 nineteen times
(Grannos), and 1 thirty-nine times (Belenos).[55]
The god or gods identified with Mercury were very popular in Gaul, as
Caesar's words and the witness of place-names derived from the Roman name
of the god show. These had probably supplanted earlier names derived
from those of the corresponding native gods. Many temples of the god
existed, especially in the region of the Allobrogi, and bronze
statuettes of him have been found in abundance. Pliny also describes a
colossal statue designed for the Arverni who had a great temple of the
god on the Puy de Dome.[56] Mercury was not necessarily the chief god,
and at times, e.g. in war, the native war-gods would be prominent. The
native names of the gods assimilated to Mercury are many in number; in
some cases they are epithets, derived from the names of places where a
local "Mercury" was worshipped, in others they are derived from some
function of the gods.[57] One of these titles is Artaios, perhaps
cognate with Irish _art_, "god," or connected with _artos_, "bear."
Professor Rh[^y]s, however, finds its cognate in Welsh _ar_, "ploughed
land," as if one of the god's functions connected him with
agriculture.[58] This is supported by another inscription to Mercurius
Cultor at Wurtemberg. Local gods of agriculture must thus have been
assimilated to Mercury. A god Moccus, "swine," was also identified with
Mercury, and the swine was a frequent representative of the corn-spirit
or of vegetation divinities in Europe. The flesh of the animal was often
mixed with the seed corn or buried in the fields to promote fertility.
The swine had been a sacred animal among the Celts, but had apparently
become an anthropomorphic god of fertility, Moccus, assimilated to
Mercury, perhaps because the Greek Hermes caused fertility in flocks and
herds. Such a god was one of a class whose importance was great among
the Celts as an agricultural people.
Commerce, much developed among the settled Gauls, gave rise to a god or
gods who guarded roads over which merchants travelled, and boundaries
where their transactions took place. Hence we have an inscription from
Yorkshire, "To the god who invented roads and paths," while another
local god of roads, equated with Mercury, was Cimiacinus.[59]
Another god, Ogmios, a native god of speech, who draws men by chains
fastened to the tip of his tongue, is identified in Lucian with
Heracles, and is identical with the Goidelic Ogma.[60] Eloquence and
speech are important matters among primitive peoples, and this god has
more likeness to Mercury as a culture-god than to Heracles, Greek
writers speaking of eloquence as binding men with the chains of Hermes.
Several local gods, of agriculture, commerce, and culture, were thus
identified with Mercury, and the Celtic Mercury was sometimes worshipped
on hilltops, one of the epithets of the god, Dumias, being connected
with the Celtic word for hill or mound. Irish gods were also associated
with mounds.
Many local gods were identified with Apollo both in his capacity of god
of healing and also that of god of light.[61] The two functions are not
incompatible, and this is suggested by the name Grannos, god of thermal
springs both in Britain and on the Continent. The name is connected with
a root which gives words meaning "burning," "shining," etc., and from
which comes also Irish _grian_, "sun." The god is still remembered in a
chant sung round bonfires in Auvergne. A sheaf of corn is set on fire,
and called "Granno mio," while the people sing, "Granno, my friend;
Granno, my father; Granno, my mother."[62] Another god of thermal
springs was Borvo, Bormo, or Bormanus, whose name is derived from
_borvo_, whence Welsh _berw_, "boiling," and is evidently connected with
the bubbling of the springs.[63] Votive tablets inscribed Grannos or
Borvo show that the offerers desired healing for themselves or others.
The name Belenos found over a wide area, but mainly in Aquileia, comes
from _belo-s_, bright, and probably means "the shining one." It is thus
the name of a Celtic sun-god, equated with Apollo in that character. If
he is the Belinus referred to by Geoffrey of Monmouth,[64] his cult must
have extended into Britain from the Continent, and he is often mentioned
by classical writers, while much later Ausonius speaks of his priest in
Gaul.[65] Many place and personal names point to the popularity of his
cult, and inscriptions show that he, too, was a god of health and of
healing-springs. The plant _Belinuntia_ was called after him and
venerated for its healing powers.[66] The sun-god's functions of light
and fertility easily passed over into those of health-giving, as our
study of Celtic festivals will show.
A god with the name Maponos, connected with words denoting
"youthfulness," is found in England and Gaul, equated with Apollo, who
himself is called _Bonus Puer_ in a Dacian inscription. Another god
Mogons or Mogounos, whose name is derived from _Mago_, "to increase,"
and suggests the idea of youthful strength, may be a form of the
sun-god, though some evidence points to his having been a sky-god.[67]
The Celtic Apollo is referred to by classical writers. Diodorus speaks
of his circular temple in an island of the Hyperboreans, adorned with
votive offerings. The kings of the city where the temple stood, and its
overseers, were called "Boreads," and every nineteenth year the god
appeared dancing in the sky at the spring equinox.[68] The
identifications of the temple with Stonehenge and of the Boreads with
the Bards are quite hypothetical. Apollonius says that the Celts
regarded the waters of Eridanus as due to the tears of Apollo--probably
a native myth attributing the creation of springs and rivers to the
tears of a god, equated by the Greeks with Apollo.[69] The Celtic
sun-god, as has been seen, was a god of healing springs.
Some sixty names or titles of Celtic war-gods are known, generally
equated with Mars.[70] These were probably local tribal divinities
regarded as leading their worshippers to battle. Some of the names show
that these gods were thought of as mighty warriors, e.g. Caturix,
"battle-king," Belatu-Cadros--a common name in Britain--perhaps meaning
"comely in slaughter,"[71] and Albiorix, "world-king."[72] Another name,
Rigisamus, from _rix_ and _samus_, "like to," gives the idea of
"king-like."[73]
Toutatis, Totatis, and Tutatis are found in inscriptions from Seckau,
York, and Old Carlisle, and may be identified with Lucan's Teutates, who
with Taranis and Esus mentioned by him, is regarded as one of three
pan-Celtic gods.[74] Had this been the case we should have expected to
find many more inscriptions to them. The scholiast on Lucan identifies
Teutates now with Mars, now with Mercury. His name is connected with
_teuta_, "tribe," and he is thus a tribal war-god, regarded as the
embodiment of the tribe in its warlike capacity.
Neton, a war-god of the Accetani, has a name connected with Irish _nia_,
"warrior," and may be equated with the Irish war-god Net. Another god,
Camulos, known from British and continental inscriptions, and figured on
British coins with warlike emblems, has perhaps some connection with
Cumal, father of Fionn, though it is uncertain whether Cumal was an
Irish divinity.[75]
Another god equated with Mars is the Gaulish Braciaca, god of malt.
According to classical writers, the Celts were drunken race, and besides
importing quantities of wine, they made their own native drinks, e.g.
[Greek: chourmi], the Irish _cuirm_, and _braccat_, both made from malt
(_braich_).[76] These words, with the Gaulish _brace_, "spelt,"[77] are
connected with the name of this god, who was a divine personification of
the substance from which the drink was made which produced, according to
primitive ideas, the divine frenzy of intoxication. It is not clear why
Mars should have been equated with this god.
Caesar says that the Celtic Juppiter governed heaven. A god who carries a
wheel, probably a sun-god, and another, a god of thunder, called
Taranis, seem to have been equated with Juppiter. The sun-god with the
wheel was not equated with Apollo, who seems to have represented Celtic
sun-gods only in so far as they were also gods of healing. In some cases
the god with the wheel carries also a thunderbolt, and on some altars,
dedicated to Juppiter, both a wheel and a thunderbolt are figured. Many
races have symbolised the sun as a circle or wheel, and an old Roman
god, Summanus, probably a sun-god, later assimilated to Juppiter, had as
his emblem a wheel. The Celts had the same symbolism, and used the wheel
symbol as an amulet,[78] while at the midsummer festivals blazing
wheels, symbolising the sun, were rolled down a slope. Possibly the god
carries a thunderbolt because the Celts, like other races, believed that
lightning was a spark from the sun.
Three divinities have claims to be the god whom Caesar calls Dispater--a
god with a hammer, a crouching god called Cernunnos, and a god called
Esus or Silvanus. Possibly the native Dispater was differently envisaged
in different districts, so that these would be local forms of one god.
1. The god Taranis mentioned by Lucan is probably the Taranoos and
Taranucnos of inscriptions, sometimes equated with Juppiter.[79] These
names are connected with Celtic words for "thunder"; hence Taranis is a
thunder-god. The scholiasts on Lucan identify him now with Juppiter, now
with Dispater. This latter identification is supported by many who
regard the god with the hammer as at once Taranis and Dispater, though
it cannot be proved that the god with the hammer is Taranis. On one
inscription the hammer-god is called Sucellos; hence we may regard
Taranis as a distinct deity, a thunder-god, equated with Juppiter, and
possibly represented by the Taran of the Welsh tale of _Kulhwych_.[80]
Primitive men, whose only weapon and tool was a stone axe or hammer,
must have regarded it as a symbol of force, then of supernatural force,
hence of divinity. It is represented on remains of the Stone Age, and
the axe was a divine symbol to the Mycenaeans, a hieroglyph of Neter to
the Egyptians, and a worshipful object to Polynesians and Chaldeans. The
cult of axe or hammer may have been widespread, and to the Celts, as to
many other peoples, it was a divine symbol. Thus it does not necessarily
denote a thunderbolt, but rather power and might, and possibly, as the
tool which shaped things, creative might. The Celts made _ex voto_
hammers of lead, or used axe-heads as amulets, or figured them on altars
and coins, and they also placed the hammer in the hand of a god.[81]
The god with the hammer is a gracious bearded figure, clad in Gaulish
dress, and he carries also a cup. His plastic type is derived from that
of the Alexandrian Serapis, ruler of the underworld, and that of
Hades-Pluto.[82] His emblems, especially that of the hammer, are also
those of the Pluto of the Etruscans, with whom the Celts had been in
contact.[83] He is thus a Celtic Dispater, an underworld god, possibly
at one time an Earth-god and certainly a god of fertility, and ancestor
of the Celtic folk. In some cases, like Serapis, he carries a _modius_
on his head, and this, like the cup, is an emblem of chthonian gods, and
a symbol of the fertility of the soil. The god being benevolent, his
hammer, like the tool with which man forms so many things, could only be
a symbol of creative force.[84] As an ancestor of the Celts, the god is
naturally represented in Celtic dress. In one bas-relief he is called
Sucellos, and has a consort, Nantosvelta.[85] Various meanings have been
assigned to "Sucellos," but it probably denotes the god's power of
striking with the hammer. M. D'Arbois hence regards him as a god of
blight and death, like Balor.[86] But though this Celtic Dispater was a
god of the dead who lived on in the underworld, he was not necessarily a
destructive god. The underworld god was the god from whom or from whose
kingdom men came forth, and he was also a god of fertility. To this we
shall return.
2. A bearded god, probably squatting, with horns from each of which
hangs a torque, is represented on an altar found at Paris.[87] He is
called Cernunnos, perhaps "the horned," from _cerna_, "horn," and a
whole group of nameless gods, with similar or additional attributes,
have affinities with him.
(a) A bronze statuette from Autun represents a similar figure, probably
horned, who presents a torque to two ram's-headed serpents. Fixed above
his ears are two small heads.[88] On a monument from Vandoeuvres is a
squatting horned god, pressing a sack. Two genii stand beside him on a
serpent, while one of them holds a torque.[89]
(b) Another squatting horned figure with a torque occurs on an altar
from Reims. He presses a bag, from which grain escapes, and on it an ox
and stag are feeding. A rat is represented on the pediment above, and on
either side stand Apollo and Mercury.[90] On the altar of Saintes is a
squatting but headless god with torque and purse. Beside him is a
goddess with a cornucopia, and a smaller divinity with a cornucopia and
an apple. A similar squatting figure, supported by male and female
deities, is represented on the other side of the altar.[91] On the altar
of Beaune are three figures, one horned with a cornucopia, another
three-headed, holding a basket.[92] Three figures, one female and two
male, are found on the Dennevy altar. One god is three-faced, the other
has a cornucopia, which he offers to a serpent.[93]
(c) Another image represents a three-faced god, holding a serpent with a
ram's head.[94]
(d) Above a seated god and goddess on an altar from Malmaison is a block
carved to represent three faces. To be compared with these are seven
steles from Reims, each with a triple face but only one pair of eyes.
Above some of these is a ram's head. On an eighth stele the heads are
separated.[95]
Cernunnos may thus have been regarded as a three-headed, horned,
squatting god, with a torque and ram's-headed serpent. But a horned god
is sometimes a member of a triad, perhaps representing myths in which
Cernunnos was associated with other gods. The three-headed god may be
the same as the horned god, though on the Beaune altar they are
distinct. The various representations are linked together, but it is not
certain that all are varying types of one god. Horns, torque, horned
snake, or even the triple head may have been symbols pertaining to more
than one god, though generally associated with Cernunnos.
The squatting attitude of the god has been differently explained, and
its affinities regarded now as Buddhist, now as Greco-Egyptian.[96] But
if the god is a Dispater, and the ancestral god of the Celts, it is
natural, as M. Mowat points out, to represent him in the typical
attitude of the Gauls when sitting, since they did not use seats.[97]
While the horns were probably symbols of power and worn also by chiefs
on their helmets,[98] they may also show that the god was an
anthropomorphic form of an earlier animal god, like the wolf-skin of
other gods. Hence also horned animals would be regarded as symbols of
the god, and this may account for their presence on the Reims monument.
Animals are sometimes represented beside the divinities who were their
anthropomorphic forms.[99] Similarly the ram's-headed serpent points to
animal worship. But its presence with three-headed and horned gods is
enigmatic, though, as will be seen later, it may have been connected
with a cult of the dead, while the serpent was a chthonian animal.[100]
These gods were gods of fertility and of the underworld of the dead.
While the bag or purse (interchangeable with the cornucopia) was a
symbol of Mercury, it was also a symbol of Pluto, and this may point to
the fact that the gods who bear it had the same character as Pluto. The
significance of the torque is also doubtful, but the Gauls offered
torques to the gods, and they may have been regarded as vehicles of the
warrior's strength which passed from him to the god to whom the victor
presented it.
Though many attempts have been made to prove the non-Celtic origin of
the three-headed divinities or of their images,[101] there is no reason
why the conception should not be Celtic, based on some myth now lost to
us. The Celts had a cult of human heads, and fixed them up on their
houses in order to obtain the protection of the ghost. Bodies or heads
of dead warriors had a protective influence on their land or tribe, and
myth told how the head of the god Bran saved his country from invasion.
In other myths human heads speak after being cut off.[102] It might thus
easily have been believed that the representation of a god's head had a
still more powerful protective influence, especially when it was
triplicated, thus looking in all directions, like Janus.
The significance of the triad on these monuments is uncertain but since
the supporting divinities are now male, now female, now male and female,
it probably represents myths of which the horned or three-headed god was
the central figure. Perhaps we shall not be far wrong in regarding such
gods, on the whole, as Cernunnos, a god of abundance to judge by his
emblems, and by the cornucopia held by his companions, probably
divinities of fertility. In certain cases figures of squatting and
horned goddesses with cornucopia occur.[103] These may be consorts of
Cernunnos, and perhaps preceded him in origin. We may also go further
and see in this god of abundance and fertility at once an Earth and an
Under-earth god, since earth and under-earth are much the same to
primitive thought, and fertility springs from below the earth's surface.
Thus Cernunnos would be another form of the Celtic Dispater. Generally
speaking, the images of Cernunnos are not found where those of the god
with the hammer (Dispater) are most numerous. These two types may thus
be different local forms of Dispater. The squatting attitude of
Cernunnos is natural in the image of the ancestor of a people who
squatted. As to the symbols of plenty, we know that Pluto was confounded
with Plutus, the god of riches, because corn and minerals came out of
the earth, and were thus the gifts of an Earth or Under-earth god.
Celtic myth may have had the same confusion.
On a Paris altar and on certain steles a god attacks a serpent with a
club. The serpent is a chthonian animal, and the god, called Smertullos,
may be a Dispater.[104] Gods who are anthropomorphic forms of earlier
animal divinities, sometimes have the animals as symbols or attendants,
or are regarded as hostile to them. In some cases Dispater may have
outgrown the serpent symbolism, the serpent being regarded locally as
his foe; this assumes that the god with the club is the same as the god
with the hammer. But in the case of Cernunnos the animal remained as his
symbol.
Dispater was a god of growth and fertility, and besides being lord of
the underworld of the dead, not necessarily a dark region or the abode
of "dark" gods as is so often assumed by writers on Celtic religion, he
was ancestor of the living. This may merely have meant that, as in other
mythologies, men came to the surface of the earth from an underground
region, like all things whose roots struck deep down into the earth. The
lord of the underworld would then easily be regarded as their
ancestor.[105]
3. The hammer and the cup are also the symbols of a god called Silvanus,
identified by M. Mowat with Esus,[106] a god represented cutting down a
tree with an axe. Axe and hammer, however, are not necessarily
identical, and the symbols are those of Dispater, as has been seen. A
purely superficial connection between the Roman Silvanus and the Celtic
Dispater may have been found by Gallo-Roman artists in the fact that
both wear a wolf-skin, while there may once have been a Celtic wolf
totem-god of the dead.[107] The Roman god was also associated with the
wolf. This might be regarded as one out of many examples of a mere
superficial assimilation of Roman and Celtic divinities, but in this
case they still kept certain symbols of the native Dispater--the cup and
hammer. Of course, since the latter was also a god of fertility, there
was here another link with Silvanus, a god of woods and vegetation. The
cult of the god was widespread--in Spain, S. Gaul, the Rhine provinces,
Cisalpine Gaul, Central Europe and Britain. But one inscription gives
the name Selvanos, and it is not impossible that there was a native god
Selvanus. If so, his name may have been derived from _selva_,
"possession," Irish _sealbh_, "possession," "cattle," and he may have
been a chthonian god of riches, which in primitive communities consisted
of cattle.[108] Domestic animals, in Celtic mythology, were believed to
have come from the god's land. Selvanus would thus be easily identified
with Silvanus, a god of flocks.
Thus the Celtic Dispater had various names and forms in different
regions, and could be assimilated to different foreign gods. Since Earth
and Under-earth are so nearly connected, this divinity may once have
been an Earth-god, and as such perhaps took the place of an earlier
Earth-mother, who now became his consort or his mother. On a monument
from Salzbach, Dispater is accompanied by a goddess called Aeracura,
holding a basket of fruit, and on another monument from Ober-Seebach,
the companion of Dispater holds a cornucopia. In the latter instance
Dispater holds a hammer and cup, and the goddess may be Aeracura.
Aeracura is also associated with Dispater in several inscriptions.[109]
It is not yet certain that she is a Celtic goddess, but her presence
with this evidently Celtic god is almost sufficient proof of the fact.
She may thus represent the old Earth-goddess, whose place the native
Dispater gradually usurped.
Lucan mentions a god Esus, who is represented on a Paris altar as a
woodman cutting down a tree, the branches of which are carried round to
the next side of the altar, on which is represented a bull with three
cranes--Tarvos Trigaranos. The same figure, unnamed, occurs on another
altar at Treves, but in this case the bull's head appears in the
branches, and on them sit the birds. M. Reinach applies one formula to
the subjects of these altars--"The divine Woodman hews the Tree of the
Bull with Three Cranes."[110] The whole represents some myth unknown to
us, but M. D'Arbois finds in it some allusion to events in the
Cuchulainn saga. To this we shall return.[111] Bull and tree are perhaps
both divine, and if the animal, like the images of the divine bull, is
three-horned, then the three cranes (_garanus_, "crane") may be a rebus
for three-horned (_trikeras_), or more probably three-headed
(_trikarenos_).[112] In this case woodman, tree, and bull might all be
representatives of a god of vegetation. In early ritual, human, animal,
or arboreal representatives of the god were periodically destroyed to
ensure fertility, but when the god became separated from these
representatives, the destruction or slaying was regarded as a sacrifice
to the god, and myths arose telling how he had once slain the animal. In
this case, tree and bull, really identical, would be mythically regarded
as destroyed by the god whom they had once represented. If Esus was a
god of vegetation, once represented by a tree, this would explain why,
as the scholiast on Lucan relates, human sacrifices to Esus were
suspended from a tree. Esus was worshipped at Paris and at Treves; a
coin with the name AEsus was found in England; and personal names like
Esugenos, "son of Esus," and Esunertus, "he who has the strength of
Esus," occur in England, France, and Switzerland.[113] Thus the cult of
this god may have been comparatively widespread. But there is no
evidence that he was a Celtic Jehovah or a member, with Teutates and
Taranis, of a pan-Celtic triad, or that this triad, introduced by Gauls,
was not accepted by the Druids.[114] Had such a great triad existed,
some instance of the occurrence of the three names on one inscription
would certainly have been found. Lucan does not refer to the gods as a
triad, nor as gods of all the Celts, or even of one tribe. He lays
stress merely on the fact that they were worshipped with human
sacrifice, and they were apparently more or less well-known local
gods.[115]
The insular Celts believed that some of their gods lived on or in hills.
We do not know whether such a belief was entertained by the Gauls,
though some of their deities were worshipped on hills, like the Puy de
Dome. There is also evidence of mountain worship among them. One
inscription runs, "To the Mountains"; a god of the Pennine Alps,
Poeninus, was equated with Juppiter; and the god of the Vosges mountains
was called Vosegus, perhaps still surviving in the giant supposed to
haunt them.[116]
Certain grouped gods, _Dii Casses_, were worshipped by Celts on the
right bank of the Rhine, but nothing is known regarding their functions,
unless they were road gods. The name means "beautiful" or "pleasant,"
and _Cassi_ appears in personal and tribal names, and also in
_Cassiterides_, an early name of Britain, perhaps signifying that the
new lands were "more beautiful" than those the Celts had left. When tin
was discovered in Britain, the Mediterranean traders called it [Greek:
chassiteros], after the name of the place where it was found, as
_cupreus_, "copper," was so called from Cyprus.[117]
Many local tutelar divinities were also worshipped. When a new
settlement was founded, it was placed under the protection of a tribal
god, or the name of some divinised river on whose banks the village was
placed, passed to the village itself, and the divinity became its
protector. Thus Dea Bibracte, Nemausus, and Vasio were tutelar
divinities of Bibracte, Nimes, and Vaison. Other places were called
after Belenos, or a group of divinities, usually the _Matres_ with a
local epithet, watched over a certain district.[118] The founding of a
town was celebrated in an annual festival, with sacrifices and libations
to the protecting deity, a practice combated by S. Eloi in the eighth
century. But the custom of associating a divinity with a town or region
was a great help to patriotism. Those who fought for their homes felt
that they were fighting for their gods, who also fought on their side.
Several inscriptions, "To the genius of the place," occur in Britain,
and there are a few traces of tutelar gods in Irish texts, but generally
local saints had taken their place.
The Celtic cult of goddesses took two forms, that of individual and that
of grouped goddesses, the latter much more numerous than the grouped
gods. Individual goddesses were worshipped as consorts of gods, or as
separate personalities, and in the latter case the cult was sometimes
far extended. Still more popular was the cult of grouped goddesses. Of
these the _Matres_, like some individual goddesses, were probably early
Earth-mothers, and since the primitive fertility-cults included all that
might then be summed up as "civilisation," such goddesses had already
many functions, and might the more readily become divinities of special
crafts or even of war. Many individual goddesses are known only by their
names, and were of a purely local character.[119] Some local goddesses
with different names but similar functions are equated with the same
Roman goddess; others were never so equated.
The Celtic Minerva, or the goddesses equated with her, "taught the
elements of industry and the arts,"[120] and is thus the equivalent of
the Irish Brigit. Her functions are in keeping with the position of
woman as the first civiliser--discovering agriculture, spinning, the art
of pottery, etc. During this period goddesses were chiefly worshipped,
and though the Celts had long outgrown this primitive stage, such
culture-goddesses still retained their importance. A goddess equated
with Minerva in Southern France and Britain is Belisama, perhaps from
_qval_, "to burn" or "shine."[121] Hence she may have been associated
with a cult of fire, like Brigit and like another goddess Sul, equated
with Minerva at Bath and in Hesse, and in whose temple perpetual fires
burned.[122] She was also a goddess of hot springs. Belisama gave her
name to the Mersey,[123] and many goddesses in Celtic myth are
associated with rivers.
Some war-goddesses are associated with Mars--Nemetona (in Britain and
Germany), perhaps the same as the Irish Nemon, and Cathubodua, identical
with the Irish war-goddess Badb-catha, "battle-crow," who tore the
bodies of the slain.[124] Another goddess Andrasta, "invincible,"
perhaps the same as the Andarta of the Voconces, was worshipped by the
people of Boudicca with human sacrifices, like the native Bellona of the
Scordisci.[125]
A goddess of the chase was identified with Artemis in Galatia, where she
had a priestess Camma, and also in the west. At the feast of the
Galatian goddess dogs were crowned with flowers, her worshippers feasted
and a sacrifice was made to her, feast and sacrifice being provided out
of money laid aside for every animal taken in the chase.[126] Other
goddesses were equated with Diana, and one of her statues was destroyed
in Christian times at Treves.[127] These goddesses may have been thought
of as rushing through the forest with an attendant train, since in later
times Diana, with whom they were completely assimilated, became, like
Holda, the leader of the "furious host" and also of witches'
revels.[128] The Life of Caesarius of Arles speaks of a "demon" called
Diana by the rustics. A bronze statuette represents the goddess riding a
wild boar,[129] her symbol and, like herself, a creature of the forest,
but at an earlier time itself a divinity of whom the goddess became the
anthropomorphic form.
Goddesses, the earlier spirits of the waters, protected rivers and
springs, or were associated with gods of healing wells. Dirona or Sirona
is associated with Grannos mainly in Eastern Gaul and the Rhine
provinces, and is sometimes represented carrying grapes and grain.[130]
Thus this goddess may once have been connected with fertility, perhaps
an Earth-mother, and if her name means "the long-lived,"[131] this would
be an appropriate title for an Earth-goddess. Another goddess, Stanna,
mentioned in an inscription at Perigueux, is perhaps "the standing or
abiding one," and thus may also have been Earth-goddess.[132] Grannos
was also associated with the local goddesses Vesunna and Aventia, who
gave their names to Vesona and Avanche. His statue also stood in the
temple of the goddess of the Seine, Sequana.[133] With Bormo were
associated Bormana in Southern Gaul, and Damona in Eastern Gaul--perhaps
an animal goddess, since the root of her name occurs in Irish _dam_,
"ox," and Welsh _dafad_, "sheep." Dea Brixia was the consort of
Luxovius, god of the waters of Luxeuil. Names of other goddesses of the
waters are found on _ex votos_ and plaques which were placed in or near
them. The Roman Nymphae, sometimes associated with Bormo, were the
equivalents of the Celtic water-goddesses, who survived in the
water-fairies of later folk-belief. Some river-goddesses gave their
names to many rivers in the Celtic area--the numerous Avons being named
from Abnoba, goddess of the sources of the Danube, and the many Dees and
Dives from Divona. Clota was goddess of the Clyde, Sabrina had her
throne "beneath the translucent wave" of the Severn, Icauna was goddess
of the Yonne, Sequana of the Seine, and Sinnan of the Shannon.
In some cases forests were ruled by goddesses--that of the Ardennes by
Dea Arduinna, and the Black Forest, perhaps because of the many waters
in it, by Dea Abnoba.[134] While some goddesses are known only by being
associated with a god, e.g. Kosmerta with Mercury in Eastern Gaul,
others have remained separate, like Epona, perhaps a river-goddess
merged with an animal divinity, and known from inscriptions as a
horse-goddess.[135] But the most striking instance is found in the
grouped goddesses.
Of these the _Deoe Matres_, whose name has taken a Latin form and whose
cult extended to the Teutons, are mentioned in many inscriptions all
over the Celtic area, save in East and North-West Gaul.[136] In art they
are usually represented as three in number, holding fruit, flowers, a
cornucopia, or an infant. They were thus goddesses of fertility, and
probably derived from a cult of a great Mother-goddess, the Earth
personified. She may have survived as a goddess Berecynthia; worshipped
at Autun, where her image was borne through the fields to promote
fertility, or as the goddesses equated with Demeter and Kore, worshipped
by women on an island near Britain.[137] Such cults of a Mother-goddess
lie behind many religions, but gradually her place was taken by an
Earth-god, the Celtic Dispater or Dagda, whose consort the goddess
became. She may therefore be the goddess with the cornucopia on
monuments of the horned god, or Aeracura, consort of Dispater, or a
goddess on a monument at Epinal holding a basket of fruit and a
cornucopia, and accompanied by a ram's-headed serpent.[138] These
symbols show that this goddess was akin to the _Matres_. But she
sometimes preserved her individuality, as in the case of Berecynthia and
the _Matres_, though it is not quite clear why she should have been thus
triply multiplied. A similar phenomenon is found in the close connection
of Demeter and Persephone, while the Celts regarded three as a sacred
number. The primitive division of the year into three seasons--spring,
summer, and winter--may have had its effect in triplicating a goddess of
fertility with which the course of the seasons was connected.[139] In
other mythologies groups of three goddesses are found, the Hathors in
Egypt, the Moirai, Gorgons, and Graiae of Greece, the Roman Fates, and
the Norse Nornae, and it is noticeable that the _Matres_ were sometimes
equated with the Parcae and Fates.[140]
In the _Matres_, primarily goddesses of fertility and plenty, we have
one of the most popular and also primitive aspects of Celtic religion.
They originated in an age when women cultivated the ground, and the
Earth was a goddess whose cult was performed by priestesses. But in
course of time new functions were bestowed on the _Matres_. Possibly
river-goddesses and others are merely mothers whose functions have
become specialised. The _Matres_ are found as guardians of individuals,
families, houses, of towns, a province, or a whole nation, as their
epithets in inscriptions show. The _Matres Domesticae_ are household
goddesses; the _Matres Treverae_, or _Gallaicae_, or _Vediantae_, are the
mothers of Treves, of the Gallaecae, of the Vediantii; the _Matres
Nemetiales_ are guardians of groves. Besides presiding over the fields
as _Matres Campestrae_ they brought prosperity to towns and people.[141]
They guarded women, especially in childbirth, as _ex votos_ prove, and
in this aspect they are akin to the _Junones_ worshipped also in Gaul
and Britain. The name thus became generic for most goddesses, but all
alike were the lineal descendants of the primitive Earth-mother.[142]
Popular superstition has preserved the memory of these goddesses in the
three _bonnes dames_, _dames blanches_, and White Women, met by
wayfarers in forests, or in the three fairies or wise women of
folk-tales, who appear at the birth of children. But sometimes they have
become hateful hags. The _Matres_ and other goddesses probably survived
in the beneficent fairies of rocks and streams, in the fairy Abonde who
brought riches to houses, or Esterelle of Provence who made women
fruitful, or Aril who watched over meadows, or in beings like Melusine,
Viviane, and others.[143] In Gallo-Roman Britain the cult of the
_Matres_ is found, but how far it was indigenous there is uncertain. A
Welsh name for fairies, _Y Mamau_, "the Mothers," and the phrase, "the
blessing of the Mothers" used of a fairy benediction, may be a
reminiscence of such goddesses.[144] The presence of similar goddesses
in Ireland will be considered later.[145] Images of the _Matres_ bearing
a child have sometimes been taken for those of the Virgin, when found
accidentally, and as they are of wood blackened with age, they are known
as _Vierges Noires_, and occupy an honoured place in Christian
sanctuaries. Many churches of Notre Dame have been built on sites where
an image of the Virgin is said to have been miraculously found--the
image probably being that of a pagan Mother. Similarly, an altar to the
_Matres_ at Vaison is now dedicated to the Virgin as the "good
Mother."[146]
In inscriptions from Eastern and Cisalpine Gaul, and from the Rhine and
Danube region, the _Matronae_ are mentioned, and this name is probably
indicative of goddesses like the _Matres_.[147] It is akin to that of
many rivers, e.g. the Marne or Meyrone, and shows that the Mothers were
associated with rivers. The Mother river fertilised a large district,
and exhibited the characteristic of the whole group of goddesses.
Akin also to the _Matres_ are the _Suleviae_, guardian goddesses called
_Matres_ in a few inscriptions; the _Comedovae_, whose name perhaps
denotes guardianship or power; the _Dominae_, who watched over the home,
perhaps the _Dames_ of mediaeval folk-lore; and the _Virgines_, perhaps
an appellative of the _Matres_, and significant when we find that virgin
priestesses existed in Gaul and Ireland.[148] The _Proxumae_ were
worshipped in Southern Gaul, and the _Quadriviae_, goddesses of
cross-roads, at Cherbourg.[149]
Some Roman gods are found on inscriptions without being equated with
native deities. They may have been accepted by the Gauls as new gods, or
they had perhaps completely ousted similar native gods. Others, not
mentioned by Caesar, are equated with native deities, Juno with Clivana,
Saturn with Arvalus, and to a native Vulcan the Celts vowed spoils of
war.[150] Again, many native gods are not equated with Roman deities on
inscriptions. Apart from the divinities of Pyrenaean inscriptions, who
may not be Celtic, the names of over 400 native deities, whether equated
with Roman gods or not, are known. Some of these names are mere
epithets, and most of the gods are of a local character, known here by
one name, there by another. Only in a very few cases can it be asserted
that a god was worshipped over the whole Celtic area by one name, though
some gods in Gaul, Britain, and Ireland with different names have
certainly similar functions.[151]
The pantheon of the continental Celts was a varied one. Traces of the
primitive agricultural rites, and of the priority of goddesses to gods,
are found, and the vaguer aspects of primitive nature worship are seen
behind the cult of divinities of sky, sun, thunder, forests, rivers, or
in deities of animal origin. We come next to evidence of a higher stage,
in divinities of culture, healing, the chase, war, and the underworld.
We see divinities of Celtic groups--gods of individuals, the family, the
tribe. Sometimes war-gods assumed great prominence, in time of war, or
among the aristocracy, but with the development of commerce, gods
associated with trade and the arts of peace came to the front.[152] At
the same time the popular cults of agricultural districts must have
remained as of old. With the adoption of Roman civilisation, enlightened
Celts separated themselves from the lower aspects of their religion, but
this would have occurred with growing civilisation had no Roman ever
entered Gaul. In rural districts the more savage aspects of the cult
would still have remained, but that these were entirely due to an
aboriginal population is erroneous. The Celts must have brought such
cults with them or adopted cults similar to their own wherever they
came. The persistence of these cults is seen in the fact that though
Christianity modified them, it could not root them out, and in
out-of-the-way corners, survivals of the old ritual may still be found,
for everywhere the old religion of the soil dies hard.
FOOTNOTES:
[53] Caesar, _de Bell. Gall._ vi. 17, 18.
[54] Bloch (Lavisse), _Hist, de France_, i. 2, 419; Reinaoh, _BF_ 13,
23.
[55] _Trans. Gaelic Soc. of Inverness_, xxvi. p. 411 f.
[56] Vallentin, _Les Dieux de la cite des Allobroges_, 15; Pliny, _HN_
xxxiv. 7.
[57] These names are Alaunius, Arcecius, Artaius, Arvernorix, Arvernus,
Adsmerius, Canetonensis, Clavariatis, Cissonius, Cimbrianus, Dumiatis,
Magniacus, Moecus, Toeirenus, Vassocaletus, Vellaunus, Visuoius,
Biausius, Cimiacinus, Naissatis. See Holder, _s.v._
[58] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 6.
[59] Huebner, vii. 271; _CIL_ iii. 5773.
[60] Lucian, _Heracles_, 1 f. Some Gaulish coins figure a head to which
are bound smaller heads. In one case the cords issue from the mouth
(Blanchet, i. 308, 316-317). These may represent Lucian's Ogmios, but
other interpretations have been put upon them. See Robert, _RC_ vii.
388; Jullian, 84.
[61] The epithets and names are Anextiomarus, Belenos, Bormo, Borvo, or
Bormanus, Cobledulitavus, Cosmis (?), Grannos, Livicus, Maponos, Mogo or
Mogounos, Sianus, Toutiorix, Viudonnus, Virotutis. See Holder, _s.v._
[62] Pommerol, _Ball. de Soc. d'ant. de Paris_, ii. fasc. 4.
[63] See Holder, _s.v._ Many place-names are derived from _Borvo, e.g._
Bourbon l'Archambaut, which gave its name to the Bourbon dynasty, thus
connected with an old Celtic god.
[64] See p. 102, _infra_.
[65] Jul. Cap. _Maxim._ 22; Herodian, viii. 3; Tert. _Apol._ xxiv. 70;
Auson. _Prof._ xi. 24.
[66] Stokes derives _belinuntia_ from _beljo_-, a tree or leaf, Irish
_bile_, _US_ 174.
[67] Holder, _s.v._; Stokes, _US_ 197; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 23; see p. 180,
_infra_.
[68] Diod. Sic. ii. 47.
[69] Apoll. Rhod. iv. 609.
[70] Albiorix, Alator, Arixo, Beladonnis, Barrex, Belatucadros,
Bolvinnus, Braciaca, Britovis, Buxenus, Cabetius, Camulus, Cariocecius,
Caturix, Cemenelus, Cicollius, Carrus, Cocosus, Cociduis, Condatis,
Cnabetius, Corotiacus, Dinomogetimarus, Divanno, Dunatis, Glarinus,
Halamardus, Harmogius, Ieusdriuus, Lacavus, Latabius, Leucetius,
Leucimalacus, Lenus, Mullo, Medocius, Mogetius, Nabelcus, Neton, Ocelos,
Ollondios, Rudianus, Rigisamus, Randosatis, Riga, Segomo, Sinatis,
Smertatius, Toutates, Tritullus, Vesucius, Vincius, Vitucadros,
Vorocius. See Holder, _s.v._
[71] D'Arbois, ii. 215; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 37.
[72] So Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 42.
[73] Huebner, 61.
[74] Holder, _s.v._; Lucan, i. 444 f. The opinions of writers who take
this view are collected by Reinach, _RC_ xviii. 137.
[75] Holder, _s.v._ The Gaulish name Camulogenus, "born of Cumel,"
represents the same idea as in Fionn's surname, MacCumall.
[76] Athen. iv. 36; Dioscorides, ii. 110; Joyce, _SH_ ii. 116, 120; _IT_
i. 437, 697.
[77] Pliny, _HN_ xviii. 7.
[78] Gaidoz, _Le Dieu Gaulois de Soleil_; Reinach, _CS_ 98, _BF_ 35;
Blanchet, i. 27.
[79] Lucan, _Phar._ i. 444. Another form, Tanaros, may be simply the
German Donar.
[80] Loth, i. 270.
[81] Gaidoz, _RC_ vi. 457; Reinach, _OS_ 65, 138; Blanchet, i. 160. The
hammer is also associated with another Celtic Dispater, equated with
Sylvanus, who was certainly not a thunder-god.
[82] Reinach, _BF_ 137 f.; Courcelle-Seneuil, 115 f.
[83] Barthelemy, _RC_ i. l f.
[84] See Flouest, _Rev. Arch._ v. 17.
[85] Reinach, _RC_ xvii. 45.
[86] D'Arbois, ii. 126. He explains Nantosvelta as meaning "She who is
brilliant in war." The goddess, however, has none of the attributes of a
war-goddess. M. D'Arbois also saw in a bas-relief of the hammer-god, a
female figure, and a child, the Gaulish equivalents of Balor, Ethne, and
Lug (_RC_ xv. 236). M. Reinach regards Sucellos, Nantosvelta, and a bird
which is figured with them, as the same trio, because pseudo-Plutarch
(_de Fluv._ vi. 4) says that _lougos_ means "crow" in Celtic. This is
more than doubtful. In any case Ethne has no warlike traits in Irish
story, and as Lug and Balor were deadly enemies, it remains to be
explained why they appear tranquilly side by side. See _RC_ xxvi. 129.
Perhaps Nantosvelta, like other Celtic goddesses, was a river nymph.
_Nanto_ Gaulish is "valley," and _nant_ in old Breton is "gorge" or
"brook." Her name might mean "shining river." See Stokes, _US_ 193, 324.
[87] _RC_ xviii. 254. Cernunnos may be the Juppiter Cernenos of an
inscription from Pesth, Holder, _s.v._
[88] Reinach, _BF_ 186, fig. 177.
[89] _Rev. Arch._ xix. 322, pl. 9.
[90] Bertrand, _Rev. Arch._ xv. 339, xvi. pl. 12.
[91] Ibid. xv. pl. 9, 10.
[92] Ibid. xvi. 9.
[93] Ibid. pl. 12 _bis_.
[94] Bertrand, _Rev. Arch._ xvi. 8.
[95] Ibid. xvi. 10 f.
[96] Ibid. xv., xvi.; Reinach, _BF_ 17, 191.
[97] _Bull. Epig._ i. 116; Strabo, iv. 3; Diod. Sic. v. 28.
[98] Diod. Sic. v. 30; Reinach, _BF_ 193.
[99] See p. 212, _infra_.
[100] See p. 166, _infra_.
[101] See, e.g., Mowat, _Bull. Epig._ i. 29; de Witte, _Rev. Arch._ ii.
387, xvi. 7; Bertrand, _ibid._ xvi. 3.
[102] See pp. 102, 242, _infra_; Joyce, _SH_ ii. 554; Curtin, 182; _RC_
xxii. 123, xxiv. 18.
[103] Dom Martin, ii. 185; Reinach, _BF_ 192, 199.
[104] See, however, p. 136, _infra_; and for another interpretation of
this god as equivalent of the Irish Lug slaying Balor, see D'Arbois, ii.
287.
[105] See p. 229, _infra_.
[106] Reinach, _BF_ 162, 184; Mowat, _Bull. Epig._ i. 62, _Rev. Epig._
1887, 319, 1891, 84.
[107] Reinach, _BF_ 141, 153, 175, 176, 181; see p. 218, _infra_.
Flouest, _Rev. Arch._ 1885, i. 21, thinks that the identification was
with an earlier chthonian Silvanus. Cf. Jullian, 17, note 3, who
observes that the Gallo-Roman assimilations were made "sur le doinaine
archaisant des faits populaires et rustiques de l'Italie." For the
inscriptions, see Holder, _s.v._
[108] Stokes, _US_ 302; MacBain, 274; _RC_ xxvi. 282.
[109] Gaidoz, _Rev. Arch._ ii. 1898; Mowat, _Bull. Epig._ i. 119;
Courcelle-Seneuil, 80 f.; Pauly-Wissowa, _Real. Lex._ i. 667;
Daremberg-Saglio, _Dict._ ii., _s.v._ "Dispater."
[110] Lucan, i. 444; _RC_ xviii. 254, 258.
[111] See p. 127, _infra_.
[112] For a supposed connection between this bas-relief and the myth of
Geryon, see Reinach, _BF_ 120; _RC_ xviii. 258 f.
[113] _Coins of the Ancient Britons_, 386; Holder, i. 1475, 1478.
[114] For these theories see Dom Martin, ii. 2; Bertrand, 335 f.
[115] Cf. Reinach, _RC_ xviii. 149.
[116] Orelli, 2107, 2072; Monnier, 532; Tacitus, xxi. 38.
[117] Holder, i. 824; Reinach, _Rev. Arch._ xx. 262; D'Arbois, _Les
Celtes_, 20. Other grouped gods are the Bacucei, Castoeci, Icotii,
Ifles, Lugoves, Nervini, and Silvani. See Holder, _s.v._
[118] For all these see Holder, _s.v._
[119] Professor Anwyl gives the following statistics: There are 35
goddesses mentioned once, 2 twice, 3 thrice, 1 four times, 2 six times,
2 eleven times, 1 fourteen times (Sirona), 1 twenty-one times
(Rosmerta), 1 twenty-six times (Epona) (_Trans. Gael. Soc. Inverness_,
xxvi. 413).
[120] Caesar, vi. 17.
[121] D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 54; _Rev. Arch._ i. 201. See Holder,
_s.v._
[122] Solinus, xxii. 10; Holder, _s.v._
[123] Ptolemy, ii. 2.
[124] See p. 71, _infra_.
[125] Dio Cass. lxii. 7; Amm. Mare, xxvii. 4. 4.
[126] Plutarch, _de Vir. Mul._ 20; Arrian, _Cyneg._ xxxiv. 1.
[127] S. Greg. _Hist._ viii. 15.
[128] Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ 283, 933; Reinach, _RC_ xvi. 261.
[129] Reinach, _BF_ 50.
[130] Holder, i. 1286; Robert, _RC_ iv. 133.
[131] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 27.
[132] Anwyl, _Celt. Rev._ 1906, 43.
[133] Holder, _s.v._; Bulliot, _RC_ ii. 22.
[134] Holder, i. 10, 89.
[135] Holder, _s.v._; see p. 213, _infra_.
[136] Holder, ii. 463. They are very numerous in South-East Gaul, where
also three-headed gods are found.
[137] See pp. 274-5, _infra_.
[138] Courcelle-Seneuil, 80-81.
[139] See my article "Calendar" in Hastings' _Encyclop. of Religion and
Ethics_, iii. 80.
[140] _CIL_ v. 4208, 5771, vii. 927; Holder, ii. 89.
[141] For all these titles see Holder, _s.v._
[142] There is a large literature devoted to the _Matres_. See De Wal,
_Die Maeder Gottinem_; Vallentin, _Le Culte des Matrae_; Daremberg-Saglio,
_Dict. s.v. Matres_; Ihm, _Jahrbuch. des Vereins von Alterth. in
Rheinlande_, No. 83; Roscher, _Lexicon_, ii. 2464 f.
[143] See Maury, _Fees du Moyen Age_; Sebillot, i. 262; Monnier, 439 f.;
Wright, _Celt, Roman, and Saxon_, 286 f.; Vallentin, _RC_ iv. 29. The
_Matres_ may already have had a sinister aspect in Roman times, as they
appear to be intended by an inscription _Lamiis Tribus_ on an altar at
Newcastle. Huebner, 507.
[144] Anwyl, _Celt. Rev._ 1906, 28. Cf. _Y Foel Famau_, "the hill of the
Mothers," in the Clwydian range.
[145] See p. 73, _infra_.
[146] Vallentin, _op. cit._ iv. 29; Maury, _Croyances du Moyen Age_,
382.
[147] Holder, _s.v._
[148] See pp. 69, 317, _infra_.
[149] For all these see Holder, _s.v._; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 103; _RC_ iv. 34.
[150] Florus, ii. 4.
[151] See the table of identifications, p. 125, _infra_.
[152] We need not assume with Jullian, 18, that there was one supreme
god, now a war-god, now a god of peace. Any prominent god may have
become a war-god on occasion.
CHAPTER IV.
THE IRISH MYTHOLOGICAL CYCLE.
