The Religion of the Ancient Celts Part 41

[1198] Nutt-Meyer, i. 45 f., text and translation.

[1199] Ibid. 42 f.

[1200] Ibid. 58. The simultaneous birth formula occurs in many _Marchen_, though that of the future wife is not common.

[1201] Nutt-Meyer, i. 52, 57, 85, 87.

[1202] _ZCP_ ii. 316 f. Here Mongan comes directly from Elysium, as does Oisin before meeting S. Patrick.

[1203] _IT_ iii. 345; O'Grady, ii. 88. Cf. Rees, 331.

[1204] Guest, iii. 356 f.; see p. 116, _supra_.

[1205] In some of the tales the small animal still exists independently after the birth, but this is probably not their primitive form.

[1206] See my _Religion: Its Origin and Forms_, 76-77.

[1207] Skene, i. 532. After relating various shapes in which he has been, the poet adds that he has been a grain which a hen received, and that he rested in her womb as a child. The reference in this early poem from a fourteenth century MS. shows that the fusion of the _Marchen_ formula with a myth of rebirth was already well known. See also Guest, iii. 362, for verses in which the transformations during the combat are exaggerated.

[1208] Skene, i. 276, 532.

[1209] Miss Hull, 67; D'Arbois, v. 331.

[1210] For various forms of _geno_-, see Holder, i. 2002; Stokes, _US_ 110.

[1211] For all these names see Holder, _s.v._

[1212] S. Aug. _de Civ. Dei_, xv. 23; Isidore, _Orat._ viii. 2. 103.

_Dusios_ may be connected with Lithuanian _dvaese_, "spirit," and perhaps with [Greek: Thehos] (Holder, _s.v._). D'Arbois sees in the _dusii_ water-spirits, and compares river-names like Dhuys, Duseva, Dusius (vi. 182; _RC_ xix. 251). The word may be connected with Irish _duis_, glossed "n.o.ble" (Stokes, _TIG_ 76). The Bretons still believe in fairies called _duz_, and our word _dizzy_ may be connected with _dusios_, and would then have once signified the madness following on the _amour_, like Greek [Greek: nympholeptos], or "the inconvenience of their succubi," described by Kirk in his _Secret Commonwealth of the Elves_.

[1213] _LL_ 12_b_; _TOS_ v. 234.

[1214] Rh[^y]s, _HL_ 549.

[1215] Skene, i. 276, 309, etc.

[1216] Sigerson, _Bards of the Gael_, 379.

[1217] Miss Hull, 288; Hyde, _Lit. Hist. of Ireland_, 300.

[1218] _RC_ xxvi. 21.

[1219] Skene, ii. 506.

[1220] D'Arbois, ii. 246, where he also derives Erigena's pantheism from Celtic beliefs, such as he supposes to be exemplified by these poems.

[1221] _LU_ 15_a_; D'Arbois, ii. 47 f.; Nutt-Meyer, ii. 294 f.

[1222] Another method of accounting for this knowledge was to imagine a long-lived personage like Fintan who survived for 5000 years. D'Arbois, ii. ch. 4. Here there was no transformation or rebirth.

[1223] Nutt-Meyer, i. 24; _ZCP_ ii. 316.

[1224] O'Curry, _MS. Mat._ 78.

[1225] Wood-Martin, _Pagan Ireland_, 140; _Choice Notes_, 61; Monnier, 143; Maury, 272.

[1226] _Choice Notes_, 69; Rees, 92; Le Braz{2}, ii. 82, 86, 307; _Rev.

des Trad. Pop._ xii. 394.

[1227] Le Braz{2}, ii. 80; _Folk-lore Jour._ v. 189.

[1228] _Folk-Lore_, iv. 352.

[1229] Carmichael, _Carm. Gadel._ ii. 334; Rh[^y]s, _CFL_ 602; Le Braz{2}, i. 179, 191, 200.

[1230] Mr. Nutt, _Voyage of Bran_, derived the origin of the rebirth conception from orgiastic cults.

CHAPTER XXIV.

ELYSIUM.

The Celtic conception of Elysium, the product at once of religion, mythology, and romantic imagination, is found in a series of Irish and Welsh tales. We do not know that a similar conception existed among the continental Celts, but, considering the likeness of their beliefs in other matters to those of the insular Celts, there is a strong probability that it did. There are four typical presentations of the Elysium conception. In Ireland, while the G.o.ds were believed to have retired within the hills or _sid_, it is not unlikely that some of them had always been supposed to live in these or in a subterranean world, and it is therefore possible that what may be called the subterranean or _sid_ type of Elysium is old. But other types also appear--that of a western island Elysium, of a world below the waters, and of a world co-extensive with this and entered by a mist.

The names of the Irish Elysium are sometimes of a general character--Mag Mor, "the Great Plain"; Mag Mell, "the Pleasant Plain"; Tir n'Aill, "the Other-world"; Tir na m-Beo, "the Land of the Living"; Tir na n-Og, "the Land of Youth"; and Tir Tairngiri, "the Land of Promise"--possibly of Christian origin. Local names are Tir fa Tonn, "Land under Waves"; I-Bresail and the Land of Falga, names of the island Elysium. The last denotes the Isle of Man as Elysium, and it may have been so regarded by Goidels in Britain at an early time.[1231] To this period may belong the tales of Cuchulainn's raid on Falga, carried at a later time to Ireland.

