Early Bardic Literature, Ireland Part 3

These divine nations, with their many successive generations and dynasties, const.i.tute a single family; they are all inter-connected and spring from common sources, and where the literature permits us to see more clearly, the earlier races exhibit a common character. Like a human clan, the elements of this divine family grew and died, and shed forth seedlings which, in time, over-grew and killed the parent stock. Great names became obscure and pa.s.sed away, and new ones grew and became great. G.o.ds, wors.h.i.+pped by the whole nation, declined and became topical, and minor deities expanding, became national. G.o.ds lost their immortality, and were remembered as giants of the old time--mighty men, which were of yore, men of renown.

"The G.o.ds which were of old time rest in their tombs,"

sang the Egyptians, consciously ascribing mortality even to G.o.ds.

Such was Mac Ere, King of Fir-bolgs. His temple [Note: Strand near Ballysadare, Co. Sligo], beside the sea at Iorrus Domnan [Note: Keating--evidently quoting a bardic historian], became his tomb. Daily the salt tide embraces the feet of the great tumulus, regal amongst its smaller comrades, where the last king of Fir-bolgs was wors.h.i.+pped by his people. "Good [Note: Temple--vide post.] were the years of the sovereignty of Mac Ere. There was no wet or tempestuous weather in Ireland, nor was there any unfruitful year." Such were all the predecessors of the children of Dana--G.o.ds which were of old times, that rest in their tombs; and the days, too, of the Tuatha De Danan were numbered. They, too, smitten by a more celestial light, vanished from their hills, like Ossian lamenting over his own heroes; those others still mightier, might say:--

"Once every step which we took might be heard throughout the firmament. Now, all have gone, they have melted into the air."

But that divine tree, though it had its branches in fairy-land, had its roots in the soil of Erin. An unceasing translation of heroes into Tir-na-n-og went on through time, the fairy-world of the bards, receiving every century new inhabitants, whose humbler human origin being forgotten, were supplied there with both wives and children. The apotheosis of great men went forward, tirelessly; the hero of one epoch becoming the G.o.d of the next, until the formation of the Tuatha De Danan, who represent the G.o.ds of the historic ages. Had the advent of exact genealogy been delayed, and the creative imagination of the bards suffered to work on for a couple of centuries longer, unchecked by the historical conscience, Cuculain's human origin would, perhaps, have been forgotten, and he would have been numbered amongst the Tuatha De Danan, probably, as the son of Lu Lamfada and the Moreega, his patron deities.

It was, indeed, a favourite fancy of the bards that not Sualtam, but Lu Lamfada himself, was his father; this, however, in a spiritual or supernatural sense, for his age was far removed from that of the Tuatha De Danan, and falling well within the scope of the historic period.

Even as late as the time of Alexander, the Greeks could believe a great contemporary warrior to be of divine origin, and the son of Zeus.

When the Irish bards began to elaborate a general history of their country, they naturally commenced with the enumeration of the elder G.o.ds. I at one time suspected that the long pedigrees running between those several divisions of the mythological period were the invention of mediaeval historians, anxious to spin out the national record, that it might reach to s.h.i.+nar and the dispersion. Not only, however, was such fabrication completely foreign to the genius of the literature, but in the fragments of those early divine cycles, we see that each of these personages was at one time the centre of a literature, and holds a definite place as regards those who went before and came after.

These pedigrees, as I said before, have no historical meaning, being pre-Milesian, and therefore absolutely prehistoric; but as the genealogy of the G.o.ds, and as representing the successive generations of that invisible family, whose history not one or ten bards, but the whole bardic and druidic organisation of the island, delighted to record, collate, and verify--those pedigrees are as reliable as that of any of the regal clans. They represent accurately the mythological panorama, as it unrolled itself slowly through the centuries before the imagination and spirit of our ancestors accurately that divine drama, millennium--lasting, with its exits and entrances of G.o.ds.