Three divine and heroic cycles of myths are known in Ireland, one
telling of the Tuatha De Danann, the others of Cuchulainn and of the
Fians. They are distinct in character and contents, but the gods of the
first cycle often help the heroes of the other groups, as the gods of
Greece and India assisted the heroes of the epics. We shall see that
some of the personages of these cycles may have been known in Gaul; they
are remembered in Wales, but, in the Highlands, where stories of
Cuchulainn and Fionn are still told, the Tuatha De Danann are less known
now than in 1567, when Bishop Carsewell lamented the love of the
Highlanders for "idle, turbulent, lying, worldly stories concerning the
Tuatha Dedanans."[153]
As the new Achaean religion in Greece and the Vedic sacred books of India
regarded the aboriginal gods and heroes as demons and goblins, so did
Christianity in Ireland sometimes speak of the older gods there. On the
other hand, it was mainly Christian scribes who changed the old
mythology into history, and made the gods and heroes kings. Doubtless
myths already existed, telling of the descent of rulers and people from
divinities, just as the Gauls spoke of their descent from Dispater, or
as the Incas of Peru, the Mikados of Japan, and the kings of Uganda
considered themselves offspring of the gods. This is a universal
practice, and made it the more easy for Christian chroniclers to
transmute myth into history. In Ireland, as elsewhere, myth doubtless
told of monstrous races inhabiting the land in earlier days, of the
strife of the aborigines and incomers, and of their gods, though the
aboriginal gods may in some cases have been identified with Celtic gods,
or worshipped in their own persons. Many mythical elements may therefore
be looked for in the euhemerised chronicles of ancient Ireland. But the
chroniclers themselves were but the continuers of a process which must
have been at work as soon as the influence of Christianity began to be
felt.[154] Their passion, however, was to show the descent of the Irish
and the older peoples from the old Biblical personages, a process dear
to the modern Anglo-Israelite, some of whose arguments are based on the
wild romancing of the chroniclers.
Various stories were told of the first peopling of Ireland. Banba, with
two other daughters of Cain, arrived with fifty women and three men,
only to die of the plague. Three fishermen next discovered Ireland, and
"of the island of Banba of Fair Women with hardihood they took
possession." Having gone to fetch their wives, they perished in the
deluge at Tuath Inba.[155] A more popular account was that of the coming
of Cessair, Noah's granddaughter, with her father, husband, a third man,
Ladru, "the first dead man of Erin," and fifty damsels. Her coming was
the result of the advice of a _laimh-dhia_, or "hand-god," but their
ship was wrecked, and all save her husband, Finntain, who survived for
centuries, perished in the flood.[156] Cessair's ship was less
serviceable than her grandparent's! Followed the race of Partholan, "no
wiser one than the other," who increased on the land until plague swept
them away, with the exception of Tuan mac Caraill, who after many
transformations, told the story of Ireland to S. Finnen centuries
after.[157] The survival of Finntain and Tuan, doubles of each other,
was an invention of the chroniclers, to explain the survival of the
history of colonists who had all perished. Keating, on the other hand,
rejecting the sole survivor theory as contradictory to Scripture,
suggests that "aerial demons," followers of the invaders, revealed all
to the chroniclers, unless indeed they found it engraved with "an iron
pen and lead in the rocks."[158]
Two hundred years before Partholan's coming, the Fomorians had
arrived,[159] and they and their chief Cichol Gricenchos fought
Partholan at Mag Itha, where they were defeated. Cichol was footless,
and some of his host had but one arm and one leg.[160] They were demons,
according to the chroniclers, and descendants of the luckless Ham.
Nennius makes Partholan and his men the first Scots who came from Spain
to Ireland. The next arrivals were the people of Nemed who returned to
Spain, whence they came (Nennius), or died to a man (Tuan). They also
were descendants of the inevitable Noah, and their sojourn in Ireland
was much disturbed by the Fomorians who had recovered from their defeat,
and finally overpowered the Nemedians after the death of Nemed.[161]
From Tory Island the Fomorians ruled Ireland, and forced the Nemedians
to pay them annually on the eve of Samhain (Nov. 1st) two-thirds of
their corn and milk and of the children born during the year. If the
Fomorians are gods of darkness, or, preferably, aboriginal deities, the
tribute must be explained as a dim memory of sacrifice offered at the
beginning of winter when the powers of darkness and blight are in the
ascendant. The Fomorians had a tower of glass in Tory Island. This was
one day seen by the Milesians, to whom appeared on its battlements what
seemed to be men. A year after they attacked the tower and were
overwhelmed in the sea.[162] From the survivors of a previously wrecked
vessel of their fleet are descended the Irish. Another version makes the
Nemedians the assailants. Thirty of them survived their defeat, some of
them going to Scotland or Man (the Britons), some to Greece (to return
as the Firbolgs), some to the north, where they learned magic and
returned as the Tuatha De Danann.[163] The Firbolgs, "men of bags,"
resenting their ignominious treatment by the Greeks, escaped to Ireland.
They included the Firbolgs proper, the Fir-Domnann, and the
Galioin.[164] The Fomorians are called their gods, and this, with the
contemptuous epithets bestowed on them, may point to the fact that the
Firbolgs were the pre-Celtic folk of Ireland and the Fomorians their
divinities, hostile to the gods of the Celts or regarded as dark
deities. The Firbolgs are vassals of Ailill and Medb, and with the Fir
Domnann and Galioin are hostile to Cuchulainn and his men,[165] just as
Fomorians were to the Tuatha De Danann. The strifes of races and of
their gods are inextricably confused.
The Tuatha De Danann arrived from heaven--an idea in keeping with their
character as beneficent gods, but later legend told how they came from
the north. They reached Ireland on Beltane, shrouded in a magic mist,
and finally, after one or, in other accounts, two battles, defeated the
Firbolgs and Fomorians at Magtured. The older story of one battle may be
regarded as a euhemerised account of the seeming conflict of nature
powers.[166] The first battle is described in a fifteenth to sixteenth
century MS.,[167] and is referred to in a fifteenth century account of
the second battle, full of archaic reminiscences, and composed from
various earlier documents.[168] The Firbolgs, defeated in the first
battle, join the Fomorians, after great losses. Meanwhile Nuada, leader
of the Tuatha De Danann, lost his hand, and as no king with a blemish
could sit on the throne, the crown was given to Bres, son of the
Fomorian Elatha and his sister Eri, a woman of the Tuatha De Danann. One
day Eri espied a silver boat speeding to her across the sea. From it
stepped forth a magnificent hero, and without delay the pair, like the
lovers in Theocritus, "rejoiced in their wedlock." The hero, Elatha,
foretold the birth of Eri's son, so beautiful that he would be a
standard by which to try all beautiful things. He gave her his ring, but
she was to part with it only to one whose finger it should fit. This was
her child Bres, and by this token he was later, as an exile, recognised
by his father, and obtained his help against the Tuatha De Danann. Like
other wonderful children, Bres grew twice as quickly as any other child
until he was seven.[169] Though Elatha and Eri are brother and sister,
she is among the Tuatha De Danann.[170] There is the usual inconsistency
of myth here and in other accounts of Fomorian and Tuatha De Danann
unions. The latter had just landed, but already had united in marriage
with the Fomorians. This inconsistency escaped the chroniclers, but it
points to the fact that both were divine not human, and that, though in
conflict, they united in marriage as members of hostile tribes often do.
The second battle took place twenty-seven years after the first, on
Samhain. It was fought like the first on the plain of Mag-tured, though
later accounts made one battle take place at Mag-tured in Mayo, the
other at Mag-tured in Sligo.[171] Inconsistently, the conquering Tuatha
De Danann in the interval, while Bres is their king, must pay tribute
imposed by the Fomorians. Obviously in older accounts this tribute must
have been imposed before the first battle and have been its cause. But
why should gods, like the Tuatha De Danann, ever have been in
subjection? This remains to be seen, but the answer probably lies in
parallel myths of the subjection or death of divinities like Ishtar,
Adonis, Persephone, and Osiris. Bres having exacted a tribute of the
milk of all hornless dun cows, the cows of Ireland were passed through
fire and smeared with ashes--a myth based perhaps on the Beltane fire
ritual.[172] The avaricious Bres was satirised, and "nought but decay
was on him from that hour,"[173] and when Nuada, having recovered,
claimed the throne, he went to collect an army of the Fomorians, who
assembled against the Tuatha De Danann. In the battle Indech wounded
Ogma, and Balor slew Nuada, but was mortally wounded by Lug. Thereupon
the Fomorians fled to their own region.
The Tuatha De Danann remained masters of Ireland until the coming of the
Milesians, so named from an eponymous Mile, son of Bile. Ith, having
been sent to reconnoitre, was slain, and the Milesians now invaded
Ireland in force. In spite of a mist raised by the Druids, they landed,
and, having met the three princes who slew Ith, demanded instant battle
or surrender of the land. The princes agreed to abide by the decision of
the Milesian poet Amairgen, who bade his friends re-embark and retire
for the distance of nine waves. If they could then effect a landing,
Ireland was theirs. A magic storm was raised, which wrecked many of
their ships, but Amairgen recited verses, fragments, perhaps, of some
old ritual, and overcame the dangers. After their defeat the survivors
of the Tuatha De Danann retired into the hills to become a fairy folk,
and the Milesians (the Goidels or Scots) became ancestors of the Irish.
Throughout the long story of the conquests of Ireland there are many
reduplications, the same incidents being often ascribed to different
personages.[174] Different versions of similar occurrences, based on
older myths and traditions, may already have been in existence, and
ritual practices, dimly remembered, required explanation. In the hands
of the chroniclers, writing history with a purpose and combining their
information with little regard to consistency, all this was reduced to a
more or less connected narrative. At the hands of the prosaic
chroniclers divinity passed from the gods, though traces of it still
linger.
"Ye are gods, and, behold, ye shall die, and the waves be upon you at
last.
In the darkness of time, in the deeps of the years, in the changes of
things,
Ye shall sleep as a slain man sleeps, and the world shall forget you for
kings."
From the annalistic point of view the Fomorians are sea demons or
pirates, their name being derived from _muir_, "sea," while they are
descended along with other monstrous beings from them. Professor
Rh[^y]s, while connecting the name with Welsh _foawr_, "giant" (Gaelic
_famhair_), derives the name from _fo_, "under," and _muir_, and regards
them as submarine beings.[175] Dr. MacBain connected them with the
fierce powers of the western sea personified, like the _Muireartach_, a
kind of sea hag, of a Fionn ballad.[176] But this association of the
Fomorians with the ocean may be the result of a late folk-etymology,
which wrongly derived their name from _muir_. The Celtic experience of
the Lochlanners or Norsemen, with whom the Fomorians are
associated,[177] would aid the conception of them as sea-pirates of a
more or less demoniacal character. Dr. Stokes connects the second
syllable _mor_ with _mare_ in "nightmare," from _moro_, and regards them
as subterranean as well as submarine.[178] But the more probable
derivation is that of Zimmer and D'Arbois, from _fo_ and _morio_ (_mor_,
"great "),[179] which would thus agree with the tradition which regarded
them as giants. They were probably beneficent gods of the aborigines,
whom the Celtic conquerors regarded as generally evil, perhaps equating
them with the dark powers already known to them. They were still
remembered as gods, and are called "champions of the _sid_," like the
Tuatha De Danann.[180] Thus King Bres sought to save his life by
promising that the kine of Ireland would always be in milk, then that
the men of Ireland would reap every quarter, and finally by revealing
the lucky days for ploughing, sowing, and reaping.[181] Only an
autochthonous god could know this, and the story is suggestive of the
true nature of the Fomorians. The hostile character attributed to them
is seen from the fact that they destroyed corn, milk, and fruit. But in
Ireland, as elsewhere, this destructive power was deprecated by begging
them not to destroy "corn nor milk in Erin beyond their fair
tribute."[182] Tribute was also paid to them on Samhain, the time when
the powers of blight feared by men are in the ascendant. Again, the
kingdom of Balor, their chief, is still described as the kingdom of
cold.[183] But when we remember that a similar "tribute" was paid to
Cromm Cruaich, a god of fertility, and that after the conquest of the
Tuatha De Danann they also were regarded as hostile to agriculture,[184]
we realise that the Fomorians must have been aboriginal gods of
fertility whom the conquering Celts regarded as hostile to them and
their gods. Similarly, in folk-belief the beneficent corn-spirit has
sometimes a sinister and destructive aspect.[185] Thus the stories of
"tribute" would be distorted reminiscences of the ritual of gods of the
soil, differing little in character from that of the similar Celtic
divinities. What makes it certain that the Fomorians were aboriginal
gods is that they are found in Ireland before the coming of the early
colonist Partholan. They were the gods of the pre-Celtic folk--Firbolgs,
Fir Domnann, and Galioin[186]--all of them in Ireland before the Tuatha
De Danaan arrived, and all of them regarded as slaves, spoken of with
the utmost contempt. Another possibility, however, ought to be
considered. As the Celtic gods were local in character, and as groups of
tribes would frequently be hostile to other groups, the Fomorians may
have been local gods of a group at enmity with another group,
worshipping the Tuatha De Danaan.
The strife of Fomorians and Tuatha De Danann suggests the dualism of all
nature religions. Demons or giants or monsters strive with gods in
Hindu, Greek, and Teutonic mythology, and in Persia the primitive
dualism of beneficent and hurtful powers of nature became an ethical
dualism--the eternal opposition of good and evil. The sun is vanquished
by cloud and storm, but shines forth again in vigour. Vegetation dies,
but undergoes a yearly renewal. So in myth the immortal gods are wounded
and slain in strife. But we must not push too far the analogy of the
apparent strife of the elements and the wars of the gods. The one
suggested the other, especially where the gods were elemental powers.
But myth-making man easily developed the suggestion; gods were like men
and "could never get eneuch o' fechtin'." The Celts knew of divine
combats before their arrival in Ireland, and their own hostile powers
were easily assimilated to the hostile gods of the aborigines.
The principal Fomorians are described as kings. Elatha was son of Net,
described by Cormac as "a battle god of the heathen Gael," i.e. he is
one of the Tuatha De Danann, and has as wives two war-goddesses, Badb
and Nemaind.[187] Thus he resembles the Fomorian Tethra whose wife is a
_badb_ or "battle-crow," preying on the slain.[188] Elatha's name,
connected with words meaning "knowledge," suggests that he was an
aboriginal culture-god.[189] In the genealogies, Fomorians and Tuatha De
Danann are inextricably mingled. Bres's temporary position as king of
the Tuatha Dea may reflect some myth of the occasional supremacy of the
powers of blight. Want and niggardliness characterise his reign, and
after his defeat a better state of things prevails. Bres's consort was
Brigit, and their son Ruadan, sent to spy on the Tuatha De Danann, was
slain. His mother's wailing for him was the first mourning wail ever
heard in Erin.[190] Another god, Indech, was son of Dea Domnu, a
Fomorian goddess of the deep, i.e. of the underworld and probably also
of fertility, who may hold a position among the Fomorians similar to
that of Danu among the Tuatha De Danann. Indech was slain by Ogma, who
himself died of wounds received from his adversary.
Balor had a consort Cethlenn, whose venom killed Dagda. His one eye had
become evil by contact with the poisonous fumes of a concoction which
his father's Druids were preparing. The eyelid required four men to
raise it, when his evil eye destroyed all on whom its glance fell. In
this way Balor would have slain Lug at Mag-tured, but the god at once
struck the eye with a sling-stone and slew him.[191] Balor, like the
Greek Medusa, is perhaps a personification of the evil eye, so much
feared by the Celts. Healthful influences and magical charms avert it;
hence Lug, a beneficent god, destroys Balor's maleficence.
Tethra, with Balor and Elatha, ruled over Erin at the coming of the
Tuatha De Danann. From a phrase used in the story of Connla's visit to
Elysium, "Thou art a hero of the men of Tethra," M. D'Arbois assumes
that Tethra was ruler of Elysium, which he makes one with the land of
the dead. The passage, however, bears a different interpretation, and
though a Fomorian, Tethra, a god of war, might be regarded as lord of
all warriors.[192] Elysium was not the land of the dead, and when M.
D'Arbois equates Tethra with Kronos, who after his defeat became ruler
of a land of dead heroes, the analogy, like other analogies with Greek
mythology, is misleading. He also equates Bres, as temporary king of the
Tuatha De Danann, with Kronos, king of heaven in the age of gold.
Kronos, again, slain by Zeus, is parallel to Balor slain by his grandson
Lug. Tethra, Bres, and Balor are thus separate fragments of one god
equivalent to Kronos.[193] Yet their personalities are quite distinct.
Each race works out its mythology for itself, and, while parallels are
inevitable, we should not allow these to override the actual myths as
they have come down to us.
Professor Rh[^y]s makes Bile, ancestor of the Milesians who came from
Spain, a Goidelic counterpart of the Gaulish Dispater, lord of the dead,
from whom the Gauls claimed descent. But Bile, neither a Fomorian nor of
the Tuatha De Danann, is an imaginary and shadowy creation. Bile is next
equated with a Brythonic Beli, assumed to be consort of Don, whose
family are equivalent to the Tuatha De Danann.[194] Beli was a mythic
king whose reign was a kind of golden age, and if he was father of Don's
children, which is doubtful, Bile would then be father of the Tuatha De
Danann. But he is ancestor of the Milesians, their opponents according
to the annalists. Beli is also equated with Elatha, and since Don,
reputed consort of Beli, was grandmother of Llew, equated with Irish
Lug, grandson of Balor, Balor is equivalent to Beli, whose name is
regarded by Professor Rh[^y]s as related etymologically to Balor's.[195]
Bile, Balor, and Elatha are thus Goidelic equivalents of the shadowy
Beli. But they also are quite distinct personalities, nor are they ever
hinted at as ancestral gods of the Celts, or gods of a gloomy
underworld. In Celtic belief the underworld was probably a fertile
region and a place of light, nor were its gods harmful and evil, as
Balor was.
On the whole, the Fomorians came to be regarded as the powers of nature
in its hostile aspect. They personified blight, winter, darkness, and
death, before which men trembled, yet were not wholly cast down, since
the immortal gods of growth and light, rulers of the bright other-world,
were on their side and fought against their enemies. Year by year the
gods suffered deadly harm, but returned as conquerors to renew the
struggle once more. Myth spoke of this as having happened once for all,
but it went on continuously.[196] Gods were immortal and only seemed to
die. The strife was represented in ritual, since men believe that they
can aid the gods by magic, rite, or prayer. Why, then, do hostile
Fomorians and Tuatha De Danann intermarry? This happens in all
mythologies, and it probably reflects, in the divine sphere, what takes
place among men. Hostile peoples carry off each the other's women, or
they have periods of friendliness and consequent intermarriage. Man
makes his gods in his own image, and the problem is best explained by
facts like these, exaggerated no doubt by the Irish annalists.
The Tuatha De Danann, in spite of their euhemerisation, are more than
human. In the north where they learned magic, they dwelt in four cities,
from each of which they brought a magical treasure--the stone of Fal,
which "roared under every king," Lug's unconquerable spear, Nuada's
irresistible sword, the Dagda's inexhaustible cauldron. But they are
more than wizards or Druids. They are re-born as mortals; they have a
divine world of their own, they interfere in and influence human
affairs. The euhemerists did not go far enough, and more than once their
divinity is practically acknowledged. When the Fian Caoilte and a woman
of the Tuatha De Danann appear before S. Patrick, he asks, "Why is she
youthful and beautiful, while you are old and wrinkled?" And Caoilte
replies, "She is of the Tuatha De Danann, who are unfading and whose
duration is perennial. I am of the sons of Milesius, that are perishable
and fade away."[197]
After their conversion, the Celts, sons of Milesius, thought that the
gods still existed in the hollow hills, their former dwellings and
sanctuaries, or in far-off islands, still caring for their former
worshippers. This tradition had its place with that which made them a
race of men conquered by the Milesians--the victory of Christianity over
paganism and its gods having been transmuted into a strife of races by
the euhemerists. The new faith, not the people, conquered the old gods.
The Tuatha De Danann became the _Daoine-sidhe_, a fairy folk, still
occasionally called by their old name, just as individual fairy kings or
queens bear the names of the ancient gods. The euhemerists gave the
Fomorians a monstrous and demoniac character, which they did not always
give to the Tuatha De Danann; in this continuing the old tradition that
Fomorians were hostile and the Tuatha De Danann beneficent and mild.
The mythological cycle is not a complete "body of divinity"; its
apparent completeness results from the chronological order of the
annalists. Fragments of other myths are found in the _Dindsenchas_;
others exist as romantic tales, and we have no reason to believe that
all the old myths have been preserved. But enough remains to show the
true nature of the Tuatha De Danann--their supernatural character, their
powers, their divine and unfailing food and drink, their mysterious and
beautiful abode. In their contents, their personages, in the actions
that are described in them, the materials of the "mythological cycle,"
show how widely it differs from the Cuchulainn and Fionn cycles.[198]
"The white radiance of eternity" suffuses it; the heroic cycles, magical
and romantic as they are, belong far more to earth and time.
FOOTNOTES:
[153] For some Highland references to the gods in saga and _Maerchen_,
see _Book of the Dean of Lismore_, 10; Campbell, _WHT_ ii. 77. The
sea-god Lir is probably the Liur of Ossianic ballads (Campbell, _LF_
100, 125), and his son Manannan is perhaps "the Son of the Sea" in a
Gaelic song (Carmichael, _CG_ ii. 122). Manannan and his daughters are
also known (Campbell, _witchcraft_, 83).
[154] The euhemerising process is first seen in tenth century poems by
Eochaid hua Flainn, but was largely the work of Flainn Manistrech, _ob._
1056. It is found fully fledged in the _Book of Invasions_.
[155] Keating, 105-106.
[156] Keating, 107; _LL_ 4_b_. Cf. _RC_ xvi. 155.
[157] _LL_ 5.
[158] Keating, 111. Giraldus Cambrensis, _Hist. Irel._ c. 2, makes
Roanus survive and tell the tale of Partholan to S. Patrick. He is the
Caoilte mac Ronan of other tales, a survivor of the Fians, who held many
racy dialogues with the Saint. Keating abuses Giraldus for equating
Roanus with Finntain in his "lying history," and for calling him Roanus
instead of Ronanus, a mistake in which he, "the guide bull of the herd,"
is followed by others.
[159] Keating, 164.
[160] _LL_ 5_a_.
[161] Keating, 121; _LL_ 6_a_; _RC_ xvi. 161.
[162] Nennius, _Hist. Brit._ 13.
[163] _LL_ 6, 8_b_.
[164] _LL_ 6_b_, 127_a_; _IT_ iii. 381; _RC_ xvi. 81.
[165] _LL_ 9_b_, 11_a_.
[166] See Cormac, _s.v._ "Nescoit," _LU_ 51.
[167] _Harl. MSS._ 2, 17, pp. 90-99. Cf. fragment from _Book of
Invasions_ in _LL_ 8.
[168] _Harl. MS._ 5280, translated in _RC_ xii. 59 f.
[169] _RC_ xii. 60; D'Arbois, v. 405 f.
[170] For Celtic brother-sister unions see p. 224.
[171] O'Donovan, _Annals_, i. 16.
[172] _RC_ xv. 439.
[173] _RC_ xii. 71.
[174] Professor Rh[^y]s thinks the Partholan story is the aboriginal,
the median the Celtic version of the same event. Partholan, with initial
_p_ cannot be Goidelic (_Scottish Review_, 1890, "Myth. Treatment of
Celtic Ethnology").
[175] _HL_ 591.
[176] _CM_ ix. 130; Campbell _LF_ 68.
[177] _RC_ xii. 75.
[178] _US_ 211.
[179] D'Arbois, ii. 52; _RC_ xii. 476.
[180] _RC_ xii. 73.
[181] _RC_ xii. 105.
[182] _RC_ xxii. 195.
[183] Larmime, "Kian, son of Kontje."
[184] See p. 78; _LL_ 245_b_.
[185] Mannhardt, _Mythol. Forsch._ 310 f.
[186] "Fir Domnann," "men of Domna," a goddess (Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 597), or a
god (D'Arbois, ii. 130). "Domna" is connected with Irish-words meaning
"deep" (Windisch, _IT_ i. 498; Stokes, _US_ 153). Domna, or Domnu, may
therefore have been a goddess of the deep, not the sea so much as the
underworld, and so perhaps an Earth-mother from whom the Fir Domnann
traced their descent.
[187] Cormac, _s.v._ "Neith"; D'Arbois, v. 400; _RC_ xii. 61.
[188] _LU_ 50. Tethra is glossed _badb_ (_IT_ i. 820).
[189] _IT_ i. 521; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 274 f.
[190] _RC_ xii. 95.
[191] _RC_ xii. 101.
[192] See p. 374.
[193] D'Arbois, ii. 198, 375.
[194] _HL_ 90-91.
[195] _HL_ 274, 319, 643. For Beli, see p. 112, _infra_.
[196] Whatever the signification of the battle of Mag-tured may be, the
place which it was localised is crowded with Neolithic megaliths,
dolmens, etc. To later fancy these were the graves of warriors slain in
a great battle fought there, and that battle became the fight between
Fomorians and Tuatha De Dananns. Mag-tured may have been the scene of a
battle between their respective worshippers.
[197] O'Grady, ii. 203.
[198] It should be observed that, as in the Vedas, the Odyssey, the
Japanese _Ko-ji-ki_, as well as in barbaric and savage mythologies,
_Maerchen_ formulae abound in the Irish mythological cycle.
CHAPTER V.
THE TUATHA DE DANANN
The meaning formerly given to _Tuatha De Danann_ was "the men of science
who were gods," _danann_ being here connected with _dan_, "knowledge."
But the true meaning is "the tribes _or_ folk of the goddess Danu,"[199]
which agrees with the cognates _Tuatha_ or _Fir Dea_, "tribes _or_ men
of the goddess." The name was given to the group, though Danu had only
three sons, Brian, Iuchar, and Iucharbar. Hence the group is also called
_fir tri ndea_, "men of the three gods."[200] The equivalents in Welsh
story of Danu and her folk are Don and her children. We have seen that
though they are described as kings and warriors by the annalists, traces
of their divinity appear. In the Cuchulainn cycle they are supernatural
beings and sometimes demons, helping or harming men, and in the Fionn
cycle all these characteristics are ascribed to them. But the theory
which prevailed most is that which connected them with the hills or
mounds, the last resting-places of the mighty dead. Some of these bore
their names, while other beings were also associated with the mounds
(_sid_)--Fomorians and Milesian chiefs, heroes of the sagas, or those
who had actually been buried in them.[201] Legend told how, after the
defeat of the gods, the mounds were divided among them, the method of
division varying in different versions. In an early version the Tuatha
De Danann are immortal and the Dagda divides the _sid_.[202] But in a
poem of Flann Manistrech (_ob._ 1056) they are mortals and die.[203] Now
follows a regular chronology giving the dates of their reigns and their
deaths, as in the poem of Gilla Coemain (eleventh century).[204] Hence
another legend told how, Dagda being dead, Bodb Dearg divided the _sid_,
yet even here Manannan is said to have conferred immortality upon the
Tuatha De Danann.[205] The old pagan myths had shown that gods might
die, while in ritual their representatives were slain, and this may have
been the starting-point of the euhemerising process. But the divinity of
the Tuatha De Danann is still recalled. Eochaid O'Flynn (tenth century),
doubtful whether they are men or demons, concludes, "though I have
treated of these deities in order, yet have I not adored them."[206]
Even in later times they were still thought of as gods in exile, a view
which appears in the romantic tales and sagas existing side by side with
the notices of the annalists. They were also regarded as fairy kings and
queens, and yet fairies of a different order from those of ordinary
tradition. They are "fairies or sprites with corporeal forms, endowed
with immortality," and yet also _dei terreni_ or _side_ worshipped by
the folk before the coming of S. Patrick. Even the saint and several
bishops were called by the fair pagan daughters of King Loegaire, _fir
side_, "men of the _sid_," that is, gods.[207] The _sid_ were named
after the names of the Tuatha De Danann who reigned in them, but the
tradition being localised in different places, several mounds were
sometimes connected with one god. The _sid_ were marvellous underground
palaces, full of strange things, and thither favoured mortals might go
for a time or for ever. In this they correspond exactly to the oversea
Elysium, the divine land.
But why were the Tuatha De Danann associated with the mounds? If fairies
or an analogous race of beings were already in pagan times connected
with hills or mounds, gods now regarded as fairies would be connected
with them. Dr. Joyce and O'Curry think that an older race of aboriginal
gods or _sid-folk_ preceded the Tuatha Dea in the mounds.[208] These may
have been the Fomorians, the "champions of the _sid_," while in _Mesca
Ulad_ the Tuatha Dea go to the underground dwellings and speak with the
_side_ already there. We do not know that the fairy creed as such
existed in pagan times, but if the _side_ and the Tuatha De Danann were
once distinct, they were gradually assimilated. Thus the Dagda is called
"king of the _side_"; Aed Abrat and his daughters, Fand and Liban, and
Labraid, Liban's husband, are called _side_, and Manannan is Fand's
consort.[209] Labraid's island, like the _sid_ of Mider and the land to
which women of the _side_ invite Connla, differs but little from the
usual divine Elysium, while Mider, one of the _side_, is associated with
the Tuatha De Danann.[210] The _side_ are once said to be female, and
are frequently supernatural women who run away or marry mortals.[211]
Thus they may be a reminiscence of old Earth goddesses. But they are not
exclusively female, since there are kings of the _side_, and as the name
_Fir side_, "men of the _side_," shows, while S. Patrick and his friends
were taken for _sid_-folk.
The formation of the legend was also aided by the old cult of the gods
on heights, some of them sepulchral mounds, and now occasionally sites
of Christian churches.[212] The Irish god Cenn Cruaich and his Welsh
equivalent Penn Cruc, whose name survives in _Pennocrucium_, have names
meaning "chief _or_ head of the mound."[213] Other mounds or hills had
also a sacred character. Hence gods worshipped at mounds, dwelling or
revealing themselves there, still lingered in the haunted spots; they
became fairies, or were associated with the dead buried in the mounds,
as fairies also have been, or were themselves thought to have died and
been buried there. The haunting of the mounds by the old gods is seen in
a prayer of S. Columba's, who begs God to dispel "this host (i.e. the
old gods) around the cairns that reigneth."[214] An early MS also tells
how the Milesians allotted the underground part of Erin to the Tuatha
Dea who now retired within the hills; in other words, they were gods of
the hills worshipped by the Milesians on hills.[215] But, as we shall
see, the gods dwelt elsewhere than in hills.[216]
Tumuli may already in pagan times have been pointed out as tombs of gods
who died in myth or ritual, like the tombs of Zeus in Crete and of
Osiris in Egypt. Again, fairies, in some aspects, are ghosts of the
dead, and haunt tumuli; hence, when gods became fairies they would do
the same. And once they were thought of as dead kings, any notable
tumuli would be pointed out as theirs, since it is a law in folk-belief
to associate tumuli or other structures not with the dead or with their
builders, but with supernatural or mythical or even historical
personages. If _side_ ever meant "ghosts," it would be easy to call the
dead gods by this name, and to connect them with the places of the
dead.[217]
Many strands went to the weaving of the later conception of the gods,
but there still hung around them an air of mystery, and the belief that
they were a race of men was never consistent with itself.
Danu gave her name to the whole group of gods, and is called their
mother, like the Egyptian Neith or the Semitic Ishtar.[218] In the
annalists she is daughter of Dagda, and has three sons. She may be akin
to the goddess Anu, whom Cormac describes as "_mater deorum
hibernensium_. It was well she nursed the gods." From her name he
derives _ana_, "plenty," and two hills in Kerry are called "the Paps of
Anu."[219] Thus as a goddess of plenty Danu or Anu may have been an
early Earth-mother, and what may be a dim memory of Anu in
Leicestershire confirms this view. A cave on the Dane Hills is called
"Black Annis' Bower," and she is said to have been a savage woman who
devoured human victims.[220] Earth-goddesses usually have human victims,
and Anu would be no exception. In the cult of Earth divinities Earth and
under-Earth are practically identical, while Earth-goddesses like
Demeter and Persephone were associated with the underworld, the dead
being Demeter's folk. The fruits of the earth with their roots below the
surface are then gifts of the earth- or under-earth goddess. This may
have been the case with Danu, for in Celtic belief the gifts of
civilisation came from the underworld or from the gods. Professor
Rh[^y]s finds the name Anu in the dat. _Anoniredi_, "chariot of Anu," in
an inscription from Vaucluse, and the identification is perhaps
established by the fact that goddesses of fertility were drawn through
the fields in a vehicle.[221] Cormac also mentions Buanann as mother and
nurse of heroes, perhaps a goddess worshipped by heroes.[222]
Danu is also identified with Brigit, goddess of knowledge (_dan_),
perhaps through a folk-etymology. She was worshipped by poets, and had
two sisters of the same name connected with leechcraft and
smithwork.[223] They are duplicates or local forms of Brigit, a goddess
of culture and of poetry, so much loved by the Celts. She is thus the
equivalent of the Gaulish goddess equated with Minerva by Caesar, and
found on inscriptions as Minerva Belisama and Brigindo. She is the Dea
Brigantia of British inscriptions.[224] One of the seats of her worship
was the land of the Brigantes, of whom she was the eponymous goddess,
and her name (cf. Ir. _brig_, "power" or "craft"; Welsh _bri_, "honour,"
"renown") suggests her high functions. But her popularity is seen in the
continuation of her personality and cult in those of S. Brigit, at whose
shrine in Kildare a sacred fire, which must not be breathed on, or
approached by a male, was watched daily by nineteen nuns in turn, and on
the twentieth day by the saint herself.[225] Similar sacred fires were
kept up in other monasteries,[226] and they point to the old cult of a
goddess of fire, the nuns being successors of a virgin priesthood like
the vestals, priestesses of Vesta. As has been seen, the goddesses
Belisama and Sul, probably goddesses of fire, resembled Brigit in
this.[227] But Brigit, like Vesta, was at once a goddess of fire and of
fertility, as her connection with Candlemas and certain ritual survivals
also suggest. In the Hebrides on S. Bride's day (Candlemas-eve) women
dressed a sheaf of oats in female clothes and set it with a club in a
basket called "Briid's bed." Then they called, "Briid is come, Briid is
welcome." Or a bed was made of corn and hay with candles burning beside
it, and Bride was invited to come as her bed was ready. If the mark of
the club was seen in the ashes, this was an omen of a good harvest and a
prosperous year.[228] It is also noteworthy that if cattle cropped the
grass near S. Brigit's shrine, next day it was as luxuriant as ever.
Brigit, or goddesses with similar functions, was regarded by the Celts
as an early teacher of civilisation, inspirer of the artistic, poetic,
and mechanical faculties, as well as a goddess of fire and fertility. As
such she far excelled her sons, gods of knowledge. She must have
originated in the period when the Celts worshipped goddesses rather than
gods, and when knowledge--leechcraft, agriculture, inspiration--were
women's rather than men's. She had a female priesthood, and men were
perhaps excluded from her cult, as the tabued shrine at Kildare
suggests. Perhaps her fire was fed from sacred oak wood, for many
shrines of S. Brigit were built under oaks, doubtless displacing pagan
shrines of the goddess.[229] As a goddess, Brigit is more prominent than
Danu, also a goddess of fertility, even though Danu is mother of the
gods.
Other goddesses remembered in tradition are Cleena and Vera, celebrated
in fairy and witch lore, the former perhaps akin to a river-goddess
Clota, the Clutoida (a fountain-nymph) of the continental Celts; the
latter, under her alternative name Dirra, perhaps a form of a goddess of
Gaul, Dirona.[230] Aine, one of the great fairy-queens of Ireland, has
her seat at Knockainy in Limerick, where rites connected with her former
cult are still performed for fertility on Midsummer eve. If they were
neglected she and her troops performed them, according to local
legend.[231] She is thus an old goddess of fertility, whose cult, even
at a festival in which gods were latterly more prominent, is still
remembered. She is also associated with the waters as a water-nymph
captured for a time as a fairy-bride by the Earl of Desmond.[232] But
older legends connect her with the _sid_. She was daughter of Eogabal,
king of the _sid_ of Knockainy, the grass on which was annually
destroyed at Samhain by his people, because it had been taken from them,
its rightful owners. Oilill Olomm and Ferchus resolved to watch the
_sid_ on Samhain-eve. They saw Eogabal and Aine emerge from it. Ferchus
killed Eogabal, and Oilill tried to outrage Aine, who bit the flesh from
his ear. Hence his name of "Bare Ear."[233] In this legend we see how
earlier gods of fertility come to be regarded as hostile to growth.
Another story tells of the love of Aillen, Eogabal's son, for Manannan's
wife and that of Aine for Manannan. Aine offered her favours to the god
if he would give his wife to her brother, and "the complicated bit of
romance," as S. Patrick calls it, was thus arranged.[234]
Although the Irish gods are warriors, and there are special war-gods,
yet war-goddesses are more prominent, usually as a group of
three--Morrigan, Neman, and Macha. A fourth, Badb, sometimes takes the
place of one of these, or is identical with Morrigan, or her name, like
that of Morrigan, may be generic.[235] _Badb_ means "a scald-crow,"
under which form the war-goddesses appeared, probably because these
birds were seen near the slain. She is also called Badbcatha,
"battle-Badb," and is thus the equivalent of _-athubodua,_ or, more
probably, _Cathubodua_, mentioned in an inscription from Haute-Savoie,
while this, as well as personal names like _Boduogenos_, shows that a
goddess Bodua was known to the Gauls.[236] The _badb_ or battle-crow is
associated with the Fomorian Tethra, but Badb herself is consort of a
war-god Net, one of the Tuatha De Danann, who may be the equivalent of
Neton, mentioned in Spanish inscriptions and equated with Mars.
Elsewhere Neman is Net's consort, and she may be the Nemetona of
inscriptions, e.g. at Bath, the consort of Mars. Cormac calls Net and
Neman "a venomous couple," which we may well believe them to have
been.[237] To Macha were devoted the heads of slain enemies, "Macha's
mast," but she, according to the annalists, was slain at Mag-tured,
though she reappears in the Cuchulainn saga as the Macha whose
ill-treatment led to the "debility" of the Ulstermen.[238] The name
Morrigan may mean "great queen," though Dr. Stokes, connecting _mor_
with the same syllable in "Fomorian," explains it as
"nightmare-queen."[239] She works great harm to the Fomorians at
Mag-tured, and afterwards proclaims the victory to the hills, rivers,
and fairy-hosts, uttering also a prophecy of the evils to come at the
end of time.[240] She reappears prominently in the Cuchulainn saga,
hostile to the hero because he rejects her love, yet aiding the hosts of
Ulster and the Brown Bull, and in the end trying to prevent the hero's
death.[241]
The prominent position of these goddesses must be connected with the
fact that women went out to war--a custom said to have been stopped by
Adamnan at his mother's request, and that many prominent heroines of the
heroic cycles are warriors, like the British Boudicca, whose name may be
connected with _boudi_, "victory." Specific titles were given to such
classes of female warriors--_bangaisgedaig_, _banfeinnidi_, etc.[242]
But it is possible that these goddesses were at first connected with
fertility, their functions changing with the growing warlike tendencies
of the Celts. Their number recalls that of the threefold _Matres_, and
possibly the change in their character is hinted in the Romano-British
inscription at Benwell to the _Lamiis Tribus_, since Morrigan's name is
glossed _lamia_.[243] She is also identified with Anu, and is mistress
of Dagda, an Earth-god, and with Badb and others expels the Fomorians
when they destroyed the agricultural produce of Ireland.[244] Probably
the scald-crow was at once the symbol and the incarnation of the
war-goddesses, who resemble the Norse Valkyries, appearing sometimes as
crows, and the Greek Keres, bird-like beings which drank the blood of
the slain. It is also interesting to note that Badb, who has the
character of a prophetess of evil, is often identified with the "Washer
at the Ford," whose presence indicates death to him whose armour or
garments she seems to cleanse.[245]
The _Matres_, goddesses of fertility, do not appear by name in Ireland,
but the triplication of such goddesses as Morrigan and Brigit, the
threefold name of Dagda's wife, or the fact that Arm, Danu, and Buanan
are called "mothers," while Buanan's name is sometimes rendered "good
mother," may suggest that such grouped goddesses were not unknown. Later
legend knows of white women who assist in spinning, or three hags with
power over nature, or, as in the _Battle of Ventry_, of three
supernatural women who fall in love with Conncrithir, aid him in fight,
and heal his wounds. In this document and elsewhere is mentioned the
"_sid_ of the White Women."[246] Goddesses of fertility are usually
goddesses of love, and the prominence given to females among the _side_,
the fact that they are often called _Be find_, "White Women," like
fairies who represent the _Matres_ elsewhere, and that they freely offer
their love to mortals, may connect them with this group of goddesses.
Again, when the Milesians arrived in Ireland, three kings of the Tuatha
Dea had wives called Eriu, Banba, and Fotla, who begged that Ireland
should be called after them. This was granted, but only Eriu (Erin)
remained in general use.[247] The story is an aetiological myth
explaining the names of Ireland, but the three wives may be a group like
the _Matres_, guardians of the land which took its name from them.
Brian, Iuchar, and Iucharba, who give a title to the whole group, are
called _tri dee Donand_, "the three gods (sons of) Danu," or, again,
"gods of _dan_" (knowledge), perhaps as the result of a folk-etymology,
associating _dan_ with their mother's name Danu.[248] Various attributes
are personified as their descendants, Wisdom being son of all
three.[249] Though some of these attributes may have been actual gods,
especially Ecne or Wisdom, yet it is more probable that the
personification is the result of the subtleties of bardic science, of
which similar examples occur.[250] On the other hand, the fact that Ecne
is the son of three brothers, may recall some early practice of
polyandry of which instances are met with in the sagas.[251] M. D'Arbois
has suggested that Iuchar and Iucharba are mere duplicates of Brian, who
usually takes the leading place, and he identifies them with three kings
of the Tuatha Dea reigning at the time of the Milesian invasion--
MacCuill, MacCecht, and MacGrainne, so called, according to Keating,
because the hazel (_coll_), the plough (_cecht_), and the sun (_grian_)
were "gods of worship" to them. Both groups are grandsons of Dagda, and
M. D'Arbois regards this second group as also triplicates of one god,
because their wives Fotla, Banba, and Eriu all bear names of Ireland
itself, are personifications of the land, and thus may be "reduced to
unity."[252] While this reasoning is ingenious, it should be remembered
that we must not lay too much stress upon Irish divine genealogies,
while each group of three may have been similar local gods associated at
a later time as brothers. Their separate personality is suggested by the
fact that the Tuatha De Danann are called after them "the Men of the
Three Gods," and their supremacy appears in the incident of Dagda, Lug,
and Ogma consulting them before the fight at Mag-tured--a natural
proceeding if they were gods of knowledge or destiny.[253] The brothers
are said to have slain the god Cian, and to have been themselves slain
by Lug, and on this seems to have been based the story of _The Children
of Tuirenn_, in which they perish through their exertions in obtaining
the _eric_ demanded by Lug.[254] Here they are sons of Tuirenn, but more
usually their mother Danu or Brigit is mentioned.
Another son of Brigit's was Ogma, master of poetry and inventor of
_ogham_ writing, the word being derived from his name.[255] It is more
probable that Ogma's name is a derivative from some word signifying
"speech" or "writing," and that the connection with "ogham" may be a
mere folk-etymology. Ogma appears as the champion of the gods,[256] a
position given him perhaps from the primitive custom of rousing the
warriors' emotions by eloquent speeches before a battle. Similarly the
Babylonian Marduk, "seer of the gods," was also their champion in fight.
Ogma fought and died at Mag-tured; but in other accounts he survives,
captures Tethra's sword, goes on the quest for Dagda's harp, and is
given a _sid_ after the Milesian victory. Ogma's counterpart in Gaul is
Ogmios, a Herakles and a god of eloquence, thus bearing the dual
character of Ogma, while Ogma's epithet _grianainech_, "of the smiling
countenance," recalls Lucian's account of the "smiling face" of
Ogmios.[257] Ogma's high position is the result of the admiration of
bardic eloquence among the Celts, whose loquacity was proverbial, and to
him its origin was doubtless ascribed, as well as that of poetry. The
genealogists explain his relationship to the other divinities in
different ways, but these confusions may result from the fact that gods
had more than one name, of which the annalists made separate
personalities. Most usually Ogma is called Brigit's son. Her functions
were like his own, but in spite of the increasing supremacy of gods over
goddesses, he never really eclipsed her.
Among other culture gods were those associated with the arts and
crafts--the development of Celtic art in metal-work necessitating the
existence of gods of this art. Such a god is Goibniu, eponymous god of
smiths (Old Ir. _goba_, "smith"), and the divine craftsman at the battle
of Mag-tured, making spears which never failed to kill.[258] Smiths have
everywhere been regarded as uncanny--a tradition surviving from the
first introduction of metal among those hitherto accustomed to stone
weapons and tools. S. Patrick prayed against the "spells of women,
smiths, and Druids," and it is thus not surprising to find that Goibniu
had a reputation for magic, even among Christians. A spell for making
butter, in an eighth century MS. preserved at S. Gall, appeals to his
"science."[259] Curiously enough, Goibniu is also connected with the
culinary art in myth, and, like Hephaistos, prepares the feast of the
gods, while his ale preserves their immortality.[260] The elation
produced by heady liquors caused them to be regarded as draughts of
immortality, like Soma, Haoma, or nectar. Goibniu survives in tradition
as the _Gobhan Saer_, to whom the building of round towers is ascribed.