Tir Tairngiri is also identified with the Isle of Man.[1232]

A brief resume of the princ.i.p.al Elysium tales is necessary as a preliminary to a discussion of the problems which they involve, though it can give but little idea of the beauty and romanticism of the tales themselves. These, if not actually composed in pagan times, are based upon story-germs current before the coming of Christianity to Ireland.

1. _The sid Elysium._--In the story of Etain, when Mider discovered her in her rebirth, he described the land whither he would carry her, its music and its fair people, its warm streams, its choice mead and wine.

There is eternal youth, and love is blameless. It is within Mider's _sid_, and Etain accompanies him there. In the sequel King Eochaid's Druid discovers the _sid_, which is captured by the king, who then regains Etain.[1233] Other tales refer to the _sid_ in similar terms, and describe its treasures, its food and drink better than those of earth. It is in most respects similar to the island Elysium, save that it is localised on earth.

2. _The island Elysium._--The story of the voyage of Bran is found fragmentarily in the eleventh century _LU_, and complete in the fourteenth and sixteenth century MSS. It tells how Bran heard mysterious music when asleep. On waking he found a silver branch with blossoms, and next day there appeared a mysterious woman singing the glory of the land overseas, its music, its wonderful tree, its freedom from pain and death. It is one of thrice fifty islands to the west of Erin, and there she dwells with thousands of "motley women." Before she disappears the branch leaps into her hand. Bran set sail with his comrades and met Manannan crossing the sea in his chariot. The G.o.d told him that the sea was a flowery plain, Mag Mell, and that all around, unseen to Bran, were people playing and drinking "without sin." He bade him sail on to the Land of Women. Then the voyagers went on and reached the Isle of Joy, where one of their number remained behind. At last they came to the Land of Women, and we hear of their welcome, the dreamlike lapse of time, the food and drink which had for each the taste he desired. Finally the tale recounts their home-sickness, the warning they received not to set foot on Erin, how one of their number leaped ash.o.r.e and turned to ashes, how Bran from his boat told of his wanderings and then disappeared for ever.[1234]

Another story tells how Connla was visited by a G.o.ddess from Mag Mell.

Her people dwell in a _sid_ and are called "men of the _sid_." She invites him to go to the immortal land, and departs, leaving him an apple, which supports him for a month without growing less. Then she reappears and tells Connla that "the Ever-Living Ones" desire him to join them. She bids him come with her to the Land of Joy where there are only women. He steps into her crystal boat and vanishes from his father and the Druid who has vainly tried to exercise his spells against her.[1235] In this tale there is a confusion between the _sid_ and the island Elysium.

The eighteenth century poem of Oisin in Tir na n-Og is probably based on old legends, and describes how Niam, daughter of the king of Tir na n-Og, placed _geasa_ on Oisin to accompany her to that land of immortal youth and beauty. He mounted on her steed, which plunged forwards across the sea, and brought them to the land where Oisin spent three hundred years before returning to Ireland, and there suffering, as has been seen, from the breaking of the tabu not to set foot on the soil of Erin.[1236]

In _Serglige Conculaind_, "Cuchulainn's Sickness," the G.o.ddess Fand, deserted by Manannan, offers herself to the hero if he will help her sister's husband Labraid against his enemies in Mag Mell. Labraid lives in an island frequented by troops of women, and possessing an inexhaustible vat of mead and trees with magic fruit. It is reached with marvellous speed in a boat of bronze. After a preliminary visit by his charioteer Laeg, Cuchulainn goes thither, vanquishes Labraid's foes, and remains a month with Fand. He returns to Ireland, and now we hear of the struggle for him between his wife Emer and Fand. But Manannan suddenly appears, reawakens Fand's love, and she departs with him. The G.o.d shakes his cloak between her and Cuchulainn to prevent their ever meeting again.[1237] In this story Labraid, Fand, and Liban, Fand's sister, though dwellers on an island Elysium, are called _sid_-folk. The two regions are partially confused, but not wholly, since Manannan is described as coming from his own land (Elysium) to woo Fand. Apparently Labraid of the Swift Hand on the Sword (who, though called "chief of the _side_", is certainly a war-G.o.d) is at enmity with Manannan's hosts, and it is these with whom Cuchulainn has to fight.[1238]

In an Ossianic tale several of the Fians were carried off to the Land of Promise. After many adventures, Fionn, Diarmaid, and others discover them, and threaten to destroy the land if they are not restored. Its king, Avarta, agrees to the restoration, and with fifteen of his men carries the Fians to Erin on one horse. Having reached there, he bids them look at a certain field, and while they are doing so, he and his men disappear.[1239]

3. _Land under Waves._--Fiachna, of the men of the _sid_, appeared to the men of Connaught, and begged their help against Goll, who had abducted his wife. Loegaire and his men dive with Fiachna into Loch Naneane, and reach a wonderful land, with marvellous music and where the rain is ale. They and the _sid_-folk attack the fort of Mag Mell and defeat Goll. Each then obtains a woman of the _side_, but at the end of a year they become homesick. They are warned not to descend from horseback in Erin. Arrived among their own people, they describe the marvels of Tir fa Tonn, and then return there, and are no more seen.[1240] Here, again, the _sid_ Elysium and Land under Waves are confused, and the divine tribes are at war, as in the story of Cuchulainn.

In a section of the Ossianic tale just cited, Fionn and his men arrive on an island, where Diarmaid reaches a beautiful country at the bottom of a well. This is Tir fa Tonn, and Diarmaid fights its king who has usurped his nephew's inheritance, and thus recovers it for him.[1241]