Millennium-lasting, and more so, for it is plain that one divine generation represents on the average a much greater s.p.a.ce of time than a generation of mortal men. The former probably represents the period which would elapse before a hero would become so divine, that is, so consecrated in the imagination of the country, as to be received into the family of the G.o.ds. Cuculain died in the era of the Incarnation, three hundred years, if not more, before the country even began to be Christianised, yet he is never spoken of as anything but a great hero, from which one of two things would follow, either that the apotheosis of heroes needed the lapse of centuries, or that, during the first, second, third, and fourth centuries, the historical conscience was so enlightened, and a positive definite knowledge of the past so universal, that the translation of heroes into the divine clans could no longer take place. The latter is indeed the more correct view; but the reader will, I think, agree with me that the divine generations, taken generally, represent more than the average s.p.a.ce of man's life. To what remote unimagined distances of time those earlier cycles extend has been shown by an examination of the tombs of the lower Moy Tura. The ancient heroes there interred were those who, as Fir-bolgs, preceded the reign of the Tuath De Danan, coming long after the Clanna Nemedh in the divine cycle, who were themselves preceded by the children of Partholan, who were subsequent to the Queen Keasair. Such then being the position in the divine cycle of the Fir-bolgs, an examination of the Firbolgic raths on Moy Tura has revealed only implements of stone, proving demonstratively that the early divine cycles originated before the bronze age in Ireland, whenever that commenced. Those heroes who, as Fir-bolgs, received divine honours, lived in the age of stone. So far is it from being the case, that the mythological record has been extended and unduly stretched, to enable the monkish historians to connect the Irish pedigrees with those of the Mosaic record, that it has, I believe, been contracted for this purpose.

The reader will be now prepared to peruse with some interest and understanding one or two of the mythological pedigrees. To these I have at times appended the dates, as given in the chronicles, to show how the early historians rationalised the pre-historic record.

Angus Og, the Beautiful, represents the Greek Eros. He was surnamed Og, or young; Mac-an-Og, or the son of youth; Mac-an-Dagda, son of the Dagda. He was represented with a harp, and attended by bright birds, his own transformed kisses, at whose singing love arose in the hearts of youths and maidens. To him and to his father the great tumulus of New Grange, upon the Boyne, was sacred.

"I visited the Royal Brugh that stands By the dark-rolling waters of the Boyne, Where Angus Og magnificently dwells."

He was the patron G.o.d of Diarmid, the Paris of Ossian's Fianna, and removed him into Tir-na-n-Og, when he died, having been ripped by the tusks of the wild boar on the peaks of Slieve Gulban.

Lu Lamfada was the patron G.o.d of Cuculain. He was surnamed Ioldana, as the source of the sciences, and represented the Greek Apollo. The latter was argurgurotoxos [Transcriber's Note: Greek in the original], but Lu was a sling bearing G.o.d. Of Fomorian descent on the mother's side, he joined his father's people, the Tuatha De Danan, in the great war against the Fomoroh. He is princ.i.p.ally celebrated for his oppression of the sons of Turann, in vengeance for the murder of his father.

ANGUS OG, (circa 1500 B.C.) LU LAMFADA, (circa 1500 B.C.) son of son of THE DAGDA, (Zeus) Cian, son of son of Elathan, Diancect, (G.o.d the healer) son of son of Dela, Esric, son of son of Ned, Dela, son of son of Indaei, Ned, son of son of Indaei, son of ALLDAEI.

Amongst other Irish G.o.ds was Bove Derg, who dwelt invisible in the Galtee mountains, and in the hills above Lough Derg. The transformed children alluded to in Vol. I. were his grand-children. It was his goldsmith Len, who gave its ancient name to the Lakes of Killarney, Locha Lein. Here by the lake he worked, surrounded by rainbows and showers of fiery dew.

Mananan was the G.o.d of the sea, of winds and storms, and most skilled in magic lore. He was friendly to Cuculain, and was invoked by seafaring men. He was called the Far Shee of the promontories.