Another god of crafts was Creidne the brazier (Ir. _cerd_, "artificer";
cf. Scots _caird_, "tinker"), who assisted in making a silver hand for
Nuada, and supplied with magical rapidity parts of the weapons used at
Mag-tured.[261] According to the annalists, he was drowned while
bringing golden ore from Spain.[262] Luchtine, god of carpenters,
provided spear-handles for the battle, and with marvellous skill flung
them into the sockets of the spear-heads.[263]
Diancecht, whose name may mean "swift in power," was god of medicine,
and, with Creidne's help, fashioned a silver hand for Nuada.[264] His
son Miach replaced this by a magic restoration of the real hand, and in
jealousy his father slew him--a version of the _Maerchen_ formula of the
jealous master. Three hundred and sixty-five herbs grew from his grave,
and were arranged according to their properties by his sister Airmed,
but Diancecht again confused them, "so that no one knows their proper
cures."[265] At the second battle of Mag-tured, Diancecht presided over
a healing-well containing magic herbs. These and the power of spells
caused the mortally wounded who were placed in it to recover. Hence it
was called "the spring of health."[266] Diancecht, associated with a
healing-well, may be cognate with Grannos. He is also referred to in the
S. Gall MS., where his healing powers are extolled.
An early chief of the gods is Dagda, who, in the story of the battle of
Mag-tured, is said to be so called because he promised to do more than
all the other gods together. Hence they said, "It is thou art the _good
hand_" (_dag-dae_). The _Coir Anmann_ explains _Dagda_ as "fire of god"
(_daig_ and _dea_). The true derivation is from _dagos_, "good," and
_deivos_, "god," though Dr. Stokes considers _Dagda_ as connected with
_dagh_, whence _daghda_, "cunning."[267] Dagda is also called Cera, a
word perhaps derived from _kar_ and connected with Lat. _cerus_,
"creator" and other names of his are _Ruad-rofhessa_, "lord of great
knowledge," and _Eochaid Ollathair_, "great father," "for a great father
to the Tuatha De Danann was he."[268] He is also called "a beautiful
god," and "the principal god of the pagans."[269] After the battle he
divides the _brugs_ or _sid_ among the gods, but his son Oengus, having
been omitted, by a stratagem succeeded in ousting his father from
his _sid_, over which he now himself reigned[270]--possibly the survival
of an old myth telling of a superseding of Dagda's cult by that of
Oengus, a common enough occurrence in all religions. In another version,
Dagda being dead, Bodb Dearg divides the _sid_, and Manannan makes the
Tuatha Dea invisible and immortal. He also helps Oengus to drive out his
foster-father Elemar from his _brug_, where Oengus now lives as a
god.[271] The underground _brugs_ are the gods' land, in all respects
resembling the oversea Elysium, and at once burial-places of the
euhemerised gods and local forms of the divine land. Professor Rh[^y]s
regards Dagda as an atmospheric god; Dr. MacBain sees in him a sky-god.
More probably he is an early Earth-god and a god of agriculture. He has
power over corn and milk, and agrees to prevent the other gods from
destroying these after their defeat by the Milesians--former beneficent
gods being regarded as hurtful, a not uncommon result of the triumph of
a new faith.[272] Dagda is called "the god of the earth" "because of the
greatness of his power."[273] Mythical objects associated with him
suggest plenty and fertility--his cauldron which satisfied all comers,
his unfailing swine, one always living, the other ready for cooking, a
vessel of ale, and three trees always laden with fruit. These were in
his _sid_, where none ever tasted death;[274] hence his _sid_ was a
local Elysium, not a gloomy land of death, but the underworld in its
primitive aspect as the place of gods of fertility. In some myths he
appears with a huge club or fork, and M. D'Arbois suggests that he may
thus be an equivalent of the Gaulish god with the mallet.[275] This is
probable, since the Gaulish god may have been a form of Dispater, an
Earth or under-Earth god of fertility.
If Dagda was a god of fertility, he may have been an equivalent of a god
whose image was called _Cenn_ or _Cromm Cruaich_, "Head _or_ Crooked One
of the Mound," or "Bloody Head _or_ Crescent."[276] Vallancey, citing a
text now lost, says that _Crom-eocha_ was a name of Dagda, and that a
motto at the sacrificial place at Tara read, "Let the altar ever blaze
to Dagda."[277] These statements may support this identification. The
cult of Cromm is preserved in some verses:
"He was their god,
The withered Cromm with many mists...
To him without glory
They would kill their piteous wretched offspring,
With much wailing and peril,
To pour their blood around Cromm Cruaich.
Milk and corn
They would ask from him speedily
In return for a third of their healthy issue,
Great was the horror and fear of him.
To him noble Gaels would prostrate themselves."[278]
Elsewhere we learn that this sacrifice in return for the gifts of corn
and milk from the god took place at Samhain, and that on one occasion
the violent prostrations of the worshippers caused three-fourths of them
to die. Again, "they beat their palms, they pounded their bodies ...
they shed falling showers of tears."[279] These are reminiscences of
orgiastic rites in which pain and pleasure melt into one. The god must
have been a god of fertility; the blood of the victims was poured on the
image, the flesh, as in analogous savage rites and folk-survivals, may
have been buried in the fields to promote fertility. If so, the victims'
flesh was instinct with the power of the divinity, and, though their
number is obviously exaggerated, several victims may have taken the
place of an earlier slain representative of the god. A mythic _Crom
Dubh_, "Black Crom," whose festival occurs on the first Sunday in
August, may be another form of Cromm Cruaich. In one story the name is
transferred to S. Patrick's servant, who is asked by the fairies when
they will go to Paradise. "Not till the day of judgment," is the answer,
and for this they cease to help men in the processes of agriculture. But
in a variant Manannan bids Crom ask this question, and the same result
follows.[280] These tales thus enshrine the idea that Crom and the
fairies were ancient gods of growth who ceased to help men when they
deserted them for the Christian faith. If the sacrifice was offered at
the August festival, or, as the texts suggest, at Samhain, after
harvest, it must have been on account of the next year's crop, and the
flesh may have been mingled with the seed corn.
Dagda may thus have been a god of growth and fertility. His wife or
mistress was the river-goddess, Boand (the Boyne),[281] and the children
ascribed to him were Oengus, Bodb Dearg, Danu, Brigit, and perhaps Ogma.
The euhemerists made him die of Cethlenn's venom, long after the battle
of Mag-tured in which he encountered her.[282] Irish mythology is
remarkably free from obscene and grotesque myths, but some of these
cluster round Dagda. We hear of the Gargantuan meal provided for him in
sport by the Fomorians, and of which he ate so much that "not easy was
it for him to move and unseemly was his apparel," as well as his conduct
with a Fomorian beauty. Another amour of his was with Morrigan, the
place where it occurred being still known as "The Couple's Bed."[283] In
another tale Dagda acts as cook to Conaire the great.[284]
The beautiful and fascinating Oengus is sometimes called _Mac Ind Oc_,
"Son of the Young Ones," i.e. Dagda and Boand, or _In Mac Oc_, "The
Young Son." This name, like the myth of his disinheriting his father,
may point to his cult superseding that of Dagda. If so, he may then have
been affiliated to the older god, as was frequently done in parallel
cases, e.g. in Babylon. Oengus may thus have been the high god of some
tribe who assumed supremacy, ousting the high god of another tribe,
unless we suppose that Dagda was a pre-Celtic god with functions similar
to those of Oengus, and that the Celts adopted his cult but gave that of
Oengus a higher place. In one myth the supremacy of Oengus is seen.
After the first battle of Mag-tured, Dagda is forced to become the slave
of Bres, and is much annoyed by a lampooner who extorts the best pieces
of his rations. Following the advice of Oengus, he not only causes the
lampooner's death, but triumphs over the Fomorians.[285] On insufficient
grounds, mainly because he was patron of Diarmaid, beloved of women, and
because his kisses became birds which whispered love thoughts to youths
and maidens, Oengus has been called the Eros of the Gaels. More probably
he was primarily a supreme god of growth, who occasionally suffered
eclipse during the time of death in nature, like Tammuz and Adonis, and
this may explain his absence from Mag-tured. The beautiful story of his
vision of a maiden with whom he fell violently in love contains too many
_Maerchen_ formulae to be of any mythological or religious value. His
mother Boand caused search to be made for her, but without avail. At
last she was discovered to be the daughter of a semi-divine lord of a
_sid_, but only through the help of mortals was the secret of how she
could be taken wrung from him. She was a swan-maiden, and on a certain
day only would Oengus obtain her. Ultimately she became his wife. The
story is interesting because it shows how the gods occasionally required
mortal aid.[286]
Equally influenced by _Maerchen_ formulae is the story of Oengus and
Etain. Etain and Fuamnach were wives of Mider, but Fuamnach was jealous
of Etain, and transformed her into an insect. In this shape Oengus found
her, and placed her in a glass _grianan_ or bower filled with flowers,
the perfume of which sustained her. He carried the _grianan_ with him
wherever he went, but Fuamnach raised a magic wind which blew Etain away
to the roof of Etair, a noble of Ulster. She fell through a smoke-hole
into a golden cup of wine, and was swallowed by Etair's wife, of whom
she was reborn.[287] Professor Rh[^y]s resolves all this into a sun and
dawn myth. Oengus is the sun, Etain the dawn, the _grianan_ the expanse
of the sky.[288] But the dawn does not grow stronger with the sun's
influence, as Etain did under that of Oengus. At the sun's appearance
the dawn begins
"to faint in the light of the sun she loves,
To faint in his light and to die."
The whole story is built up on the well-known _Marchen_ formulae of the
"True Bride" and the "Two Brothers," but accommodated to well-known
mythic personages, and the _grianan_ is the Celtic equivalent of various
objects in stories of the "Cinderella" type, in which the heroine
conceals herself, the object being bought by the hero and kept in his
room.[289] Thus the tale reveals nothing of Etain's divine functions,
but it illustrates the method of the "mythological" school in
discovering sun-heroes and dawn-maidens in any incident, mythical or
not.
Oengus appears in the Fionn cycle as the fosterer and protector of
Diarmaid.[290] With Mider, Bodb, and Morrigan, he expels the Fomorians
when they destroy the corn, fruit, and milk of the Tuatha De
Danann.[291] This may point to his functions as a god of fertility.
Although Mider appears mainly as a king of the _side_ and ruler of the
_brug_ of Bri Leith, he is also connected with the Tuatha Dea.[292]
Learning that Etain had been reborn and was now married to King Eochaid,
he recovered her from him, but lost her again when Eochaid attacked his
_brug_. He was ultimately avenged in the series of tragic events which
led to the death of Eochaid's descendant Conaire. Though his _sid_ is
located in Ireland, it has so much resemblance to Elysium that Mider
must be regarded as one of its lords. Hence he appears as ruler of the
Isle of Falga, i.e. the Isle of Man regarded as Elysium. Thence his
daughter Blathnat, his magical cows and cauldron, were stolen by
Cuchulainn and Curoi, and his three cranes from Bri Leith by
Aitherne[293]--perhaps distorted versions of the myths which told how
various animals and gifts came from the god's land. Mider may be the
Irish equivalent of a local Gaulish god, Medros, depicted on bas-reliefs
with a cow or bull.[294]
The victory of the Tuatha Dea at the first battle of Mag-tured, in June,
their victory followed, however, by the deaths of many of them at the
second battle in November, may point to old myths dramatising the
phenomena of nature, and connected with the ritual of summer and winter
festivals. The powers of light and growth are in the ascendant in
summer; they seem to die in winter. Christian euhemerists made use of
these myths, but regarded the gods as warriors who were slain, not as
those who die and revive again. At the second battle, Nuada loses his
life; at the first, though his forces are victorious, his hand was cut
off by the Fomorian Sreng, for even when victorious the gods must
suffer. A silver hand was made for him by Diancecht, and hence he was
called Nuada _Argetlam_, "of the silver hand." Professor Rh[^y]s regards
him as a Celtic Zeus, partly because he is king of the Tuatha De Danann,
partly because he, like Zeus or Tyr, who lost tendons or a hand through
the wiles of evil gods, is also maimed.[295] Similarly in the _Rig-Veda_
the Acvins substitute a leg of iron for the leg of Vispala, cut off in
battle, and the sun is called "golden-handed" because Savitri cut off
his hand and the priests replaced it by one of gold. The myth of Nuada's
hand may have arisen from primitive attempts at replacing lopped-off
limbs, as well as from the fact that no Irish king must have any bodily
defect, or possibly because an image of Nuada may have lacked a hand or
possessed one of silver. Images were often maimed or given artificial
limbs, and myths then arose to explain the custom.[296] Nuada appears to
be a god of life and growth, but he is not a sun-god. His Welsh
equivalent is Llud Llawereint, or "silver-handed," who delivers his
people from various scourges. His daughter Creidylad is to be wedded to
Gwythur, but is kidnapped by Gwyn. Arthur decides that they must fight
for her yearly on 1st May until the day of judgment, when the victor
would gain her hand.[297] Professor Rh[^y]s regards Creidylad as a
Persephone, wedded alternately to light and dark divinities.[298] But
the story may rather be explanatory of such ritual acts as are found in
folk-survivals in the form of fights between summer and winter, in which
a Queen of May figures, and intended to assist the conflict of the gods
of growth with those of blight.[299] Creidylad is daughter of a probable
god of growth, nor is it impossible that the story of the battle of
Mag-tured is based on mythic explanations of such ritual combats.
The Brythons worshipped Nuada as Nodons in Romano-British times. The
remains of his temple exist near the mouth of the Severn, and the god
may have been equated with Mars, though certain symbols seem to connect
him with the waters as a kind of Neptune.[300] An Irish mythic poet
Nuada Necht may be the Nechtan who owned a magic well whence issued the
Boyne, and was perhaps a water-god. If such a water-god was associated
with Nuada, he and Nodons might be a Celtic Neptune.[301] But the
relationship and functions of these various personages are obscure, nor
is it certain that Nodons was equated with Neptune or that Nuada was a
water-god. His name may be cognate with words meaning "growth,"
"possession," "harvest," and this supports the view taken here of his
functions.[302] The Welsh Nudd Hael, or "the Generous," who possessed a
herd of 21,000 milch kine, may be a memory of this god, and it is
possible that, as a god of growth, Nuada had human incarnations called
by his name.[303]
Ler, whose name means "sea," and who was a god of the sea, is father of
Manannan as well as of the personages of the beautiful story called _The
Children of Lir_, from which we learn practically all that is known of
him. He resented not being made ruler of the Tuatha Dea, but was later
reconciled when the daughter of Bodb Dearg was given to him as his wife.
On her death, he married her sister, who transformed her step-children
into swans.[304] Ler is the equivalent of the Brythonic Llyr, later
immortalised by Shakespeare as King Lear.
The greatness of Manannan mac Lir, "son of the sea," is proved by the
fact that he appears in many of the heroic tales, and is still
remembered in tradition and folk-tale. He is a sea-god who has become
more prominent than the older god of the sea, and though not a supreme
god, he must have had a far-spreading cult. With Bodb Dearg he was
elected king of the Tuatha De Danann. He made the gods invisible and
immortal, gave them magical food, and assisted Oengus in driving out
Elemar from his _sid_. Later tradition spoke of four Manannans, probably
local forms of the god, as is suggested by the fact that the true name
of one of them is said to be Orbsen, son of Allot. Another, the son of
Ler, is described as a renowned trader who dwelt in the Isle of Man, the
best of pilots, weather-wise, and able to transform himself as he
pleased. The _Coir Anmann_ adds that the Britons and the men of Erin
deemed him god of the sea.[305] That position is plainly seen in many
tales, e.g. in the magnificent passage of _The Voyage of Bran_, where he
suddenly sweeps into sight, riding in a chariot across the waves from
the Land of Promise; or in the tale of _Cuchulainn's Sickness_, where
his wife Fand sees him, "the horseman of the crested sea," coming across
the waves. In the _Agallamh na Senorach_ he appears as a cavalier
breasting the waves. "For the space of nine waves he would be submerged
in the sea, but would rise on the crest of the tenth without wetting
chest or breast."[306] In one archaic tale he is identified with a great
sea wave which swept away Tuag, while the waves are sometimes called
"the son of Lir's horses"--a name still current in Ireland, or, again,
"the locks of Manannan's wife."[307] His position as god of the sea may
have given rise to the belief that he was ruler of the oversea Elysium,
and, later, of the other-world as a magical domain coterminous with this
earth. He is still remembered in the Isle of Man, which may owe its name
to him, and which, like many another island, was regarded by the Goidels
as the island Elysium under its name of Isle of Falga. He is also the
Manawyddan of Welsh story.
Manannan appears in the Cuchulainn and Fionn cycles, usually as a ruler
of the Other-world. His wife Fand was Cuchulainn's mistress, Diarmaid
was his pupil in fairyland, and Cormac was his guest there. Even in
Christian times surviving pagan beliefs caused legend to be busy with
his name. King Fiachna was fighting the Scots and in great danger, when
a stranger appeared to his wife and announced that he would save her
husband's life if she would consent to abandon herself to him. She
reluctantly agreed, and the child of the _amour_ was the seventh-century
King Mongan, of whom the annalist says, "every one knows that his real
father was Manannan."[308] Mongan was also believed to be a rebirth of
Fionn. Manannan is still remembered in folk-tradition, and in the Isle
of Man, where his grave is to be seen, some of his ritual survived until
lately, bundles of rushes being placed for him on midsummer eve on two
hills.[309] Barintus, who steers Arthur to the fortunate isles, and S.
Barri, who crossed the sea on horseback, may have been legendary forms
of a local sea-god akin to Manannan, or of Manannan himself.[310] His
steed was Enbarr, "water foam _or_ hair," and Manannan was "the horseman
of the maned sea." "Barintus," perhaps connected with _barr find_,
"white-topped," would thus be a surname of the god who rode on Enbarr,
the foaming wave, or who was himself the wave, while his mythic
sea-riding was transferred to the legend of S. Barri, if such a person
ever existed.
Various magical possessions were ascribed to Manannan--his armour and
sword, the one making the wearer invulnerable, the other terrifying all
who beheld it; his horse and canoe; his swine, which came to life again
when killed; his magic cloak; his cup which broke when a lie was spoken;
his tablecloth, which, when waved, produced food. Many of these are
found everywhere in _Maerchen_, and there is nothing peculiarly Celtic in
them. We need not, therefore, with the mythologists, see in his armour
the vapoury clouds or in his sword lightning or the sun's rays. But
their magical nature as well as the fact that so much wizardry is
attributed to Manannan, points to a copious mythology clustering round
the god, now for ever lost.
The parentage of Lug is differently stated, but that account which makes
him son of Cian and of Ethne, daughter of Balor, is best attested.[311]
Folk-tradition still recalls the relation of Lug and Balor. Balor, a
robber living in Tory Island, had a daughter whose son was to kill her
father. He therefore shut her up in an inaccessible place, but in
revenge for Balor's stealing MacIneely's cow, the latter gained access
to her, with the result that Ethne bore three sons, whom Balor cast into
the sea. One of them, Lug, was recovered by MacIneely and fostered by
his brother Gavida. Balor now slew MacIneely, but was himself slain by
Lug, who pierced his single eye with a red-hot iron.[312] In another
version, Kian takes MacIneely's place and is aided by Manannan, in
accordance with older legends.[313] But Lug's birth-story has been
influenced in these tales by the _Maerchen_ formula of the girl hidden
away because it has been foretold that she will have a son who will slay
her father.
Lug is associated with Manannan, from whose land he comes to assist the
Tuatha Dea against the Fomorians. His appearance was that of the sun,
and by this brilliant warrior's prowess the hosts were utterly
defeated.[314] This version, found in _The Children of Tuirenn_, differs
from the account in the story of Mag-tured. Here Lug arrives at the
gates of Tara and offers his services as a craftsman. Each offer is
refused, until he proclaims himself "the man of each and every art," or
_samildanach_, "possessing many arts." Nuada resigns his throne to him
for thirteen days, and Lug passes in review the various craftsmen (i.e.
the gods), and though they try to prevent such a marvellous person
risking himself in fight, he escapes, heads the warriors, and sings his
war-song. Balor, the evil-eyed, he slays with a sling-stone, and his
death decided the day against the Fomorians. In this account Lug
_samildanach_ is a patron of the divine patrons of crafts; in other
words, he is superior to a whole group of gods. He was also inventor of
draughts, ball-play, and horsemanship. But, as M. D'Arbois shows,
_samildanach_ is the equivalent of "inventor of all arts," applied by
Caesar to the Gallo-Roman Mercury, who is thus an equivalent of Lug.[315]
This is attested on other grounds. As Lug's name appears in Irish Louth
(_Lug-magh_) and in British Lugu-vallum, near Hadrian's Wall, so in Gaul
the names Lugudunum (Lyons), Lugudiacus, and Lugselva ("devoted to
Lugus") show that a god Lugus was worshipped there. A Gaulish feast of
Lugus in August--the month of Lug's festival in Ireland--was perhaps
superseded by one in honour of Augustus. No dedication to Lugus has yet
been found, but images of and inscriptions to Mercury abound at
Lugudunum Convenarum.[316] As there were three Brigits, so there may
have been several forms of Lugus, and two dedications to the _Lugoves_
have been found in Spain and Switzerland, one of them inscribed by the
shoemakers of Uxama.[317] Thus the Lugoves may have been multiplied
forms of Lugus or _Lugovos_, "a hero," the meaning given to "Lug" by
O'Davoren.[318] Shoe-making was not one of the arts professed by Lug,
but Professor Rh[^y]s recalls the fact that the Welsh Lleu, whom he
equates with Lug, disguised himself as a shoemaker.[319] Lugus, besides
being a mighty hero, was a great Celtic culture-god, superior to all
other culture divinities.
The euhemerists assigned a definite date to Lug's death, but side by
side with this the memory of his divinity prevailed, and he appears as
the father and helper of Cuchulainn, who was possibly a rebirth of the
god.[320] His high position appears in the fact that the Gaulish
assembly at Lugudunum was held in his honour, like the festival of
Lugnasad in Ireland. Craftsmen brought their wares to sell at this
festival of the god of crafts, while it may also have been a harvest
festival.[321] Whether it was a strictly solar feast is doubtful, though
Professor Rh[^y]s and others insist that Lug is a sun-god. The name of
the Welsh Lleu, "light," is equated with Lug, and the same meaning
assigned to the latter.[322] This equation has been contested and is
doubtful, Lugus probably meaning "hero."[323] Still the sun-like traits
ascribed to Lug before Mag-tured suggest that he was a sun-god, and
solar gods elsewhere, e.g. the Polynesian Maui, are culture-gods as
well. But it should be remembered that Lug is not associated with the
true solar festivals of Beltane and Midsummer.
While our knowledge of the Tuatha De Danann is based upon a series of
mythic tales and other records, that of the gods of the continental
Celts, apart from a few notices in classical authors and elsewhere,
comes from inscriptions. But as far as can be judged, though the names
of the two groups seldom coincide, their functions must have been much
alike, and their origins certainly the same. The Tuatha De Danann were
nature divinities of growth, light, agriculture--their symbols and
possessions suggesting fertility, e.g. the cauldron. They were
divinities of culture and crafts, and of war. There must have been many
other gods in Ireland than those described here, while some of those may
not have been worshipped all over Ireland. Generally speaking, there
were many local gods in Gaul with similar functions but different names,
and this may have been true of Ireland. Perhaps the different names
given to Dagda, Manannan, and others were simply names of similar local
gods, one of whom became prominent, and attracted to himself the names
of the others. So, too, the identity of Danu and Brigit might be
explained, or the fact that there were three Brigits. We read also in
the texts of the god of Connaught, or of Ulster, and these were
apparently regional divinities, or of "the god of Druidism"--perhaps a
god worshipped specially by Druids.[324] The remote origin of some of
these divinities may be sought in the primitive cult of the Earth
personified as a fertile being, and in that of vegetation and
corn-spirits, and the vague spirits of nature in all its aspects. Some
of these still continued to be worshipped when the greater gods had been
evolved. Though animal worship was not lacking in Ireland, divinities
who are anthropomorphic forms of earlier animal-gods are less in
evidence than on the Continent. The divinities of culture, crafts, and
war, and of departments of nature, must have slowly assumed the definite
personality assigned them in Irish religion. But, doubtless, they
already possessed that before the Goidels reached Ireland. Strictly
speaking, the underground domain assigned later to the Tuatha De Danann
belongs only to such of them as were associated with fertility. But in
course of time most of the group, as underground dwellers, were
connected with growth and increase. These could be blighted by their
enemies, or they themselves could withhold them when their worshippers
offended them.[325]
Irish mythology points to the early pre-eminence of goddesses. As
agriculture and many of the arts were first in the hands of women,
goddesses of fertility and culture preceded gods, and still held their
place when gods were evolved. Even war-goddesses are prominent in
Ireland. Celtic gods and heroes are often called after their mothers,
not their fathers, and women loom largely in the tales of Irish
colonisation, while in many legends they play a most important part.
Goddesses give their name to divine groups, and, even where gods are
prominent, their actions are free, their personalities still clearly
defined. The supremacy of the divine women of Irish tradition is once
more seen in the fact that they themselves woo and win heroes; while
their capacity for love, their passion, their eternal youthfulness and
beauty are suggestive of their early character as goddesses of
ever-springing fertility.[326]
This supremacy of goddesses is explained by Professor Rh[^y]s as
non-Celtic, as borrowed by the Celts from the aborigines.[327] But it is
too deeply impressed on the fabric of Celtic tradition to be other than
native, and we have no reason to suppose that the Celts had not passed
through a stage in which such a state of things was normal. Their innate
conservatism caused them to preserve it more than other races who had
long outgrown such a state of things.
FOOTNOTES:
[199] _HL_ 89; Stokes, _RC_ xii. 129. D'Arbois, ii. 125, explains it as
"Folk of the god whose mother is called Danu."
[200] _RC_ xii. 77. The usual Irish word for "god" is _dia_; other names
are _Fiadu_, _Art_, _Dess_.
[201] See Joyce, _SII_. i. 252, 262; _PN_ i. 183.
[202] _LL_ 245_b_.
[203] _LL_ 11.
[204] _LL_ 127. The mounds were the sepulchres of the euhemerised gods.
[205] _Book of Fermoy_, fifteenth century.
[206] _LL_ 11_b_.
[207] _IT_ i. 14, 774; Stokes, _TL_ i. 99, 314, 319. _Sid_ is a fairy
hill, the hill itself or the dwelling within it. Hence those who dwell
in it are _Aes_ or _Fir side_, "men of the mound," or _side_, fairy
folk. The primitive form is probably _sedos_, from _sed_, "abode" or
"seat"; cf. Greek [Greek: edos] "a temple." Thurneysen suggests a
connection with a word equivalent to Lat. _sidus_, "constellation," or
"dwelling of the gods."
[208] Joyce, _SH_ i. 252; O'Curry, _MS. Mat._ 505.
[209] "Vision of Oengus," _RC_ iii. 344; _IT_ i. 197 f.
[210] Windisch, _Ir. Gram._ 118; O'Curry, _MC_ ii. 71; see p. 363,
_infra_.
[211] Windisch, _Ir. Gram._ 118, Sec. 6; _IT_ iii. 407; _RC_ xvi. 139.
[212] Shore, _JAI_ xx. 9.
[213] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 203 f. _Pennocrucium_ occurs in the _Itinerary_ of
Antoninus.
[214] Keating, 434.
[215] Joyce, _SH_ i. 252.
[216] See p. 228. In Scandinavia the dead were called elves, and lived
feasting in their barrows or in hills. These became the seat of
ancestral cults. The word "elf" also means any divine spirit, later a
fairy. "Elf" and _side_ may thus, like the "elf-howe" and the _sid_ or
mound, have a parallel history. See Vigfusson-Powell, _Corpus Poet.
Boreale_, i. 413 f.
[217] Tuan MacCairill (_LU_ 166) calls the Tuatha Dea, "dee ocus andee,"
and gives the meaning as "poets and husbandmen." This phrase, with the
same meaning, is used in "Coir Anmann" (_IT_ iii. 355), but there we
find that it occurred in a pagan formula of blessing--"The blessing of
gods and not-gods be on thee." But the writer goes on to say--"These
were their gods, the magicians, and their non-gods, the husbandmen."
This may refer to the position of priest-kings and magicians as gods.
Rh[^y]s compares Sanskrit _deva_ and _adeva_ (_HL_ 581). Cf. the phrase
in a Welsh poem (Skene, i. 313), "Teulu Oeth et Anoeth," translated by
Rh[^y]s as "Household of Power and Not-Power" (_CFL_ ii. 620), but the
meaning is obscure. See Loth, i. 197.
[218] _LL_ 10_b_.
[219] Cormac, 4. Stokes (_US_ 12) derives Anu from _(p)an_, "to
nourish"; cf. Lat. _panis_.
[220] _Leicester County Folk-lore_, 4. The _Coir Anmann_ says that Anu
was worshipped as a goddess of plenty (_IT_ iii. 289).
[221] Rh[^y]s, _Trans. 3rd Inter. Cong. Hist. of Rel._ ii. 213. See
Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ 251 ff., and p. 275, _infra_.
[222] Rh[^y]s, _ibid._ ii. 213. He finds her name in the place-name
_Bononia_ and its derivatives.
[223] Cormac, 23.
[224] Caesar, vi. 17; Holder, _s.v._; Stokes, _TIG_ 33.
[225] Girald. Cambr. _Top. Hib._ ii. 34 f. Vengeance followed upon rash
intrusion. For the breath tabu see Frazer, _Early Hist. of the
Kingship_, 224.
[226] Joyce, _SH_ i. 335.
[227] P. 41, _supra_.
[228] Martin, 119; Campbell, _Witchcraft_, 248.
[229] Frazer, _op. cit._ 225.
[230] Joyce, _PN_ i. 195; O'Grady, ii. 198; Wood-Martin, i. 366; see p.
42, _supra_.
[231] Fitzgerald, _RC_ iv. 190. Aine has no connection with Anu, nor is
she a moon-goddess, as is sometimes supposed.
[232] _RC_ iv. 189.
[233] Keating, 318; _IT_ iii. 305; _RC_ xiii. 435.
[234] O'Grady, ii. 197.
[235] _RC_ xii. 109, xxii. 295; Cormac, 87; Stokes, _TIG_ xxxiii.
[236] Holder, i. 341; _CIL_ vii. 1292; Caesar, ii. 23.
[237] _LL_ 11_b_; Cormac, s.v. _Neit_; _RC_ iv. 36; _Arch. Rev._ i. 231;
Holder, ii. 714, 738.
[238] Stokes, _TIG, LL_ 11_a_.
[239] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 43; Stokes, _RC_ xii. 128.
[240] _RC_ xii. 91, 110.
[241] See p. 131.
[242] Petrie, _Tara_, 147; Stokes, _US_ 175; Meyer, _Cath Finntraga_,
Oxford, 1885, 76 f.; _RC_ xvi. 56, 163, xxi. 396.
[243] _CIL_ vii. 507; Stokes, _US_ 211.
[244] _RC_ i. 41, xii. 84.
[245] _RC_ xxi. 157, 315; Miss Hull, 247. A _baobh_ (a common Gaelic
name for "witch") appears to Oscar and prophesies his death in a Fionn
ballad (Campbell, _The Fians_, 33). In Brittany the "night-washers,"
once water-fairies, are now regarded as _revenants_ (Le Braz, i. 52).
[246] Joyce, _SH_ i. 261; Miss Hull, 186; Meyer, _Cath Finntraga_, 6,
13; _IT_ i. 131, 871.
[247] _LL_ 10_a_.
[248] _LL_ 10_a_, 30_b_, 187_c_.
[249] _RC_ xxvi. 13; _LL_ 187_c_.
[250] Cf. the personification of the three strains of Dagda's harp
(Leahy, ii. 205).
[251] See p. 223, _infra_.
[252] D'Arbois, ii. 372.
[253] _RC_ xii. 77, 83.
[254] _LL_ 11; _Atlantis_, London, 1858-70, iv. 159.
[255] O'Donovan, _Grammar_, Dublin, 1845, xlvii.
[256] _RC_ xii. 77.
[257] Lucian, _Herakles_.
[258] _RC_ xii. 89. The name is found in Gaulish Gobannicnos, and in
Welsh Abergavenny.
[259] _IT_ i. 56; Zimmer, _Glossae Hibernicae_, 1881, 270.
[260] _Atlantis_, 1860, iii. 389.
[261] _RC_ xii. 89.
[262] _LL_ ll_a_.
[263] _RC_ xii. 93.
[264] Connac, 56, and _Coir Anmann_ (_IT_ iii. 357) divide the name as
_dia-na-cecht_ and explain it as "god of the powers."
[265] _RC_ xii. 67. For similar stories of plants springing from graves,
see my _Childhood of Fiction_, 115.
[266] _RC_ xii, 89, 95.
[267] _RC_ vi. 369; Cormac, 23.
[268] Cormac, 47, 144; _IT_ iii. 355, 357.
[269] _IT_ iii. 355; D'Arbois, i. 202.
[270] _LL_ 246_a_.
[271] _Irish MSS. Series_, i. 46; D'Arbois, ii. 276. In a MS. edited by
Dr. Stirn, Oengus was Dagda's son by Elemar's wife, the amour taking
place in her husband's absence. This incident is a parallel to the
birth-stories of Mongan and Arthur, and has also the Fatherless Child
theme, since Oengus goes in tears to Mider because he has been taunted
with having no father or mother. In the same MS. it is the Dagda who
instructs Oengus how to obtain Elemar's _sid_. See _RC_ xxvii. 332,
xxviii. 330.
[272] _LL_ 245_b_.
[273] _IT_ iii. 355.
[274] O'Donovan, _Battle of Mag-Rath_, Dublin, 1842, 50; _LL_ 246_a_.
[275] D'Arbois, v. 427, 448.
[276] The former is Rh[^y]s's interpretation (_HL_ 201) connecting
_Cruaich_ with _cruach_, "a heap"; the latter is that of D'Arbois (ii.
106), deriving _Cruaich_ from _cru_, "blood." The idea of the image
being bent or crooked may have been due to the fact that it long stood
ready to topple over, as a result of S. Patrick's miracle. See p. 286,
_infra_.
[277] Vallancey, in _Coll. de Rebus Hib._ 1786, iv. 495.
[278] _LL_ 213_b_. D'Arbois thinks Cromm was a Fomorian, the equivalent
of Taranis (ii. 62). But he is worshipped by Gaels. _Crin_, "withered,"
probably refers to the idol's position after S. Patrick's miracle, no
longer upright but bent like an old man. Dr. Hyde, _Lit. Hist. of
Ireland_, 87, with exaggerated patriotism, thinks the sacrificial
details are copied by a Christian scribe from the Old Testament, and are
no part of the old ritual.
[279] _RC_ xvi. 35, 163.
[280] Fitzgerald, _RL_ iv. 175.
[281] _RC_ xxvi. 19.
[282] _Annals of the Four Masters_, A.M. 3450.
[283] _RC_ xii. 83, 85; Hyde, _op. cit._ 288.
[284] _LU_ 94.
[285] _RC_ xii. 65. Elsewhere three supreme "ignorances" are ascribed to
Oengus (_RL_ xxvi. 31).
[286] _RC_ iii. 342.
[287] _LL_ 11_c_; _LU_ 129; _IT_ i. 130. Cf. the glass house, placed
between sky and moon, to which Tristan conducts the queen. Bedier,
_Tristan et Iseut_, 252. In a fragmentary version of the story Oengus is
Etain's wooer, but Mider is preferred by her father, and marries her. In
the latter half of the story, Oengus does not appear (see p. 363,
_infra_). Mr. Nutt (_RC_ xxvii. 339) suggests that Oengus, not Mider,
was the real hero of the story, but that its Christian redactors gave
Mider his place in the second part. The fragments are edited by Stirn
(_ZCP_ vol. v.).
[288] _HL_ 146.
[289] See my _Childhood of Fiction_, 114, 153. The tale has some unique
features, as it alone among Western _Maerchen_ and saga variants of the
"True Bride" describes the malicious woman as the wife of Mider. In
other words, the story implies polygamy, rarely found in European
folk-tales.
[290] O'Grady, _TOS_ iii.
[291] _RC_ i. 41.
[292] O'Curry, _MC_ i. 71.
[293] _LL_ 117_a_. See p. 381, _infra_.
[294] Cumont, _RC_ xxvi. 47; D'Arbois, _RC_ xxvii. 127, notes the
difficulty of explaining the change of _e_ to _i_ in the names.
[295] _HL_ 121.
[296] See Crooke, _Folk-Lore_, viii. 341. Cf. Herod, ii. 131.
[297] Loth, i. 269.
[298] _HL_ 563.
[299] Train, _Isle of Man_, Douglas, 1845, ii. 118; Grimm, _Teut. Myth._
ii. ch. 24; Frazer, _GB_{2} ii. 99 f.
[300] Bathurst, _Roman Antiquities at Lydney Park_, 1879; Holder, _s.v._
"Nodons."
[301] See Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 122; Cook, _Folk-Lore_, xvii. 30.
[302] Stokes, _US_ 194-195; Rh[^y]s, _HL_, 128, _IT_ i. 712.
[303] Loth, ii. 235, 296. See p. 160, _infra_.
[304] Joyce, _OCR_.
[305] For these four Manannans see Cormac 114, _RC_ xxiv. 270, _IT_ iii.
357.
[306] O'Grady, ii.
[307] _Bodley Dindsenchas_, No. 10, _RC_ xii. 105; Joyce, _SH_ i. 259;
_Otia Merseiana_, ii. "Song of the Sea."
[308] _LU_ 133.
[309] Moore, 6.
[310] Geoffrey, _Vita Merlini_, 37; Rees, 435. Other saintly legends are
derived from myths, e.g. that of S. Barri in his boat meeting S.
Scuithne walking on the sea. Scuithne maintains he is walking on a
field, and plucks a flower to prove it, while Barri confutes him by
pulling a salmon out of the sea. This resembles an episode in the
meeting of Bran and Manannan (Stokes, _Felire_, xxxix.; Nutt-Meyer, i.
39). Saints are often said to assist men just as the gods did.
Columcille and Brigit appeared over the hosts of Erin assisting and
encouraging them _(RC_ xxiv. 40).
[311] _RC_ xii. 59.
[312] _Folk-Lore Journal_, v. 66; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 314.
[313] Larminie, "Kian, son of Kontje."
[314] Joyce, _OCR_ 37.
[315] D'Arbois, vi. 116, _Les Celtes_, 39, _RC_ xii. 75, 101, 127, xvi.
77. Is the defaced inscription at Geitershof, _Deo M ... Sam ..._
(Holder, ii. 1335), a dedication to Mercury Samildanach? An echo of
Lug's story is found in the Life of S. Herve, who found a devil in his
monastery in the form of a man who said he was a good carpenter, mason,
locksmith, etc., but who could not make the sign of the cross. Albert le
Grand, _Saints de la Bretagne_, 49, _RC_ vii. 231.
[316] Holder, _s.v._; D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 44, _RC_ vii. 400.
[317] Holder, _s.v._ "Lugus."
[318] Stokes, _TIG_ 103. Gaidoz contests the identification of the
Lugoves and of Lug with Mercury, and to him the Lugoves are grouped
divinities like the _Matres_ (_RC_ vi. 489).
[319] _HL_ 425.
[320] See p. 349, _infra_.
[321] See p. 272, _infra_.
[322] _HL_ 409.
[323] See Loth, _RC_ x. 490.
[324] Leahy, i. 138, ii. 50, 52, _LU_ 124_b_.
[325] _LL_ 215_a_; see p. 78, _supra_.
[326] See, further, p. 385, _infra_.
[327] _The Welsh People_, 61. Professor Rh[^y]s admits that the theory
of borrowing "cannot easily be proved."
CHAPTER VI.
THE GODS OF THE BRYTHONS
Our knowledge of the gods of the Brythons, i.e. as far as Wales is
concerned, is derived, apart from inscriptions, from the _Mabinogion_,
which, though found in a fourteenth century MS., was composed much
earlier, and contains elements from a remote past. Besides this, the
_Triads_, probably of twelfth-century origin, the _Taliesin_, and other
poems, though obscure and artificial, the work of many a "confused bard
drivelling" (to cite the words of one of them), preserve echoes of the
old mythology.[328] Some of the gods may lurk behind the personages of
Geoffrey of Monmouth's _Historia Britonum_ and of the Arthurian cycle,
though here great caution is required. The divinities have become heroes
and heroines, kings and princesses, and if some of the episodes are
based on ancient myths, they are treated in a romantic spirit. Other
episodes are mere _Maerchen_ formulae. Like the wreckage of some rich
galleon, the _debris_ of the old mythology has been used to construct a
new fabric, and the old divinities have even less of the god-like traits
of the personages of the Irish texts.
Some of the personages bear similar names to the Irish divinities, and
in some cases there is a certain similarity of incidents to those of the
Irish tales.[329] Are, then, the gods dimly revealed in Welsh literature
as much Goidelic as Brythonic? Analysing the incidents of the
_Mabinogion_, Professor Anwyl has shown that they have an entirely local
character, and are mainly associated with the districts of Dyfed and
Gwent, of Anglesey, and of Gwynedd, of which Pryderi, Branwen, and
Gwydion are respectively the heroic characters.[330] These are the
districts where a strong Goidelic element prevailed, whether these
Goidels were the original inhabitants of Britain, driven there by
Brythons,[331] or tribes who had settled there from Ireland,[332] or
perhaps a mixture of both. In any case they had been conquered by
Brythons and had become Brythonic in speech from the fifth century
onwards. On account of this Goidelic element, it has been claimed that
the personages of the _Mabinogion_ are purely Goidelic. But examination
proves that only a few are directly parallel in name with Irish
divinities, and while here there are fundamental likenesses, the
_incidents_ with Irish parallels may be due to mere superficial
borrowings, to that interchange of _Maerchen_ and mythical _donnees_
which has everywhere occurred. Many incidents have no Irish parallels,
and most of the characters are entirely different in name from Irish
divinities. Hence any theory which would account for the likenesses,
must also account for the differences, and must explain why, if the
_Mabinogion_ is due to Irish Goidels, there should have been few or no
borrowings in Welsh literature from the popular Cuchulainn and Ossianic
sagas,[333] and why, at a time when Brythonic elements were uppermost,
such care should have been taken to preserve Goidelic myths. If the
tales emanated from native Welsh Goidels, the explanation might be that
they, the kindred of the Irish Goidels, must have had a certain
community with them in divine names and myths, while others of their
gods, more local in character, would differ in name. Or if they are
Brythonic, the likenesses might be accounted for by an early community
in myth and cult among the common ancestors of Brythons and
Goidels.[334] But as the date of the composition of the _Mabinogion_ is
comparatively late, at a time when Brythons had overrun these Goidelic
districts, more probably the tales contain a mingling of Goidelic (Irish
or Welsh) and Brythonic divinities, though some of these may be
survivals of the common Celtic heritage.[335] Celtic divinities were
mainly of a local, tribal character. Hence some would be local Goidelic
divinities, others, classed with these, local Brythonic divinities. This
would explain the absence of divinities and heroes of other local
Brythonic groups, e.g. Arthur, from the _Mabinogion_. But with the
growing importance of these, they attracted to their legend the folk of
the _Mabinogion_ and other tales. These are associated with Arthur in
_Kulhwych_, and the Don group mingles with that of Taliesin in the
_Taliesin_ poems.[336] Hence Welsh literature, as far as concerns the
old religion, may be regarded as including both local Goidelic and
Brythonic divinities, of whom the more purely Brythonic are Arthur,
Gwynn, Taliesin, etc.[337] They are regarded as kings and queens, or as
fairies, or they have magical powers. They are mortal and die, and the
place of their burial is pointed out, or existing tumuli are associated
with them, All this is parallel to the history of the Tuatha De Danann,
and shows how the same process of degradation had been at work in Wales
as in Ireland.
The story of the Llyr group is told in the _Mabinogion_ of Branwen and
of Manawyddan. They are associated with the Pwyll group, and apparently
opposed to that of Don. Branwen is married to Matholwych, king of
Ireland, but is ill-treated by him on account of the insults of the
mischievous Evnissyen, in spite of the fact that Bran had atoned for the
insult by many gifts, including that of a cauldron of regeneration. Now
he crosses with an army to Ireland, where Evnissyen throws Branwen's
child, to whom the kingdom is given, on the fire. A fight ensues; the
dead Irish warriors are resuscitated in the cauldron, but Evnissyen, at
the cost of his life, destroys it. Bran is slain, and by his directions
his head is cut off and carried first to Harlech, then to Gwales, where
it will entertain its bearers for eighty years. At the end of that time
it is to be taken to London and buried. Branwen, departing with the
bearers, dies of a broken heart at Anglesey, and meanwhile Caswallyn,
son of Beli, seizes the kingdom.[338] Two of the bearers of the head are
Manawyddan and Pryderi, whose fortunes we follow in the _Mabinogi_ of
the former. Pryderi gives his mother Rhiannon to Manawyddan as his wife,
along with some land which by magic art is made barren. After following
different crafts, they are led by a boar to a strange castle, where
Rhiannon and Pryderi disappear along with the building. Manawyddan, with
Pryderi's wife Kieva, set out as shoemakers, but are forced to abandon
this craft on account of the envy of the craftsmen. Finally, we learn
how Manawyddan overcame the enchanter Llwyt, who, because of an insult
offered by Pryderi's father to his friend Gwawl, had made Rhiannon and
Pryderi disappear. They are now restored, and Llwyt seeks no further
revenge.
The story of Branwen is similar to a tale of which there are variants in
Teutonic and Scandinavian sagas, but the resemblance is closer to the
latter.[339] Possibly a similar story with their respective divinities
or heroes for its characters existed among Celts, Teutons, and Norsemen,
but more likely it was borrowed from Norsemen who occupied both sides of
the Irish Sea in the ninth and tenth century, and then naturalised by
furnishing it with Celtic characters. But into this framework many
native elements were set, and we may therefore scrutinise the story for
Celtic mythical elements utilised by its redactor, who probably did not
strip its Celtic personages of their earlier divine attributes. In the
two _Mabinogi_ these personages are Llyr, his sons Bran and Manawyddan,
his daughter Branwen, their half-brothers Nissyen and Evnissyen, sons of
Llyr's wife Penardim, daughter of Beli, by a previous marriage with
Eurosswyd.
Llyr is the equivalent of the Irish Ler, the sea-god, but two other
Llyrs, probably duplicates of himself, are known to Welsh story--Llyr
Marini, and the Llyr, father of Cordelia, of the chroniclers.[340] He is
constantly confused with Lludd Llawereint, e.g. both are described as
one of three notable prisoners of Britain, and both are called fathers
of Cordelia or Creiddylad.[341] Perhaps the two were once identical, for
Manannan is sometimes called son of Alloid (= Lludd), in Irish texts, as
well as son of Ler.[342] But the confusion may be accidental, nor is it
certain that Nodons or Lludd was a sea-god. Llyr's prison was that of
Eurosswyd,[343] whose wife he may have abducted and hence suffered
imprisonment. In the _Black Book of Caermarthen_ Bran is called son of Y
Werydd or "Ocean," according to M. Loth's interpretation of the name,
which would thus point to Llyr's position as a sea-god. But this is
contested by Professor Rh[^y]s who makes Ywerit wife of Llyr, the name
being in his view a form of the Welsh word for Ireland. In Geoffrey and
the chroniclers Llyr becomes a king of Britain whose history and that of
his daughters was immortalised by Shakespeare. Geoffrey also refers to
Llyr's burial in a vault built in honour of Janus.[344] On this
Professor Rh[^y]s builds a theory that Llyr was a form of the Celtic Dis
with two faces and ruler of a world of darkness.[345] But there is no
evidence that the Celtic Dispater was lord of a gloomy underworld, and
it is best to regard Llyr as a sea-divinity.
Manawyddan is not god-like in these tales in the sense in which the
majestic Manannan of Irish story is, though elsewhere we learn that
"deep was his counsel."[346] Though not a magician, he baffles one of
the great wizards of Welsh story, and he is also a master craftsman, who
instructs Pryderi in the arts of shoe-making, shield-making, and
saddlery. In this he is akin to Manannan, the teacher of Diarmaid.
Incidents of his career are reflected in the _Triads_, and his union
with Rhiannon may point to an old myth in which they were from the first
a divine pair, parents of Pryderi. This would give point to his
deliverance of Pryderi and Rhiannon from the hostile magician.[347]
Rhiannon resembles the Irish Elysium goddesses, and Manawyddan, like
Manannan, is lord of Elysium in a _Taliesin_ poem.[348] He is a
craftsman and follows agriculture, perhaps a reminiscence of the old
belief that fertility and culture come from the god's land. Manawyddan,
like other divinities, was drawn into the Arthurian cycle, and is one of
those who capture the famous boar, the _Twrch Trwyth_.[349]
Bran, or Bendigeit Vran ("Bran the Blessed"), probably an old pagan
title which appropriately enough denotes one who figured later in
Christian hagiology, is so huge that no house or ship can hold him.
Hence he wades over to Ireland, and as he draws near is thought to be a
mountain. This may be an archaic method of expressing his divinity--a
gigantic non-natural man like some of the Tuatha Dea and Ossianic
heroes. But Bran also appears as the _Urdawl Ben_, or "Noble Head,"
which makes time pass to its bearers like a dream, and when buried
protects the land from invasion. Both as a giant squatting on a rock and
as a head, Bran is equated by Professor Rh[^y]s with Cernunnos, the
squatting god, represented also as a head, and also with the Welsh Urien
whose attribute was a raven, the supposed meaning of Bran's name.[350]
He further equates him with Uthr Ben, "Wonderful Head," the superior
bard, harper and piper of a _Taliesin_ poem.[351] Urien, Bran, and Uthr
are three forms of a god worshipped by bards, and a "dark" divinity,
whose wading over to Ireland signifies crossing to Hades, of which he,
like Yama, who first crossed the rapid waters to the land of death, is
the ruler.[352] But Bran is not a "dark" god in the sense implied here.
Cernunnos is god of a happy underworld, and there is nothing dark or
evil in him or in Bran and his congeners. Professor Rh[^y]s's "dark"
divinities are sometimes, in his view, "light" gods, but they cannot be
both. The Celtic lords of the dead had no "dark" character, and as gods
of fertility they were, so to speak, in league with the sun-god, the
slayer of Bran, according to Professor Rh[^y]s's ingenious theory. And
although to distracted Irish secretaries Ireland may be Hades, its
introduction into this _Mabinogi_ merely points to the interpretation of
a mythico-historic connection between Wales and Ireland. Thus if Bran is
Cernunnos, this is because he is a lord of the underworld of fertility,
the counterpart of which is the distant Elysium, to which Bran seems
rather to belong. Thus, in presence of his head, time passes as a dream
in feasting and joy. This is a true Elysian note, and the tabued door of
the story is also suggestive of the tabus of Elysium, which when broken
rob men of happiness.[353] As to the power of the head in protecting the
land, this points to actual custom and belief regarding the relics of
the dead and the power of divine images or sculptured heads.[354] The
god Bran has become a king and law-giver in the _Mabinogion_ and the
_Triads_,[355] while Geoffrey of Monmouth describes how Belinus and
Brennus, in the Welsh version Beli and Bran, dispute the crown of
Britain, are reconciled, and finally conquer Gaul and Rome.[356] The
mythic Bran is confused with Brennus, leader of the Gauls against Rome
in 390 B.C., and Belinus may be the god Belenos, as well as Beli, father
of Lludd and Caswallawn. But Bran also figures as a Christian
missionary. He is described as hostage at Rome for his son Caradawc,
returning thence as preacher of Christianity to the Cymry--a legend
arising out of a misunderstanding of his epithet "Blessed" and a
confusing of his son with the historic Caractacus.[357] Hence Bran's
family is spoken of as one of the three saintly families of Prydein, and
he is ancestor of many saints.[358]
Branwen, "White Bosom," daughter of a sea-god, may be a sea-goddess,
"Venus of the northern sea,"[359] unless with Mr. Nutt we connect her
with the cauldron described in her legend,[360] symbol of an orgiastic
cult, and regard her as a goddess of fertility. But the connection is
not clear in the story, though in some earlier myth the cauldron may
have been her property. As Brangwaine, she reappears in romance, giving
a love-potion to Tristram--perhaps a reminiscence of her former
functions as a goddess of love, or earlier of fertility. In the
_Mabinogion_ she is buried in Anglesey at Ynys Bronwen, where a cairn
with bones discovered in 1813 was held to be the grave and remains of
Branwen.[361]
The children of Don, the equivalent of Danu, and probably like her, a
goddess of fertility, are Gwydion, Gilvaethwy, Amaethon, Govannon, and
Arianrhod, with her sons, Dylan and Llew.[362] These correspond,
therefore, in part to the Tuatha Dea, though the only members of the
group who bear names similar to the Irish gods are Govannon (= Goibniu)
and possibly Llew (= Lug). Gwydion as a culture-god corresponds to Ogma.
In the _Triads_ Beli is called father of Arianrhod,[363] and assuming
that this Arianrhod is identical with the daughter of Don, Professor
Rh[^y]s regards Beli as husband of Don. But the identification is far
from certain, and the theory built upon it that Beli is one with the
Irish Bile, and that both are lords of a dark underworld, has already
been found precarious.[364] In later belief Don was associated with the
stars, the constellation Cassiopeia being called her court. She is
described as "wise" in a _Taliesin_ poem.[365]
This group of divinities is met with mainly in the _Mabinogi_ of Math,
which turns upon Gilvaethwy's illicit love of Math's "foot-holder"
Goewin. To assist him in his _amour_, Gwydion, by a magical trick,
procures for Math from the court of Pryderi certain swine sent him by
Arawn, king of Annwfn. In the battle which follows when the trick is
discovered, Gwydion slays Pryderi by enchantment. Math now discovers
that Gilvaethwy has seduced Goewin, and transforms him and Gwydion
successively into deer, swine, and wolves. Restored to human form,
Gwydion proposes that Arianrhod should be Math's foot-holder, but Math
by a magic test discovers that she is not a virgin. She bears two sons,
Dylan, fostered by Math, and another whom Gwydion nurtures and for whom
he afterwards by a trick obtains a name from Arianrhod, who had sworn
never to name him. The name is Llew Llaw Gyffes, "Lion of the Sure
Hand." By magic, Math and Gwydion form a wife for Llew out of flowers.
She is called Blodeuwedd, and later, at the instigation of a lover,
Gronw, she discovers how Llew can be killed. Gronw attacks and wounds
him, and he flies off as an eagle. Gwydion seeks for Llew, discovers
him, and retransforms him to human shape. Then he changes Blodeuwedd
into an owl, and slays Gronw.[366] Several independent tales have gone
to the formation of this _Mabinogi_, but we are concerned here merely
with the light it may throw on the divine characters who figure in it.
Math or Math Hen, "the Ancient,"[367] is probably an old divinity of
Gwyned, of which he is called lord. He is a king and a magician,
pre-eminent in wizardry, which he teaches to Gwydion, and in a _Triad_
he is called one of the great men of magic and metamorphosis of
Britain.[368] More important are his traits of goodness to the
suffering, and justice with no trace of vengeance to the wrong-doer.
Whether these are derived from his character as a god or from the Celtic
kingly ideal, it is impossible to say, though the former is by no means
unlikely. Possibly his supreme magical powers make him the equivalent of
the Irish "god of Druidism," but this is uncertain, since all gods were
more or less dowered with these.
Gwydion's magical powers are abundantly illustrated in the tale. At
Pryderi's court he changes fungus into horses and dogs, and afterwards
slays Pryderi by power of enchantments; he produces a fleet by magic
before Arianrhod's castle; with Math's help he forms Blodeuwedd out of
flowers; he gives Llew his natural shape when he finds him as a wasted
eagle on a tree, his flesh and the worms breeding in it dropping from
him; he transforms the faithless Blodeuwedd into an owl. Some of these
and other deeds are referred to in the _Taliesin_ poems, while Taliesin
describes himself as enchanted by Gwydion.[369] In the _Triads_ he is
one of the three great astrologers of Prydein, and this emphasis laid on
his powers of divination is significant when it is considered that his
name may be derived from a root _vet_, giving words meaning "saying" or
"poetry," while cognate words are Irish _faith_, "a prophet" or "poet,"
German _wuth_, "rage," and the name of Odinn.[370] The name is
suggestive of the ecstasy of inspiration producing prophetic and poetic
utterance. In the _Mabinogion_ he is a mighty bard, and in a poem, he,
under the name of Gweir, is imprisoned in the Other-world, and there
becomes a bard, thus receiving inspiration from the gods' land.[371] He
is the ideal _faith_--diviner, prophet, and poet, and thus the god of
those professing these arts. Strabo describes how the Celtic _vates_
(_faith_) was also a philosopher, and this character is given in a poem
to Seon (probably = Gwydion), whose artists are poets and
magicians.[372] But he is also a culture-god, bringing swine to men from
the gods' land. For though Pryderi is described as a mortal who has
himself received the swine from Annwfn (Elysium), there is no doubt that
he himself was a lord of Annwfn, and it was probably on account of
Gwydion's theft from Annwfn that he, as Gweir, was imprisoned there
"through the messenger of Pwyll and Pryderi."[373] A raid is here made
directly on the god's land for the benefit of men, and it is
unsuccessful, but in the _Mabinogi_ a different version of the raid is
told. Perhaps Gwydion also brought kine from Annwfn, since he is called
one of the three herds of Britain,[374] while he himself may once have
been an animal god, then an anthropomorphic deity associated with
animals. Thus in the _Mabinogi_, when Gwydion flees with the swine, he
rests each night at a place one of the syllables of which is _Moch_,
"swine"--an aetiological myth explaining why places which were once sites
of the cult of a swine-god, afterwards worshipped as Gwydion, were so
called.
Gwydion has also a tricky, fraudulent character in the _Mabinogi_, and
although "in his life there was counsel," yet he had a "vicious
muse."[375] It is also implied that he is lover of his sister Arianrhod
and father of Dylan and Llew--the mythic reflections of a time when such
unions, perhaps only in royal houses, were permissible. Instances occur
in Irish tales, and Arthur was also his sister's lover.[376] In later
belief Gwydion was associated with the stars; and the Milky Way was
called Caer Gwydion. Across it he had chased the faithless
Blodeuwedd.[377] Professor Rh[^y]s equates him with Odinn, and regards
both as representing an older Celto-Teutonic hero, though many of the
alleged similarities in their respective mythologies are not too
obvious.[378]
Amaethon the good is described in _Kulhwych_ as the only husbandman who
could till or dress a certain piece of land, though Kulhwych will not be
able to force him or to make him follow him.[379] This, together with
the name Amaethon, from Cymric _amaeth_, "labourer" or "ploughman," throws
some light on his functions.[380] He was a god associated with
agriculture, either as one who made waste places fruitful, or possibly
as an anthropomorphic corn divinity. But elsewhere his taking a roebuck
and a whelp, and in a _Triad_, a lapwing from Arawn, king of Annwfn, led
to the battle of Godeu, in which he fought Arawn, aided by Gwydion, who
vanquished one of Arawn's warriors, Bran, by discovering his name.[381]
Amaethon, who brings useful animals from the gods' land, plays the same
part as Gwydion, bringer of the swine. The dog and deer are frequent
representatives of the corn-spirit, of which Amaethon may have been an
anthropomorphic form, or they, with the lapwing, may have been earlier
worshipful animals, associated with Amaethon as his symbols, while later
myth told how he had procured them from Annwfn.
The divine functions of Llew Llaw Gyffes are hardly apparent in the
_Mabinogi_. The incident of Blodeuwedd's unfaithfulness is simply that
of the _Maerchen_ formula of the treacherous wife who discovers the
secret of her husband's life, and thus puts him at her lover's
mercy.[382] But since Llew is not slain, but changes to eagle form, this
unusual ending may mean that he was once a bird divinity, the eagle
later becoming his symbol. Some myth must have told of his death, or he
was afterwards regarded as a mortal who died, for a poem mentions his
tomb, and adds, "he was a man who never gave justice to any one." Dr.
Skene suggests that truth, not justice, is here meant, and finds in this
a reference to Llew's disguises.[383] Professor Rh[^y]s, for reasons not
held convincing by M. Loth, holds that _Llew_, "lion," was a
misapprehension for his true name _Lleu_, interpreted by him
"light."[384] This meaning he also gives to _Lug_, equating Lug and
Llew, and regarding both as sun-gods. He also equates _Llaw Gyffes_,
"steady _or_ strong hand," with Lug's epithet _Lam fada_, "long hand,"
suggesting that _gyffes_ may have meant "long," although it was Llew's
steadiness of hand in shooting which earned him the title.[385] Again,
Llew's rapid growth need not make him the sun, for this was a privilege
of many heroes who had no connection with the sun. Llew's unfortunate
matrimonial affairs are also regarded as a sun myth. Blodeuwedd is a
dawn goddess dividing her love between the sun-god and the prince of
darkness. Llew as the sun is overcome by the latter, but is restored by
the culture-hero Gwydion, who slays the dark rival. The transformation
of Blodeuwedd into an owl means that the Dawn has become the Dusk.[386]
As we have seen, all this is a _Maerchen_ formula with no mythical
significance. Evidence of the precariousness of such an interpretation
is furnished from the similar interpretation of the story of Curoi's
wife, Blathnat, whose lover Cuchulainn slew Curoi.[387] Here a supposed
sun-god is the treacherous villain who kills a dark divinity, husband of
a dawn goddess.
If Llew is a sun-god, the equivalent of Lug, it is curious that he is
never connected with the August festival in Wales which corresponds to
Lugnasad in Ireland. There may be some support to the theory which makes
him a sun-god in a _Triad_ where he is one of the three _ruddroawc_ who
cause a year's sterility wherever they set their feet, though in this
Arthur excels them, for he causes seven years' sterility![388] Does this
point to the scorching of vegetation by the summer sun? The mythologists
have not made use of this incident. On the whole the evidence for Llew
as a sun-god is not convincing. The strongest reason for identifying him
with Lug rests on the fact that both have uncles who are smiths and have
similar names--Govannon and Gavida (Goibniu). Like Amaethon, Govannon,
the artificer or smith (_gof_, "smith"), is mentioned in _Kulhwych_ as
one whose help must be gained to wait at the end of the furrows to
cleanse the iron of the plough.[389] Here he is brought into connection
with the plough, but the myth to which the words refer is lost. A
_Taliesin_ poem associates him with Math--"I have been with artificers,
with the old Math and with Govannon," and refers to his _Caer_ or
castle.[390]
Arianrhod, "silver wheel," has a twofold character. She pretends to be a
virgin, and disclaims all knowledge of her son Llew, yet she is mistress
of Gwydion. In the _Triads_ she appears as one of the three blessed (or
white) ladies of Britain.[391] Perhaps these two aspects of her
character may point to a divergence between religion and mythology, the
cult of a virgin goddess of whom myth told discreditable things. More
likely she was an old Earth-goddess, at once a virgin and a fruitful
mother, like Artemis, the virgin goddess, yet neither chaste nor fair,
or like a Babylonian goddess addressed as at once "mother, wife, and
maid." Arianrhod, "beauty famed beyond summer's dawn," is mentioned in a
_Taliesin_ poem, and she was later associated with the constellation
Corona Borealis.[392] Possibly her real name was forgotten, and that of
Arianrhod derived from a place-name, "Caer Arianrhod," associated with
her. The interpretation which makes her a dawn goddess, mother of light,
Lleu, and darkness, Dylan, is far from obvious.[393] Dylan, after his
baptism, rushed into the sea, the nature of which became his. No wave
ever broke under him; he swam like a fish; and hence was called Dylan
Eil Ton or "son of the wave." Govannon, his uncle, slew him, an incident
interpreted as the defeat of darkness, which "hies away to lurk in the
sea." Dylan, however, has no dark traits and is described as a blonde.
The waves lament his death, and, as they dash against the shore, seek to
avenge it. His grave is "where the wave makes a sullen sound," but
popular belief identifies him with the waves, and their noise as they
press into the Conway is his dying groan. Not only is he _Eil Ton_, "son
of the wave," but also _Eil Mor_, "son of the sea."[394] He is thus a
local sea-god, and like Manannan identified with the waves, and yet
separate from them, since they mourn his death. The _Mabinogi_ gives us
the _debris_ of myths explaining how an anthropomorphic sea-god was
connected with the goddess Arianrhod and slain by a god Govannon.
Another _Mabinogion_ group is that of Pwyll, prince of Dyved, his wife
Rhiannon, and their son Pryderi.[395] Pwyll agrees with Arawn, king of
Annwfn (Elysium), to reign over his kingdom for a year. At the end of
that time he slays Arawn's rival Havgan. Arawn sends him gifts, and
Pwyll is now known as Pen or Head of Annwfn, a title showing that he was
once a god, belonging to the gods' land, later identified with the
Christian Hades. Pwyll now agrees with Rhiannon,[396] who appears
mysteriously on a magic hillock, and whom he captures, to rid her of an
unwelcome suitor Gwawl. He imprisons him in a magical bag, and Rhiannon
weds Pwyll. The story thus resolves itself into the formula of the Fairy
Bride, but it paves the way for the vengeance taken on Pryderi and
Rhiannon by Gwawl's friend Llwyt. Rhiannon has a son who is stolen as
soon as born. She is accused of slaying him and is degraded, but Teyrnon
recovers the child from its super-human robber and calls him Gwri. As he
grows up, Teyrnon notices his resemblance to Pwyll, and takes him to his
court. Rhiannon is reinstated, and because she cries that her anguish
(_pryderi_) is gone, the boy is now called Pryderi. Here, again, we have
_Maerchen_ incidents, which also appear in the Fionn saga.[397]
Though there is little that is mythological here, it is evident that
Pwyll is a god and Rhiannon a goddess, whose early importance, like that
of other Celtic goddesses, appears from her name, a corruption of
Rigantona, "great queen." Elsewhere we hear of her magic birds whose
song charmed Bran's companions for seven years, and of her marriage to
Manawyddan--an old myth in which Manawyddan may have been Pryderi's
father, while possibly in some other myth Pryderi may have been child of
Rigantona and Teyrnon (=Tigernonos, "king").[398] We may postulate an
old Rhiannon saga, fragments of which are to be found in the _Mabinogi_,
and there may have been more than one goddess called Rigantona, later
fused into one. But in the tales she is merely a queen of old romance.
Pryderi, as has been seen, was despoiled of his swine by Gwydion. They
were the gift of Arawn, but in the _Triads_ they seem to have been
brought from Annwfn by Pwyll, while Pryderi acted as swineherd.[399]
Both Pwyll and Pryderi are thus connected with those myths which told of
the bringing of domestic animals from the gods' land. But since they are
certainly gods, associated with the gods' land, this is perhaps the
result of misunderstanding. A poem speaks of the magic cauldron of Pen
Annwfn, i.e. Pwyll, and this points to a myth explaining his connection
with Annwfn in a different way from the account in the _Mabinogi_. The
poem also tells how Gweir was imprisoned in Caer Sidi (=Annwfn) "through
the messenger of Pwyll and Pryderi."[400] They are thus lords of Annwfn,
whose swine Gweir (Gwydion) tries to steal. Elsewhere Caer Sidi is
associated with Manawyddan and Pryderi, perhaps a reference to their
connection as father and son.[401] Thus Pryderi and Pwyll belong to the
bright Elysium, and may once have been gods of fertility associated with
the under-earth region, which was by no means a world of darkness.
Whatever be the meaning of the death of Pryderi at the hands of Gwydion,
it is connected with later references to his grave.[402]
A fourth group is that of Beli and his sons, referred to in the
_Mabinogi_ of Branwen, where one of them, Caswallawn, usurps the throne,
and thus makes Manawyddan, like MacGregor, landless. In the _Dream of
Maxen_, the sons of Beli are Lludd, Caswallawn, Nynnyaw, and
Llevelys.[403] Geoffrey calls Beli Heli, and speaks of an earlier king
Belinus, at enmity with his brother Brennius.[404] But probably Beli or
Heli and Belinus are one and the same, and both represent the earlier
god Belenos. Caswellawn becomes Cassivellaunus, opponent of Caesar, but
in the _Mabinogi_ he is hostile to the race of Llyr, and this may be
connected with whatever underlies Geoffrey's account of the hostility of
Belinus and Brennius (=Bran, son of Llyr), perhaps, like the enmity of
the race of D[^o]n to Pryderi, a reminiscence of the strife of rival
tribes or of Goidel and Brython.[405] As has been seen, the evidence for
regarding Beli as D[^o]n's consort or the equivalent of Bile is slender.
Nor, if he is Belenos, the equivalent of Apollo, is he in any sense a
"dark" god. He is regarded as a victorious champion, preserver of his
"honey isle" and of the stability of his kingdom, in a _Taliesin_ poem
and in the _Triads_.[406]
The personality of Casswallawn is lost in that of the historic
Cassivellaunus, but in a reference to him in the _Triads_ where, with
Caradawc and Gweirydd, he bears the title "war king," we may see a
glimpse of his divine character, that of a god of war, invisibly leading
on armies to battle, and as such embodied in great chiefs who bore his
name.[407] Nynnyaw appears in Geoffrey's pages as Nennius, who dies of
wounds inflicted by Caesar, to the great grief of Cassivellaunus.[408]
The theory that Lludd Llaw Ereint or _Lodens Lamargentios_ represents
_Nodens_ (Nuada) _L[=a]margentios_, the change being the result of
alliteration, has been contested,[409] while if the Welsh Lludd and Nudd
were identical it is strange that they should have become distinct
personalities, Gwyn, son of Nudd, being the lover of Creiddylad,
daughter of Lludd,[410] unless in some earlier myth their love was that
of brother and sister. Lludd is also confused or is identical with Llyr,
just as the Irish Ler is with Alloid. He is probably the son of Beli
who, in the tale of _Lludd and Llevelys_, by the advice of Llevelys rids
his country of three plagues.[411] These are, first, the Coranians who
hear every whisper, and whom he destroys by throwing over them water in
which certain insects given him by Levelys have been bruised. The second
is a shriek on May-eve which makes land and water barren, and is caused
by a dragon which attacks the dragon of the land. These Lludd captures
and imprisons at Dinas Emreis, where they afterwards cause trouble to
Vortigern at the building of his castle. The third is that of the
disappearance of a year's supply of food by a magician, who lulls every
one to sleep and who is captured by Lludd. Though the Coranians appear
in the _Triads_ as a hostile tribe,[412] they may have been a
supernatural folk, since their name is perhaps derived from _cor_,
"dwarf," and they are now regarded as mischievous fairies.[413] They may
thus be analogous to the Fomorians, and their story, like that of the
dragon and the magician who produce blight and loss of food, may be
based on older myth or ritual embodying the belief in powers hostile to
fertility, though it is not clear why those powers should be most active
on May-day. But this may be a misunderstanding, and the dragons are
overcome on May-eve. The references in the tale to Lludd's generosity
and liberality in giving food may reflect his function as a god of
growth, but, like other euhemerised gods, he is also called a mighty
warrior, and is said to have rebuilt the walls of Caer Ludd (London),
his name still surviving in "Ludgate Hill," where he was buried.[414]
This legend doubtless points to some ancient cult of Lludd at this spot.
Nudd already discussed under his title Nodons, is less prominent than
his son Gwyn, whose fight with Gwthur we have explained as a mythic
explanation of ritual combats for the increase of fertility. He also
appears as a hunter and as a great warrior,[415] "the hope of armies,"
and thus he may be a god of fertility who became a god of war and the
chase. But legend associated him with Annwfn, and regarded him, like the
Tuatha Dea, as a king of fairyland.[416] In the legend of S. Collen, the
saint tells two men, whom he overhears speaking of Gwyn and the fairies,
that these are demons. "Thou shalt receive a reproof from Gwyn," said
one of them, and soon after Collen was summoned to meet the king of
Annwfn on Glastonbury Tor. He climbed the hill with a flask of holy
water, and saw on its top a splendid castle, with crowds of beautiful
and youthful folk, while the air resounded with music. He was brought to
Gwyn, who politely offered him food, but "I will not eat of the leaves
of the tree," cried the saint; and when he was asked to admire the
dresses of the crowd, all he would say was that the red signified
burning, the blue coldness. Then he threw the holy water over them, and
nothing was left but the bare hillside.[417] Though Gwyn's court on
Glastonbury is a local Celtic Elysium, which was actually located there,
the story marks the hostility of the Church to the cult of Gwyn, perhaps
practised on hilltops, and this is further seen in the belief that he
hunts souls of the wicked and is connected with Annwfn in its later
sense of hell. But a mediant view is found in _Kulhwych_, where it is
said of him that he restrains the demons of hell lest they should
destroy the people of this world. In the _Triads_ he is, like other
gods, a great magician and astrologer.[418]
Another group, unknown to the _Mabinogion_, save that Taliesin is one of
the bearers of Bran's head, is found in the _Book of Taliesin_ and in
the late story of Taliesin. These, like the _Arthur_ cycle, often refer
to personages of the _Mabinogion_; hence we gather that local groups of
gods, originally distinct, were later mingled in story, the references
in the poems reflecting this mingling. Late as is the _Hanes Taliesin_
or story of Taliesin, and expressed as much of it is in a _Maerchen_
formula, it is based on old myths about Cerridwen and Taliesin of which
its compiler made use, following an old tradition already stereotyped in
one of the poems in the _Maerchen_ formula of the Transformation
Combat.[419] But the mythical fragments are also mingled with traditions
regarding the sixth century poet Taliesin. The older saga was perhaps
developed in a district south of the Dyfi estuary.[420] In Lake Tegid
dwell Tegid Voel, Cerridwen, and their children--the fair maiden
Creirwy, Morvran, and the ugly Avagddu. To give Avagddu knowledge, his
mother prepares a cauldron of inspiration from which three drops of
inspiration will be produced. These fall on the finger of Gwion, whom
she set to stir it. He put the finger in his mouth, and thus acquired
the inspiration. He fled, and Cerridwen pursued, the rest of the story
being accommodated to the Transformation Combat formula. Finally,
Cerridwen as a hen swallows Gwion as a grain of wheat, and bears him as
a child, whom she throws into the sea. Elphin, who rescues him, calls
him Taliesin, and brings him up as a bard.[421]
The water-world of Tegid is a submarine Elysium with the customary
cauldron of inspiration, regeneration, and fertility, like the cauldron
associated with a water-world in the _Mabinogion_. "Shall not my chair
be defended from the cauldron of Cerridwen," runs a line in a Taliesin
poem, while another speaks of her chair, which was probably in Elysium
like that of Taliesin himself in Caer Sidi.[422] Further references to
her connection with poetry show that she may have been worshipped by
bards, her cauldron being the source of their inspiration.[423] Her
anger at Gwion may point to some form of the Celtic myth of the theft of
the elements of culture from the gods' land. But the cauldron was first
of all associated with a fertility cult,[424] and Cerridwen must
therefore once have been a goddess of fertility, who, like Brigit, was
later worshipped by bards. She may also have been a corn-goddess, since
she is called a goddess of grain, and tradition associates the pig--a
common embodiment of the corn-spirit--with her.[425] If the tradition is
correct, this would be an instance, like that of Demeter and the pig, of
an animal embodiment of the corn-spirit being connected with a later
anthropomorphic corn-goddess.
Taliesin was probably an old god of poetic inspiration confused with the
sixth century poet of the same name, perhaps because this boastful poet
identified himself or was identified by other bards with the gods. He
speaks of his "splendid chair, inspiration of fluent and urgent song" in
Caer Sidi or Elysium, and, speaking in the god's name or identifying
himself with him, describes his presence with Llew, Bran, Gwydion, and
others, as well as his creation and his enchantment before he became
immortal.[426] He was present with Arthur when a cauldron was stolen
from Aunwfn, and basing his verses on the mythic transformations and
rebirths of the gods, recounts in highly inflated language his own
numerous forms and rebirths.[427] His claims resemble those of the
_Shaman_ who has the entree of the spirit-world and can transform
himself at will. Taliesin's rebirth is connected with his acquiring of
inspiration. These incidents appear separately in the story of Fionn,
who acquired his inspiration by an accident, and was also said to have
been reborn as Mongan. They are myths common to various branches of the
Celtic people, and applied in different combinations to outstanding gods
or heroes.[428] The _Taliesin_ poems show that there may have been two
gods or two mythic aspects of one god, later combined together. He is
the son of the goddess and dwells in the divine land, but he is also a
culture-hero stealing from the divine land. Perhaps the myths reflect
the encroachment of the cult of a god on that of a goddess, his
worshippers regarding him as her son, her worshippers reflecting their
hostility to the new god in a myth of her enmity to him. Finally, the
legend of the rescue of Taliesin the poet from the waves became a myth
of the divine outcast child rescued by Elphin, and proving himself a
bard when normal infants are merely babbling.
The occasional and obscure references to the other members of this group
throw little light on their functions, save that Morvran, "sea-crow," is
described in _Kulhwych_ as so ugly and terrible that no one would strike
him at the battle of Camlan. He may have been a war-god, like the
scald-crow goddesses of Ireland, and he is also spoken of in the
_Triads_ as an "obstructor of slaughter" or "support of battle."[429]
Ingenuity and speculation have busied themselves with trying to prove
that the personages of the Arthurian cycle are the old gods of the
Brythons, and the incidents of the romances fragments of the old
mythology. While some of these personages--those already present in
genuinely old Welsh tales and poems or in Geoffrey's _History_--are
reminiscent of the old gods, the romantic presentment of them in the
cycle itself is so largely imaginative, that nothing certain can be
gained from it for the understanding of the old mythology, much less the
old religion. Incidents which are the common stock of real life as well
as of romance are interpreted mythologically, and it is never quite
obvious why the slaying of one hero by another should signify the
conquest of a dark divinity by a solar hero, or why the capture of a
heroine by one knight when she is beloved of another, should make her a
dawn-goddess sharing her favours, now with the sun-god, now with a
"dark" divinity. Or, even granting the truth of this method, what light
does it throw on Celtic religion?
We may postulate a local Arthur saga fusing an old Brythonic god with
the historic sixth century Arthur. From this or from Geoffrey's handling
of it sprang the great romantic cycle. In the ninth century Nennius
Arthur is the historic war-chief, possibly Count of Britain, but in the
reference to his hunting the _Porcus Troit_ (the _Twrch Trwyth_) the
mythic Arthur momentarily appears.[430] Geoffrey's Arthur differs from
the later Arthur of romance, and he may have partially rationalised the
saga, which was either of recent formation or else local and obscure,
since there is no reference to Arthur in the _Mabinogion_--a fact which
shows that "in the legends of Gwynedd and Dyfedd he had no place
whatever,"[431] and also that Arthur the god or mythic hero was also
purely local. In Geoffrey Arthur is the fruit of Igerna's _amour_ with
Uther, to whom Merlin has given her husband's shape. Arthur conquers
many hosts as well as giants, and his court is the resort of all
valorous persons. But he is at last wounded by his wife's seducer, and
carried to the Isle of Avallon to be cured of his wounds, and nothing
more is ever heard of him.[432] Some of these incidents occur also in
the stories of Fionn and Mongan, and those of the mysterious begetting
of a wonder child and his final disappearance into fairyland are local
forms of a tale common to all branches of the Celts.[433] This was
fitted to the history of the local god or hero Arthur, giving rise to
the local saga, to which was afterwards added events from the life of
the historic Arthur. This complex saga must then have acquired a wider
fame long before the romantic cycle took its place, as is suggested by
the purely Welsh tales of _Kulhwych_ and the _Dream of Rhonabwy_, in the
former of which the personages (gods) of the _Mabinogion_ figure in
Arthur's train, though he is far from being the Arthur of the romances.
Sporadic references to Arthur occur also in Welsh literature, and to the
earlier saga belongs the Arthur who spoils Elysium of its cauldron in a
_Taliesin_ poem.[434] In the _Triads_ there is a mingling of the
historic, the saga, and the later romance Arthur, but probably as a
result of the growing popularity of the saga Arthur he is added to many
Triads as a more remarkable person than the three whom they
describe.[435] Arthurian place-names over the Brythonic area are more
probably the result of the popularity of the saga than that of the later
romantic cycle, a parallel instance being found in the extent of
Ossianic place-names over the Goidelic area as a result of the spread of
the Fionn saga.
The character of the romance Arthur--the flower of knighthood and a
great warrior--and the blending of the historic war-leader Arthur with
the mythic Arthur, suggest that the latter was the ideal hero of certain
Brythonic groups, as Fionn and Cuchulainn of certain Goidelic groups. He
may have been the object of a cult as these heroes perhaps were, or he
may have been a god more and more idealised as a hero. If the earlier
form of his name was Artor, "a ploughman," but perhaps with a wider
significance, and having an equivalent in Artaius, a Gaulish god equated
with Mercury,[436] he may have been a god of agriculture who became a
war-god. But he was also regarded as a culture-hero, stealing a cauldron
and also swine from the gods' land, the last incident euhemerised into
the tale of an unsuccessful theft from March, son of Meirchion,[437]
while, like other culture-heroes, he is a bard. To his story was easily
fitted that of the wonder-child, who, having finally disappeared into
Elysium (later located at Glastonbury), would reappear one day, like
Fionn, as the Saviour of his people. The local Arthur finally attained a
fame far exceeding that of any Brythonic god or hero.
Merlin, or Myrddin, appears in the romances as a great magician who is
finally overcome by the Lady of the Lake, and is in Geoffrey son of a
mysterious invisible personage who visits a woman, and, finally taking
human shape, begets Merlin. As a son who never had a father he is chosen
as the foundation sacrifice for Vortigern's tower by his magicians, but
he confutes them and shows why the tower can never be built, namely,
because of the dragons in the pool beneath it. Then follow his
prophecies regarding the dragons and the future of the country, and the
story of his removal of the Giant's Dance, or Stonehenge, from Ireland
to its present site--an aetiological myth explaining the origin of the
great stone circle. His description of how the giants used the water
with which they washed the stones for the cure of sickness or wounds,
probably points to some ritual for healing in connection with these
megaliths. Finally, we hear of his transformation of the lovelorn Uther
and of his confidant Ulfin, as well as of himself.[438] Here he appears
as little more than an ideal magician, possibly an old god, like the
Irish "god of Druidism," to whose legend had been attached a story of
supernatural conception. Professor Rh[^y]s regards him as a Celtic Zeus
or as the sun, because late legends tell of his disappearance in a glass
house into the sea. The glass house is the expanse of light travelling
with the sun (Merlin), while the Lady of the Lake who comes daily to
solace Merlin in his enchanted prison is a dawn-goddess. Stonehenge was
probably a temple of this Celtic Zeus "whose late legendary self we have
in Merlin."[439] Such late romantic episodes and an aetiological myth can
hardly be regarded as affording safe basis for these views, and their
mythological interpretation is more than doubtful. The sun is never
prisoner of the dawn as Merlin is of Viviane. Merlin and his glass house
disappear for ever, but the sun reappears every morning. Even the most
poetic mythology must conform in some degree to actual phenomena, but
this cannot be said of the systems of mythological interpretation. If
Merlin belongs to the pagan period at all, he was probably an ideal
magician or god of magicians, prominent, perhaps, in the Arthur saga as
in the later romances, and credited with a mysterious origin and an
equally mysterious ending, the latter described in many different ways.
The boastful Kei of the romances appears already in _Kulhwych_, while in
Geoffrey he is Arthur's seneschal.[440] Nobler traits are his in later
Welsh poetry; he is a mighty warrior, fighting even against a hundred,
though his powers as a toper are also great. Here, too, his death is
lamented.[441] He may thus have been a god of war, and his battle-fury
may be poetically described in a curious passage referring to him in
_Kulhwych_: "His breath lasted nine days and nine nights under water. He
could remain without sleep for the same period. No physician could heal
a wound inflicted by his sword. When he pleased he could make himself as
tall as the tallest tree in the wood. And when it rained hardest,
whatever he carried remained dry above and below his hand to the
distance of a handbreadth, so great was his natural heat. When it was
coldest he was as glowing fuel to his companions."[442] This almost
exactly resembles Cuchulainn's aspect in his battle-fury. In a curious
poem Gwenhyvar (Guinevere) extols his prowess as a warrior above that of
Arthur, and in _Kulhwych_ and elsewhere there is enmity between the
two.[443] This may point to Kei's having been a god of tribes hostile to
those of whom Arthur was hero.
Mabon, one of Arthur's heroes in _Kulhwych_ and the _Dream of Rhonabwy_,
whose name, from _mab_ (_map_), means "a youth," may be one with the god
Maponos equated with Apollo in Britain and Gaul, perhaps as a god of
healing springs.[444] His mother's name, Modron, is a local form of
_Matrona_, a river-goddess and probably one of the mother-goddesses as
her name implies. In the _Triads_ Mabon is one of the three eminent
prisoners of Prydein. To obtain his help in hunting the magic boar his
prison must be found, and this is done by animals, in accordance with a
_Maerchen_ formula, while the words spoken by them show the immense
duration of his imprisonment--perhaps a hint of his immortality.[445]
But he was also said to have died and been buried at Nantlle,[446]
which, like Gloucester, the place of his prison, may have been a site of
his widely extended cult.[447]
* * * * *
Taken as a whole the various gods and heroes of the Brythons, so far as
they are known to us, just as they resemble the Irish divinities in
having been later regarded as mortals, magicians, and fairies, so they
resemble them in their functions, dimly as these are perceived. They are
associated with Elysium, they are lords of fertility and growth, of the
sea, of the arts of culture and of war. The prominent position of
certain goddesses may point to what has already been discovered of them
in Gaul and Ireland--their pre-eminence and independence. But, like the
divinities of Gaul and Ireland, those of Wales were mainly local in
character, and only in a few cases attained a wider popularity and cult.
Certain British gods mentioned on inscriptions may be identified with
some of those just considered--Nodons with Nudd or Lludd, Belenos with
Belinus or Beli, Maponos with Mabon, Taranos (in continental
inscriptions only), with a Taran mentioned in _Kulhwych_.[448] Others
are referred to in classical writings--Andrasta, a goddess of victory,
to whom Boudicca prayed;[449] Sul, a goddess of hot springs, equated
with Minerva at Bath.[450] Inscriptions also mention Epona, the
horse-goddess; Brigantia, perhaps a form of Brigit; Belisama (the Mersey
in Ptolemy),[451] a goddess in Gaulish inscriptions. Others refer to the
group goddesses, the _Matres_. Some gods are equated with Mars--Camulos,
known also on the Continent and perhaps the same as Cumal, father of
Fionn; Belatucadros, "comely in slaughter"; Cocidius, Corotiacus,
Barrex, and Totatis (perhaps Lucan's Teutates). Others are equated with
Apollo in his character as a god of healing--Anextiomarus, Grannos (at
Musselburgh and in many continental inscriptions), Arvalus, Mogons, etc.
Most of these and many others found on isolated inscriptions were
probably local in character, though some, occurring also on the
Continent, had attained a wider popularity.[452] But some of the
inscriptions referring to the latter may be due to Gaulish soldiers
quartered in Britain.
COMPARATIVE TABLE OF DIVINITIES WITH SIMILAR NAMES IN IRELAND, BRITAIN,
AND GAUL.
_Italics denote names found in Inscriptions._
IRELAND. BRITAIN. GAUL.
_Anextiomarus_ _Anextiomarus_
Anu Anna (?) _Anoniredi_, "chariot of Anu"
Badb _Bodua_
Beli, Belinus _Belenos_
Belisama _Belisama_
Brigit _Brigantia_ _Brigindu_
Bron Bran Brennus (?)
Buanann _Buanu_
Cumal _Camulos_ _Camulos_
Danu Don
_Epona_ _Epona_
Goibniu Govannon
_Grannos_ _Grannos_
Ler Llyr
Lug Llew or Lleu (?) Lugus, _Lugores_
Mabon, _Maponos_ _Maponos_
Manannan Manawyddan
_Matres_ _Matres_
Mider _Medros_ (?)
Modron _Matrona_ (?)
Nemon _Nemetona_
Net _Neton_
Nuada _Nodons_, Nudd
Hael, Lludd (?)
Ogma Ogmios
_Silvanus_ _Silvanus_
Taran _Taranis_
_Totatis, Tutatis_ Teutates
FOOTNOTES:
[328] The text of the _Mabinogion_ has been edited by Rh[^y]s and Evans,
1887, and it has been translated into English by Lady Guest, and more
critically, into French, by Loth. Many of the _Triads_ will be found in
Loth's second volume. For the poetry see Skene, _Four Ancient Books of
Wales_.
[329] These incidents are found mainly in the story of Branwen, e.g.
those of the cauldron, a frequent accessory in Irish tales; the
regeneration of the warriors, also found in the story of Mag-tured,
though no cauldron is used; the red-hot house, occurring also in _Mesca
Ulad_; the description of Bran paralleled by that of MacCecht.
[330] Anwyl, _ZCP_ i. 277, ii. 124, iii. 122.
[331] Bp. of S. Davids, _Vestiges of the Gael in Gwynned_, 1851;
Rh[^y]s, _TSC_ 1894-1895, 21.
[332] Skene, i. 45; Meyer, _TSC_ 1895-1896, 55.
[333] Cf. John, _The Mabinogion_, 1901, 19. Curoi appears as Kubert, and
Conchobar as Knychur in _Kulhwych_ (Loth, i. 202). A poem of _Taliesin_
has for subject the death of Corroi, son of Dayry (Curoi mac Daire),
Skene, i. 254.
[334] Loth, _RC_ x. 356; John, _op. cit._ 19; Nutt, _Arch. Rev._ i. 331.
[335] The giant Ysppadden in _Kulhwych_ resembles Balor, but has no evil
eye.
[336] Anwyl, _ZCP_ ii. 127-128, "The merging of the two legends [of Don
and Taliesin] may have arisen through the fusion of Penllyn with Ardudwy
and Arvon."
[337] Professor Rh[^y]s thinks that the Llyr family may be pre-Celtic,
_TSC_ 1894-1895, 29 f.; _CFL_ 552.
[338] Loth, i. 97 f.; Lady Guest, iii. 143 f.
[339] See Nutt, _Folk-lore Record_, v. 1 f.
[340] Loth, i. 298, ii. 243-244; Geoffrey, _Hist. Brit._ ii. 11.
[341] Loth, i. 224, 265, ii. 215, 244; Geoff. ii. 11.
[342] Skene, i. 81; Rh[^y]s, _Academy_, Jan. 7, 1882.
[343] _Triads_, Loth, ii. 293; Nutt, _Folk-lore Record_, v. 9.
[344] _Hist. Brit._ ii. 11-14.
[345] _AL_ 131.
[346] Skene, i. 262.
[347] See Nutt-Meyer, ii. 17.
[348] Skene, i. 276.
[349] Loth, i. 208, 280; see also i. 197, ii. 245, 294.
[350] See Skene i. 355. The raven is rather the bird of prey come to
devour Urien than his "attribute."
[351] Skene, i. 298.
[352] For these theories see Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 90_f_.; _AL_ ch. 11; _CFL_
552.
[353] See Ch. XXIV.
[354] See p. 242.
[355] Loth, i. 65, ii. 285.
[356] _Hist. Brit._ iii. 1_f_. Geoffrey says that Billingsgate was
called after Belinus, and that his ashes were preserved in the gate, a
tradition recalling some connection of the god with the gate.
[357] An early Caradawc saga may have become mingled with the story of
Caractacus.
[358] Rees, 77.
[359] So Elton, 291.
[360] _Folk-lore Record_, v. 29.
[361] Lady Guest, iii. 134.
[362] Don is sometimes held to be male, but she is distinctly called
sister of Math (Loth, i. 134), and as the equivalent of Danu she must be
female.
[363] Loth, ii. 209.
[364] See p. 60, _supra_, and Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 90_f_.
[365] Lady Guest, iii. 255; Skene, i. 297, 350.
[366] For this _Mabinogi_ see Loth, i. 117f.; Guest, iii. 189f.
[367] Skene, i. 286.
[368] Loth, ii. 229, 257; and for other references to Math, Skene, i.
281, 269, 299.
[369] Skene, i. 296, 281.
[370] Loth, ii. 297; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 276.
[371] Skene, i. 264.
[372] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 270. Skene, i. 430, 537, gives a different meaning
to _seon_.
[373] Skene, i. 264.
[374] Loth, ii. 296.
[375] Skene, i. 299, 531.
[376] See p. 224, _infra_.
[377] Guest, iii. 255; Morris, _Celtic Remains_, 231.
[378] _HL_ 283 _f_. See also Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ i. 131.
[379] Loth, i. 240.
[380] Stokes, _US_ 34.
[381] _Myvyrian Archaeol._ i. 168; Skene, i. 275, 278 f.; Loth, ii. 259.
[382] See my _Childhood of Fiction_, 127. Llew's vulnerability does not
depend on the discovery of his separable soul, as is usual. The earliest
form of this _Maerchen_ is the Egyptian story of the Two Brothers, and
that of Samson and Delilah is another old form of it.
[383] Skene, i. 314, ii. 342.
[384] _HL_ 408; _RC_ x. 490.
[385] _HL_ 237, 319, 398, 408.
[386] _HL_ 384.
[387] _HL_ 474, 424.
[388] Loth, ii. 231.
[389] Loth, i. 240.
[390] Skene, i, 286-287.
[391] Loth, ii. 263.
[392] Skene, ii. 159; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 157; Guest, iii. 255.
[393] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 161, 566.
[394] Skene, i. 282, 288, 310, 543, ii. 145; Loth, i. 135; Rh[^y]s, _HL_
387.
[395] Loth, i. 27 f.; Guest, iii. 7 f.
[396] Rhiannon is daughter of Heveidd Hen or "the Ancient," probably an
old divinity.
[397] In the _Mabinogi_ and in Fionn tales a mysterious hand snatches
away newly-born children. Cf. _ZCP_ i. 153.
[398] Anwyl, _ZCP_ i. 288.
[399] Loth, ii. 247.
[400] Skene, i. 264.
[401] Ibid. i. 276.
[402] Ibid. i. 310.