BOVE DERG (circa 1500 B.C.) MANANAN (circa 1500 B.C.) son of son of Eocaidh Garf, Alloid, son of son of Duach Temen, Elathan, son of son of Bras, Dela, son of son of Dela, Ned, son of son of Ned, Indaei, son of son of Indaei, son of ALLDAEI.

The Tuatha De Danan maybe counted literally by the hundred, each with a distinct history, and all descended from Alldaei.

From Alldaei the pedigree runs back thus:--

Alldaei son of Tath, son of Tabarn, son of Enna, son of Baath, son of Ebat, son of Betah, son of Iarbanel, son of NEMEDH (circa 1700 B.C.)

Nemedh, as I have said, forms one of the great epochs in the mythological record. As will be seen, he and the earlier Partholan have a common source:--

NEMEDH son of Sera, son of Pamp, son of Tath, PARTHOLAN (2000 B.C.) son of son of Sera, son of Sru, son of Esru, son of Pramant.

The connection between Keasair, the earliest of the Irish G.o.ds, and the rest of the cycle, I have not discovered, but am confident of its existence.

How this divine cycle can be expunged from the history of Ireland I am at a loss to see. The account which a nation renders of itself must, and always does, stand at the head of every history.

How different is this from the history and genealogy of the Greek G.o.ds which runs thus:--

The Olympian G.o.ds, t.i.tans, Physical ent.i.ties, Nox, Chaos, &c.

The Greek G.o.ds, undoubtedly, had a long ancestry extending into the depths of the past, but the sudden advent of civilisation broke up the bardic system before the historians could become philosophical, or philosophers interested in antiquities.

But the Irish history corrects our view with regard to other matters connected with the G.o.ds of the Aryan nations of Europe also.

All the nations of Europe lived at one time under the bardic and druidic system, and under that system imagined their G.o.ds and elaborated their various theogonies, yet, in no country in Europe has a bardic literature been preserved except in Ireland, for no thinking man can believe Homer to have been a product of that rude type of civilisation of which he sings. This being the case, modern philosophy, accounting for the origin of the cla.s.sical deities by guesses and _a priori_ reasonings, has almost universally adopted that explanation which I have, elsewhere, called Wordsworthian, and which derives them directly from the imagination personifying the aspects of nature.

"In that fair clime, the lonely herdsman, stretched On the soft gra.s.s through half a summer's day, With music lulled his indolent repose, And in some fit of weariness if he, When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear A distant strain far sweeter than the sounds Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetched, Even from the blazing chariot of the sun, A beardless youth who touched a golden lute And filled the illumined groves with ravishment-- ***

"Sunbeams upon distant hills, Gliding apace with shadows in their train, Might, with small help from fancy, be transformed Into fleet oreads, sporting visibly."

This is pretty, but untrue. In all the ancient Irish literature we find the connection of the G.o.ds, both those who survived into the historic times, and those whom they had dethroned, with the raths and cairns perpetually and almost universally insisted upon. The scene of the destruction of the Firbolgs will be found to be a place of tombs, the metropolis of the Fomorians a place of tombs, and a place of tombs the sacred home of the Tuatha along the sh.o.r.es of the Boyne. Doubtless, they are represented also as dwelling in the hills, lakes, and rivers, but still the connection between the great raths and cairns and the G.o.ds is never really forgotten. When the floruit of a G.o.d has expired, he is a.s.signed a tomb in one of the great tumuli. No one can peruse this ancient literature without seeing clearly the genesis of the Irish G.o.ds, _videlicet_ heroes, pa.s.sing, through the imagination and through the region of poetic representation, into the world of the supernatural.