[403] Loth, i. 166.
[404] _Hist. Brit._ ii. 11, iii. 1, 20, iv. 3.
[405] Cf. Anwyl, _ZCP_ i. 287.
[406] Skene, i. 431; Loth, ii. 278. Some phrases seem to connect Beli
with the sea--the waves are his cattle, the brine his liquor.
[407] Loth, ii. 209, 249, 260, 283.
[408] Geoffrey, _Brit. Hist._ iv. 3. 4.
[409] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 125 f.; Loth, i. 265; MacBain, _CM_ ix. 66.
[410] See Loth, i. 269; and Skene, i. 293.
[411] Loth, i. 173 f.
[412] Loth, ii. 256, 274.
[413] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 606. Cf. the Breton fairies, the _Korr_ and
_Korrigan_.
[414] Geoffrey, iii. 20.
[415] Loth, i. 253-254; Skene, i. 293.
[416] Guest, iii. 323.
[417] Ibid. 325.
[418] Loth, i. 253, ii. 297.
[419] See p. 353, _infra_.; Skene, i. 532.
[420] Anwyl, _ZCP_ i. 293.
[421] Guest, iii. 356 f.
[422] Skene, i. 275, 296.
[423] Ibid. i. 498, 500.
[424] See p. 382, _infra_.
[425] _Mon. Hist. Brit._ i. 698, ii.; Thomas, _Revue de l'hist. des
Religions_, xxxviii. 339.
[426] Skene, i. 263, 274-276, 278, 281-282, 286-287. His "chair" bestows
immortal youth and freedom from sickness.
[427] Skene, i. 264, 376 f., 309, 532. See p. 356, _infra_.
[428] See pp. 350-1, _infra_. Fionn and Taliesin are examples of the
_Maerchen_ formula of a hero expelled and brought back to honour,
Nutt-Meyer, ii. 88.
[429] Loth, i. 209, ii. 238; Skene, ii. 459.
[430] Nennius, ch. 50, 79.
[431] Anwyl, _ZCP_ i. 293.
[432] Geoffrey, viii. 9-xi. 3.
[433] Nutt-Meyer, ii. 22 f.
[434] See p. 381, _infra_.
[435] Loth, ii. 232, 245.
[436] Rh[^y]s, _AL_, 39 f. Others derive the name from _arto-s_, "bear."
MacBain, 357.
[437] Loth. ii. 247; Skene, ii. 459.
[438] Geoffrey, vi. 17-19, vii. viii. 1, 10-12, 19. In a poem (Skene, i.
478), Myrddin is called "the man who speaks from the grave"--a
conception familiar to the Celts, who thought of the dead as living on
in the grave. See p. 340, _infra_.
[439] Rh[^y]s, _HL_, 154 f., 158-159, 194.
[440] Geoffrey, ix. 12, etc.
[441] Skene, ii. 51.
[442] Loth. i. 225; cf. p. 131, _infra_. From this description Elton
supposes Kei to have been a god of fire.
[443] _Myv. Arch._ i. 175; Loth, i. 269. Rh[^y]s, _AL_ 59, thinks Merlin
may have been Guinevere's ravisher.
[444] Holder, i. 414.
[445] Loth i. 250, 260 f., 280, ii. 215, 244.
[446] Skene, i. 363, ii. 406; _Myv. Arch._ i. 78.
[447] Hu Gadarn is mentioned in the _Triads_ as a leader of the Cymry
from the east and their teacher in ploughing. He divided them into
clans, and invented music and song. The monster _avanc_ was drawn by him
from the lake which had burst and caused the flood (see p. 231,
_infra_). Perhaps Hu is an old culture-god of some tribes, but the
_Triads_ referring to him are of late date (Loth, ii. 271, 289, 290-291,
298-299). For the ridiculous Neo-Druidic speculations based on Hu, see
Davies, _Celtic Researches_ and _Mythology and Rites of the Druids_.
Gurgiunt, son of Belinus, in Geoffrey, iii. 11, may be the French
legendary Gargantua, perhaps an old god. See the works of Sebillot and
Gaidoz on _Gargantua_.
[448] Loth, i. 270.
[449] Dio Cassius, lxii. 6.
[450] Solinus, xxii. 10. See p. 2, _supra_.
[451] Ptol. ii. 3. 2.
[452] For all these see Holder, _s.v._
CHAPTER VII.
THE CUCHULAINN CYCLE.
The events of the Cuchulainn cycle are supposed to date from the
beginning of the Christian era--King Conchobar's death synchronising
with the crucifixion. But though some personages who are mentioned in
the Annals figure in the tales, on the whole they deal with persons who
never existed. They belong to a world of romance and myth, and embody
the ideals of Celtic paganism, modified by Christian influences and
those of classical tales and romantic sagas of other regions, mainly
Scandinavian. The present form of the tales as they exist in the _Book
of the Dun Cow_ and the _Book of Leinster_ must have been given them in
the seventh or eighth century, but they embody materials of a far older
date. At an early time the saga may have had a more or less definite
form, but new tales were being constantly added to it, and some of the
longer tales are composed of incidents which once had no connection with
each other.
Cuchulainn is the central figure of the cycle, and its central episode
is that of the _Tain bo Cuailgne_, or "Cattle Spoil of Cooley." Other
personages are Conchobar and Dechtire, Ailill and Medb, Fergus, Conall
Cernach, Curoi, Deirdre, and the sons of Usnach. Some of these are of
divine descent, some are perhaps euhemerised divinities; Conchobar is
called _dia talmaide_, "a terrestrial god," and Dechtire a goddess. The
cycle opens with the birth of Conchobar, son of Cathbad and of Nessa,
daughter of one of the Tuatha De Danann, though in an older rescension
of the tale he is Nessa's son by the god Lug. During Conchobar's reign
over Ulster Cuchulainn was born. He was son of Dechtire, either by
Sualtaim, or by her brother Conchobar, or by the god Lug, of whom he may
also be a reincarnation.[453] Like other heroes of saga, he possesses
great strength and skill at a tender age, and, setting out for
Conchobar's court, overpowers the king's "boy corps," and then becomes
their chief. His next adventure is the slaying of the watch-dog of
Culann the smith, and his appeasing the anger of its owner by offering
to act as his watch-dog. Cathbad now announced that his name would
henceforth be Cu Chulainn, "Culann's hound."[454] At the mature age of
seven he obtained Conchobar's spears, sword, shield, and chariot, and
with these he overcame three mighty champions, returning in the
distortion of his "battle-fury" to Emania. To prevent mischief from his
rage, the women went forth naked to meet him. He modestly covered his
eyes, for it was one of his _geasa_ not to look on a woman's breast.
Thus taken unawares, he was plunged into three successive vats of cold
water until his natural appearance was restored to him, although the
water boiled and hissed from his heat.[455]
As Cuchulainn grew up, his strength, skill, wisdom, and beauty were
unsurpassed. All women fell in love with him, and to forestall a series
of _bonnes fortunes_, the men of Ulster sought a wife for him. But the
hero's heart was set on Emer, daughter of Forgall, whom he wooed in a
strange language which none but she could understand. At last she
consented to be his wife if he would slay a number of warriors. Forgall
was opposed to the match, and with a view to Cuchulainn's destruction
suggested that he should go to Donall in Alba to increase his skill, and
to Scathach if he would excel all other warriors. He agreed, provided
that Forgall would give him whatever he asked for on his return. Arrived
in Alba, he refused the love of Donall's daughter, Dornolla, who swore
to be avenged. Thence he went to Scathach, overcoming all the dangers of
the way, leaping in safety the gulf surrounding her island, after
essaying in vain to cross a narrow, swinging bridge. From Scathach he
learned supreme skill in arms, and overcame her Amazonian rival Aife. He
begat a son by Aife, and instructed her to call him Conla, to give him
his father's ring, to send him to seek Cuchulainn, and to forbid him to
reveal his name. In the sequel, Cuchulainn, unaware that Conla was his
son, slew him in single combat, too late discovering his identity from
the ring which he wore. This is the well-known saga formula of Sohrab
and Rustum, of Theseus and Hippolytus. On his return from Scathach's
isle Cuchulainn destroyed Forgall's _rath_ with many of its inmates,
including Forgall, and carried off Emer. To the ten years which
followed, during which he was the great champion of Ulster, belong many
tales in which he figures prominently. One of these is _The Debility of
the Ultonians_. This was caused by Macha, who, during her pregnancy, was
forced to run a race with Conchobar's horses. She outran them, but gave
birth immediately to twins, and, in her pangs, cursed the men of Ulster,
with a curse that, in time of oppression, they would be overcome with
the weakness of childbirth. From this Cuchulainn was exempt, for he was
not of Ulster, but a son of Lug.[456] Various attempts have been made to
explain this "debility." It may be a myth explaining a Celtic use of the
"couvade," though no example of a simultaneous tribal couvade is known,
unless we have here an instance of Westermarck's "human pairing season
in primitive times," with its consequent simultaneous birth-period for
women and couvade for men.[457] Others, with less likelihood, explain it
as a period of tabu, with cessation from work and warfare, at a funeral
or festival.[458] In any case Macha's curse is a myth explanatory of the
origin of some existing custom, the duration of which is much
exaggerated by the narrator. To this period belong also the tale of
Cuchulainn's visit to Elysium, and others to be referred to later.
Another story describes his attack upon Morrigan because she would
neither yield up the cows which she was driving away nor tell her true
name--an instance of the well-known name tabu. Morrigan took the form of
a bird, and was then recognised by Cuchulainn, who poured scorn upon
her, while she promised to oppose him during the fight of the _Tain_ in
the forms of an eel, a wolf, and a cow, all of which he vowed to
destroy.[459] Like many others in the saga, this story is introductory
to the main episode of the _Tain_. To this we now turn.
Medb had been wife of Conchobar, but, leaving him, had married in
succession two chiefs called Ailill, the second of whom had a bull,
Findbennach, the White-horned, which she resolved to match by one in
every way its equal. Having been refused the Brown Bull of Cuailgne, she
summoned all her forces to invade Ulster. The moment was inauspicious
for Ulster, for all its men were suffering from their "debility."
Cuchulainn, therefore, went out to encounter the host, and forced Medb
to agree that a succession of her warriors should engage him in single
combat. Among these was his old friend Ferdia, and nothing is so
touching as his reluctance to fight him or so pathetic as his grief when
Ferdia falls. The reluctance is primarily due to the tie of
blood-brotherhood existing between them. Finally, the Ulstermen rose in
force and defeated Medb, but not before she had already captured the
bull and sent it into her own land. There it was fought by the
Findbennach and slew it, rushing back to Ulster with the mangled body on
its horns. But in its frenzy a rock seemed to be another bull, which it
charged; its brains were dashed out, and it fell dead.
The Morrigan had warned the bull of the approach of Medb's army, and she
had also appeared in the form of a beautiful woman to Cuchulainn
offering him her love, only to be repulsed. Hence she turned against
him, and described how she would oppose him as an eel, a wolf, and a red
heifer--an incident which is probably a variant of that already
described.[460] In each of these shapes she was conquered and wounded by
the hero, and knowing that none whom he hurt could be healed save by
himself, she appeared to him as an old crone milking a cow. At each
draught of the milk which he received from her he blessed her with "the
blessing of gods and not-gods," and so her wounds were healed.[461] For
this, at a later time, she tried to ward off his death, but
unsuccessfully. During the progress of the _Tain_, one of Cuchulainn's
"fairy kinsmen," namely, Lug, who announced himself as his father,
appeared to aid him, while others of the Tuatha Dea threw "herbs of
healing" into the streams in which his wounds were washed.[462]
During the _Tain_, Cuchulainn slaughtered the wizard Calatin and his
daughters. But Calatin's wife bore three posthumous sons and three
daughters, and through their means the hero was at last slain.
Everything was done to keep him back from the host which now advanced
against Ulster, but finally one of Calatin's daughters took the form of
Niamh and bade him go forth. As he passed to the fight, Calatin's
daughters persuaded him to eat the flesh of a dog--a fatal deed, for it
was one of his _geasa_ never to eat dog's flesh. So it was that in the
fight he was slain by Lugaid,[463] and his soul appeared to the thrice
fifty queens who had loved him, chanting a mystic song of the coming of
Christ and the day of doom--an interesting example of a phantasm
coincidental with death.[464] This and other Christian touches show that
the Christian redactors of the saga felt tenderly towards the old pagan
hero. This is even more marked in the story in which he appears to King
Loegaire and S. Patrick, begging the former to believe in God and the
saint, and praying Patrick to "bring me with thy faithful ones unto the
land of the living."[465] A similar Christianising appears in the story
of Conchobar's death, the result of his mad frenzy on hearing from his
Druid that an earthquake is the result of the shameful crucifixion of
Christ.[466]
In the saga, Cuchulainn appears as the ideal Celtic warrior, but, like
other ideal warriors, he is a "magnified, non-natural man," many of his
deeds being merely exaggerations of those common among barbaric folk.
Even his "distortion" or battle frenzy is but a magnifying of the wild
frenzy of all wild fighters. To the person of this ideal warrior, some
of whose traits may have been derived from traditional stories of actual
heroes, _Maerchen_ and saga episodes attached themselves. Of every ideal
hero, Celtic, Greek, Babylonian, or Polynesian, certain things are
told--his phenomenal strength as a child; his victory over enormous
forces; his visits to the Other-world; his amours with a goddess; his
divine descent. These belong to the common stock of folk-tale episodes,
and accumulate round every great name. Hence, save in the colouring
given to them or the use made of them by any race, they do not afford a
key to the mythic character of the hero. Such deeds are ascribed to
Cuchulainn, as they doubtless were to the ideal heroes of the "undivided
Aryans," but though parallels may be found between him and the Greek
Heracles, they might just as easily be found in non-Aryan regions, e.g.
in Polynesia. Thus the parallels between Cuchulainn and Heracles throw
little light on the personality of the former, though here and there in
such parallels we observe a peculiarly Celtic touch. Thus, while the
Greek hero rescues Hesione from a dragon, it is from three Fomorians
that Cuchulainn rescues Devorgilla, namely, from beings to whom actual
human sacrifice was paid. Thus a _Maerchen_ formula of world-wide
existence has been moulded by Celtic religious belief and ritual
practice.[467]
It was inevitable that the "mythological school" should regard
Cuchulainn as a solar hero. Thus "he reaches his full development at an
unusually early age," as the sun does,[468] but also as do many other
heroes of saga and _Maerchen_ who are not solar. The three colours of
Cuchulainn's hair, dark near the skin, red in the middle, golden near
the top, are claimed to be a description of the sun's rays, or of the
three parts into which the Celts divided the day.[469] Elsewhere his
tresses are yellow, like Prince Charlie's in fact and in song, yet he
was not a solar hero. Again, the seven pupils of his eyes perhaps
"referred to the days of the week."[470] Blindness befell all women who
loved him, a reference to the difficulty of gazing at the sun.[471] This
is prosaic! The blindness was a compliment paid to Cuchulainn the blind,
by women who made themselves blind while talking to him, just as Conall
Cernach's mistresses squinted as he did.[472] Cuchulainn's blindness
arose from his habit of sinking one eye into his head and protruding the
other--a well-known solar trait! His "distortion," during which, besides
this "blindness," blood shot upwards from his head and formed a magic
mist, and his anger caused showers of sparks to mount above him, points
to dawn or sunset,[473] though the setting sun would rather suggest a
hero sinking calmly to rest than a mad giant setting out to slaughter
friend and foe. The "distortion," as already pointed out, is the
exaggerated description of the mad warrior rage, just as the fear which
produced death to those who saw him brandish his weapons, was also
produced by Maori warrior methods.[474] Lug, who may be a sun-god, has
no such "distortion." The cooling of the hero in three vats, the waters
of which boil over, and his emergence from them pinky red in colour,
symbolise the sun sinking into the waters and reappearing at dawn.[475]
Might it not describe in an exaggerated way the refreshing bath taken by
frenzied warriors, the water being supposed to grow warm from the heat
of their bodies?[476] One of the hero's _geasa_ was not to see
Manannan's horses, the waves; which, being interpreted, means that the
sun is near its death as it approaches the sea. Yet Lug, a sun-god,
rides the steed Enbarr, a personification of the waves, while Cuchulainn
himself often crossed the sea, and also lived with the sea-god's wife,
Fand, without coming to grief. Again, the magic horses which he drives,
black and grey in colour, are "symbols of day and night,"[477] though it
is not obvious why a grey horse should symbolise day, which is not
always grey even in the isles of the west. Unlike a solar hero, too,
Cuchulainn is most active in winter, and rests for a brief space from
slaughtering at midday--the time of the sun's greatest activity both in
summer and winter.
Another theory is that every visit of the hero to a strange land
signifies a descent to Hades, suggested by the sun sinking in the west.
Scathach's island may be Hades, but it is more probably Elysium with
some traits borrowed from the Christian idea of hell. But Emer's land,
also visited by Cuchulainn, suggests neither Hades nor Elysium. Emer
calls herself _ingen rig richis garta_, translated by Professor Rh[^y]s
as "daughter of the coal-faced king," i.e. she is daughter of darkness.
Hence she is a dawn-maiden and becomes the sun-hero's wife.[478] There
is nothing in the story to corroborate this theory, apart from the fact
that it is not clear, even to the hypothetical primitive mind, why dawn
and sun should be a divine pair. Emer's words probably mean that she is
"daughter of a king" and "a flame of hospitality" (_richis garta_.)[479]
Cuchulainn, in visiting her, went from west to east, contrary to the
apparent course of the sun. The extravagance of the solar theory is
further seen in the hypothesis that because Cuchulainn has other wives,
the sun-god made love to as many dawn-maidens as there are days in the
year,[480] like the king in Louys' romance with his 366 wives, one for
each day of the year, leap-year included.
Further examples of the solar theory need not be cited. It is enough to
see in Cuchulainn the ideal warrior, whose traits are bombastic and
obscure exaggerations of actual custom and warfare, or are borrowed from
folk-tale _motifs_ not exclusively Celtic. Possibly he may have been a
war-god, since he is associated with Badb[481] and also with Morrigan.
But he has also some traits of a culture hero. He claims superiority in
wisdom, in law, in politics, in the art of the _Filid_, and in Druidism,
while he brings various things from the world of the gods[482]. In any
case the Celts paid divine honours to heroes, living or dead,[483] and
Cuchulainn, god or ideal hero, may have been the subject of a cult. This
lends point to the theory of M. D'Arbois that Cuchulainn and Conall
Cernach are the equivalents of Castor and Pollux, the Dioscuri, said by
Diodorus to be worshipped among the Celts near the Ocean.[484]
Cuchulainn, like Pollux, was son of a god, and was nursed, according to
some accounts, by Findchoem, mother of Conall,[485] just as Leda was
mother of Castor as well as of Pollux. But, on the other hand,
Cuchulainn, unlike Pollux, was mortal. M. D'Arbois then identifies the
two pairs of heroes with certain figures on an altar at Cluny. These are
Castor and Pollux; Cernunnos and Smertullos. He equates Castor with
Cernunnos, and Pollux with Smertullos. Smertullos is Cuchulainn, and the
name is explained from an incident in the _Tain_, in which the hero,
reproached for his youth, puts on a false beard before attacking
Morrigan in her form as an eel. This is expressed by _smerthain_, "to
attach", and is thus connected with and gave rise to the name
Smertullos. On the altar Smertullos is attacking an eel or serpent.
Hence Pollux is Smertullos-Cuchulainn.[486] Again, the name Cernunnos
signifies "the horned one," from _cernu_, "horn," a word found in
Conall's epithet Cernach. But this was not given him because he was
horned, but because of the angular shape of his head, the angle (_cern_)
being the result of a blow.[487] The epithet may mean "victorious."[488]
On the whole, the theory is more ingenious than convincing, and we have
no proof that the figures of Castor and Pollux on the altar were
duplicates of the Celtic pair. Cernunnos was an underworld god, and
Conall has no trace of such a character.
M. D'Arbois also traces the saga in Gaul in the fact that on the menhir
of Kervadel Mercury is figured with a child, Mercury, in his opinion,
being Lug, and the child Cuchulainn.[489] On another altar are depicted
(1) a woodman, Esus, cutting down a tree, and (2) a bull on which are
perched three birds--Tarvos Trigaranos. The two subjects, as M. Reinach
points out, are combined on another altar at Treves, on which a woodman
is cutting down a tree in which are perched three birds, while a bull's
head appears in the branches.[490] These represent, according to M.
D'Arbois, incidents of the _Tain_--the cutting down of trees by
Cuchulainn and placing them in the way of his enemies, and the warning
of the bull by Morrigan in the bird form which she shared with her
sisters Badb and Macha.[491] Why, then, is Cuchulainn called Esus?
"Esus" comes from a root which gives words meaning "rapid motion,"
"anger," "strength"--all shown by the hero.[492] The altars were found
in the land of the Belgic Treveri, and some Belgic tribes may have
passed into Britain and Ireland carrying the Esus-Cuchulainn legend
there in the second century B.C., e.g. the Setantii, dwelling by the
Mersey, and bearing a name similar to that of the hero in his
childhood--Setanta (_Setantios_) as well as the Menapii and Brigantes,
located in Ireland by Ptolemy.[493] In other words, the divine Esus,
with his surname Smertullos, was called in Ireland Setanta, after the
Setantii, and at a later date, Cuchulainn. The princely name Donnotaurus
resembles _Dond tarb_, the "Brown Bull" of the saga, and also suggests
its presence in Gaul, while the name [Greek: deiotaros], perhaps the
equivalent of _De[^u]io-taruos_, "Divine Bull," is found in
Galatia.[494] Thus the main elements of the saga may have been known to
the continental Celts before it was localised in Ireland,[495] and, it
may be added, if it was brought there by Gallo-British tribes, this
might account for the greater popularity of the native, possibly
pre-Celtic, Fionn saga among the folk, as well as for the finer literary
quality of the Cuchulainn saga. But the identification of Esus with
Cuchulainn rests on slight grounds; the names Esus and Smertullos are
not found in Ireland, and the Gaulish Esus, worshipped with human
sacrifice, has little affinity with the hero, unless his deeds of
slaughter are reminiscent of such rites. It is possible, however, that
the episode of the _Tain_ came from a myth explaining ritual acts. This
myth may have been the subject of the bas-reliefs, carried to Ireland,
and there worked into the saga.
The folk-versions of the saga, though resembling the literary versions,
are less elaborate and generally wilder, and perhaps represent its
primitive form.[496] The greatest differences are found in versions of
the _Tain_ and of Cuchulainn's death, which, separate in the saga, are
parts of one folk-tale, the death occurring during the fighting over the
bull. The bull is his property, and Medb sends Garbh mac Stairn to take
it from him. He pretends to be a child, goes to bed, and tricks Garbh,
who goes off to get the bull. Cuchulainn arrives before him and
personates the herdsman. Each seizes a horn, and the bull is torn in
two.[497] Does this represent the primitive form of the _Tain_, and,
further, were the bull and Cuchulainn once one and the same--a bull, the
incarnation of a god or vegetation spirit, being later made
anthropomorphic--a hero-god whose property or symbol was a bull?
Instances of this process are not unknown among the Celts.[498] In
India, Indra was a bull and a divine youth, in Greece there was the
bull-Dionysos, and among the Celts the name of the divine bull was borne
by kings.[499] In the saga Morrigan is friendly to the bull, but fights
for Medb; but she is now friendly, now hostile to Cuchulainn, finally,
however, trying to avert his doom. If he had once been the bull, her
friendliness would not be quite forgotten, once he became human and
separate from the bull. When she first met Cuchulainn she had a cow on
whom the Brown Bull was to beget a calf, and she told the hero that "So
long as the calf which is in this cow's body is a yearling, it is up to
that time that thou art in life; and it is this that will lead to the
_Tain_."[500] This suggests that the hero was to die in the battle, but
it shows that the Brown Bull's calf is bound up his life. The Bull was a
reincarnation of a divine swineherd, and if, as in the case of
Cuchulainn, "his rebirth could only be of himself,"[501] the calf was
simply a duplicate of the bull, and, as it was bound up with the hero's
life, bull and hero may well have been one. The life or soul was in the
calf, and, as in all such cases, the owner of the soul and that in which
it is hidden are practically identical. Cuchulainn's "distortion" might
then be explained as representing the bull's fury in fight, and the
folk-tales would be popular forms of an old myth explaining ritual in
which a bull, the incarnation of a tree or vegetation spirit, was slain,
and the sacred tree cut down and consumed, as in Celtic agricultural
ritual. This would be the myth represented on the bas-reliefs, and in
the ritual the bull would be slain, rent, and eaten by his worshippers.
Why, then, should Cuchulainn rend the bull? In the later stages of such
rites the animal was slain, not so much as a divine incarnation as a
sacrifice to the god once incarnated in him. And when a god was thus
separated from his animal form, myths often arose telling how he himself
had slain the animal.[502] In the case of Cuchulainn and the bull, the
god represented by the bull became separate from it, became
anthropomorphic, and in that form was associated with or actually was
the hero Cuchulainn. Bull sacrifices were common among the Celts with
whom the bull had been a divine animal.[503] Possibly a further echo of
this myth and ritual is to be found in the folk-belief that S. Martin
was cut up and eaten in the form of an ox--the god incarnate in the
animal being associated with a saint.[504] Thus the literary versions of
the _Tain_, departing from the hypothetical primitive versions, kept the
bull as the central figure, but introduced a rival bull, and described
its death differently, while both bulls are said to be reincarnations of
divine swine-herds.[505] The idea of a fight for a bull is borrowed from
actual custom, and thus the old form of the story was further distorted.
The Cuchulainn saga is more coherent than the Fionn saga, because it
possesses one central incident. The "canon" of the saga was closed at an
early date, while that of Fionn has practically never been closed,
mainly because it has been more a saga of the folk than that of
Cuchulainn. In some respects the two may have been rivals, for if the
Cuchulainn saga was introduced by conquerors from Britain or Gaul, it
would not be looked on with favour by the folk. Or if it is the saga of
Ulster as opposed to that of Leinster, rivalry would again ensue. The
Fionn saga lives more in the hearts of the people, though it sometimes
borrows from the other. This borrowing, however, is less than some
critics, e.g. Zimmer, maintain. Many of the likenesses are the result of
the fact that wherever a hero exists a common stock of incidents becomes
his. Hence there is much similarity in all sagas wherever found.
FOOTNOTES:
[453] _IT_ i. 134; Nutt-Meyer, ii. 38 f.; Windisch, _Tain_, 342; L.
Duvau, "La Legende de la Conception de Cuchulainn," _RC_ ix. 1 f.
[454] Windisch, _Tain_, 118 f. For a similar reason Finnchad was called
Cu Cerca, "the hound of Cerc" (_IT_ iii. 377).
[455] For the boyish exploits, see Windisch, _Tain_, 106 f.
[456] _RC_ vii. 225; Windisch, _Tain_, 20. Macha is a granddaughter of
Ler, but elsewhere she is called Mider's daughter (_RC_ xvi. 46).
[457] Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ ii. 654; Westermarck, _Hist. of Human Marriage_,
ch. 2.
[458] Miss Hull, _Folk-Lore_, xii. 60, citing instances from Jevons,
_Hist. of Religion_, 65.
[459] Windisch, _IT_ ii. 239.
[460] Windisch, 184, 312, 330; cf. _IT_ iii. 355; Miss Hull, 164 f.;
Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 468.
[461] _LL_ 119_a_; _RC_ iii. 175.
[462] Windisch, 342.
[463] _RC_ iii. 175 f.
[464] Ibid. 185.
[465] Crowe, _Jour. Kilkenny Arch. Soc._ 1870-1871, 371 f.
[466] _LL_ 79_a_; O'Curry, _MS. Mat_, 640.
[467] _LL_ 125_a_. See my _Childhood of fiction_, ch. 14.
[468] Miss Hull, lxxvi.
[469] "Da Derga's Hostel," _RC_ xxii. 283; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 438.
[470] _LL_ 68_a_; Rh[^y]s, 437; Ingcel the one-eyed has also many pupils
(_RC_ xxii. 58).
[471] Miss Hull, lxiii.
[472] _RC_ viii. 49.
[473] _LL_ 77_b_; Miss Hull, lxii.
[474] Other Celtic heroes undergo this distortion, which resembles the
Scandinavian warrior rage followed by languor, as in the case of
Cuchulainn.
[475] Miss Hull, p. lxvi.
[476] Irish saints, standing neck deep in freezing water, made it hot.
[477] _IT_ i. 268; D'Arbois, v. 103; Miss Hull, lxvi.
[478] _HL_ 448.
[479] See Meyer, _RC xi_. 435; Windisch, _IT_ i. 589, 740. Though
_richis_ means "charcoal," it is also glossed "flame," hence it could
only be glowing charcoal, without any idea of darkness.
[480] _HL_ 458.
[481] _IT_ i. 107.
[482] _Arch. Rev._ i. 1 f.; _IT_ i. 213; see p. 381, _infra_.
[483] See p. 164, _infra_.
[484] Diod. Siculus, iv. 56.
[485] _IT_ iii. 393.
[486] _Les Celtes_, 58 f. Formerly M. D'Arbois identified Smertullos
with Lug, ii. 217; Holder, i. 46, 262. For the incident of the beard,
see Windisch, _Tain_, 308.
[487] _IT_ iii. 395.
[488] _IT_ i. 420.
[489] _RC_ xxvii. 319 f.
[490] _RC_ xviii. 256.
[491] _Les Celtes_, 63; _RC_ xix. 246.
[492] D'Arbois, _RC_ xx. 89.
[493] D'Arbois, _RC_ xxvii. 321; _Les Celtes_, 65.
[494] _Les Celtes_, 49; Caesar, vi. 14.
[495] In contradiction to this, M. D'Arbois elsewhere thinks that Druids
from Britain may have taught the Cuchulainn legend in Gaul (_RC_ xxvii.
319).
[496] See versions in _Book of the Dean of Lismore_; _CM_ xiii.;
Campbell, _The Fians_, 6 f.
[497] _CM_ xiii. 327, 514. The same story is told of Fionn, _ibid._ 512.
See also ballad versions in Campbell, _LF_ 3 f.
[498] See p. 212, _infra_.
[499] A Galatian king was called Brogitaros, probably a form of
_Brogitaruos_, "bull of the province," a title borne by Conchobar, _tarb
in choicid_ (_IT_ i. 72). This with the epithets applied to heroes in
the _Triads_, "bull-phantom," "prince bull of combat" (Loth, ii. 232,
243), may be an appellative denoting great strength.
[500] _IT_ ii. 241 f.; D'Arbois, _Les Druides_, 168.
[501] Miss Hull, 58.
[502] See p. 212, _infra_.
[503] See p. 208, _infra_.
[504] Fitzgerald, _RC_ vi. 254.
[505] See p. 243, _infra_.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE FIONN SAGA.
The most prominent characters in the Fionn saga, after the death of
Fionn's father Cumal, are Fionn, his son Oisin, his grandson Oscar, his
nephew Diarmaid with his _ball-seire_, or "beauty-spot," which no woman
could resist; Fergus famed for wisdom and eloquence; Caoilte mac Ronan,
the swift; Conan, the comic character of the saga; Goll mac Morna, the
slayer of Cumal, but later the devoted friend of Fionn, besides a host
of less important personages. Their doings, like those of the heroes of
saga and epos everywhere, are mainly hunting, fighting, and love-making.
They embody much of the Celtic character--vivacity, valour, kindness,
tenderness, as well as boastfulness and fiery temper. Though dating from
pagan times, the saga throws little light upon pagan beliefs, but
reveals much concerning the manners of the period. Here, as always in
early Celtdom, woman is more than a mere chattel, and occupies a
comparatively high place. The various parts of the saga, like those of
the Finnish _Kalevala_, always existed separately, never as one complete
epos, though always bearing a certain relation to each other. Lonnrot,
in Finland, was able, by adding a few connecting links of his own, to
give unity to the _Kalevala_, and had MacPherson been content to do this
for the Fionn saga, instead of inventing, transforming, and serving up
the whole in the manner of the sentimental eighteenth century, what a
boon would he have conferred on Celtic literature. The various parts of
the saga belong to different centuries and come from different authors,
all, however, imbued with the spirit of the Fionn tradition.
A date cannot be given to the beginnings of the saga, and additions have
been made to it even down to the eighteenth century, Michael Comyn's
poem of Oisin in Tir na n-Og being as genuine a part of it as any of the
earlier pieces. Its contents are in part written, but much more oral.
Much of it is in prose, and there is a large poetic literature of the
ballad kind, as well as _Maerchen_ of the universal stock made purely
Celtic, with Fionn and the rest of the heroic band as protagonists. The
saga embodies Celtic ideals and hopes; it was the literature of the
Celtic folk on which was spent all the riches of the Celtic imagination;
a world of dream and fancy into which they could enter at all times and
disport themselves. Yet, in spite of its immense variety, the saga
preserves a certain unity, and it is provided with a definite framework,
recounting the origin of the heroes, the great events in which they were
concerned, their deaths or final appearances, and the breaking up of the
Fionn band.
The historic view of the Fians is taken by the annalists, by Keating,
O'Curry, Dr. Joyce, and Dr. Douglas Hyde.[506] According to this view,
they were a species of militia maintained by the Irish kings for the
support of the throne and the defence of the country. From Samhain to
Beltane they were quartered on the people, and from Beltane to Samhain
they lived by hunting. How far the people welcomed this billeting, we
are not told. Their method of cooking the game which they hunted was one
well known to all primitive peoples. Holes were dug in the ground; in
them red-hot stones were placed, and on the stones was laid venison
wrapped in sedge. All was then covered over, and in due time the meat
was done to a turn. Meanwhile the heroes engaged in an elaborate
toilette before sitting down to eat. Their beds were composed of
alternate layers of brushwood, moss, and rushes. The Fians were divided
into _Catha_ of three thousand men, each with its commander, and
officers to each hundred, each fifty, and each nine, a system not unlike
that of the ancient Peruvians. Each candidate for admission to the band
had to undergo the most trying ordeals, rivalling in severity those of
the American Indians, and not improbably genuine though exaggerated
reminiscences of actual tests of endurance and agility. Once admitted he
had to observe certain _geasa_ or "tabus," e.g. not to choose his wife
for her dowry like other Celts, but solely for her good manners, not to
offer violence to a woman, not to flee when attacked before less than
nine warriors, and the like.
All this may represent some genuine tradition with respect to a warrior
band, with many exaggerations in details and numbers. Some of its
outstanding heroes may have had names derived from or corresponding to
those of the heroes of an existing saga. But as time went on they became
as unhistorical as their ideal prototypes; round their names
crystallised floating myths and tales; things which had been told of the
saga heroes were told of them; their names were given to the personages
of existing folk-tales. This might explain the great divergence between
the "historical" and the romantic aspects of the saga as it now exists.
Yet we cannot fail to see that what is claimed as historical is full of
exaggeration, and, in spite of the pleading of Dr. Hyde and other
patriots, little historic fact can be found in it. Even if this exists,
it is the least important part of the saga. What is important is that
part--nine-tenths of the whole--which "is not true because it cannot be
true." It belongs to the region of the supernatural and the unreal. But
personages, nine-tenths of whose actions belong to this region, must
bear the same character themselves, and for that reason are all the more
interesting, especially when we remember that the Celts firmly believed
in them and in their exploits. A Fionn myth arose as all myths do,
increasing as time went on, and the historical nucleus, if it ever
existed, was swamped and lost. Throughout the saga the Fians are more
than mere mortals, even in those very parts which are claimed as
historical. They are giants; their story "bristles with the
supernatural"; they are the ideal figures of Celtic legend throwing
their gigantic shadows upon the dim and misty background of the past. We
must therefore be content to assume that whether personages called
Fionn, Oisin, Diarmaid, or Conan, ever existed, what we know of them now
is purely mythical.
Bearing in mind that they are the cherished heroes of popular fancy in
Ireland and the Scottish Highlands, we have now to inquire whether they
were Celtic in origin. We have seen that the Celts were a conquering
people in Ireland, bringing with them their own religion and mythology,
their own sagas and tales reflected now in the mythological and
Cuchulainn cycles, which found a local habitation in Ireland. Cuchulainn
was the hero of a saga which flourished more among the aristocratic and
lettered classes than among the folk, and there are few popular tales
about him. But it is among the folk that the Fionn saga has always been
popular, and for every peasant who could tell a story of Cuchulainn a
thousand could tell one of Fionn. Conquerors often adopt beliefs,
traditions, and customs of the aboriginal folk, after hostilities have
ceased, and if the pre-Celtic people had a popular hero and a saga
concerning him, it is possible that in time it was accepted by the Celts
or by the lower classes among them. But in the process it must have been
completely Celticised, like the aborigines themselves; to its heroes
were given Celtic names, or they may have been associated with existing
Celtic personages like Cumal, and the whole saga was in time adapted to
the conceptions and legendary history of the Celts. Thus we might
account for the fact that it has so largely remained without admixture
with the mythological and Cuchulainn cycles, though its heroes are
brought into relation with the older gods. Thus also we might account
for its popularity as compared with the Cuchulainn saga among the
peasantry in whose veins must flow so much of the aboriginal blood both
in Ireland and the Highlands. In other words, it was the saga of a
non-Celtic people occupying both Ireland and Scotland. If Celts from
Western Europe occupied the west of Scotland at an early date, they may
have been so few in number that their own saga or sagas died out. Or if
the Celtic occupation of the West Highlands originated first from
Ireland, the Irish may have been unable to impose their Cuchulainn saga
there, or if they themselves had already adopted the Fionn saga and
found it again in the Highlands, they would but be the more attached to
what was already localised there. This would cut the ground from the
theory that the Fionn saga was brought to Scotland from Ireland, and it
would account for its popularity in the Highlands, as well as for the
fact that many Fionn stories are attached to Highland as well as to
Irish localities, while many place-names in both countries have a Fian
origin. Finally, the theory would explain the existence of so many
_Maerchen_ about Fionn and his men, so few about Cuchulainn.
Returning to the theory of the historic aspect of the Fians, it should
be noted that, while, when seen through the eyes of the annalists, the
saga belongs to a definite historical period, when viewed by itself it
belongs to a mythic age, and though the Fians are regarded as champions
of Ireland, their foes are usually of a supernatural kind, and they
themselves move in a magic atmosphere. They are also brought into
connection with the unhistoric Tuatha De Danann; they fight with them or
for them; they have amours with or wed their women; and some of the gods
even become members of the Fian band. Diarmaid was the darling of the
gods Oengus and Manannan, and in his direst straits was assisted by the
former. In all this we are in the wonderland of myth, not the _terra
firma_ of history. There is a certain resemblance between the Cuchulainn
and Fionn sagas, but no more than that which obtains between all sagas
everywhere. Both contain similar incidents, but these are the stock
episodes of universal saga belief, fitted to the personages of
individual sagas. Hence we need not suppose with Professor Windisch that
the mythic incidents of the Fionn saga are derived from the Cuchulainn
cycle.
The personages against whom Fionn and his men fight show the mythic
nature of the saga. As champions of Leinster they fight the men of
Ulster and Connaught, but they also war against oversea invaders--the
Lochlanners. While Lochlann may mean any land beyond the sea, like the
Welsh _Llychlyn_ it probably meant "the fabulous land beneath the lakes
or the waves of the sea," or simply the abode of hostile, supernatural
beings. Lochlanners would thus be counterparts of the Fomorians, and the
conflicts of the Fians with them would reflect old myths. But with the
Norse invasions, the Norsemen became the true Lochlanners, against whom
Fionn and his men fight as Charlemagne fought Muhammadans--a sheer
impossibility. Professor Zimmer, however, supposes that the Fionn saga
took shape during the Norse occupation from the ninth century onwards.
Fionn is half Norse, half Irish, and equivalent to Caittil Find, who
commanded the apostate Irish in the ninth century, while Oisin and Oscar
are the Norse Asvin and Asgeirr. But it is difficult to understand why
one who was half a Norseman should become the chosen hero of the Celts
in the very age in which Norsemen were their bitter enemies, and why
Fionn, if of Norse origin, fights against Lochlanners, i.e. Norsemen. It
may also be inquired why the borrowing should have affected the saga
only, not the myths of the gods. No other Celtic scholar has given the
slightest support to this brilliant but audacious theory. On the other
hand, if the saga has Norse affinities, and if it is, in origin,
pre-Celtic, these may be sought in an earlier connection of Ireland with
Scandinavia in the early Bronze Age. Ireland had a flourishing
civilisation then, and exported beautiful gold ornaments to Scandinavia,
where they are still found in Bronze Age deposits.[507] This flourishing
civilisation was overwhelmed by the invasion of the Celtic barbarians.
But if the Scandinavians borrowed gold and artistic decorations from
Ireland, and if the Fionn saga or part of it was already in existence,
why should they not have borrowed some of its incidents, or why, on the
other hand, should not some episodes have found their way from the north
to Ireland? We should also consider, however, that similar incidents may
have been evolved in both countries on similar lines and quite
independently.
The various contents of the saga can only be alluded to in the briefest
manner. Fionn's birth-story belongs to the well-known "Expulsion and
Return" formula, applied to so many heroes of saga and folk-tale, but
highly elaborated in his case at the hands of the annalists. Thus his
father Cumal, uncle of Conn the Hundred Fighter, 122-157 A.D., wished to
wed Muirne, daughter of Conn's chief druid, Tadg. Tadg refused, knowing
that through this marriage he would lose his ancestral seat. Cumal
seized Muirne and married her, and the king, on Tadg's appeal, sent an
army against him. Cumal was slain; Muirne fled to his sister, and gave
birth to Demni, afterwards known as Fionn. Perhaps in accordance with
old matriarchal usage, Fionn's descent through his mother is emphasised,
while he is related to the ancient gods, Tadg being son of Nuada. This
at once points to the mythical aspect of the saga. Cumal may be
identical with the god Camulos. In a short time, Fionn, now a marauder
and an outlaw, appeared at Conn's Court, and that same night slew one of
the Tuatha Dea, who came yearly and destroyed the palace. For this he
received his rightful heritage--the leadership of the Fians, formerly
commanded by Cumal.[508] Another incident of Fionn's youth tells how he
obtained his "thumb of knowledge." The eating of certain "salmon of
knowledge" was believed to give inspiration, an idea perhaps derived
from earlier totemistic beliefs. The bard Finneces, having caught one of
the coveted salmon, set his pupil Fionn to cook it, forbidding him to
taste it. But as he was turning the fish Fionn burnt his thumb and
thrust it into his mouth, thus receiving the gift of inspiration.
Hereafter he had only to suck his thumb in order to obtain secret
information.[509] In another story the inspiration is already in his
thumb, as Samson's strength was in his hair, but the power is also
partly in his tooth, under which, after ritual preparation, he has to
place his thumb and chew it.[510]
Fionn had many wives and sweethearts, one of them, Saar, being mother of
Oisin. Saar was turned into a fawn by a Druid, and fled from Fionn's
house. Long after he found a beast-child in the forest and recognised
him as his son. He nourished him until his beast nature disappeared, and
called him Oisin, "little fawn." Round this birth legend many stories
sprang up--a sure sign of its popularity.[511] Oisin's fame as a poet
far excelled that of Fionn, and he became the ideal bard of the Gaels.
By far the most passionate and tragic story of the saga is that of
Diarmaid and Grainne, to whom Fionn was betrothed. Grainne put _geasa_
upon Diarmaid to elope with her, and these he could not break. They
fled, and for many days were pursued by Fionn, who at last overtook
them, but was forced by the Fians to pardon the beloved hero. Meanwhile
Fionn waited for his revenge. Knowing that it was one of Diarmaid's
_geasa_ never to hunt a wild boar, he invited him to the chase of the
boar of Gulban. Diarmaid slew it, and Fionn then bade him measure its
length with his foot. A bristle pierced his heel, and he fell down in
agony, beseeching Fionn to bring him water in his hand, for if he did
this he would heal him. In spite of repeated appeals, Fionn, after
bringing the water, let it drip from his hands. Diarmaid's brave soul
passed away, and on Fionn's character this dire blot was fixed for
ever.[512]
Other tales relate how several of the Fians were spirited away to the
Land beyond the Seas, how they were rescued, how Diarmaid went to Land
under Waves, and how Fionn and his men were entrapped in a Fairy Palace.
Of greater importance are those which tell the end of the Fian band.
This, according to the annalists, was the result of their exactions and
demands. Fionn was told by his wife, a wise woman, never to drink out of
a horn, but coming one day thirsty to a well, he forgot this tabu, and
so brought the end near. He encountered the sons of Uirgrenn, whom he
had slain, and in the fight with them he fell.[513] Soon after were
fought several battles, culminating in that of Gabhra in which all but a
few Fians perished. Among the survivors were Oisin and Caoilte, who
lingered on until the coming of S. Patrick. Caoilte remained on earth,
but Oisin, whose mother was of the _sid_ folk, went to fairyland for a
time, ultimately returning and joining S. Patrick's company.[514] But a
different version is given in the eighteenth century poem of Michael
Comyn, undoubtedly based on popular tales. Oisin met the Queen of Tir na
n-Og and went with her to fairyland, where time passed as a dream until
one day he stood on a stone against which she had warned him. He saw his
native land and was filled with home-sickness. The queen tried to
dissuade him, but in vain. Then she gave him a horse, warning him not to
set foot on Irish soil. He came to Ireland; and found it all changed.
Some puny people were trying in vain to raise a great stone, and begged
the huge stranger to help them. He sprang from his horse and flung the
stone from its resting-place. But when he turned, his horse was gone,
and he had become a decrepit old man. Soon after he met S. Patrick and
related the tale to him.
Of most of the tales preserved in twelfth to fifteenth century MSS. it
may be said that in essence they come down to us from a remote
antiquity, like stars pulsing their clear light out of the hidden depths
of space. Many of them exist as folk-tales, often wild and weird in
form, while some folk-tales have no literary parallels. Some are
_Maerchen_ with members of the Fian band as heroes, and of these there
are many European parallels. But it is not unlikely that, as in the case
of the Cuchulainn cycle, the folk versions may be truer to the original
forms of the saga than the rounded and polished literary versions.
Whatever the Fians were in origin--gods, mythic heroes, or actual
personages--it is probable that a short _Heldensage_ was formed in early
times. This slowly expanded, new tales were added, and existing
_Maerchen_ formulae were freely made use of by making their heroes the
heroes of the saga. Then came the time when many of the tales were
written down, while later they were adapted to a scheme of Irish
history, the heroes becoming warriors of a definite historic period, or
perhaps connected with such warriors. But these heroes belonged to a
timeless world, whose margins are "the shore of old romance," and it was
as if they, who were not for an age but for all time, scorned to become
the puppets of the page of history.