When a king died, his people raised his ferta, set up his stone, and engraved upon it, at least in later times, his name in ogham. They celebrated his death with funeral lamentations and funeral games, and listened to the bards chanting his prowess, his liberality, and his beauty. In the case of great warriors, these games and lamentations became periodical. It is distinctly recorded in many places, for instance in connection with Taylti, who gave her name to Taylteen and Garman, who gave her name to Loch Garman, now Wexford, and with Lu Lamfada, whose annual wors.h.i.+p gave its name to the Kalends of August.

Gradually, as his actual achievements became more remote, and the imagination of the bards, proportionately, more unrestrained, he would pa.s.s into the world of the supernatural. Even in the case of a hero so surrounded with historic light as Cuculain we find a halo, as of G.o.dhood, often settling around him. His gray warsteed had already pa.s.sed into the realm of mythical representation, as a second avatar of the Liath Macha, the grey war-horse of the war-G.o.ddess Macha. This could be believed, even in the days when the imagination was controlled by the annalists and tribal heralds.

The G.o.ds of the Irish were their deified ancestors. They were not the offspring of the poetic imagination, personifying the various aspects of nature. Traces, indeed, we find of their influence over the operations of nature, but they are, upon the whole, slight and unimportant.

From nature they extract her secrets by their necromantic and magical labours, but nature is as yet too great to be governed and impelled by them. The Irish Apollo had not yet entered into the sun.

Like every country upon which imperial Rome did not leave the impress of her genius, Ireland, in these ethnic times, attained only a partial unity. The chief king indeed presided at Tara, and enjoyed the reputation and emoluments flowing to him on that account, but, upon the whole, no Irish king exercised more than a local sovereignty; they were all reguli, petty kings, and their direct authority was small. This being the case, it would appear to me that in the more ancient times the death of a king would not be an event which would disturb a very extensive district, and that, though his tomb might be considerable, it would not be gigantic.

Now on the banks of the Boyne, opposite Rosnaree, there stands a tumulus, said to be the greatest in Europe. It covers acres of ground, being of proportionate height. The earth is confined by a compact stone wall about twelve feet high. The central chamber, made of huge irregular pebbles, is about twenty feet from ground to roof, communicating with the outer air by a flagged pa.s.sage. Immense pebbles, drawn from the County of Antrim, stand around it, each of which, even to move at all, would require the labour of many men, a.s.sisted with mechanical appliances. It is, of course, impossible to make an accurate estimate of the expenditure of labour necessary for the construction of such a work, but it would seem to me to require thousands of men working for years.

Can we imagine that a petty king of those times could, after his death, when probably his successor had enough to do to sustain his new authority, command such labour merely to provide for himself a tomb. If this tomb were raised to the hero whose name it bears immediately after his death, and in his mundane character, he must have been such a king as never existed in Ireland, even in the late Christian times.

Even Brian of the Tributes himself, could not have commanded such a sepulture, or anything like it, living though he did, probably, two thousand years later than that Eocaidh Mac Elathan, whenever he did live. There is a _nodus_ here needing a G.o.d to solve it.

Returning now to what would most likely take place after the interment of a hero, we may well imagine that the size of his tomb would be in proportion to the love which he inspired, where no accidental causes would interfere with the gratification of that feeling. Of one of his heroes, Ossian, sings--

"We made his cairn great and high Like a king's."

After that there would be periodical meetings in his honour, the celebration of games, solemn recitations by bards, singing his aristeia [Transcriber's Note: Greek in the original]. Gradually the new wine would burst the old bottles. The ever-active, eager-loving imagination would behold the champion grown to heroic proportions, the favourite of the G.o.ds, the performer of superhuman feats. The tomb, which was once commensurate with the love and reverence which he inspired, would seem so now no longer. The tribal bards, wandering or attending the great fairs and a.s.semblies, would disperse among strangers and neighbours a knowledge of his renown. In the same cemetery or neighbourhood their might be other tombs of heroes now forgotten, while he, whose fame was in every bardic mouth in all that region, was honoured only with a tomb no greater than theirs. The mere king or champion, grown into a topical hero, would need a greater tomb.

Ere long again, owing to the bardic fraternity, who, though coming from Innishowen or Cape Clear, formed a single community, the topical hero would, in some cases, where his character was such as would excite deeper reverence and greater fame, grow into a national hero, and a still n.o.bler tomb be required, in order that the visible memorial might prove commensurate with the imaginative conception.

Now all this time the periodic celebrations, the games, and lamentations, and songs would be a.s.suming a more solemn character. Awe would more and more mingle with the other feelings inspired by his name.

Certain rites and a certain ritual would attend those annual games and lamentations, which would formerly not have been suitable, and eventually, when the hero, slowly drawing nearer through generations, if not centuries, at last reached Tir-na-n-Og, and was received into the family of the G.o.ds, a religious feeling of a different nature would mingle with the more secular celebration of his memory, and his rath or cairn would a.s.sume in their eyes a new character.

To an ardent imaginative people the complete extinction by death of a much-loved hero would even at first be hardly possible. That the tomb which held his ashes should be looked upon as the house of the hero must have been, even shortly after his interment, a prevailing sentiment, whether expressed or not. Also, the feeling must have been present, that the hero in whose honour they performed the annual games, and periodically chanted the remembrance of whose achievements, saw and heard those things that were done in his honour. But as the celebration became greater and more solemn, this feeling would become more strong, and as the tomb, from a small heap of stones or low mound, grew into an enormous and imposing rath, the belief that this was the hero's house, in which he invisibly dwelt, could not be avoided, even before they ceased to regard him as a disembodied hero; and after the hero had mingled with the divine clans, and was numbered amongst the G.o.ds, the idea that the rath was a tomb could not logically be entertained. As a G.o.d, was he not one of those who had eaten of the food provided by Mananan, and therefore never died. The rath would then become his house or temple. As matter of fact, the bardic writings teem with this idea.

From reason and probability, we would with some certainty conclude that the great tumulus of New Grange was the temple of some Irish G.o.d; but that it was so, we know as a fact. The father and king of the G.o.ds is alluded to as dwelling there, going out from thence, and returning again, and there holding his invisible court.

"Behold the _Sid_ before your eyes, It is manifest to you that it is a king's mansion."

[Note: O'Curry's Ma.n.u.script Materials of Irish History, page 505.]

"Bove Derg went to visit the Dagda at the Brugh of Mac-An-Og."

[Note: "Dream of Angus," Revue Celtique, Vol. III., page 349.]

Here also dwelt Angus Og, the son of the Dagda. In this, his spiritual court or temple, he is represented as having entertained Oscar and the Ossianic heroes, and thither he conducted [Note: Publications of Ossianic Society, Vol. III., page 201.] the spirit of Diarmid, that he might have him for ever there.

In the etymology also we see the origin of the Irish G.o.ds. A grave in Irish is Sid, the disembodied spirit is Sidhe, and this latter word glosses Tuatha De Danan.

The fact that the grave of a hero developed slowly into the temple of a G.o.d, explains certain obscurities in the annals and literature. As a hero was exalted into a G.o.d, so in turn a G.o.d sank into a hero, or rather into the race of the giants. The elder G.o.ds, conquered and destroyed by the younger, could no longer be regarded as really divine, for were they not proved to be mortal? The development of the temple from the tomb was not forgotten, the whole country being filled with such tombs and incipient temples, from the great Brugh on the Boyne to the smallest mound in any of the cemeteries. Thus, when the elder G.o.ds lost their spiritual sovereignty, and their destruction at the hands of the younger took the form of great battles, then as the G.o.d was forced to become a giant, so his temple was remembered to be a tomb. Doubtless, in his own territory, divine honours were still paid him; but in the national imagination and in the cla.s.sical literature and received history, he was a giant of the olden time, slain by the G.o.ds, and interred in the rath which bore his name. Such was the great Mac Erc, King of Fir-bolgs.