The earliest evidence of the attitude of the ecclesiastical world to
these heroes is found in the _Agallamh na Senorach_, or "Colloquy of the
Ancients."[515] This may have been composed in the thirteenth century,
and its author knew scores of Fionn legends. Making use of the tradition
that Caoilte and Oisin had met S. Patrick, he makes Caoilte relate many
of the tales, usually in connection with some place-name of Fian origin.
The saint and his followers are amazed at the huge stature of the Fians,
but Patrick asperges them with holy water, and hosts of demons flee from
them. At each tale which Caoilte tells, the saint says, "Success and
benediction, Caoilte. All this is to us a recreation of spirit and of
mind, were it only not a destruction of devotion and a dereliction of
prayer." But presently his guardian angel appears, and bids him not only
listen to the tales but cause them to be written down. He and his
attendant clerics now lend a willing ear to the recital and encourage
the narrator with their applause. Finally, baptism is administered to
Caoilte and his men, and by Patrick's intercessions Caoilte's relations
and Fionn himself are brought out of hell. In this work the
representatives of paganism are shown to be on terms of friendliness
with the representatives of Christianity.
But in Highland ballads collected in the sixteenth century by the Dean
of Lismore, as well as in Irish ballads found in MSS. dating from the
seventeenth century onwards, the saint is a sour and intolerant cleric,
and the Fians are equally intolerant and blasphemous pagans. There is no
attempt at compromise; the saint rejoices that the Fian band are in
hell, and Oisin throws contempt on the God of the shaven priests. But
sometimes this contempt is mingled with humour and pathos. Were the
heroes of Oisin's band now alive, scant work would be made of the monks'
bells, books, and psalm-singing. It is true that the saint gives the
weary old man hospitality, but Oisin's eyes are blinded with tears as he
thinks of the departed glories of the Fians, and his ears are tormented
"by jangling bells, droning psalms, and howling clerics." These ballads
probably represent one main aspect of the attitude of the Church to
Celtic paganism. How, then, did the more generous _Colloquy_ come into
being? We must note first that some of the ballads have a milder tone.
Oisin is urged to accept the faith, and he prays for salvation. Probably
these represent the beginning of a reaction in favour of the old heroes,
dating from a time when the faith was well established. There was no
danger of a pagan revival, and, provided the Fians were Christianised,
it might be legitimate to represent them as heroic and noble. The
_Colloquy_ would represent the high-water mark of this reaction among
the lettered classes, for among the folk, to judge by popular tales, the
Fians had never been regarded in other than a favourable light. The
_Colloquy_ re-established the dignity of the Fian band in the eyes of
official Christianity. They are baptized or released from hell, and in
their own nature they are virtuous and follow lofty ideals. "Who or what
was it that maintained you in life?" asks Patrick. And Caoilte gives the
noble reply, "Truth that was in our hearts, and strength in our arms,
and fulfilment in our tongues." Patrick says of Fionn: "He was a king, a
seer, a poet, a lord with a manifold and great train; our magician, our
knowledgeable one, our soothsayer; all whatsoever he said was sweet with
him. Excessive, perchance, as ye deem my testimony of Fionn, although ye
hold that which I say to be overstrained, nevertheless, and by the King
that is above me, he was three times better still." Not only so, but
Caoilte maintains that Fionn and his men were aware of the existence of
the true God. They possessed the _anima naturaliter Christiana_. The
growing appreciation of a wider outlook on life, and possibly
acquaintance with the romances of chivalry, made the composition of the
_Colloquy_ possible, but, again, it may represent a more generous
conception of paganism existing from the time of the first encounter of
Christianity with it in Ireland.
The strife of creeds in Ireland, the old order changing, giving place to
new, had evidently impressed itself on the minds of Celtic poets and
romancers. It suggested itself to them as providing an excellent
"situation"; hence we constantly hear of the meeting of gods, demigods,
or heroes with the saints of the new era. Frequently they bow before the
Cross, they are baptized and receive the Christian verity, as in the
_Colloquy_ and in some documents of the Cuchulainn cycle. Probably no
other European folk-literature so takes advantage of just this
situation, this meeting of creeds, one old and ready to vanish away, the
other with all the buoyant freshness of youth.
Was MacPherson's a genuine Celtic epic unearthed by him and by no one
else? No mortal eye save his has ever seen the original, but no one who
knows anything of the contents of the saga can deny that much of his
work is based on materials collected by him. He knew some of the tales
and ballads current among the folk, possibly also some of the Irish MS.
versions. He saw that there was a certain unity among them, and he saw
that it was possible to make it more evident still. He fitted the
floating incidents into an epic framework, adding, inventing, altering,
and moulding the whole into an English style of his own. Later he seems
to have translated the whole into Gaelic. He gave his version to the
world, and found himself famous, but he gave it as the genuine
translation of a genuine Celtic epic. Here was his craft; here he was
the "charlatan of genius." His genius lay in producing an epic which
people were willing to read, and in making them believe it to be not his
work but that of the Celtic heroic age. Any one can write an epic, but
few can write one which thousands will read, which men like
Chateaubriand, Goethe, Napoleon, Byron, and Coleridge will admire and
love, and which will, as it were, crystallise the aspirations of an age
weary with classical formalism. MacPherson introduced his readers to a
new world of heroic deeds, romantic adventure, deathless love, exquisite
sentiments sentimentally expressed. He changed the rough warriors and
beautiful but somewhat unabashed heroines of the saga into sentimental
personages, who suited the taste of an age poised between the bewigged
and powdered formalism of the eighteenth century, and the outburst of
new ideals which was to follow. His _Ossian_ is a cross between Pope's
_Homer_ and Byron's _Childe Harold_. His heroes and heroines are not on
their native heath, and are uncertain whether to mince and strut with
Pope or to follow nature with Rousseau's noble savages and Saint
Pierre's Paul and Virginia. The time has gone when it was heresy to cast
doubt upon the genuineness of MacPherson's epic, but if any one is still
doubtful, let him read it and then turn to the existing versions,
ballads, and tales. He will find himself in a totally different
atmosphere, and will recognise in the latter the true epic note--the
warrior's rage and the warrior's generosity, dire cruelty yet infinite
tenderness, wild lust yet also true love, a world of magic
supernaturalism, but an exact copy of things as they were in that
far-off age. The barbarism of the time is in these old tales--deeds
which make one shiver, customs regarding the relations of the sexes now
found only among savages, social and domestic arrangements which are
somewhat lurid and disgusting. And yet, withal, the note of bravery, of
passion, of authentic life is there; we are held in the grip of genuine
manhood and womanhood. MacPherson gives a picture of the Ossianic age as
he conceived it, an age of Celtic history that "never was on sea or
land." Even his ghosts are un-Celtic, misty and unsubstantial phantasms,
unlike the embodied _revenants_ of the saga which are in agreement with
the Celtic belief that the soul assumed a body in the other world.
MacPherson makes Fionn invariably successful, but in the saga tales he
is often defeated. He mingles the Cuchulainn and Ossianic cycles, but
these, save in a few casual instances, are quite distinct in the old
literature. Yet had not his poem been so great as it is, though so
un-Celtic, it could not have influenced all European literature. But
those who care for genuine Celtic literature, the product of a people
who loved nature, romance, doughty deeds, the beauty of the world, the
music of the sea and the birds, the mountains, valour in men, beauty in
women, will find all these in the saga, whether in its literary or its
popular forms. And through it all sounds the undertone of Celtic pathos
and melancholy, the distant echo
"Of old unhappy, far-off things
And battles long ago."
FOOTNOTES:
[506] See Joyce, _OCR_ 447.
[507] Montelius, _Les Temps Prehistoriques_, 57, 151; Reinach, _RC_ xxi.
8.
[508] The popular versions of this early part of the saga differ much in
detail, but follow the main outlines in much the same way. See Curtin,
_HTI_ 204; Campbell, _LF_ 33 f.; _WHT_ iii. 348.
[509] In a widespread group of tales supernatural knowledge is obtained
by eating part of some animal, usually a certain snake. In many of these
tales the food is eaten by another person than he who obtained it, as in
the case of Fionn. Cf. the Welsh story of Gwion, p. 116, and the
Scandinavian of Sigurd, and other parallels in Miss Cox, _Cinderella_,
496; Frazer, _Arch. Rev._ i. 172 f. The story is thus a folk-tale
formula applied to Fionn, doubtless because it harmonised with Celtic or
pre-Celtic totemistic ideas. But it is based on ancient ideas regarding
the supernatural knowledge possessed by reptiles or fish, and among
American Indians, Maoris, Solomon Islanders, and others there are
figured representations of a man holding such an animal, its tongue
being attached to his tongue. He is a _shaman_, and American Indians
believe that his inspiration comes from the tongue of a mysterious river
otter, caught by him. See Dall, _Bureau of Ethnol._ 3rd report; and Miss
Buckland, _Jour. Anth. Inst._ xxii. 29.
[510] _TOS_ iv.; O'Curry, _MS. Mat._ 396; Joyce, _OCR_ 194, 339.
[511] For ballad versions see Campbell, _LF_ 198.
[512] Numerous ballad versions are given in Campbell _LF_ 152 f. The
tale is localised in various parts of Ireland and the Highlands, many
dolmens in Ireland being known as Diarmaid and Grainne's beds.
[513] For an account differing from this annalistic version, see _ZCP_
i. 465.
[514] O'Grady, ii. 102. This, on the whole, agrees with the Highland
ballad version, _LF_ 198.
[515] _IT_ iv.; O'Grady, _Silva Gad._ text and translation.
CHAPTER IX.
GODS AND MEN.
Though man usually makes his gods in his own image, they are unlike as
well as like him. Intermediate between them and man are ideal heroes
whose parentage is partly divine, and who may themselves have been gods.
One mark of the Celtic gods is their great stature. No house could
contain Bran, and certain divine people of Elysium who appeared to Fionn
had rings "as thick as a three-ox goad."[516] Even the Fians are giants,
and the skull of one of them could contain several men. The gods have
also the attribute of invisibility, and are only seen by those to whom
they wish to disclose themselves, or they have the power of concealing
themselves in a magic mist. When they appear to mortals it is usually in
mortal guise, sometimes in the form of a particular person, but they can
also transform themselves into animal shapes, often that of birds. The
animal names of certain divinities show that they had once been animals
pure and simple, but when they became anthropomorphic, myths would arise
telling how they had appeared to men in these animal shapes. This, in
part, accounts for these transformation myths. The gods are also
immortal, though in myth we hear of their deaths. The Tuatha De Danann
are "unfading," their "duration is perennial."[517] This immortality is
sometimes an inherent quality; sometimes it is the result of eating
immortal food--Manannan's swine, Goibniu's feast of age and his immortal
ale, or the apples of Elysium. The stories telling of the deaths of the
gods in the annalists may be based on old myths in which they were said
to die, these myths being connected with ritual acts in which the human
representatives of gods were slain. Such rites were an inherent part of
Celtic religion. Elsewhere the ritual of gods like Osiris or Adonis,
based on their functions as gods of vegetation, was connected with
elaborate myths telling of their death and revival. Something akin to
this may have occurred among the Celts.
The divinities often united with mortals. Goddesses sought the love of
heroes who were then sometimes numbered among the gods, and gods had
amours with the daughters of men.[518] Frequently the heroes of the
sagas are children of a god or goddess and a mortal,[519] and this
divine parentage was firmly believed in by the Celts, since personal
names formed of a divine name and _-genos_ or _-gnatos_, "born of," "son
of," are found in inscriptions over the whole Celtic area, or in Celtic
documents--Boduogenos, Camulognata, etc. Those who first bore these
names were believed to be of divine descent on one side. Spirits of
nature or the elements of nature personified might also be parents of
mortals, as a name like Morgen, from _Morigenos_, "Son of the Sea," and
many others suggest. For this and for other reasons the gods frequently
interfere in human affairs, assisting their children or their
favourites. Or, again, they seek the aid of mortals or of the heroes of
the sagas in their conflicts or in time of distress, as when Morrigan
besought healing from Cuchulainn.
As in the case of early Greek and Roman kings, Celtic kings who bore
divine names were probably believed to be representatives or
incarnations of gods. Perhaps this explains why a chief of the Boii
called himself a god and was revered after his death, and why the Gauls
so readily accepted the divinity of Augustus. Irish kings bear divine
names, and of these Nuada occurs frequently, one king, Irel Faith, being
identified with Nuada Airgetlam, while in one text _nuadat_ is glossed
_in rig_, "of the king," as if _Nuada_ had come to be a title meaning
"king." Welsh kings bear the name Nudd (Nodons), and both the actual and
the mythic leader Brennus took their name from the god Bran. King
Conchobar is called _dia talmaide_, "a terrestrial god." If kings were
thought to be god-men like the Pharaohs, this might account for the
frequency of tales about divine fatherhood or reincarnation, while it
would also explain the numerous _geasa_ which Irish kings must observe,
unlike ordinary mortals. Prosperity was connected with their observance,
though this prosperity was later thought to depend on the king's
goodness. The nature of the prosperity--mild seasons, abundant crops,
fruit, fish, and cattle--shows that the king was associated with
fertility, like the gods of growth.[520] Hence they had probably been
once regarded as incarnations of such gods. Wherever divine kings are
found, fertility is bound up with them and with the due observance of
their tabus. To prevent misfortune to the land, they are slain before
they grow old and weak, and their vigour passes on to their successors.
Their death benefits their people.[521] But frequently the king might
reign as long as he could hold his own against all comers, or, again, a
slave or criminal was for a time treated as a mock king, and slain as
the divine king's substitute. Scattered hints in Irish literature and in
folk survivals show that some such course as this had been pursued by
the Celts with regard to their divine kings, as it was also
elsewhere.[522] It is not impossible that some at least of the Druids
stood in a similar relation to the gods. Kings and priests were probably
at first not differentiated. In Galatia twelve "tetrarchs" met annually
with three hundred assistants at Drunemeton as the great national
council.[523] This council at a consecrated place (_nemeton_), its
likeness to the annual Druidic gathering in Gaul, and the possibility
that _Dru_- has some connection with the name "Druid," point to a
religious as well as political aspect of this council. The "tetrarchs"
may have been a kind of priest-kings; they had the kingly prerogative of
acting as judges as had the Druids of Gaul. The wife of one of them was
a priestess,[524] the office being hereditary in her family, and it may
have been necessary that her husband should also be a priest. One
tetrarch, Deiotarus, "divine bull," was skilled in augury, and the
priest-kingship of Pessinus was conferred on certain Celts in the second
century B.C., as if the double office were already a Celtic
institution.[525] Mythic Celtic kings consulted the gods without any
priestly intervention, and Queen Boudicca had priestly functions.[526]
Without giving these hints undue emphasis, we may suppose that the
differentiation of the two offices would not be simultaneous over the
Celtic area. But when it did take effect priests would probably lay
claim to the prerogatives of the priest-king as incarnate god. Kings
were not likely to give these up, and where they retained them priests
would be content with seeing that the tabus and ritual and the slaying
of the mock king were duly observed. Irish kings were perhaps still
regarded as gods, though certain Druids may have been divine priests,
since they called themselves creators of the universe, and both
continental and Irish Druids claimed superiority to kings. Further, the
name [Greek: semnotheoi], applied along with the name "Druids" to Celtic
priests, though its meaning is obscure, points to divine pretensions on
their part.[527]
The incarnate god was probably representative of a god or spirit of
earth, growth, or vegetation, represented also by a tree. A symbolic
branch of such a tree was borne by kings, and perhaps by Druids, who
used oak branches in their rites.[528] King and tree would be connected,
the king's life being bound up with that of the tree, and perhaps at one
time both perished together. But as kings were represented by a
substitute, so the sacred tree, regarded as too sacred to be cut down,
may also have had its _succedaneum_. The Irish _bile_ or sacred tree,
connected with the kings, must not be touched by any impious hand, and
it was sacrilege to cut it down.[529] Probably before cutting down the
tree a branch or something growing upon it, e.g. mistletoe, had to be
cut, or the king's symbolic branch secured before he could be slain.
This may explain Pliny's account of the mistletoe rite. The mistletoe or
branch was the soul of the tree, and also contained the life of the
divine representative. It must be plucked before the tree could be cut
down or the victim slain. Hypothetical as this may be, Pliny's account
is incomplete, or he is relating something of which all the details were
not known to him. The rite must have had some other purpose than that of
the magico-medical use of the mistletoe which he describes, and though
he says nothing of cutting down the tree or slaying a human victim, it
is not unlikely that, as human sacrifice had been prohibited in his
time, the oxen which were slain during the rite took the place of the
latter. Later romantic tales suggest that, before slaying some
personage, the mythico-romantic survivor of a divine priest or king, a
branch carried by him had to be captured by his assailant, or plucked
from the tree which he defended.[530] These may point to an old belief
in tree and king as divine representatives, and to a ritual like that
associated with the Priest of Nemi. The divine tree became the mystic
tree of Elysium, with gold and silver branches and marvellous fruits.
Armed with such a branch, the gift of one of its people, mortals might
penetrate unhindered to the divine land. Perhaps they may be regarded as
romantic forms of the old divine kings with the branch of the divine
tree.
If in early times the spirit of vegetation was feminine, her
representative would be a woman, probably slain at recurring festivals
by the female worshippers. This would explain the slaying of one of
their number at a festival by Namnite women. But when male spirits or
gods superseded goddesses, the divine priest-king would take the place
of the female representative. On the other hand, just as the goddess
became the consort of the god, a female representative would continue as
the divine bride in the ritual of the sacred marriage, the May Queen of
later folk-custom. Sporadically, too, conservatism would retain female
cults with female divine incarnations, as is seen by the presence of the
May Queen alone in certain folk-survivals, and by many Celtic rituals
from which men were excluded.[531]
FOOTNOTES:
[516] O'Grady, ii. 228.
[517] Ibid. ii. 203. Cf. Caesar, vi. 14, "the immortal gods" of Gaul.
[518] Cf. Ch. XXIV.; O'Grady, ii. 110, 172; Nutt-Meyer, i. 42.
[519] Leahy, ii. 6.
[520] _IT_ iii. 203; _Trip. Life_, 507; _Annals of the Four Masters_,
A.D. 14; _RC_ xxii. 28, 168. Chiefs as well as kings probably influenced
fertility. A curious survival of this is found in the belief that
herrings abounded in Dunvegan Loch when MacLeod arrived at his castle
there, and in the desire of the people in Skye during the potato famine
that his fairy banner should be waved.
[521] An echo of this may underlie the words attributed to King Ailill,
"If I am slain, it will be the redemption of many" (O'Grady, ii. 416).
[522] See Frazer, _Kingship_; Cook, _Folk-Lore_, 1906, "The European
Sky-God." Mr. Cook gives ample evidence for the existence of Celtic
incarnate gods. With his main conclusions I agree, though some of his
inferences seem far-fetched. The divine king was, in his view, a
sky-god; he was more likely to have been the representative of a god or
spirit of growth or vegetation.
[523] Strabo, xii. 5. 2.
[524] Plutarch, _de Virt. Mul._ 20.
[525] Cicero, _de Div._ i. 15, ii. 36; Strabo, xii. 5. 3; Stachelin,
_Gesch. der Kleinasiat. Galater._
[526] Livy, v. 34; Dio Cass. lxii. 6.
[527] _Ancient Laws of Ireland_, i. 22; Diog. Laert. i. proem 1; see p.
301, _infra_.
[528] Pliny, xvi. 95.
[529] P. 201, _infra_.
[530] Cf. the tales of Gawain and the Green Knight with his holly bough,
and of Gawain's attempting to pluck the bough of a tree guarded by
Gramoplanz (Weston, _Legend of Sir Gawain_, 22, 86). Cf. also the tale
of Diarmaid's attacking the defender of a tree to obtain its fruit, and
the subsequent slaughter of each man who attacks the hero hidden in its
branches (_TOS_ vol. iii.). Cf. Cook, _Folk-Lore_, xvii. 441.
[531] See Chap. XVIII.
CHAPTER X.
THE CULT OF THE DEAD.
The custom of burying grave-goods with the dead, or slaying wife or
slaves on the tomb, does not necessarily point to a cult of the dead,
yet when such practices survive over a long period they assume the form
of a cult. These customs flourished among the Celts, and, taken in
connection with the reverence for the sepulchres of the dead, they point
to a worship of ancestral spirits as well as of great departed heroes.
Heads of the slain were offered to the "strong shades"--the ghosts of
tribal heroes whose praises were sung by bards.[532] When such heads
were placed on houses, they may have been devoted to the family ghosts.
The honour in which mythic or real heroes were held may point to an
actual cult, the hero being worshipped when dead, while he still
continued his guardianship of the tribe. We know also that the tomb of
King Cottius in the Alps was a sacred place, that Irish kings were often
inaugurated on ancestral burial cairns, and that Irish gods were
associated with barrows of the dead.[533]
The cult of the dead culminated at the family hearth, around which the
dead were even buried, as among the Aeduii; this latter custom may have
been general.[534] In any case the belief in the presence of ancestral
ghosts around the hearth was widespread, as existing superstitions show.
In Brittany the dead seek warmth at the hearth by night, and a feast is
spread for them on All Souls' eve, or crumbs are left for them after a
family gathering.[535] But generally the family ghost has become a
brownie, lutin, or pooka, haunting the hearth and doing the household
work.[536] Fairy corresponds in all respects to old ancestral ghost, and
the one has succeeded to the place of the other, while the fairy is even
said to be the ghost of a dead person.[537] Certain archaeological
remains have also a connection with this ancient cult. Among Celtic
remains in Gaul are found andirons of clay, ornamented with a ram's
head. M. Dechelette sees in this "the symbol of sacrifice offered to the
souls of ancestors on the altar of the hearth."[538] The ram was already
associated as a sacrificial animal with the cult of fire on the hearth,
and by an easy transition it was connected with the cult of the dead
there. It is found as an emblem on ancient tombs, and the domestic Lar
was purified by the immolation of a ram.[539] Figurines of a ram have
been found in Gaulish tombs, and it is associated with the god of the
underworld.[540] The ram of the andirons was thus a permanent
representative of the victim offered in the cult of the dead. A
mutilated inscription on one of them may stand for _Laribus augustis_,
and certain markings on others may represent the garlands twined round
the victim.[541] Serpents with rams' heads occur on the monuments of the
underworld god. The serpent was a chthonian god or the emblem of such a
god, and it may have been thought appropriate to give it the head of an
animal associated with the cult of the dead.
The dead were also fed at the grave or in the house. Thus cups were
placed in the recess of a well in the churchyard of Kilranelagh by those
interring a child under five, and the ghost of the child was supposed to
supply the other spirits with water from these cups.[542] In Ireland,
after a death, food is placed out for the spirits, or, at a burial, nuts
are placed in the coffin.[543] In some parts of France, milk is poured
out on the grave, and both in Brittany and in Scotland the dead are
supposed to partake of the funeral feast.[544] These are survivals from
pagan times and correspond to the rites in use among those who still
worship ancestors. In Celtic districts a cairn or a cross is placed over
the spot where a violent or accidental death has occurred, the purpose
being to appease the ghost, and a stone is often added to the cairn by
all passers-by.[545]
Festivals were held in Ireland on the anniversaries of the death of
kings or chiefs, and these were also utilised for purposes of trade,
pleasure, or politics. They sometimes occurred on the great festivals,
e.g. Lugnasad and Samhain, and were occasionally held at the great
burial-places.[546] Thus the gathering at Taillti on Lugnasad was said
to have been founded by Lug in memory of his foster-mother, Tailtiu, and
the Leinstermen met at Carman on the same day to commemorate King
Garman, or in a variant account, a woman called Carman. She and her sons
had tried to blight the corn of the Tuatha De Danann, but the sons were
driven off and she died of grief, begging that a fair should always be
held in her name, and promising abundance of milk, fruit, and fish for
its observance.[547] These may be aetiological myths explaining the
origin of these festivals on the analogy of funeral festivals, but more
likely, since Lugnasad was a harvest festival, they are connected with
the custom of slaying a representative of the corn-spirit. The festival
would become a commemoration of all such victims, but when the custom
itself had ceased it would be associated with one particular personage,
the corn-goddess regarded as a mortal.
This would be the case where the victim was a woman, but where a male
was slain, the analogy of the slaying of the divine king or his
_succedaneum_ would lead to the festivals being regarded as
commemorative of a king, e.g. Garman. This agrees with the statement
that observance of the festival produced plenty; non-observance, dearth.
The victims were slain to obtain plenty, and the festival would also
commemorate those who had died for this good cause, while it would also
appease their ghosts should these be angry at their violent deaths.
Certain of the dead were thus commemorated at Lugnasad, a festival of
fertility. Both the corn-spirit or divinity slain in the reaping of the
corn, and the human victims, were appeased by its observance.[548] The
legend of Carman makes her hostile to the corn--a curious way of
regarding a corn-goddess. But we have already seen that gods of
fertility were sometimes thought of as causing blight, and in
folk-belief the corn-spirit is occasionally believed to be dangerous.
Such inversions occur wherever revolutions in religion take place.
The great commemoration of the dead was held on Samhain eve, a festival
intended to aid the dying powers of vegetation, whose life, however, was
still manifested in evergreen shrubs, in the mistletoe, in the sheaf of
corn from last harvest--the abode of the corn-spirit.[549] Probably,
also, human representatives of the vegetation or corn-spirit were slain,
and this may have suggested the belief in the presence of their ghosts
at this festival. Or the festival being held at the time of the death of
vegetation, the dead would naturally be commemorated then. Or, as in
Scandinavia, they may have been held to have an influence on fertility,
as an extension of the belief that certain slain persons represented
spirits of fertility, or because trees and plants growing on the barrows
of the dead were thought to be tenanted by their spirits.[550] In
Scandinavia, the dead were associated with female spirits or _fylgjur_,
identified with the _disir_, a kind of earth-goddesses, living in hollow
hills.[551] The nearest Celtic analogy to these is the _Matres_,
goddesses of fertility. Bede says that Christmas eve was called
_Modranicht_, "Mothers' Night,"[552] and as many of the rites of Samhain
were transferred to Yule, the former date of _Modranicht_ may have been
Samhain, just as the Scandinavian _Disablot_, held in November, was a
festival of the _disir_ and of the dead.[553] It has been seen that the
Celtic Earth-god was lord of the dead, and that he probably took the
place of an Earth-goddess or goddesses, to whom the _Matres_ certainly
correspond. Hence the connection of the dead with female Earth-spirits
would be explained. Mother Earth had received the dead before her place
was taken by the Celtic Dispater. Hence the time of Earth's decay was
the season when the dead, her children, would be commemorated. Whatever
be the reason, Celts, Teutons, and others have commemorated the dead at
the beginning of winter, which was the beginning of a new year, while a
similar festival of the dead at New Year is held in many other lands.
Both in Ireland and in Brittany, on November eve food is laid out for
the dead who come to visit the houses and to warm themselves at the fire
in the stillness of the night, and in Brittany a huge log burns on the
hearth. We have here returned to the cult of the dead at the
hearth.[554] Possibly the Yule log was once a log burned on the
hearth--the place of the family ghosts--at Samhain, when new fire was
kindled in each house. On it libations were poured, which would then
have been meant for the dead. The Yule log and the log of the Breton
peasants would thus be the domestic aspect of the fire ritual, which had
its public aspect in the Samhain bonfires.
All this has been in part affected by the Christian feast of All Souls.
Dr. Frazer thinks that the feast of All Saints (November 1st) was
intended to take the place of the pagan cult of the dead. As it failed
to do this, All Souls, a festival of all the dead, was added on November
2nd.[555] To some extent, but not entirely, it has neutralised the pagan
rites, for the old ideas connected with Samhain still survive here and
there. It is also to be noted that in some cases the friendly aspect of
the dead has been lost sight of, and, like the _sid_-folk, they are
popularly connected with evil powers which are in the ascendant on
Samhain eve.
FOOTNOTES:
[532] Silius Italicus, v. 652; Lucan, i. 447. Cf. p. 241, _infra_.
[533] Ammian. Marcell. xv. 10. 7; Joyce, _SH_ i. 45.
[534] Bulliot, _Fouilles du Mont Beuvray_, Autun, 1899, i. 76, 396.
[535] Le Braz, ii. 67; Sauve, _Folk-lore des Hautes Vosges_, 295;
Berenger-Feraud, _Superstitions et Survivances_, i. 11.
[536] Hearn, _Aryan Household_, 43 f.; Berenger-Feraud, i. 33; _Rev. des
Trad._ i. 142; Carmichael, ii. 329; Cosquin, _Trad. Pop. de la
Lorraine_, i. 82.
[537] Kennedy, 126. The mischievous brownie who overturns furniture and
smashes crockery is an exact reproduction of the Poltergeist.
[538] Dechelette, _Rev. Arch._ xxxiii, (1898), 63, 245, 252.
[539] Cicero, _De Leg._ ii. 22.
[540] Dechelette, 256; Reinach, _BF_ 189.
[541] Dechelette, 257-258. In another instance the ram is marked with
crosses like those engraved on images of the underworld god with the
hammer.
[542] Kennedy, 187.
[543] Lady Wilde, 118; Curtin, _Tales_, 54.
[544] Le Braz, i. 229; Gregor, 21; Cambry, _Voyage dans le Finistere_,
i. 229.
[545] Le Braz, ii. 47; _Folk-Lore_, iv. 357; MacCulloch, _Misty Isle of
Skye_, 254; Sebillot, i. 235-236.
[546] Names of places associated with the great festivals are also those
of the chief pagan cemeteries, Tara, Carman, Taillti, etc. (O'Curry,
_MC_ ii. 523).
[547] _Rennes Dindsenchas_, _RC_ xv. 313-314.
[548] Cf. Frazer, _Adonis_, 134.
[549] Cf. Chambers, _Mediaeval Stage_, i. 250, 253.
[550] See Vigfusson-Powell, _Corpus Poet. Boreale_, i. 405, 419. Perhaps
for a similar reason a cult of the dead may have occurred at the
Midsummer festival.
[551] Miss Faraday, _Folk-Lore_, xvii. 398 f.
[552] Bede, _de Temp. Rat._ c. xv.
[553] Vigfusson-Powell, i. 419.
[554] Curtin, _Tales_, 157; Haddon, _Folk-Lore_, iv. 359; Le Braz, ii.
115 _et passim._
[555] Frazer, _Adonis_, 253 f.
CHAPTER XI.
PRIMITIVE NATURE WORSHIP.
In early thought everything was a person, in the loose meaning then
possessed by personality, and many such "persons" were worshipped--
earth, sun, moon, sea, wind, etc. This led later to more complete
personification, and the sun or earth divinity or spirit was more or
less separated from the sun or earth themselves. Some Celtic divinities
were thus evolved, but there still continued a veneration of the objects
of nature in themselves, as well as a cult of nature spirits or
secondary divinities who peopled every part of nature. "Nor will I call
out upon the mountains, fountains, or hills, or upon the rivers, which
are now subservient to the use of man, but once were an abomination and
destruction to them, and to which the blind people paid divine honours,"
cries Gildas.[556] This was the true cult of the folk, the "blind
people," even when the greater gods were organised, and it has survived
with modifications in out-of-the-way places, in spite of the coming of
Christianity.
S. Kentigern rebuked the Cambrians for worshipping the elements, which
God made for man's use.[557] The question of the daughters of Loegaire
also throws much light on Celtic nature worship. "Has your god sons or
daughters?... Have many fostered his sons? Are his daughters dear and
beautiful to men? Is he in heaven or on earth, in the sea, in the
rivers, in the mountains, in the valleys?"[558] The words suggest a
belief in divine beings filling heaven, earth, sea, air, hills, glens,
lochs, and rivers, and following human customs. A naive faith, full of
beauty and poetry, even if it had its dark and grim aspects! These
powers or personalities had been invoked from time immemorial, but the
invocations were soon stereotyped into definite formulas. Such a formula
is put into the mouth of Amairgen, the poet of the Milesians, when they
were about to invade Erin, and it may have been a magical invocation of
the powers of nature at the beginning of an undertaking or in times of
danger:
"I invoke the land of Ireland!
Shining, shining sea!
Fertile, fertile mountain!
Wooded vale!
Abundant river, abundant in waters!
Fish abounding lake!
Fish abounding sea!
Fertile earth!
Irruption of fish! Fish there!
Bird under wave! Great fish!
Crab hole! Irruption of fish!
Fish abounding sea!"[559]
A similar formula was spoken after the destruction of Da Derga's Hostel
by MacCecht on his finding water. He bathed in it and sang--
"Cold fountain! Surface of strand ...
Sea of lake, water of Gara, stream of river;
High spring well; cold fountain!"[560]
The goddess Morrigan, after the defeat of the Fomorians, invokes the
powers of nature and proclaims the victory to "the royal mountains of
Ireland, to its chief waters, and its river mouths."[561] It was also
customary to take oaths by the elements--heaven, earth, sun, fire, moon,
sea, land, day, night, etc., and these punished the breaker of the
oath.[562] Even the gods exacted such an oath of each other. Bres swore
by sun, moon, sea, and land, to fulfil the engagement imposed on him by
Lug.[563] The formulae survived into Christian times, and the faithful
were forbidden to call the sun and moon gods or to swear by them, while
in Breton folk-custom at the present day oaths by sun, moon, or earth,
followed by punishment of the oath-breaker by the moon, are still in
use.[564] These oaths had originated in a time when the elements
themselves were thought to be divine, and similar adjurations were used
by Greeks and Scandinavians.
While the greater objects of nature were worshipped for themselves
alone, the Celts also peopled the earth with spirits, benevolent or
malevolent, of rocks, hills, dales, forests, lakes, and streams,[565]
and while greater divinities of growth had been evolved, they still
believed in lesser spirits of vegetation, of the corn, and of fertility,
connected, however, with these gods. Some of these still survive as
fairies seen in meadows, woodlands, or streams, or as demoniac beings
haunting lonely places. And even now, in French folk-belief, sun, moon,
winds, etc., are regarded as actual personages. Sun and moon are husband
and wife; the winds have wives; they are addressed by personal names and
reverenced.[566] Some spirits may already have had a demoniac aspect in
pagan times. The Tuatha Dea conjured up _meisi_, "spectral bodies that
rise from the ground," against the Milesians, and at their service were
malignant sprites--_urtrochta_, and "forms, spectres, and great queens"
called _guidemain_ (false demons). The Druids also sent forth
mischievous spirits called _siabra_. In the _Tain_ there are references
to _bocanachs_, _bananaichs_, and _geniti-glinni_, "goblins, eldritch
beings, and glen-folk."[567] These are twice called Tuatha De Danann,
and this suggests that they were nature-spirits akin to the greater
gods.[568] The _geniti-glinni_ would be spirits haunting glen and
valley. They are friendly to Cuchulainn in the _Tain_, but in the _Feast
of Bricriu_ he and other heroes fight and destroy them.[569] In modern
Irish belief they are demons of the air, perhaps fallen angels.[570]
Much of this is probably pre-Celtic as well as Celtic, but it held its
ground because it was dear to the Celts themselves. They upheld the
aboriginal cults resembling those which, in the lands whence they came,
had been native and local with themselves. Such cults are as old as the
world, and when Christianity expelled the worship of the greater gods,
younger in growth, the ancient nature worship, dowered with immortal
youth,
"bowed low before the blast
In patient deep disdain,"
to rise again in vigour. Preachers, councils, and laws inveighed against
it. The old rites continued to be practised, or survived under a
Christian dress and colouring. They are found in Breton villages, in
Highland glens, in Welsh and Cornish valleys, in Irish townships, and
only the spread of school-board education, with its materialism and
uninviting common sense, is forcing them at last to yield.
The denunciations of these cults throw some light upon them. Offerings
at trees, stones, fountains, and cross-roads, the lighting of fires or
candles there, and vows or incantations addressed to them, are
forbidden, as is also the worship of trees, groves, stones, rivers, and
wells. The sun and moon are not to be called lords. Wizardry, and
divination, and the leapings and dancings, songs and choruses of the
pagans, i.e. their orgiastic cults, are not to be practised.
Tempest-raisers are not to ply their diabolical craft.[571] These
denunciations, of course, were not without their effect, and legend told
how the spirits of nature were heard bewailing the power of the
Christian saints, their mournful cries echoing in wooded hollows,
secluded valleys, and shores of lake and river.[572] Their power, though
limited, was not annihilated, but the secrecy in which the old cults
often continued to be practised gave them a darker colour. They were
identified with the works of the devil, and the spirits of paganism with
dark and grisly demons.[573] This culminated in the mediaeval witch
persecutions, for witchcraft was in part the old paganism in a new
guise. Yet even that did not annihilate superstition, which still lives
and flourishes among the folk, though the actual worship of
nature-spirits has now disappeared.
* * * * *
Perhaps the most important object in nature to the early Celts as to
most primitive folk was the moon. The phases of the moon were apparent
before men observed the solstices and equinoxes, and they formed an easy
method of measuring time. The Celtic year was at first lunar--Pliny
speaks of the Celtic method of counting the beginning of months and
years by the moon--and night was supposed to precede day.[574] The
festivals of growth began, not at sunrise, but on the previous evening
with the rising of the moon, and the name _La Lunade_ is still given to
the Midsummer festival in parts of France.[575] At Vallon de la Suille a
wood on the slope where the festival is held is called _Bois de la
Lune_; and in Ireland, where the festival begins on the previous
evening, in the district where an ascent of Cnoc Aine is made, the
position of the moon must be observed. A similar combination of sun and
moon cults is found in an inscription at Lausanne--_To the genius of the
sun and moon._[576]
Possibly sun festivals took the place of those of the moon. Traces of
the connection of the moon with agriculture occur in different regions,
the connection being established through the primitive law of
sympathetic magic. The moon waxes and wanes, therefore it must affect
all processes of growth or decay. Dr. Frazer has cited many instances of
this belief, and has shown that the moon had a priority to the sun in
worship, e.g. in Egypt and Babylon.[577] Sowing is done with a waxing
moon, so that, through sympathy, there may be a large increase. But
harvesting, cutting timber, etc., should be done with a waning moon,
because moisture being caused by a waxing moon, it was necessary to
avoid cutting such things as would spoil by moisture at that time.
Similar beliefs are found among the Celts. Mistletoe and other magical
plants were culled with a waxing moon, probably because their power
would thus be greater. Dr. Johnson noted the fact that the Highlanders
sowed their seed with a waxing moon, in the expectation of a better
harvest. For similar occult reasons, it is thought in Brittany that
conception during a waxing moon produces a male child, during a waning
moon a female, while _accouchements_ at the latter time are dangerous.
Sheep and cows should be killed at the new moon, else their flesh will
shrink, but peats should be cut in the last quarter, otherwise they will
remain moist and give out "a power of smoke."[578]
These ideas take us back to a time when it was held that the moon was
not merely the measurer of time, but had powerful effects on the
processes of growth and decay. Artemis and Diana, moon-goddesses, had
power over all growing things, and as some Celtic goddesses were equated
with Diana, they may have been connected with the moon, more especially
as Gallo-Roman images of Diana have the head adorned with a crescent
moon. In some cases festivals of the moon remained intact, as among the
Celtiberians and other peoples to the north of them, who at the time of
full moon celebrated the festival of a nameless god, dancing all night
before the doors of their houses.[579] The nameless god may have been
the moon, worshipped at the time of her intensest light. Moonlight
dances round a great stone, with singing, on the first day of the year,
occurred in the Highlands in the eighteenth century.[580] Other
survivals of cult are seen in the practices of bowing or baring the head
at new moon, or addressing it with words of adoration or supplication.
In Ireland, Camden found the custom at new moon of saying the Lord's
Prayer with the addition of the words, "Leave us whole and sound as Thou
hast found us." Similar customs exist in Brittany, where girls pray to
the moon to grant them dreams of their future husbands.[581] Like other
races, the Celts thought that eclipses were caused by a monster
attacking the moon, while it could be driven off with cries and shouts.
In 218 B.C. the Celtic allies of Attalus were frightened by an eclipse,
and much later Christian legislation forbade the people to assemble at
an eclipse and shout, _Vince, Luna!_[582] Such a practice was observed
in Ireland in the seventeenth century. At an earlier time, Irish poets
addressed sun and moon as divinities, and they were represented on
altars even in Christian times.[583]
While the Celts believed in sea-gods--Manannan, Morgen, Dylan--the sea
itself was still personified and regarded as divine. It was thought to
be a hostile being, and high tides were met by Celtic warriors, who
advanced against them with sword and spear, often perishing in the
rushing waters rather than retreat. The ancients regarded this as
bravado. M. Jullian sees in it a sacrifice by voluntary suicide; M.
D'Arbois, a tranquil waiting for death and the introduction to another
life.[584] But the passages give the sense of an actual attack on the
waves--living things which men might terrify, and perhaps with this was
combined the belief that no one could die during a rising tide.
Similarly French fishermen threaten to cut a fog in two with a knife,
while the legend of S. Lunaire tells how he threw a knife at a fog, thus
causing its disappearance.[585] Fighting the waves is also referred to
in Irish texts. Thus Tuirbe Tragmar would "hurl a cast of his axe in the
face of the flood-tide, so that he forbade the sea, which then would not
come over the axe." Cuchulainn, in one of his fits of anger, fought the
waves for seven days, and Fionn fought and conquered the Muireartach, a
personification of the wild western sea.[586] On the French coast
fishermen throw harpoons at certain harmful waves called the Three Witch
Waves, thus drawing their blood and causing them to subside.[587] In
some cases human victims may have been offered to the rising waters,
since certain tales speak of a child set floating on the waves, and
this, repeated every seven years, kept them in their place.[588]
The sea had also its beneficent aspects. The shore was "a place of
revelation of science," and the sea sympathised with human griefs. At
the Battle of Ventry "the sea chattered, telling the losses, and the
waves raised a heavy, woeful great moan in wailing them."[589] In other
cases in Ireland, by a spell put on the waves, or by the intuitive
knowledge of the listener, it was revealed that they were wailing for a
death or describing some distant event.[590] In the beautiful song sung
by the wife of Cael, "the wave wails against the shore for his death,"
and in Welsh myth the waves bewailed the death of Dylan, "son of the
wave," and were eager to avenge it. The noise of the waves rushing into
the vale of Conwy were his dying groans.[591] In Ireland the roaring of
the sea was thought to be prophetic of a king's death or the coming of
important news; and there, too, certain great waves were celebrated in
story--Clidna's, Tuaithe's, and Rudhraidhe's.[592] Nine waves, or the
ninth wave, partly because of the sacred nature of the number nine,
partly because of the beneficent character of the waves, had a great
importance. They formed a barrier against invasion, danger, or
pestilence, or they had a healing effect.[593]
The wind was also regarded as a living being whose power was to be
dreaded. It punished King Loegaire for breaking his oath. But it was
also personified as a god Vintius, equated with Pollux and worshipped by
Celtic sailors, or with Mars, the war-god who, in his destructive
aspect, was perhaps regarded as the nearest analogue to a god of stormy
winds.[594] Druids and Celtic priestesses claimed the power of
controlling the winds, as did wizards and witches in later days. This
they did, according to Christian writers, by the aid of demons, perhaps
the old divinities of the air. Bishop Agobard describes how the
_tempestarii_ raised tempests which destroyed the fruits of the earth,
and drew "aerial ships" from Magonia, whither the ships carried these
fruits.[595] Magonia may be the upper air ruled over by a sky god
Magounos or Mogounos, equated with Apollo.[596] The winds may have been
his servants, ruled also by earthly magicians. Like Yahweh, as conceived
by Hebrew poets, he "bringeth the winds out of his treasures," and
"maketh lightnings with rain."
FOOTNOTES:
[556] Gildas ii. 4.
[557] Jocelyn, _Vila Kentig._ c. xxxii.
[558] _Trip. Life_, 315.
[559] _LL_ 12_b_. The translation is from D'Arbois, ii. 250 f; cf.
O'Curry, _MC_ ii. 190.
[560] _RC_ xxii. 400.
[561] _RC_ xii. 109.
[562] Petrie, _Tara_, 34; _RC_ vi. 168; _LU_ 118.
[563] Joyce, _OCR_ 50.
[564] D'Achery, _Spicelegium_, v. 216; Sebillot, i. 16 f., 56, 211.
[565] Gregory of Tours, _Hist._ ii. 10, speaks of the current belief in
the divinity of waters, birds, and beasts.
[566] Sebillot, i. 9, 35, 75, 247, etc.
[567] Joyce, _SH_ ii. 273; Cormac, 87; Stokes, _TIG_ xxxiii., _RC_ xv.
307.
[568] Miss Hull, 170, 187, 193; _IT_ i. 214; Leahy, i. 126.
[569] _IT_ i. 287.
[570] Henderson, _Irish Texts_, ii. 210.
[571] _Capit. Karoli Magni_, i. 62; _Leges Luitprand._ ii. 38; Canon 23,
2nd Coun. of Arles, Hefele, _Councils_, iii. 471; D'Achery, v. 215. Some
of these attacks were made against Teutonic superstitions, but similar
superstitions existed among the Celts.
[572] See Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ ii. 498.
[573] A more tolerant note is heard, e.g., in an Irish text which says
that the spirits which appeared of old were divine ministrants not
demoniacal, while angels helped the ancients because they followed
natural truth. "Cormac's Sword," _IT_ iii. 220-221. Cf. p. 152, _supra_.
[574] Caesar, vi. 18; Pliny xxii. 14. Pliny speaks of culling mistletoe
on the sixth day of the moon, which is to them the beginning of months
and years (_sexta luna, quae principia_, etc.). This seems to make the
sixth, not the first, day of the moon that from which the calculation
was made. But the meaning is that mistletoe was culled on the sixth day
of the moon, and that the moon was that by which months and years were
measured. _Luna_, not _sexta luna_, is in apposition with _quae_. Traces
of the method of counting by nights or by the moon survive locally in
France, and the usage is frequent in Irish and Welsh literature. See my
article "Calendar" (Celtic) in Hastings' _Encyclop. of Religion and
Ethics_, iii. 78 f.
[575] Delocke, "La Procession dite La Lunade," _RC_ ix. 425.
[576] Monnier, 174, 222; Fitzgerald, _RC_ iv. 189.
[577] Frazer, _Golden Bough_{2}, ii. 154 f.
[578] Pliny, xvi. 45; Johnson, _Journey_, 183; Ramsay, _Scotland in the
Eighteenth Century_, ii. 449; Sebillot, i. 41 f.; MacCulloch, _Misty
Isle of Skye_, 236. In Brittany it is thought that girls may conceive by
the moon's power (_RC_ iii. 452).
[579] Strabo, iii. 4. 16.
[580] Brand, _s.v._ "New Year's Day."
[581] Chambers, _Popular Rhymes_, 35; Sebillot, i. 46, 57 f.
[582] Polybius, v. 78; _Vita S. Eligii_, ii. 15.
[583] Osborne, _Advice to his Son_ (1656), 79; _RC_ xx. 419, 428.
[584] Aristotle, _Nic. Eth._ iii. 77; _Eud. Eth._ iii. 1. 25; Stobaeus,
vii. 40; AElian, xii. 22; Jullian, 54; D'Arbois, vi. 218.
[585] Sebillot, i. 119. The custom of throwing something at a "fairy
eddy," i.e. a dust storm, is well known on Celtic ground and elsewhere.
[586] _Folk-Lore,_ iv. 488; Curtin, _HTI_ 324; Campbell, _The Fians_,
158. Fian warriors attacked the sea when told it was laughing at them.
[587] _Melusine_, ii. 200.
[588] Sebillot, ii. 170.
[589] Meyer, _Cath. Finntraga_, 40.
[590] _RC_ xvi. 9; _LB_ 32_b_, 55.
[591] Meyer, _op. cit._ 55; Skene, i. 282, 288, 543; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 387.
[592] Meyer, 51; Joyce, _PN_ i. 195, ii. 257; _RC_ xv. 438.
[593] See p. 55, _supra_; _IT_ i. 838, iii. 207; _RC_ ii. 201, ix. 118.
[594] Holder, _s.v._ "Vintius."
[595] Agobard, i. 146.
[596] See Stokes, _RC_ vi. 267.
CHAPTER XII.
RIVER AND WELL WORSHIP.
Among the Celts the testimony of contemporary witnesses, inscriptions,
votive offerings, and survivals, shows the importance of the cult of
waters and of water divinities. Mr. Gomme argues that Celtic
water-worship was derived from the pre-Celtic aborigines,[597] but if
so, the Celts must have had a peculiar aptitude for it, since they were
so enthusiastic in its observance. What probably happened was that the
Celts, already worshippers of the waters, freely adopted local cults of
water wherever they came. Some rivers or river-goddesses in Celtic
regions seem to posses pre-Celtic names.[598]
Treasures were flung into a sacred lake near Toulouse to cause a
pestilence to cease. Caepion, who afterwards fished up this treasure,
fell soon after in battle--a punishment for cupidity, and _aurum
Tolosanum_ now became an expression for goods dishonestly acquired.[599]
A yearly festival, lasting three days, took place at Lake Gevaudan.
Garments, food, and wax were thrown into the waters, and animals were
sacrificed. On the fourth day, it is said, there never failed to spring
up a tempest of rain, thunder, and lightning--a strange reward for this
worship of the lake.[600] S. Columba routed the spirits of a Scottish
fountain which was worshipped as a god, and the well now became sacred,
perhaps to the saint himself, who washed in it and blessed it so that it
cured diseases.[601]
On inscriptions a river name is prefixed by some divine epithet--_dea_,
_augusta_, and the worshipper records his gratitude for benefits
received from the divinity or the river itself. Bormanus, Bormo or
Borvo, Danuvius (the Danube), and Luxovius are found on inscriptions as
names of river or fountain gods, but goddesses are more
numerous--Acionna, Aventia, Bormana, Brixia, Carpundia, Clutoida,
Divona, Sirona, Ura--well-nymphs; and Icauna (the Yonne), Matrona, and
Sequana (the Seine)--river-goddesses.[602] No inscription to the goddess
of a lake has yet been found. Some personal names like Dubrogenos (son
of the Dubron), Enigenus (son of the Aenus), and the belief of
Virdumarus that one of his ancestors was the Rhine,[603] point to the
idea that river-divinities might have amours with mortals and beget
progeny called by their names. In Ireland, Conchobar was so named from
the river whence his mother Nessa drew water, perhaps because he was a
child of the river-god.[604]
The name of the water-divinity was sometimes given to the place of his
or her cult, or to the towns which sprang up on the banks of rivers--the
divinity thus becoming a tutelary god. Many towns (e.g. Divonne or
Dyonne, etc.) have names derived from a common Celtic river name Deuona,
"divine." This name in various forms is found all over the Celtic
area,[605] and there is little doubt that the Celts, in their onward
progress, named river after river by the name of the same divinity,
believing that each new river was a part of his or her kingdom. The name
was probably first an appellative, then a personal name, the divine
river becoming a divinity. Deus Nemausus occurs on votive tablets at
Nimes, the name Nemausus being that of the clear and abundant spring
there whence flowed the river of the same name. A similar name occurs in
other regions--Nemesa, a tributary of the Moselle; Nemh, the source of
the Tara and the former name of the Blackwater; and Nimis, a Spanish
river mentioned by Appian. Another group includes the Matrona (Marne),
the Moder, the Madder, the Maronne and Maronna, and others, probably
derived from a word signifying "mother."[606] The mother-river was that
which watered a whole region, just as in the Hindu sacred books the
waters are mothers, sources of fertility. The Celtic mother-rivers were
probably goddesses, akin to the _Matres_, givers of plenty and
fertility. In Gaul, Sirona, a river-goddess, is represented like the
_Matres_. She was associated with Grannos, perhaps as his mother, and
Professor Rh[^y]s equates the pair with the Welsh Modron and Mabon;
Modron is probably connected with Matrona.[607] In any case the Celts
regarded rivers as bestowers of life, health, and plenty, and offered
them rich gifts and sacrifices.[608]
Gods like Grannos, Borvo, and others, equated with Apollo, presided over
healing springs, and they are usually associated with goddesses, as
their husbands or sons. But as the goddesses are more numerous, and as
most Celtic river names are feminine, female divinities of rivers and
springs doubtless had the earlier and foremost place, especially as
their cult was connected with fertility. The gods, fewer in number, were
all equated with Apollo, but the goddesses were not merged by the Romans
into the personality of one goddess, since they themselves had their
groups of river-goddesses, Nymphs and Naiads. Before the Roman conquest
the cult of water-divinities, friends of mankind, must have formed a
large part of the popular religion of Gaul, and their names may be
counted by hundreds. Thermal springs had also their genii, and they were
appropriated by the Romans, so that the local gods now shared their
healing powers with Apollo, AEsculapius, and the Nymphs. Thus every
spring, every woodland brook, every river in glen or valley, the roaring
cataract, and the lake were haunted by divine beings, mainly thought of
as beautiful females with whom the _Matres_ were undoubtedly associated.
There they revealed themselves to their worshippers, and when paganism
had passed away, they remained as _fees_ or fairies haunting spring, or
well, or river.[609] Scores of fairy wells still exist, and by them
mediaeval knights had many a fabled amour with those beautiful beings
still seen by the "ignorant" but romantic peasant.
Sanctuaries were erected at these springs by grateful worshippers, and
at some of them festivals were held, or they were the resort of
pilgrims. As sources of fertility they had a place in the ritual of the
great festivals, and sacred wells were visited on Midsummer day, when
also the river-gods claimed their human victims. Some of the goddesses
were represented by statues or busts in Gallo-Roman times, if not
earlier, and other images of them which have been found were of the
nature of _ex votos_, presented by worshippers in gratitude for the
goddess's healing gifts. Money, ingots of gold or silver, and models of
limbs or other parts of the body which had been or were desired to be
healed, were also presented. Gregory of Tours says of the Gauls that
they "represent in wood or bronze the members in which they suffer, and
whose healing they desire, and place them in a temple."[610] Contact of
the model with the divinity brought healing to the actual limbs on the
principle of sympathetic magic. Many such models have been discovered.
Thus in the shrine of Dea Sequana was found a vase with over a hundred;
another contained over eight hundred. Inscriptions were engraved on
plaques which were fastened to the walls of temples, or placed in
springs.[611] Leaden tablets with inscriptions were placed in springs by
those who desired healing or when the waters were low, and on some the
actual waters are hardly discriminated from the divinities. The latter
are asked to heal or flow or swell--words which apply more to the waters
than to them, while the tablets, with their frank animism, also show
that, in some cases, there were many elemental spirits of a well, only
some of whom were rising to the rank of a goddess. They are called
collectively _Niskas_--the Nixies of later tradition, but some have
personal names--Lerano, Dibona, Dea--showing that they were tending to
become separate divine personalities. The Peisgi are also appealed to,
perhaps the later Piskies, unless the word is a corrupt form of a Celtic
_peiskos_, or the Latin _piscus_, "fish."[612] This is unlikely, as fish
could not exist in a warm sulphurous spring, though the Celts believed
in the sacred fish of wells or streams. The fairies now associated with
wells or with a water-world beneath them, are usually nameless, and only
in a few cases have a definite name. They, like the older spirits of the
wells, have generally a beneficent character.[613] Thus in the fountains
of Logres dwelt damsels who fed the wayfarer with meat and bread, until
grievous wrong was done them, when they disappeared and the land became
waste.[614] Occasionally, however, they have a more malevolent
character.[615]
The spirit of the waters was often embodied in an animal, usually a
fish. Even now in Brittany the fairy dweller in a spring has the form of
an eel, while in the seventeenth century Highland wells contained fish
so sacred that no one dared to catch them.[616] In Wales S. Cybi's well
contained a huge eel in whose virtues the villagers believed, and terror
prevailed when any one dared to take it from the water. Two sacred fish
still exist in a holy well at Nant Peris, and are replaced by others
when they die, the dead fish being buried.[617] This latter act,
solemnly performed, is a true sign of the divine or sacred character of
the animal. Many wells with sacred fish exist in Ireland, and the fish
have usually some supernatural quality--they never alter in size, they
become invisible, or they take the form of beautiful women.[618] Any one
destroying such fish was regarded as a sacrilegious person, and
sometimes a hostile tribe killed and ate the sacred fish of a district
invaded by them, just as Egyptians of one nome insulted those of another
by killing their sacred animals.[619] In old Irish beliefs the salmon
was the fish of knowledge. Thus whoever ate the salmon of Connla's well
was dowered with the wisdom which had come to them through eating nuts
from the hazels of knowledge around the well. In this case the sacred
fish was eaten, but probably by certain persons only--those who had the
right to do so. Sinend, who went to seek inspiration from the well,
probably by eating one of its salmon, was overwhelmed by its waters. The
legend of the salmon is perhaps based on old ritual practices of the
occasional eating of a divine animal. In other cases, legends of a
miraculous supply of fish from sacred wells are perhaps later Christian
traditions of former pagan beliefs or customs concerning magical methods
of increasing a sacred or totem animal species, like those used in
Central Australia and New Guinea.[620] The frog is sometimes the sacred
animal, and this recalls the _Maerchen_ of the Frog Bridegroom living in
a well, who insisted on marrying the girl who drew its waters. Though
this tale is not peculiar to the Celts, it is not improbable that the
divine animal guardian of a well may have become the hero of a
folk-tale, especially as such wells were sometimes tabu to women.[621] A
fly was the guardian spirit of S. Michael's well in Banffshire. Auguries
regarding health were drawn from its movements, and it was believed that
the fly, when it grew old, transmigrated into another.[622]
Such beliefs were not peculiarly Celtic. They are found in all European
folk-lore, and they are still alive among savages--the animal being
itself divine or the personification of a divinity. A huge sacred eel
was worshipped by the Fijians; in North America and elsewhere there were
serpent guardians of the waters; and the Semites worshipped the fish of
sacred wells as incarnations or symbols of a god.
Later Celtic folk-belief associated monstrous and malevolent beings with
rivers and lakes. These may be the older divinities to whom a demoniac
form has been given, but even in pagan times such monstrous beings may
have been believed in, or they may be survivals of the more primitive
monstrous guardians of the waters. The last were dragons or serpents,
conventional forms of the reptiles which once dwelt in watery places,
attacking all who came near. This old idea certainly survived in Irish
and Highland belief, for the Fians conquered huge dragons or serpents in
lochs, or saints chained them to the bottom of the waters. Hence the
common place-name of Loch na piast, "Loch of the Monster." In other
tales they emerge and devour the impious or feast on the dead.[623] The
_Dracs_ of French superstition--river monsters who assume human form and
drag down victims to the depths, where they devour them--resemble these.
The _Each Uisge_, or "Water-horse," a horse with staring eyes, webbed
feet, and a slimy coat, is still dreaded. He assumes different forms and
lures the unwary to destruction, or he makes love in human shape to
women, some of whom discover his true nature by seeing a piece of
water-weed in his hair, and only escape with difficulty. Such a
water-horse was forced to drag the chariot of S. Fechin of Fore, and
under his influence became "gentler than any other horse."[624] Many
Highland lochs are still haunted by this dreaded being, and he is also
known in Ireland and France, where, however, he has more of a tricky and
less of a demoniac nature.[625] His horse form is perhaps connected with
the similar form ascribed to Celtic water-divinities. Manannan's horses
were the waves, and he was invariably associated with a horse. Epona,
the horse-goddess, was perhaps originally goddess of a spring, and, like
the _Matres_, she is sometimes connected with the waters.[626] Horses
were also sacrificed to river-divinities.[627] But the beneficent
water-divinities in their horse form have undergone a curious
distortion, perhaps as the result of later Christian influences. The
name of one branch of the Fomorians, the Goborchinn, means the
"Horse-headed," and one of their kings was Eochaid Echchenn, or
"Horse-head."[628] Whether these have any connection with the
water-horse is uncertain.
The foaming waters may have suggested another animal personification,
since the name of the Boyne in Ptolemy, [Greek: bououinda], is derived
from a primitive _bou-s_, "ox," and _vindo-s_, "white," in Irish _bo
find_, "white cow."[629] But it is not certain that this or the Celtic
cult of the bull was connected with the belief in the _Tarbh Uisge_, or
"Water-bull," which had no ears and could assume other shapes. It dwells
in lochs and is generally friendly to man, occasionally emerging to mate
with ordinary cows. In the Isle of Man the _Tarroo Ushtey_, however,
begets monsters.[630] These Celtic water-monsters have a curious
resemblance to the Australian _Bunyip_.
The _Uruisg_, often confused with the brownie, haunts lonely places and
waterfalls, and, according to his mood, helps or harms the wayfarer. His
appearance is that of a man with shaggy hair and beard.[631] In Wales
the _afanc_ is a water-monster, though the word first meant "dwarf,"
then "water-dwarf," of whom many kinds existed. They correspond to the
Irish water-dwarfs, the _Luchorpain_, descended with the Fomorians and
Goborchinn from Ham.[632]
In other cases the old water beings have a more pleasing form, like the
syrens and other fairy beings who haunt French rivers, or the mermaids
of Irish estuaries.[633] In Celtic France and Britain lake fairies are
connected with a water-world like that of Elysium tales, the region of
earlier divinities.[634] They unite with mortals, who, as in the
Swan-maiden tales, lose their fairy brides through breaking a tabu. In
many Welsh tales the bride is obtained by throwing bread and cheese on
the waters, when she appears with an old man who has all the strength of
youth. He presents his daughter and a number of fairy animals to the
mortal. When she disappears into the waters after the breaking of the
tabu, the lake is sometimes drained in order to recover her; the father
then appears and threatens to submerge the whole district. Father and
daughters are earlier lake divinities, and in the bread and cheese we
may see a relic of the offerings to these.[635]
Human sacrifice to water-divinities is suggested by the belief that
water-monsters devour human beings, and by the tradition that a river
claims its toll of victims every year. In popular rhymes the annual
character of the sacrifice is hinted at, and Welsh legend tells of a
voice heard once a year from rivers or lakes, crying, "The hour is come,
but the man is not."[636] Here there is the trace of an abandoned custom
of sacrifice and of the traditional idea of the anger of the divinity at
being neglected. Such spirits or gods, like the water-monsters, would be
ever on the watch to capture those who trespassed on their domain. In
some cases the victim is supposed to be claimed on Midsummer eve, the
time of the sacrifice in the pagan period.[637] The spirits of wells had
also a harmful aspect to those, at least, who showed irreverence in
approaching them. This is seen in legends about the danger of looking
rashly into a well or neglecting to cover it, or in the belief that one
must not look back after visiting the well. Spirits of wells were also
besought to do harm to enemies.
Legends telling of the danger of removing or altering a well, or of the
well moving elsewhere because a woman washed her hands in it, point to
old tabus concerning wells. Boand, wife of Nechtain, went to the fairy
well which he and his cup-bearers alone might visit, and when she showed
her contempt for it, the waters rose and destroyed her. They now flow as
the river Boyne. Sinend met with a similar fate for intruding on
Connla's well, in this case the pursuing waters became the Shannon.[638]
These are variants of a story which might be used to explain the origin
of any river, but the legends suggest that certain wells were tabu to
women because certain branches of knowledge, taught by the well, must be
reserved for men.[639] The legends said in effect, "See what came of
women obtruding beyond their proper sphere." Savage "mysteries" are
usually tabu to women, who also exclude men from their sacred rites. On
the other hand, as all tribal lore was once in the hands of the wise
woman, such tabus and legends may have arisen when men began to claim
such lore. In other legends women are connected with wells, as the
guardians who must keep them locked up save when water was drawn. When
the woman neglected to replace the cover, the waters burst forth,
overwhelming her, and formed a loch.[640] The woman is the priestess of
the well who, neglecting part of its ritual, is punished. Even in recent
times we find sacred wells in charge of a woman who instructs the
visitors in the due ritual to be performed.[641] If such legends and
survivals thus point to former Celtic priestesses of wells, these are
paralleled by the Norse Horgabrudar, guardians of wells, now elves
living in the waters.[642] That such legends are based on the ritual of
well-worship is suggested by Boand's walking three times _widdershins_
round the well, instead of the customary _deiseil_. The due ritual must
be observed, and the stories are a warning against its neglect.
In spite of twenty centuries of Christianity and the anathemas of saints
and councils, the old pagan practices at healing wells have survived--a
striking instance of human conservatism. S. Patrick found the pagans of
his day worshipping a well called _Slan_, "health-giving," and offering
sacrifices to it,[643] and the Irish peasant to-day has no doubt that
there is something divine about his holy wells. The Celts brought the
belief in the divinity of springs and wells with them, but would
naturally adopt local cults wherever they found them. Afterwards the
Church placed the old pagan wells under the protection of saints, but
part of the ritual often remained unchanged. Hence many wells have been
venerated for ages by different races and through changes in religion
and polity. Thus at the thermal springs of Vicarello offerings have been
found which show that their cult has continued from the Stone Age,
through the Bronze Age, to the days of Roman civilisation, and so into
modern times; nor is this a solitary instance.[644] But it serves to
show that all races, high and low, preserve the great outlines of
primitive nature religion unchanged. In all probability the ritual of
the healing wells has also remained in great part unaltered, and
wherever it is found it follows the same general type. The patient
perambulated the well three times _deiseil_ or sun-wise, taking care not
to utter a word. Then he knelt at the well and prayed to the divinity
for his healing. In modern times the saint, but occasionally the well
itself, is prayed to.[645] Then he drank of the waters, bathed in them,
or laved his limbs or sores, probably attended by the priestess of the
well. Having paid her dues, he made an offering to the divinity of the
well, and affixed the bandage or part of his clothing to the well or a
tree near by, that through it he might be in continuous _rapport_ with
the healing influences. Ritual formulae probably accompanied these acts,
but otherwise no word was spoken, and the patient must not look back on
leaving the well. Special times, Beltane, Midsummer, or August 1st, were
favourable for such visits,[646] and where a patient was too ill to
present himself at the well, another might perform the ritual for
him.[647]
The rag or clothing hung on the tree seems to connect the spirit of the
tree with that of the well, and tree and well are often found together.
But sometimes it is thrown into the well, just as the Gaulish villagers
of S. Gregory's day threw offerings of cloth and wool into a sacred
lake.[648] The rag is even now regarded in the light of an offering, and
such offerings, varying from valuable articles of clothing to mere rags,
are still hung on sacred trees by the folk. It thus probably has always
had a sacrificial aspect in the ritual of the well, but as magic and
religion constantly blend, it had also its magical aspect. The rag, once
in contact with the patient, transferred his disease to the tree, or,
being still subtly connected with him, through it the healing properties
passed over to him.
The offering thrown into the well--a pin, coin, etc., may also have this
double aspect. The sore is often pricked or rubbed with the pin as if to
transfer the disease to the well, and if picked up by another person,
the disease may pass to him. This is also true of the coin.[649] But
other examples show the sacrificial nature of the pin or other trifle,
which is probably symbolic or a survival of a more costly offering. In
some cases it is thought that those who do not leave it at the well from
which they have drunk will die of thirst, and where a coin is offered it
is often supposed to disappear, being taken by the spirit of the
well.[650] The coin has clearly the nature of an offering, and sometimes
it must be of gold or silver, while the antiquity of the custom on
Celtic ground is seen by the classical descriptions of the coins
glittering in the pool of Clitumnus and of the "gold of Toulouse" hid in
sacred tanks.[651] It is also an old and widespread belief that all
water belongs to some divine or monstrous guardian, who will not part
with any of it without a _quid pro quo_. In many cases the two rites of
rag and pin are not both used, and this may show that originally they
had the same purpose--magical or sacrificial, or perhaps both. Other
sacrifices were also made--an animal, food, or an _ex voto_, the last
occurring even in late survivals as at S. Thenew's Well, Glasgow, where
even in the eighteenth century tin cut to represent the diseased member
was placed on the tree, or at S. Winifred's Well in Wales, where
crutches were left.
Certain waters had the power of ejecting the demon of madness. Besides
drinking, the patient was thrown into the waters, the shock being
intended to drive the demon away, as elsewhere demons are exorcised by
flagellation or beating. The divinity of the waters aided the process,
and an offering was usually made to him. In other cases the sacred
waters were supposed to ward off disease from the district or from those
who drank of them. Or, again, they had the power of conferring
fertility. Women made pilgrimages to wells, drank or bathed in the
waters, implored the spirit or saint to grant them offspring, and made a
due offering.[652] Spirit or saint, by a transfer of his power, produced
fruitfulness, but the idea was in harmony with the recognised power of
water to purify, strengthen, and heal. Women, for a similar reason,
drank or washed in the waters or wore some articles dipped in them, in
order to have an easy delivery or abundance of milk.[653]
The waters also gave oracles, their method of flowing, the amount of
water in the well, the appearance or non-appearance of bubbles at the
surface when an offering was thrown in, the sinking or floating of
various articles, all indicating whether a cure was likely to occur,
whether fortune or misfortune awaited the inquirer, or, in the case of
girls, whether their lovers would be faithful. The movements of the
animal guardian of the well were also ominous to the visitor.[654]
Rivers or river divinities were also appealed to. In cases of suspected
fidelity the Celts dwelling by the Rhine placed the newly-born child in
a shield on the waters. If it floated the mother was innocent; if it
sank it was allowed to drown, and she was put to death.[655] Girls whose
purity was suspected were similarly tested, and S. Gregory of Tours
tells how a woman accused of adultery was proved by being thrown into
the Saone.[656] The mediaeval witch ordeal by water is connected with
this custom, which is, however, widespread.[657]
The malevolent aspect of the spirit of the well is seen in the "cursing
wells" of which it was thought that when some article inscribed with an
enemy's name was thrown into them with the accompaniment of a curse, the
spirit of the well would cause his death. In some cases the curse was
inscribed on a leaden tablet thrown into the waters, just as, in other
cases, a prayer for the offerer's benefit was engraved on it. Or, again,
objects over which a charm had been said were placed in a well that the
victim who drew water might be injured. An excellent instance of a
cursing-well is that of Fynnon Elian in Denbigh, which must once have
had a guardian priestess, for in 1815 an old woman who had charge of it
presided at the ceremony. She wrote the name of the victim in a book,
receiving a gift at the same time. A pin was dropped into the well in
the name of the victim, and through it and through knowledge of his
name, the spirit of the well acted upon him to his hurt.[658] Obviously
rites like these, in which magic and religion mingle, are not purely
Celtic, but it is of interest to note their existence in Celtic lands
and among Celtic folk.
FOOTNOTES:
[597] _Ethnol. in Folklore_, 104 f.
[598] D'Arbois, _PH_ ii. 132, 169; Dottin, 240.
[599] Justin, xxxii. 3; Strabo, iv. 1. 13.
[600] S. Gregory, _In Glor. Conf._ ch. 2. Perhaps the feast and
offerings were intended to cause rain in time of drought. See p. 321,
_infra_.
[601] Adamman, _Vita Colum._ ii. 10.
[602] See Holder, _s.v._
[603] D'Arbois, _RC_ x. 168, xiv. 377; _CIL_ xii. 33; Propertius, iv.
10. 41.
[604] See p. 349, _infra_.
[605] Cf. Ptolemy's [Greek: Deouana] and [Greek: Deouna] (ii. 3. 19, 11.
29); the Scots and English Dee; the Divy in Wales; Deve, Dive, and
Divette in France; Devon in England; Deva in Spain (Ptolemy's [Greek:
Deoua], ii. 6. 8). The Shannon is surnamed even in the seventh century
"the goddess" (_Trip. Life_, 313).
[606] Holder, _s.v._; D'Arbois, _PH_ ii. 119, thinks _Matrona_ is
Ligurian. But it seems to have strong Celtic affinities.
[607] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 27-29, _RC_ iv. 137.
[608] On the whole subject see Pictet, "Quelques noms celtiques de
rivieres," _RC_ ii. 1 f. Orosius, v. 15. 6, describes the sacrifices of
gold, silver, and horses, made to the Rhone.
[609] Maury, 18. By extension of this belief any divinity might appear
by the haunted spring. S. Patrick and his synod of bishops at an Irish
well were supposed to be _sid_ or gods (p. 64, _supra_.) By a fairy well
Jeanne d'Arc had her first vision.
[610] Greg. Tours, _Vita Patr._ c. 6.
[611] See Reinach, _Catal. Sommaire_, 23, 115; Baudot, _Rapport sur les
fouilles faits aux sources de la Seine_, ii. 120; _RC_ ii. 26.
[612] For these tablets see Nicolson, _Keltic Studies_, 131 f.; Jullian,
_RC_ 1898.
[613] Sebillot, ii. 195.
[614] Prologue to Chrestien's _Conte du Graal_.
[615] Sebillot, ii. 202 f.
[616] Ibid. 196-197; Martin, 140-141; Dalyell, 411.
[617] Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 366; _Folk-Lore_, viii. 281. If the fish
appeared when an invalid drank of the well, this was a good omen. For
the custom of burying sacred animals, see Herod, ii. 74; AElian, xiii.
26.
[618] Gomme, _Ethnol. in Folklore_, 92.
[619] _Trip. Life_, 113; Tigernach, _Annals_, A.D. 1061.
[620] Mackinley, 184.
[621] Burne, _Shropshire Folk-Lore_, 416; Campbell, _WHT_ ii. 145.
[622] _Old Stat. Account_, xii. 465.
[623] S. Patrick, when he cleared Ireland of serpents, dealt in this way
with the worst specimens. S. Columba quelled a monster which terrified
the dwellers by the Ness. Joyce, _PN_ i. 197; Adamnan, _Vita Columb._
ii. 28; Kennedy, 12, 82, 246; _RC_ iv. 172, 186.
[624] _RC_ xii. 347.
[625] For the water-horse, see Campbell, _WHT_ iv. 307; Macdongall, 294;
Campbell, _Superstitions_, 203; and for the Manx _Glashtyn_, a kind of
water-horse, see Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 285. For French cognates, see
Berenger-Feraud, _Superstitions et Survivances_, i. 349 f.
[626] Reinach, _CMR_ i. 63.
[627] Orosius, v. 15. 6.
[628] _LU_ 2_a_. Of Eochaid is told a variant of the Midas story--the
discovery of his horse's ears. This is also told of Labraid Lore (_RC_
ii. 98; Kennedy, 256) and of King Marc'h in Brittany and in Wales (Le
Braz, ii. 96; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ 233). Other variants are found in
non-Celtic regions, so the story has no mythological significance on
Celtic ground.
[629] Ptol. ii. 2. 7.
[630] Campbell, _WHT_ iv. 300 f.; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 284; Waldron, _Isle
of Man_, 147.
[631] Macdougall, 296; Campbell, _Superstitions_, 195. For the Uruisg as
Brownie, see _WHT_ ii. 9; Graham, _Scenery of Perthshire_, 19.
[632] Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ ii. 431, 469, _HL_, 592; _Book of Taliesin_, vii.
135.
[633] Sebillot, ii. 340; _LL_ 165; _IT_ i. 699.
[634] Sebillot, ii. 409.
[635] See Pughe, _The Physicians of Myddfai_, 1861 (these were
descendants of a water-fairy); Rh[^y]s, _Y Cymmrodor_, iv. 164;
Hartland, _Arch. Rev._ i. 202. Such water-gods with lovely daughters are
known in most mythologies--the Greek Nereus and the Nereids, the
Slavonic Water-king, and the Japanese god Ocean-Possessor (Ralston,
_Songs of the Russian People_, 148; Chamberlain, _Ko-ji-ki_, 120).
Manannan had nine daughters (Wood-Martin, i. 135).
[636] Sebillot, ii. 338, 344; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 243; Henderson,
_Folk-Lore of the N. Counties_, 262. Cf. the rhymes, "L'Arguenon veut
chaque annee son poisson," the "fish" being a human victim, and
"Blood-thirsty Dee
Each year needs three,
But bonny Don,
She needs none."
[637] Sebillot, ii. 339.
[638] _Rendes Dindsenchas_, _RC_ xv. 315, 457. Other instances of
punishment following misuse of a well are given in Sebillot, ii. 192;
Rees, 520, 523. An Irish lake no longer healed after a hunter swam his
mangy hounds through it (Joyce, _PN_ ii. 90). A similar legend occurs
with the Votiaks, one of whose sacred lakes was removed to its present
position because a woman washed dirty clothes in it (_L'Anthropologie_,
xv. 107).
[639] Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 392.
[640] Girald. Cambr. _Itin. Hib._ ii. 9; Joyce, _OCR_ 97; Kennedy, 281;
O'Grady, i. 233; Skene, ii. 59; Campbell, _WHT_ ii. 147. The waters
often submerge a town, now seen below the waves--the town of Is in
Armorica (Le Braz, i. p. xxxix), or the towers under Lough Neagh. In
some Welsh instances a man is the culprit (Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 379). In
the case of Lough Neagh the keeper of the well was Liban, who lived on
in the waters as a mermaid. Later she was caught and received the
baptismal name of Muirghenn, "sea-birth." Here the myth of a
water-goddess, said to have been baptized, is attached to the legend of
the careless guardian of a spring, with whom she is identified (O'Grady,
ii. 184, 265).
[641] Roberts, _Cambrian Pop. Antiq._ 246; Hunt, _Popular Romances_,
291; _New Stat. Account_, x. 313.
[642] Thorpe, _Northern Myth._ ii. 78.
[643] Joyce, _PN_ ii. 84. _Slan_ occurs in many names of wells.
Well-worship is denounced in the canons of the Fourth Council of Arles.
[644] Cartailhac, _L'Age de Pierre_, 74; Bulliot et Thiollier, _Mission
de S. Martin_, 60.
[645] Sebillot, ii. 284.
[646] Dalyell, 79-80; Sebillot, ii. 282, 374; see p. 266, _infra_.
[647] I have compiled this account of the ritual from notices of the
modern usages in various works. See, e.g., Moore, _Folk-Lore_, v. 212;
Mackinley, _passim_; Hope, _Holy Wells_; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_; Sebillot, 175
f.; Dixon, _Gairloch_, 150 f.
[648] Brand, ii. 68; Greg. _In Glor. Conf._ c. 2.
[649] Sebillot, ii. 293, 296; _Folk-Lore_, iv. 55.
[650] Mackinley, 194; Sebillot, ii. 296.
[651] _Folk-Lore_, iii. 67; _Athenaeum_, 1893, 415; Pliny, _Ep._ viii. 8;
Strabo, iv. 287; Diod. Sic. v. 9.
[652] Walker, _Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot._ vol. v.; Sebillot, ii. 232. In
some early Irish instances a worm swallowed with the waters by a woman
causes pregnancy. See p. 352, _infra_.
[653] Sebillot, ii. 235-236.
[654] See Le Braz, i. 61; _Folk-Lore_, v. 214; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ i. 364;
Dalyell, 506-507; Scott, _Minstrelsy_, Introd. xliii; Martin, 7;
Sebillot, ii. 242 f.; _RC_ ii. 486.
[655] Jullian, _Ep. to Maximin_, 16. The practice may have been
connected with that noted by Aristotle, of plunging the newly-born into
a river, to strengthen it, as he says (_Pol._ vii. 15. 2), but more
probably as a baptismal or purificatory rite. See p. 309, _infra_.
[656] Lefevre, _Les Gaulois_, 109; Michelet, _Origines du droit
francais_, 268.
[657] See examples of its use in Post, _Grundriss der Ethnol.
Jurisprudenz_, ii. 459 f.
[658] Roberts, _Cambrian Popular Antiquities_, 246.
CHAPTER XIII.
TREE AND PLANT WORSHIP.
The Celts had their own cult of trees, but they adopted local
cults--Ligurian, Iberian, and others. The _Fagus Deus_ (the divine
beech), the _Sex arbor_ or _Sex arbores_ of Pyrenean inscriptions, and
an anonymous god represented by a conifer on an altar at Toulouse,
probably point to local Ligurian tree cults continued by the Celts into
Roman times.[659] Forests were also personified or ruled by a single
goddess, like _Dea Arduinna_ of the Ardennes and _Dea Abnoba_ of the
Black Forest.[660] But more primitive ideas prevailed, like that which
assigned a whole class of tree-divinities to a forest, e.g. the _Fatae
Dervones_, spirits of the oak-woods of Northern Italy.[661] Groups of
trees like _Sex arbores_ were venerated, perhaps for their height,
isolation, or some other peculiarity.
The Celts made their sacred places in dark groves, the trees being hung
with offerings or with the heads of victims. Human sacrifices were hung
or impaled on trees, e.g. by the warriors of Boudicca.[662] These, like
the offerings still placed by the folk on sacred trees, were attached to
them because the trees were the abode of spirits or divinities who in
many cases had power over vegetation.
Pliny said of the Celts: "They esteem nothing more sacred than the
mistletoe and the tree on which it grows. But apart from this they
choose oak-woods for their sacred groves, and perform no sacred rite
without using oak branches."[663] Maximus of Tyre also speaks of the
Celtic (? German) image of Zeus as a lofty oak, and an old Irish
glossary gives _daur_, "oak," as an early Irish name for "god," and
glosses it by _dia_, "god."[664] The sacred need-fire may have been
obtained by friction from oak-wood, and it is because of the old
sacredness of the oak that a piece of its wood is still used as a
talisman in Brittany.[665] Other Aryan folk besides the Celts regarded
the oak as the symbol of a high god, of the sun or the sky,[666] but
probably this was not its earliest significance. Oak forests were once
more extensive over Europe than they are now, and the old tradition that
men once lived on acorns has been shown to be well-founded by the
witness of archaeological finds, e.g. in Northern Italy.[667] A people
living in an oak region and subsisting in part on acorns might easily
take the oak as a representative of the spirit of vegetation or growth.
It was long-lived, its foliage was a protection, it supplied food, its
wood was used as fuel, and it was thus clearly the friend of man. For
these reasons, and because it was the most abiding and living thing men
knew, it became the embodiment of the spirits of life and growth.
Folk-lore survivals show that the spirit of vegetation in the shape of
his representative was annually slain while yet in full vigour, that his
life might benefit all things and be passed on undiminished to his
successor.[668] Hence the oak or a human being representing the spirit
of vegetation, or both together, were burned in the Midsummer fires.
How, then, did the oak come to symbolise a god equated with Zeus. Though
the equation may be worthless, it is possible that the connection lay in
the fact that Zeus and Juppiter had agricultural functions, or that,
when the equation was made, the earlier spirit of vegetation had become
a divinity with functions resembling those of Zeus. The fires were
kindled to recruit the sun's life; they were fed with oak-wood, and in
them an oak or a human victim representing the spirit embodied in the
oak was burned. Hence it may have been thought that the sun was
strengthened by the fire residing in the sacred oak; it was thus "the
original storehouse or reservoir of the fire which was from time to time
drawn out to feed the sun."[669] The oak thus became the symbol of a
bright god also connected with growth. But, to judge by folk survivals,
the older conception still remained potent, and tree or human victim
affected for good all vegetable growth as well as man's life, while at
the same time the fire strengthened the sun.
Dr. Evans argues that "the original holy object within the central
triliths of Stonehenge was a sacred tree," an oak, image of the Celtic
Zeus. The tree and the stones, once associated with ancestor worship,
had become symbols of "a more celestial Spirit or Spirits than those of
departed human beings."[670] But Stonehenge has now been proved to have
been in existence before the arrival of the Celts, hence such a cult
must have been pre-Celtic, though it may quite well have been adopted by
the Celts. Whether this hypothetical cult was practised by a tribe, a
group of tribes, or by the whole people, must remain obscure, and,
indeed, it may well be questioned whether Stonehenge was ever more than
the scene of some ancestral rites.
Other trees--the yew, the cypress, the alder, and the ash, were
venerated, to judge by what Lucan relates of the sacred grove at
Marseilles. The Irish Druids attributed special virtues to the hazel,
rowan, and yew, the wood of which was used in magical ceremonies
described in Irish texts.[671] Fires of rowan were lit by the Druids of
rival armies, and incantations said over them in order to discomfit the
opposing host,[672] and the wood of all these trees is still believed to
be efficacious against fairies and witches.
The Irish _bile_ was a sacred tree, of great age, growing over a holy
well or fort. Five of them are described in the _Dindsenchas_, and one
was an oak, which not only yielded acorns, but nuts and apples.[673] The
mythic trees of Elysium had the same varied fruitage, and the reason in
both cases is perhaps the fact that when the cultivated apple took the
place of acorns and nuts as a food staple, words signifying "nut" or
"acorn" were transferred to the apple. A myth of trees on which all
these fruits grew might then easily arise. Another Irish _bile_ was a
yew described in a poem as "a firm strong god," while such phrases in
this poem as "word-pure man," "judgment of origin," "spell of
knowledge," may have some reference to the custom of writing divinations
in ogham on rods of yew. The other _bile_ were ash-trees, and from one
of them the _Fir Bile_, "men of the tree," were named--perhaps a
totem-clan.[674] The lives of kings and chiefs appear to have been
connected with these trees, probably as representatives of the spirit of
vegetation embodied in the tree, and under their shadow they were
inaugurated. But as a substitute for the king was slain, so doubtless
these pre-eminent sacred trees were too sacred, too much charged with
supernatural force, to be cut down and burned, and the yearly ritual
would be performed with another tree. But in time of feud one tribe
gloried in destroying the _bile_ of another; and even in the tenth
century, when the _bile maighe Adair_ was destroyed by Maelocohlen the
act was regarded with horror. "But, O reader, this deed did not pass
unpunished."[675] Of another _bile_, that of Borrisokane, it was said
that any house in which a fragment of it was burned would itself be
destroyed by fire.[676]
Tribal and personal names point to belief in descent from tree gods or
spirits and perhaps to totemism. The Eburones were the yew-tree tribe
(_eburos_); the Bituriges perhaps had the mistletoe for their symbol,
and their surname Vivisci implies that they were called "Mistletoe
men."[677] If _bile_ (tree) is connected with the name Bile, that of the
ancestor of the Milesians, this may point to some myth of descent from a
sacred tree, as in the case of the _Fir Bile_, or "men of the
tree."[678] Other names like Guidgen (_Viduo-genos_, "son of the tree"),
Dergen (_Dervo-genos_, "son of the oak"), Guerngen (_Verno-genos_, "son
of the alder"), imply filiation to a tree. Though these names became
conventional, they express what had once been a living belief. Names
borrowed directly from trees are also found---Eburos or Ebur, "yew,"
Derua or Deruacus, "oak," etc.
The veneration of trees growing beside burial mounds or megalithic
monuments was probably a pre-Celtic cult continued by the Celts. The
tree embodied the ghost of the person buried under it, but such a ghost
could then hardly be differentiated from a tree spirit or divinity. Even
now in Celtic districts extreme veneration exists for trees growing in
cemeteries and in other places. It is dangerous to cut them down or to
pluck a leaf or branch from them, while in Breton churchyards the yew is
thought to spread a root to the mouth of each corpse.[679] The story of
the grave of Cyperissa, daughter of a Celtic king in the Danube region,
from which first sprang the "mournful cypress,"[680] is connected with
universal legends of trees growing from the graves of lovers until their
branches intertwine. These embody the belief that the spirit of the dead
is in the tree, which was thus in all likelihood the object of a cult.
Instances of these legends occur in Celtic story. Yew-stakes driven
through the bodies of Naisi and Deirdre to keep them apart, became
yew-trees the tops of which embraced over Armagh Cathedral. A yew sprang
from the grave of Baile Mac Buain, and an apple-tree from that of his
lover Aillinn, and the top of each had the form of their heads.[681] The
identification of tree and ghost is here complete.
The elder, rowan, and thorn are still planted round houses to keep off
witches, or sprigs of rowan are placed over doorways--a survival from
the time when they were believed to be tenanted by a beneficent spirit
hostile to evil influences. In Ireland and the Isle of Man the thorn is
thought to be the resort of fairies, and they, like the woodland fairies
or "wood men" are probably representatives of the older tree spirits and
gods of groves and forests.[682]
Tree-worship was rooted in the oldest nature worship, and the Church had
the utmost difficulty in suppressing it. Councils fulminated against the
cult of trees, against offerings to them or the placing of lights before
them and before wells or stones, and against the belief that certain
trees were too sacred to be cut down or burned. Heavy fines were levied
against those who practised these rites, yet still they continued.[683]
Amator, Bishop of Auxerre, tried to stop the worship of a large
pear-tree standing in the centre of the town and on which the
semi-Christian inhabitants hung animals' heads with much ribaldry. At
last S. Germanus destroyed it, but at the risk of his life. S. Martin of
Tours was allowed to destroy a temple, but the people would not permit
him to attack a much venerated pine-tree which stood beside it--an
excellent example of the way in which the more official paganism fell
before Christianity, while the older religion of the soil, from which it
sprang, could not be entirely eradicated.[684] The Church often effected
a compromise. Images of the gods affixed to trees were replaced by those
of the Virgin, but with curious results. Legends arose telling how the
faithful had been led to such trees and there discovered the image of
the Madonna miraculously placed among the branches.[685] These are
analogous to the legends of the discovery of images of the Virgin in the
earth, such images being really those of the _Matres_.
Representations of sacred trees are occasionally met with on coins,
altars, and _ex votos_.[686] If the interpretation be correct which sees
a representation of part of the Cuchulainn legend on the Paris and
Treves altars, the trees figured there would not necessarily be sacred.
But otherwise they may depict sacred trees.
We now turn to Pliny's account of the mistletoe rite. The Druids held
nothing more sacred than this plant and the tree on which it grew,
probably an oak. Of it groves were formed, while branches of the oak
were used in all religious rites. Everything growing on the oak had been
sent from heaven, and the presence of the mistletoe showed that God had
selected the tree for especial favour. Rare as it was, when found the
mistletoe was the object of a careful ritual. On the sixth day of the
moon it was culled. Preparations for a sacrifice and feast were made
beneath the tree, and two white bulls whose horns had never been bound
were brought there. A Druid, clad in white, ascended the tree and cut
the mistletoe with a golden sickle. As it fell it was caught in a white
cloth; the bulls were then sacrificed, and prayer was made that God
would make His gift prosperous to those on whom He had bestowed it. The
mistletoe was called "the universal healer," and a potion made from it
caused barren animals to be fruitful. It was also a remedy against all
poisons.[687] We can hardly believe that such an elaborate ritual merely
led up to the medico-magical use of the mistletoe. Possibly, of course,
the rite was an attenuated survival of something which had once been
more important, but it is more likely that Pliny gives only a few
picturesque details and passes by the _rationale_ of the ritual. He does
not tell us who the "God" of whom he speaks was, perhaps the sun-god or
the god of vegetation. As to the "gift," it was probably in his mind the
mistletoe, but it may quite well have meant the gift of growth in field
and fold. The tree was perhaps cut down and burned; the oxen may have
been incarnations of a god of vegetation, as the tree also may have
been. We need not here repeat the meaning which has been given to the
ritual,[688] but it may be added that if this meaning is correct, the
rite probably took place at the time of the Midsummer festival, a
festival of growth and fertility. Mistletoe is still gathered on
Midsummer eve and used as an antidote to poisons or for the cure of
wounds. Its Druidic name is still preserved in Celtic speech in words
signifying "all-healer," while it is also called _sugh an daraich_, "sap
of the oak," and _Druidh lus_, "Druid's weed."[689]
Pliny describes other Celtic herbs of grace. _Selago_ was culled without
use of iron after a sacrifice of bread and wine--probably to the spirit
of the plant. The person gathering it wore a white robe, and went with
unshod feet after washing them. According to the Druids, _Selago_
preserved one from accident, and its smoke when burned healed maladies
of the eye.[690] _Samolus_ was placed in drinking troughs as a remedy
against disease in cattle. It was culled by a person fasting, with the
left hand; it must be wholly uprooted, and the gatherer must not look
behind him.[691] _Vervain_ was gathered at sunrise after a sacrifice to
the earth as an expiation--perhaps because its surface was about to be
disturbed. When it was rubbed on the body all wishes were gratified; it
dispelled fevers and other maladies; it was an antidote against
serpents; and it conciliated hearts. A branch of the dried herb used to
asperge a banquet-hall made the guests more convivial[692]
The ritual used in gathering these plants--silence, various tabus,
ritual purity, sacrifice--is found wherever plants are culled whose
virtue lies in this that they are possessed by a spirit. Other plants
are still used as charms by modern Celtic peasants, and, in some cases,
the ritual of gathering them resembles that described by Pliny.[693] In
Irish sagas plants have magical powers. "Fairy herbs" placed in a bath
restored beauty to women bathing therein.[694] During the _Tain_
Cuchulainn's wounds were healed with "balsams and healing herbs of fairy
potency," and Diancecht used similar herbs to restore the dead at the
battle of Mag-tured.[695]
FOOTNOTES:
[659] Sacaze, _Inscr. des Pyren._ 255; Hirschfeld, _Sitzungsberichte_
(Berlin, 1896), 448.
[660] _CIL_ vi. 46; _CIR_ 1654, 1683.
[661] D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 52.
[662] Lucan, _Phar._ Usener's ed., 32; Orosius, v. 16. 6; Dio Cass.
lxii. 6.
[663] Pliny, xvi. 44. The Scholiast on Lucan says that the Druids
divined with acorns (Usener, 33).
[664] Max. Tyr. _Diss._ viii. 8; Stokes, _RC_ i. 259.
[665] Le Braz, ii. 18.
[666] Mr. Chadwick (_Jour. Anth. Inst._ xxx. 26) connects this high god
with thunder, and regards the Celtic Zeus (Taranis, in his opinion) as a
thunder-god. The oak was associated with this god because his
worshippers dwelt under oaks.
[667] Helbig, _Die Italiker in der Poebene_, 16 f.
[668] Mannhardt, _Baumkultus_; Frazer, _Golden Bough_{2} iii. 198.
[669] Frazer, _loc. cit._
[670] Evans, _Arch. Rev._ i. 327 f.
[671] Joyce, _SH_ i. 236.
[672] O'Curry, _MC_ i. 213.
[673] _LL_ 199_b_; _Rennes Dindsenchas_, _RC_ xv. 420.
[674] _RC_ xv. 455, xvi. 279; Hennessey, _Chron. Scot._ 76.
[675] Keating, 556; Joyce, _PN_ i. 499.
[676] Wood-Martin, ii. 159.
[677] D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_, 51; Jullian, 41.
[678] Cook, _Folk-Lore_, xvii. 60.
[679] See Sebillot, i. 293; Le Braz, i. 259; _Folk-Lore Journal_, v.
218; _Folk-Lore Record_, 1882.
[680] Val. Probus, _Comm. in Georgica_, ii. 84.
[681] Miss Hull, 53; O'Ourry, _MS. Mat._ 465. Writing tablets, made from
each of the trees when they were cut down, sprang together and could not
be separated.
[682] _Stat. Account_, iii. 27; Moore, 151; Sebillot, i. 262, 270.
[683] Dom Martin, i. 124; _Vita S. Eligii_, ii. 16.
[684] _Acta Sanct._ (Bolland.), July 31; Sulp. Sever. _Vita S. Mart._
457.
[685] Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ 76; Maury, 13, 299. The story of beautiful
women found in trees may be connected with the custom of placing images
in trees, or with the belief that a goddess might be seen emerging from
the tree in which she dwelt.
[686] De la Tour, _Atlas des Monnaies Gaul_, 260, 286; Reinach, _Catal.
Sommaire_, 29.
[687] Pliny, _HN_ xvi. 44.
[688] See p. 162, _supra_.
[689] See Cameron, _Gaelic Names of Plants_, 45. In Gregoire de Rostren,
_Dict. francois-celt._ 1732, mistletoe is translated by _dour-dero_,
"oak-water," and is said to be good for several evils.
[690] Pliny, xxiv. 11.
[691] Ibid.
[692] Ibid. xxv. 9.
[693] See Carmichael, _Carmina Gadelica_; De Nore, _Coutumes ... des
Provinces de France_, 150 f.; Sauve, _RC_ vi. 67, _CM_ ix. 331.
[694] O'Grady, ii. 126.
[695] Miss Hull, 172; see p. 77, _supra_.
CHAPTER XIV.
ANIMAL WORSHIP.
Animal worship pure and simple had declined among the Celts of historic
times, and animals were now regarded mainly as symbols or attributes of
divinities. The older cult had been connected with the pastoral stage in
which the animals were divine, or with the agricultural stage in which
they represented the corn-spirit, and perhaps with totemism. We shall
study here (1) traces of the older animal cults; (2) the transformation
of animal gods into symbols; and (3) traces of totemism.
1.
The presence of a bull with three cranes (_Tarvos Trigaranos_) on the
Paris altar, along with the gods Esus, Juppiter, and Vulcan, suggests
that it was a divine animal, or the subject of a divine myth. As has
been seen, this bull may be the bull of the _Tain bo Cuailgne_. Both it
and its opponent were reincarnations of the swine-herds of two gods. In
the Irish sagas reincarnation is only attributed to gods or heroes, and
this may point to the divinity of the bulls. We have seen that this and
another altar may depict some myth in which the bull was the incarnation
of a tree or vegetation spirit. The divine nature of the bull is
attested by its presence on Gaulish coins as a religious symbol, and by
images of the animal with three horns--an obvious symbol of
divinity.[696] On such an image in bronze the Cimbri, Celticised
Germans, swore. The images are pre-Roman, since they are found at
Hallstadt and La Tene. Personal names like Donnotaurus (the equivalent
of the _Donn Taruos_ of the _Tain_) or Deiotaros ("divine bull"), show
that men were called after the divine animal.[697] Similarly many
place-names in which the word _taruos_ occurs, in Northern Italy, the
Pyrenees, Scotland, Ireland, and elsewhere, suggest that the places
bearing these names were sites of a bull cult or that some myth, like
that elaborated in the _Tain_, had been there localised.[698] But, as
possibly in the case of Cuchulainn and the bull, the animal tended to
become the symbol of a god, a tendency perhaps aided by the spread of
Mithraism with its symbolic bull. A god Medros leaning on a bull is
represented at Haguenau, possibly a form of Mider or of Meduris, a
surname of Toutatis, unless Medros is simply Mithras.[699] Echoes of the
cult of the bull or cow are heard in Irish tales of these animals
brought from the _sid_, or of magic bulls or of cows which produced
enormous supplies of milk, or in saintly legends of oxen leading a saint
to the site of his future church.[700] These legends are also told of
the swine,[701] and they perhaps arose when a Christian church took the
place of the site of a local animal cult, legend fusing the old and the
new cult by making the once divine animal point out the site of the
church. A late relic of a bull cult may be found in the carnival
procession of the _Boeuf Gras_ at Paris.
A cult of a swine-god Moccus has been referred to. The boar was a divine
symbol on standards, coins, and altars, and many bronze images of the
animal have been found. These were temple treasures, and in one case the
boar is three-horned.[702] But it was becoming the symbol of a goddess,
as is seen by the altars on which it accompanies a goddess, perhaps of
fertility, and by a bronze image of a goddess seated on a boar. The
altars occur in Britain, of which the animal may be the emblem--the
"Caledonian monster" of Claudian's poem.[703] The Galatian Celts
abstained from eating the swine, and there has always been a prejudice
against its flesh in the Highlands. This has a totemic appearance.[704]
But the swine is esteemed in Ireland, and in the texts monstrous swine
are the staple article of famous feasts.[705] These may have been
legendary forms of old swine-gods, the feasts recalling sacrificial
feasts on their flesh. Magic swine were also the immortal food of the
gods. But the boar was tabu to certain persons, e.g. Diarmaid, though
whether this is the attenuated memory of a clan totem restriction is
uncertain. In Welsh story the swine comes from Elysium--a myth
explaining the origin of its domestication, while domestication
certainly implies an earlier cult of the animal. When animals come to be
domesticated, the old cult restrictions, e.g. against eating them,
usually pass away. For this reason, perhaps, the Gauls, who worshipped
an anthropomorphic swine-god, trafficked in the animal and may have
eaten it.[706] Welsh story also tells of the magic boar, the _Twrch
Trwyth_, hunted by Arthur, possibly a folk-tale reminiscence of a boar
divinity.[707] Place-names also point to a cult of the swine, and a
recollection of its divinity may underlie the numerous Irish tales of
magical swine.[708] The magic swine which issued from the cave of
Cruachan and destroyed the young crops are suggestive of the
theriomorphic corn-spirit in its occasional destructive aspect.[709]
Bones of the swine, sometimes cremated, have been found in Celtic graves
in Britain and at Hallstadt, and in one case the animal was buried alone
in a tumulus at Hallstadt, just as sacred animals were buried in Egypt,
Greece, and elsewhere.[710] When the animal was buried with the dead, it
may have been as a sacrifice to the ghost or to the god of the
underworld.
The divinity of the serpent is proved by the occurrence of a horned
serpent with twelve Roman gods on a Gallo-Roman altar.[711] In other
cases a horned or ram's-headed serpent appears as the attribute of a
god, and we have seen that the ram's-headed serpent may be a fusion of
the serpent as a chthonian animal with the ram, sacrificed to the dead.
In Greece Dionysus had the form both of a bull and a horned serpent, the
horn being perhaps derived from the bull symbol. M. Reinach claims that
the primitive elements of the Orphic myth of the Thracian
Dionysos-Zagreus--divine serpents producing an egg whence came the
horned snake Zagreus, occur in dislocated form in Gaul. There enlacing
serpents were believed to produce a magic egg, and there a horned
serpent was worshipped, but was not connected with the egg. But they may
once have been connected, and if so, there may be a common foundation
both for the Greek and the Celtic conceptions in a Celtic element in
Thrace.[712] The resemblances, however, may be mere coincidences, and
horned serpents are known in other mythologies--the horn being perhaps a
symbol of divinity. The horned serpent sometimes accompanies a god who
has horns, possibly Cernunnos, the underworld god, in accordance with
the chthonian character of the serpent.[713] In the Cuchulainn cycle
Loeg on his visit to the Other-world saw two-headed serpents--perhaps a
further hint of this aspect of the animal.[714]
In all these instances of animal cults examples of the tendency to make
the divine animal anthropomorphic have been seen. We have now to
consider some instances of the complete anthropomorphic process.
2.
An old bear cult gave place to the cult of a bear goddess and probably
of a god. At Berne--an old Celtic place-name meaning "bear"--was found a
bronze group of a goddess holding a patera with fruit, and a bear
approaching her as if to be fed. The inscription runs, _Deae Artioni
Licinia Sabinilla_.[715] A local bear-cult had once existed at Berne,
and is still recalled in the presence of the famous bears there, but the
divine bear had given place to a goddess whose name and symbol were
ursine. From an old Celtic _Artos_, fem. _Arta_, "bear," were derived
various divine names. Of these _Dea Artio(n)_ means "bear goddess," and
_Artaios_, equated with Mercury, is perhaps a bear god.[716] Another
bear goddess, Andarta, was honoured at Die (Drome), the word perhaps
meaning "strong bear"--_And_- being an augmentive.[717] Numerous
place-names derived from _Artos_ perhaps witness to a widespread cult of
the bear, and the word also occurs in Welsh, and Irish personal
names--Arthmael, Arthbiu, and possibly Arthur, and the numerous Arts of
Irish texts. Descent from the divine bear is also signified in names
like Welsh _Arthgen_, Irish _Artigan_, from _Artigenos_, "son of the
bear." Another Celtic name for "bear" was the Gaulish _matu_, Irish
_math_, found in _Matugenos_, "son of the bear," and in MacMahon, which
is a corrupt form of _Mac-math-ghamhain_, "son of the bear's son," or
"of the bear."[718]
Similarly a cult of the stag seems to have given place to that of a god
with stag's horns, represented on many bas-reliefs, and probably
connected with the underworld.[719] The stag, as a grain-eater, may have
been regarded as the embodiment of the corn-spirit, and then associated
with the under-earth region whence the corn sprang, by one of those
inversions of thought so common in the stage of transition from animal
gods to gods with animal symbols. The elk may have been worshipped in
Ireland, and a three antlered stag is the subject of a story in the
Fionn saga.[720] Its third antler, like the third horn of bull or boar,
may be a sign of divinity.
The horse had also been worshipped, but a goddess Epona (Gaul. _epo-s_,
"horse"), protectress of horses and asses, took its place, and had a
far-spread cult. She rides a horse or mare with its foal, or is seated
among horses, or feeds horses. A representation of a mare suckling a
foal--a design analogous to those in which Epona feeds foals--shows that
her primitive equine nature had not been forgotten.[721] The Gauls were
horse-rearers, and Epona was the goddess of the craft; but, as in other
cases, a cult of the horse must have preceded its domestication, and its
flesh may not have been eaten, or, if so, only sacramentally.[722]
Finally, the divine horse became the anthropomorphic horse-goddess. Her
images were placed in stables, and several inscriptions and statuettes
have been found in such buildings or in cavalry barracks.[723] The
remains of the cult have been found in the Danube and Rhine valleys, in
Eastern Gaul, and in Northern Italy, all Celtic regions, but it was
carried everywhere by Roman cavalry recruited from the Celtic
tribes.[724] Epona is associated with, and often has, the symbols of the
_Matres_, and one inscription reads _Eponabus_, as if there were a group
of goddesses called Epona.[725] A goddess who promoted the fertility of
mares would easily be associated with goddesses of fertility. Epona may
also have been confused with a river-goddess conceived of as a spirited
steed. Water-spirits took that shape, and the _Matres_ were also
river-goddesses.
A statuette of a horse, with a dedication to a god Rudiobus, otherwise
unknown, may have been carried processionally, while a mule has a
dedication to Segomo, equated elsewhere with Mars. A mule god Mullo,
also equated with Mars, is mentioned on several inscriptions.[726] The
connection with Mars may have been found in the fact that the October
horse was sacrificed to him for fertility, while the horse was probably
associated with fertility among the Celts. The horse was sacrificed both
by Celts and Teutons at the Midsummer festival, undoubtedly as a divine
animal. Traces of the Celtic custom survive in local legends, and may be
interpreted in the fuller light of the Teutonic accounts. In Ireland a
man wearing a horse's head rushed through the fire, and was supposed to
represent all cattle; in other words, he was a surrogate for them. The
legend of Each Labra, a horse which lived in a mound and issued from it
every Midsummer eve to give oracles for the coming year, is probably
connected with the Midsummer sacrifice of the horse.[727] Among the
Teutons the horse was a divine sacrificial animal, and was also sacred
to Freyr, the god of fertility, while in Teutonic survivals a horse's
head was placed in the Midsummer fire.[728] The horse was sporadically
the representative of the corn-spirit, and at Rome the October horse was
sacrificed in that capacity and for fertility.[729] Among the Celts, the
horse sacrificed at Midsummer may have represented the vegetation-spirit
and benefited all domestic animals--the old rite surviving in an
attenuated form, as described above.
Perhaps the goddess Damona was an animal divinity, if her name is
derived from _damatos_, "sheep," cognate to Welsh _dafad_, "sheep," and
Gaelic _damh_, "ox." Other divine animals, as has been seen, were
associated with the waters, and the use of beasts and birds in
divination doubtless points to their divine character. A cult of
bird-gods may lurk behind the divine name Bran, "raven," and the
reference to the magic birds of Rhiannon in the _Triads_.
3.
Animal worship is connected with totemism, and certain things point to
its existence among the Celts, or to the existence of conditions out of
which totemism was elsewhere developed. These are descent from animals,
animal tabus, the sacramental eating of an animal, and exogamy.
(1) _Descent from animals._--Celtic names implying descent from animals
or plants are of two classes, clan and personal names. If the latter are
totemistic, they must be derived from the former, since totemism is an
affair of the clan, while the so-called "personal totem," exemplified by
the American Indian _manitou_, is the guardian but never the ancestor of
a man. Some clan names have already been referred to. Others are the
Bibroci of south-east Britain, probably a beaver clan (_bebros_), and
the Eburones, a yew-tree clan (_eburos_).[730] Irish clans bore animal
names: some groups were called "calves," others "griffins," others "red
deer," and a plant name is seen in _Fir Bile_, "men of the tree."[731]
Such clan totemism perhaps underlies the stories of the "descendants of
the wolf" at Ossory, who became wolves for a time as the result of a
saintly curse. Other instances of lycanthropy were associated with
certain families.[732] The belief in lycanthropy might easily attach
itself to existing wolf-clans, the transformation being then explained
as the result of a curse. The stories of Cormac mac Art, suckled by a
she-wolf, of Lughaid mac Con, "son of a wolf-dog," suckled by that
animal, and of Oisin, whose mother was a fawn, and who would not eat
venison, are perhaps totemistic, while to totemism or to a cult of
animals may be ascribed what early travellers in Ireland say of the
people taking wolves as god-fathers and praying to them to do them no
ill.[733] In Wales bands of warriors at the battle of Cattraeth are
described in Oneurin's _Gododin_ as dogs, wolves, bears, and ravens,
while Owein's band of ravens which fought against Arthur, may have been
a raven clan, later misunderstood as actual ravens.[734] Certain groups
of Dalriad Scots bore animal names--Cinel Gabran, "Little goat clan,"
and Cinel Loarn, "Fox clan." Possibly the custom of denoting Highland
clans by animal or plant badges may be connected with a belief in
descent from plants or animals. On many coins an animal is represented
on horseback, perhaps leading a clan, as birds led the Celts to the
Danube area, and these may depict myths telling how the clan totem
animal led the clan to its present territory.[735] Such myths may
survive in legends relating how an animal led a saint to the site of his
church.[736] Celtic warriors wore helmets with horns, and Irish story
speaks of men with cat, dog, or goat heads.[737] These may have been men
wearing a head-gear formed of the skin or head of the clan totem, hence
remembered at a later time as monstrous beings, while the horned helmets
would be related to the same custom. Solinus describes the Britons as
wearing animal skins before going into battle.[738] Were these skins of
totem animals under whose protection they thus placed themselves? The
"forms of beasts, birds, and fishes" which the Cruithne or Picts
tattooed on their bodies may have been totem marks, while the painting
of their bodies with woad among the southern Britons may have been of
the same character, though Caesar's words hardly denote this. Certain
marks on faces figured on Gaulish coins seem to be tattoo marks.[739]
It is not impossible that an early wolf-totem may have been associated,
because of the animal's nocturnal wanderings in forests, with the
underworld whence, according to Celtic belief, men sprang and whither
they returned, and whence all vegetation came forth. The Gallo-Roman
Silvanus, probably an underworld god, wears a wolf-skin, and may thus be
a wolf-god. There were various types of underworld gods, and this
wolf-type--perhaps a local wolf-totem ancestor assimilated to a local
"Dispater"--may have been the god of a clan who imposed its mythic wolf
origin on other clans. Some Celtic bronzes show a wolf swallowing a man
who offers no resistance, probably because he is dead. The wolf is much
bigger than the man, and hence may be a god.[740] These bronzes would
thus represent a belief setting forth the return of men to their totem
ancestor after death, or to the underworld god connected with the totem
ancestor, by saying that he devoured the dead, like certain Polynesian
divinities and the Greek Eurynomos.
In many individual names the first part is the name of an animal or
plant, the second is usually _genos_, "born from," or "son of," e.g.
Artigenos, Matugenos, "son of the bear" (_artos_, _matu_-); Urogenos,
occurring as Urogenertos, "he who has the strength of the son of the
urus"; Brannogenos, "son of the raven"; Cunogenos, "son of the
dog."[741] These names may be derived from clan totem names, but they
date back to a time when animals, trees, and men were on a common
footing, and the possibility of human descent from a tree or an animal
was believed in. Professor Rh[^y]s has argued from the frequency of
personal names in Ireland, like Curoi, "Hound of Roi," Cu Corb, "Corb's
Hound," Mac Con, "Hound's Son," and Maelchon, "Hound's Slave," that
there existed a dog totem or god, not of the Celts, but of a pre-Celtic
race.[742] This assumes that totemism was non-Celtic, an assumption
based on preconceived notions of what Celtic institutions ought to have
been. The names, it should be observed, are personal, not clan names.
(2) _Animal tabus._--Besides the dislike of swine's flesh already noted
among certain Celtic groups, the killing and eating of the hare, hen,
and goose were forbidden among the Britons. Caesar says they bred these
animals for amusement, but this reason assigned by him is drawn from his
knowledge of the breeding of rare animals by rich Romans as a pastime,
since he had no knowledge of the breeding of sacred animals which were
not eaten--a common totemic or animal cult custom.[743] The hare was
used for divination by Boudicca,[744] doubtless as a sacred animal, and
it has been found that a sacred character still attaches to these
animals in Wales. A cock or hen was ceremonially killed and eaten on
Shrove Tuesday, either as a former totemic animal, or, less likely, as a
representative of the corn-spirit. The hare is not killed in certain
districts, but occasionally it is ceremonially hunted and slain
annually, while at yearly fairs the goose is sold exclusively and
eaten.[745] Elsewhere, e.g. in Devon, a ram or lamb is ceremonially
slain and eaten, the eating being believed to confer luck.[746] The
ill-luck supposed to follow the killing of certain animals may also be
reminiscent of totemic tabus. Fish were not eaten by the Pictish Meatae
and Caledonii, and a dislike of eating certain fresh-water fish was
observed among certain eighteenth century Highlanders.[747] It has been
already seen that certain fish living in sacred wells were tabu, and
were believed to give oracles. Heron's flesh was disliked in Ireland,
and it was considered unlucky to kill a swan in the Hebrides.[748] Fatal
results following upon the killing or eating of an animal with which the
eater was connected by name or descent are found in the Irish sagas.
Conaire was son of a woman and a bird which could take human shape, and
it was forbidden to him to hunt birds. On one occasion he did so, and
for this as well as the breaking of other tabus, he lost his life.[749]
It was tabu to Cuchulainn, "the hound of Culann," to eat dog's flesh,
and, having been persuaded to do this, his strength went from him, and
he perished. Diarmaid, having been forbidden to hunt a boar with which
his life was connected, was induced by Fionn to break this tabu, and in
consequence he lost his life by one of the boar's bristles entering his
foot, or (in a variant) by the boar's killing him. Another instance is
found in a tale of certain men transformed to badgers. They were slain
by Cormac, and brought to his father Tadg to eat. Tadg unaccountably
loathed them, because they were transformed men and his cousins.[750] In
this tale, which may contain the _debris_ of totemic usage, the loathing
arises from the fact that the badgers are men--a common form of myths
explanatory of misunderstood totemic customs, but the old idea of the
relation between a man and his totem is not lost sight of. The other
tales may also be reminiscent of a clan totem tabu, later centred in a
mythic hero. Perhaps the belief in lucky or unlucky animals, or in omens
drawn from their appearance, may be based on old totem beliefs or in
beliefs in the divinity of the animals.
(3) _Sacramental eating of an animal._--The custom of "hunting the
wren," found over the whole Celtic area, is connected with animal
worship and may be totemistic in origin. In spite of its small size, the
wren was known as the king of birds, and in the Isle of Man it was
hunted and killed on Christmas or S. Stephen's day. The bird was carried
in procession from door to door, to the accompaniment of a chant, and
was then solemnly buried, dirges being sung. In some cases a feather was
left at each house and carefully treasured, and there are traces of a
custom of boiling and eating the bird.[751] In Ireland, the hunt and
procession were followed by a feast, the materials of which were
collected from house to house, and a similar usage obtained in France,
where the youth who killed the bird was called "king."[752] In most of
these districts it was considered unlucky or dangerous to kill the bird
at any other time, yet it might be ceremonially killed once a year, the
dead animal conferred luck, and was solemnly eaten or buried with signs
of mourning. Similar customs with animals which are actually worshipped
are found elsewhere,[753] and they lend support to the idea that the
Celts regarded the wren as a divine animal, or perhaps a totem animal,
that it was necessary to slay it ritually, and to carry it round the
houses of the community to obtain its divine influence, to eat it
sacramentally or to bury it. Probably like customs were followed in the
case of other animals,[754] and these may have given rise to such
stories as that of the eating of MacDatho's wonderful boar, as well as
to myths which regarded certain animals, e.g. the swine, as the immortal
food of the gods. Other examples of ritual survivals of such sacramental
eating have already been noted, and it is not improbable that the eating
of a sacred pastoral animal occurred at Samhain.
(4) _Exogamy._--Exogamy and the counting of descent through the mother
are closely connected with totemism, and some traces of both are found
among the Celts. Among the Picts, who were, perhaps, a Celtic group of
the Brythonic stock, these customs survived in the royal house. The
kingship passed to a brother of the king by the same mother, or to a
sister's son, while the king's father was never king and was frequently
a "foreigner." Similar rules of succession prevailed in early Aryan
royal houses--Greek and Roman,--and may, as Dr. Stokes thought, have
existed at Tara in Ireland, while in a Fian tale of Oisin he marries the
daughter of the king of Tir na n-Og, and succeeds him as king partly for
that reason, and partly because he had beaten him in the annual race for
the kingship.[755] Such an athletic contest for the kingship was known
in early Greece, and this tale may support the theory of the Celtic
priest-kingship, the holder of the office retaining it as long as he was
not defeated or slain. Traces of succession through a sister's son are
found in the _Mabinogion_, and Livy describes how the mythic Celtic king
Ambicatus sent not his own but his sister's sons to found new
kingdoms.[756] Irish and Welsh divine and heroic groups are named after
the mother, not the father--the children of Danu and of Don, and the men
of Domnu. Anu is mother of the gods, Buanann of heroes. The eponymous
ancestor of the Scots is a woman, Scota, and the earliest colonisers of
Ireland are women, not men. In the sagas gods and heroes have frequently
a matronymic, and the father's name is omitted--Lug mac Ethnend,
Conchobar mac Nessa, Indech, son of De Domnann, Corpre, son of Etain,
and others. Perhaps parallel to this is the custom of calling men after
their wives--e.g. the son of Fergus is Fer Tlachtga, Tlachtga's
husband.[757] In the sagas, females (goddesses and heroines) have a high
place accorded to them, and frequently choose their own lovers or
husbands--customs suggestive of the matriarchate. Thus what was once a
general practice was later confined to the royal house or told of divine
or heroic personages. Possibly certain cases of incest may really be
exaggerated accounts of misunderstood unions once permissible by totemic
law. Caesar speaks of British polyandry, brothers, sons, and fathers
sharing a wife in common.[758] Strabo speaks of Irish unions with
mothers and sisters, perhaps referring not to actual practice but to
reports of saga tales of incest.[759] Dio Cassius speaks of community of
wives among the Caledonians and Meatae, and Jerome says much the same of
the Scoti and Atecotti.[760] These notices, with the exception of
Caesar's, are vague, yet they refer to marriage customs different from
those known to their reporters. In Irish sagas incest legends circle
round the descendants of Etain--fathers unite with daughters, a son with
his mother, a woman has a son by her three brothers (just as Ecne was
son of Brian, Iuchar, and Iucharba), and is also mother of Crimthan by
that son.[761] Brother and sister unions occur both in Irish and Welsh
story.[762]
In these cases incest with a mother cannot be explained by totemic
usage, but the cases may be distorted reminiscences of what might occur
under totemism, namely, a son taking the wives of his father other than
his own mother, when those were of a different totem from his own. Under
totemism, brothers and sisters by different mothers having different
totems, might possibly unite, and such unions are found in many
mythologies. Later, when totemism passed away, the unions, regarded with
horror, would be supposed to take place between children by the same
mother. According to totem law, a father might unite with his daughter,
since she was of her mother's totem, but in practice this was frowned
upon. Polygamy also may co-exist with totemism, and of course involves
the counting of descent through the mother as a rule. If, as is
suggested by the "debility" of the Ultonians, and by other evidence, the
couvade was a Celtic institution, this would also point to the existence
of the matriarchate with the Celts. To explain all this as pre-Aryan, or
to say that the classical notices refer to non-Aryan tribes and that the
evidence in the Irish sagas only shows that the Celts had been
influenced by the customs of aboriginal tribes among whom they
lived,[763] is to neglect the fact that the customs are closely bound up
with Celtic life, while it leaves unexplained the influence of such
customs upon a people whose own customs, according to this theory, were
so totally different. The evidence, taken as a whole, points to the
existence of totemism among the early Celts, or, at all events, of the
elements which elsewhere compose it.
* * * * *
Celtic animal worship dates back to the primitive hunting and pastoral
period, when men worshipped the animals which they hunted or reared.
They may have apologised to the animal hunted and slain--a form of
worship, or, where animals were not hunted or were reared and
worshipped, one of them may have been slain annually and eaten to obtain
its divine power. Care was taken to preserve certain sacred animals
which were not hunted, and this led to domestication, the abstinence of
earlier generations leading to an increased food supply at a later time,
when domesticated animals were freely slain. But the earlier sacramental
slaying of such animals survived in the religious aspect of their
slaughter at the beginning of winter.[764] The cult of animals was also
connected with totemic usage, though at a later stage this cult was
replaced by that of anthropomorphic divinities, with the older divine
animals as their symbols, sacrificial victims, and the like. This
evolution now led to the removal of restrictions upon slaying and eating
the animals. On the other hand, the more primitive animal cults may have
remained here and there. Animal cults were, perhaps, largely confined to
men. With the rise of agriculture mainly as an art in the hands of
women, and the consequent cult of the Earth-mother, of fertility and
corn-spirits probably regarded as female, the sacramental eating of the
divine animal may have led to the slaying and eating of a human or
animal victim supposed to embody such a spirit. Later the two cults were
bound to coalesce, and the divine animal and the animal embodiment of
the vegetation spirit would not be differentiated. On the other hand,
when men began to take part in women's fertility cults, the fact that
such spirits were female or were perhaps coming to be regarded as
goddesses, may have led men to envisage certain of the anthropomorphic
animal divinities as goddesses, since some of these, e.g. Epona and
Damona, are female. But with the increasing participation of men in
agriculture, the spirits or goddesses of fertility would tend to become
male, or the consorts or mothers of gods of fertility, though the
earlier aspect was never lost sight of, witness the Corn-Mother. The
evolution of divine priest-kings would cause them to take the place of
the earlier priestesses of these cults, one of whom may have been the
divine victim. Yet in local survivals certain cults were still confined
to women, and still had their priestesses.[765]
FOOTNOTES:
[696] Reinach, _BF_ 66, 244. The bull and three cranes may be a rebus on
the name of the bull, _Tarvos Trikarenos_, "the three-headed," or
perhaps _Trikeras_, "three-horned."
[697] Plutarch, _Marius_, 23; Caesar, vii. 65; D'Arbois, _Les Celtes_,
49.
[698] Holder, _s.v._ _Tarba_, _Tarouanna_, _Tarvisium_, etc.; D'Arbois,
_Les Druides_, 155; S. Greg. _In Glor. Conf._ 48.
[699] _CIL_ xiii. 6017; _RC_ xxv. 47; Holder, ii. 528.
[700] Leahy, ii. 105 f.; Curtin, _MFI_ 264, 318; Joyce, _PN_ i. 174;
Rees, 453. Cf. Ailred, _Life of S. Ninian_, c. 8.
[701] Jocelyn, _Vita S. Kentig._ c. 24; Rees, 293, 323.
[702] Tacitus, _Germ._ xlv.; Blanchet, i. 162, 165; Reinach, _BF_ 255
f., _CMR_ i. 168; Bertrand, _Arch. Celt._ 419.
[703] Pennant, _Tour in Scotland_, 268; Reinach, _RC_ xxii. 158, _CMR_
i. 67.
[704] Pausan, vii. 17, 18; Johnson, _Journey_, 136.
[705] Joyce, _SH_ ii. 127; _IT_ i. 99, 256 (Bricriu's feast and the tale
of Macdatho's swine).
[706] Strabo, iv. 4. 3, says these swine attacked strangers. Varro, _de
Re Rustica_, ii. 4, admires their vast size. Cf. Polyb. ii. 4.
[707] The hunt is first mentioned in Nennius, c. 79, and then appears as
a full-blown folk-tale in _Kulhwych_, Loth, i. 185 f. Here the boar is a
transformed prince.
[708] I have already suggested, p. 106, _supra_, that the places where
Gwydion halted with the swine of Elysium were sites of a swine-cult.
[709] _RC_ xiii. 451. Cf. also _TOS_ vi. "The Enchanted Pigs of Oengus,"
and Campbell, _LF_ 53.
[710] _L'Anthropologie_, vi. 584; Greenwell, _British Barrows_, 274,
283, 454; _Arch. Rev._ ii. 120.
[711] _Rev. Arch._ 1897, 313.
[712] Reinach, "Zagreus le serpent cornu," _Rev. Arch_. xxxv. 210.
[713] Reinach, _BF_ 185; Bertrand, 316.
[714] "Cuchulainn's Sick-bed," D'Arbois, v. 202.
[715] See Reinach, _CMR_ i. 57.
[716] _CIL_ xiii. 5160, xii. 2199. Rh[^y]s, however, derives Artaios
from _ar_, "ploughed land," and equates the god with Mercurius Cultor.
[717] _CIL_ xii. 1556-1558; D'Arbois, _RC_ x. 165.
[718] For all these place and personal names, see Holder and D'Arbois,
_op. cit. Les Celtes_, 47 f., _Les Druides_, 157 f.
[719] See p. 32, _supra_; Reinach, _CMR_ i. 72, _Rev. Arch._ ii. 123.
[720] O'Grady, ii. 123.
[721] Epona is fully discussed by Reinach in his _Epona_, 1895, and in
articles (illustrated) in _Rev. Arch._ vols. 26, 33, 35, 40, etc. See
also ii. [1898], 190.
[722] Reinach suggests that this may explain why Vercingetorix, in view
of siege by the Romans, sent away his horses. They were too sacred to be
eaten. Caesar, vii. 71; Reinach, _RC_ xxvii. 1 f.
[723] Juvenal, viii. 154; Apul. _Metam._ iii. 27; Min. Felix, _Octav._
xxvii. 7.
[724] For the inscriptions, see Holder, _s.v._ "Epona."
[725] _CIL_ iii. 7904.
[726] _CIL_ xiii. 3071; Reinach, _BF_ 253, _CMR_ i. 64, _Repert. de la
Stat._ ii. 745; Holder, ii. 651-652.
[727] Granger, _Worship of the Romans_, 113; Kennedy, 135.
[728] Grimm, _Teut. Myth._ 49, 619, 657, 661-664.
[729] Frazer, _Golden Bough_{2}, ii. 281, 315.
[730] Caesar, v. 21, 27. Possibly the Dea Bibracte of the Aeduans was a
beaver goddess.
[731] O'Curry, _MC_ ii. 207; Elton, 298.
[732] Girald. Cambr. _Top. Hib._ ii. 19, _RC_ ii. 202; _Folk-Lore_, v.
310; _IT_ iii. 376.
[733] O'Grady, ii. 286, 538; Campbell, _The Fians_, 78; Thiers, _Traite
des Superstitions_, ii. 86.
[734] Lady Guest, ii. 409 f.
[735] Blanchet, i. 166, 295, 326, 390.
[736] See p. 209, _supra_.
[737] Diod. Sic. v. 30; _IT_ iii. 385; _RC_ xxvi. 139; Rh[^y]s, _HL_
593.
[738] _Man. Hist. Brit._ p. x.
[739] Herodian, iii. 14, 8; Duald MacFirbis in Irish _Nennius_, p. vii;
Caesar, v. 10; _ZCP_ iii. 331.
[740] See Reinach, "Les Carnassiers androphages dans l'art
gallo-romain," _CMR_ i. 279.
[741] See Holder, _s.v._
[742] Rh[^y]s, _CB_{4} 267.
[743] Caesar, v. 12.
[744] Dio Cassius, lxii. 2.
[745] See a valuable paper by N.W. Thomas, "Survivance du Culte des
Animaux dans le Pays de Galles," in _Rev. de l'Hist. des Religions_,
xxxviii. 295 f., and a similar paper by Gomme, _Arch. Rev._ 1889, 217 f.
Both writers seem to regard these cults as pre-Celtic.
[746] Gomme, _Ethnol. in Folklore_, 30, _Village Community_, 113.
[747] Dio Cass. lxxii. 21; Logan, _Scottish Gael_, ii. 12.
[748] Joyce, _SH_ ii. 529; Martin, 71.
[749] _RC_ xxii. 20, 24, 390-1.
[750] _IT_ iii. 385.
[751] Waldron, _Isle of Man_, 49; Train, _Account of the Isle of Man_,
ii. 124.
[752] Vallancey, _Coll. de Reb. Hib._ iv. No. 13; Clement, _Fetes_, 466.
For English customs, see Henderson, _Folklore of the Northern Counties_,
125.
[753] Frazer, _Golden Bough_{2}, ii. 380, 441, 446.
[754] For other Welsh instances of the danger of killing certain birds,
see Thomas, _op. cit._ xxxviii. 306.
[755] Frazer, _Kingship_, 261; Stokes, _RC_ xvi. 418; Larminie, _Myths
and Folk-tales_, 327.
[756] See Rh[^y]s, _Welsh People_, 44; Livy, v. 34.
[757] Cf. _IT_ iii. 407, 409.
[758] Caesar, v. 14.
[759] Strabo, iv. 5. 4.
[760] Dio Cass. lxxvi. 12; Jerome, _Adv. Jovin._ ii. 7. Giraldus has
much to say of incest in Wales, probably actual breaches of moral law
among a barbarous people (_Descr. Wales_, ii. 6).
[761] _RC_ xii. 235, 238, xv. 291, xvi. 149; _LL_ 23_a_, 124_b_. In
various Irish texts a child is said to have three fathers--probably a
reminiscence of polyandry. See p. 74, _supra_, and _RC_ xxiii. 333.
[762] _IT_ i. 136; Loth, i. 134 f.; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 308.
[763] Zimmer, "Matriarchy among the Picts," in Henderson, _Leadbhar nan
Gleann_.
[764] See p. 259, _infra_.
[765] See p. 274, _infra_.
CHAPTER XV.
COSMOGONY.
Whether the early Celts regarded Heaven and Earth as husband and wife is
uncertain. Such a conception is world-wide, and myth frequently explains
in different ways the reason of the separation of the two. Among the
Polynesians the children of heaven and earth--the winds, forests, and
seas personified--angry at being crushed between their parents in
darkness, rose up and separated them. This is in effect the Greek myth
of Uranus, or Heaven, and Gaea, or Earth, divorced by their son Kronos,
just as in Hindu myth Dyaus, or Sky, and Prithivi, or Earth, were
separated by Indra. Uranus in Greece gave place to Zeus, and, in India,
Dyaus became subordinate to Indra. Thus the primitive Heaven personified
recedes, and his place is taken by a more individualised god. But
generally Mother Earth remains a constant quantity. Earth was nearer man
and was more unchanging than the inconstant sky, while as the producer
of the fruits of the earth, she was regarded as the source of all
things, and frequently remained as an important divinity when a crowd of
other divinities became prominent. This is especially true of
agricultural peoples, who propitiate Earth with sacrifice, worship her
with orgiastic rites, or assist her processes by magic. With advancing
civilisation such a goddess is still remembered as the friend of man,
and, as in the Eleusinia, is represented sorrowing and rejoicing like
man himself. Or where a higher religion ousts the older one, the ritual
is still retained among the folk, though its meaning may be forgotten.
The Celts may thus have possessed the Heaven and Earth myth, but all
trace of it has perished. There are, however, remnants of myths showing
how the sky is supported by trees, a mountain, or by pillars. A high
mountain near the sources of the Rhone was called "the column of the
sun," and was so lofty as to hide the sun from the people of the
south.[766] It may have been regarded as supporting the sky, while the
sun moved round it. In an old Irish hymn and its gloss, Brigit and
Patrick are compared to the two pillars of the world, probably alluding
to some old myth of sky or earth resting on pillars.[767] Traces of this
also exist in folk-belief, as in the accounts of islands resting on four
pillars, or as in the legend of the church of Kernitou which rests on
four pillars on a congealed sea and which will be submerged when the sea
liquefies--a combination of the cosmogonic myth with that of a great
inundation.[768] In some mythologies a bridge or ladder connects heaven
and earth. There may be a survival of some such myth in an Irish poem
which speaks of the _drochet bethad_, or "bridge of life," or in the
_drochaid na flaitheanas_, or "bridge of heaven," of Hebridean
folk-lore.[769]
Those gods who were connected with the sky may have been held to dwell
there or on the mountain supporting it. Others, like the Celtic
Dispater, dwelt underground. Some were connected with mounds and hills,
or were supposed to have taken up their abode in them. Others, again,
dwelt in a distant region, the Celtic Elysium, which, once the Celts
reached the sea, became a far-off island. Those divinities worshipped in
groves were believed to dwell there and to manifest themselves at midday
or midnight, while such objects of nature as rivers, wells, and trees
were held to be the abode of gods or spirits. Thus it is doubtful
whether the Celts ever thought of their gods as dwelling in one Olympus.
The Tuatha De Danann are said to have come from heaven, but this may be
the mere assertion of some scribe who knew not what to make of this
group of beings.
In Celtic belief men were not so much created by gods as descended from
them. "All the Gauls assert that they are descended from Dispater, and
this, they say, has been handed down to them by the Druids."[770]
Dispater was a Celtic underworld god of fertility, and the statement
probably presupposes a myth, like that found among many primitive
peoples, telling how men once lived underground and thence came to the
surface of the earth. But it also points to their descent from the god
of the underworld. Thither the dead returned to him who was ancestor of
the living as well as lord of the dead.[771] On the other hand, if the
earth had originally been thought of as a female, she as Earth-mother
would be ancestress of men. But her place in the myth would easily be
taken by the Earth or Under-earth god, perhaps regarded as her son or
her consort. In other cases, clans, families, or individuals often
traced their descent to gods or divine animals or plants. Classical
writers occasionally speak of the origin of branches of the Celtic race
from eponymous founders, perhaps from their knowledge of existing Celtic
myths.[772] Ammianus Marcellinus also reports a Druidic tradition to the
effect that some Gauls were indigenous, some had come from distant
islands, and others from beyond the Rhine.[773] But this is not so much
a myth of origins, as an explanation of the presence of different
peoples in Gaul--the aborigines, the Celtae, and the Belgic Gauls. M.
D'Arbois assumes that "distant islands" means the Celtic Elysium, which
he regards as the land of the dead,[774] but the phrase is probably no
more than a distorted reminiscence of the far-off lands whence early
groups of Celts had reached Gaul.
Of the creation of the world no complete myth has survived, though from
a gloss to the _Senchus Mor_ we learn that the Druids, like the
Br[=a]hmans, boasted that they had made sun, moon, earth, and sea--a
boast in keeping with their supposed powers over the elements.[775]
Certain folk-beliefs, regarding the origin of different parts of nature,
bear a close resemblance to primitive cosmogonic myths, and they may be
taken as _disjecta membra_ of similar myths held by the Celts and
perhaps taught by the Druids. Thus sea, rivers, or springs arose from
the micturition of a giant, fairy, or saint, or from their sweat or
blood. Islands are rocks cast by giants, and mountains are the material
thrown up by them as they were working on the earth. Wells sprang up
from the blood of a martyr or from the touch of a saint's or a fairy's
staff.[776] The sea originated from a magic cask given by God to a
woman. The spigot, when opened, could not be closed again, and the cask
never ceased running until the waters covered the earth--a tale with
savage parallels.[777] In all these cases, giant, saint, or fairy has
doubtless taken the place of a god, since the stories have a very
primitive _facies_. The giant is frequently Gargantua, probably himself
once a divinity. Other references in Irish texts point to the common
cosmogonic myth of the earth having gradually assumed its present form.
Thus many new lakes and plains are said to have been formed in Ireland
during the time of Partholan and Nemed, the plains being apparently
built up out of existing materials.[778] In some cases the formation of
a lake was the result of digging the grave of some personage after whom
the lake was then named.[779] Here we come upon the familiar idea of the
danger of encroaching on the domain of a deity, e.g. that of the
Earth-god, by digging the earth, with the consequent punishment by a
flood. The same conception is found in Celtic stories of a lake or river
formed from the overflowing of a sacred well through human carelessness
or curiosity, which led to the anger of the divinity of the well.[780]
Or, again, a town or castle is submerged on account of the wickedness of
its inhabitants, the waters being produced by the curse of God or a
saint (replacing a pagan god) and forming a lake.[781] These may be
regarded as forms of a Celtic deluge-myth, which in one case, that of
the Welsh story of the ship of Nevyd, which saved Dwyvan and Dwyfach and
a pair of all kinds of animals when Lake Llion overflowed, has
apparently borrowed from the Biblical story.[782] In other cases lakes
are formed from the tears of a god, e.g. Manannan, whose tears at the
death of his son formed three lochs in Erin.[783] Apollonius reports
that the waters of Eridanus originated from the tears of Apollo when
driven from heaven by his father.[784] This story, which he says is
Celtic, has been clothed by him in a Greek form, and the god in question
may have been Belenos, equated with Apollo. Sometimes the formation of
streams was ascribed to great hail-storms--an evident mythic rendering
of the damage done by actual spates, while the Irish myths of
"illimitable sea-bursts," of which three particular instances are often
mentioned, were doubtless the result of the experience of tidal waves.
Although no complete account of the end of all things, like that of the
Scandinavian Ragnarok, has survived, scattered hints tell of its former
existence. Strabo says that the Druids taught that "fire and water must
one day prevail"--an evident belief in some final cataclysm.[785] This
is also hinted at in the words of certain Gauls to Alexander, telling
him that what they feared most of all was the fall of the heavens upon
their heads.[786] In other words, they feared what would be the signal
of the end of all things. On Irish ground the words of Conchobar may
refer to this. He announced that he would rescue the captives and spoil
taken by Medb, unless the heavens fell, and the earth burst open, and
the sea engulphed all things.[787] Such a myth mingled with Christian
beliefs may underlie the prophecy of Badb after Mag-tured regarding the
evils to come and the end of the world, and that of Fercertne in the
_Colloquy of the Two Sages_.[788] Both have a curious resemblance to the
Sybil's prophecy of doom in the Voluspa. If the gods themselves were
involved in such a catastrophe, it would not be surprising, since in
some aspects their immortality depended on their eating and drinking
immortal food and drink.[789]
FOOTNOTES:
[766] Avienus, _Ora Maritima_, 644 f.
[767] _IT_ i. 25; Gaidoz, _ZCP_ i. 27.
[768] _Annales de Bretagne_, x. 414.
[769] _IT_ i. 50, cf. 184; _Folk-Lore_, vi. 170.
[770] Caesar, vi. 18.
[771] See p. 341, _infra_.
[772] Diod. Sic. v. 24; Appian, _Illyrica_, 2.
[773] Amm. Marcel, xv. 9.
[774] D'Arbois, ii. 262, xii. 220.
[775] _Antient Laws of Ireland_, i. 23. In one MS. Adam is said to have
been created thus--his body of earth, his blood of the sea, his face of
the sun, his breath of the wind, etc. This is also found in a Frisian
tale (Vigfusson-Powell, _Corpus Poet. Bor._ i. 479), and both stories
present an inversion of well-known myths about the creation of the
universe from the members of a giant.
[776] Sebillot, i. 213 f., ii. 6, 7, 72, 97, 176, 327-328. Cf. _RC_ xv.
482, xvi. 152.
[777] Sebillot, ii. 6.
[778] _LL_ 56; Keating, 117, 123.
[779] _RC_ xv. 429, xvi. 277.
[780] See p. 191, _supra_.
[781] Sebillot, ii. 41 f., 391, 397; see p. 372, _infra_.
[782] _Triads_ in Loth, ii. 280, 299; Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 583, 663.
[783] _RC_ xvi. 50, 146.
[784] Apoll. iv. 609 f.
[785] Strabo, iv. 4. 4.
[786] Arrian, _Anab._ i. 4. 7; Strabo, vii. 3. 8. Cf. Jullian, 85.
[787] _LL_ 94; Miss Hull |
