Part 11 (1/2)

Eochy, however, would not accept defeat, and now ensues what I think is the earliest recorded war with Fairyland since the first dispossession of the Danaans. After searching Ireland for his wife in vain, he summoned to his aid the Druid Dalan. Dalan tried for a year by every means in his power to find out where she was. At last he made what seems to have been an operation of wizardry of special strengthhe made three wands of yew, and upon the wands he wrote an ogham; and by the keys of wisdom that he had, and by the ogham, it was revealed to him that Etain was in the fairy mound of Bri-Leith, and that Midir had borne her thither.

Eochy then a.s.sembled his forces to storm and destroy the fairy mound in which was the palace of Midir. It is said that he was nine years digging up one mound after another, while Midir and his folk repaired the devastation as fast as it was made. At last Midir, driven to the last stronghold, attempted a stratagemhe offered to give up Etain, and sent her with fifty handmaids to the king, but made them all so much alike that Eochy could not distinguish the true Etain from her images. She herself, it is said, gave him a sign by which to know her. The motive of the tale, including the choice of the mortal rather than the G.o.d, reminds one of the beautiful Hindu legend of Damayanti and Nala. Eochy regained his queen, who lived with him till his death, ten years afterwards, and bore him one daughter, who was named Etain, like herself.

*The Tale of Conary Mor*

From this Etain ultimately sprang the great king Conary Mor, who s.h.i.+nes in Irish legend as the supreme type of royal splendour, power, and beneficence, and whose overthrow and death were compa.s.sed by the Danaans in vengeance for the devastation of their sacred dwellings by Eochy. The tale in which the death of Conary is related is one of the most antique and barbaric in conception of all Irish legends, but it has a magnificence of imagination which no other can rival. To this great story the tale of Etain and Midir may be regarded as what the Irish called a _priomscel_, introductory tale, showing the more remote origin of the events related.

The genealogy of Conary Mor will help the reader to understand the connexion of events.

Eochy=Etain.

Cormac, King=Etain Oig (Etain the younger).

of Ulster.

Eterskel, King=Messbuachalla (the cowherds fosterling).

of Erin.

Conary Mor.

*The Law of the Geis*

The tale of Conary introduces us for the first time to the law or inst.i.tution of the _geis_, which plays henceforward a very important part in Irish legend, the violation or observance of a _geis_ being frequently the turning-point in a tragic narrative. We must therefore delay a moment to explain to the reader exactly what this peculiar inst.i.tution was.

Dineens Irish Dictionary explains the word _geis_ (p.r.o.nounced gayshplural, gaysha) as meaning a bond, a spell, a prohibition, a taboo, a magical injunction, the violation of which led to misfortune and death.(128) Every Irish chieftain or personage of note had certain _geise_ peculiar to himself which he must not transgress. These _geise_ had sometimes reference to a code of chivalrythus Dermot of the Love-spot, when appealed to by Grania to take her away from Finn, is under _geise_ not to refuse protection to a woman. Or they may be merely superst.i.tious or fantasticthus Conary, as one of his _geise_, is forbidden to follow three red hors.e.m.e.n on a road, nor must he kill birds (this is because, as we shall see, his totem was a bird). It is a _geis_ to the Ulster champion, Fergus mac Roy, that he must not refuse an invitation to a feast; on this turns the Tragedy of the Sons of Usnach. It is not at all clear who imposed these _geise_ or how any one found out what his personal _geise_ wereall that was doubtless an affair of the Druids. But they were regarded as sacred obligations, and the worst misfortunes were to be apprehended from breaking them. Originally, no doubt, they were regarded as a means of keeping oneself in proper relations with the other worldthe world of Faryand were akin to the well-known Polynesian practice of the tabu. I prefer, however, to retain the Irish word as the only fitting one for the Irish practice.

*The Cowherds Fosterling*

We now return to follow the fortunes of Etains great-grandson, Conary.

Her daughter, Etain Oig, as we have seen from the genealogical table, married Cormac, King of Ulster. She bore her husband no children save one daughter only. Embittered by her barrenness and his want of an heir, the king put away Etain, and ordered her infant to be abandoned and thrown into a pit. Then his two thralls take her to a pit, and she smiles a laughing smile at them as they were putting her into it.(129) After that they cannot leave her to die, and they carry her to a cowherd of Eterskel, King of Tara, by whom she is fostered and taught till she became a good embroidress and there was not in Ireland a kings daughter dearer than she. Hence the name she bore, Messbuachalla (Messboohala), which means the cowherds foster-child.

For fear of her being discovered, the cowherds keep the maiden in a house of wickerwork having only a roof-opening. But one of King Eterskels folk has the curiosity to climb up and look in, and sees there the fairest maiden in Ireland. He bears word to the king, who orders an opening to be made in the wall and the maiden fetched forth, for the king was childless, and it had been prophesied to him by his Druid that a woman of unknown race would bear him a son. Then said the king: This is the woman that has been prophesied to me.

*Parentage and Birth of Conary*

Before her release, however, she is visited by a denizen from the Land of Youth. A great bird comes down through her roof-window. On the floor of the hut his bird-plumage falls from him and reveals a glorious youth. Like Dana, like Leda, like Ethlinn daughter of Balor, she gives her love to the G.o.d. Ere they part he tells her that she will be taken to the king, but that she will bear to her Danaan lover a son whose name shall be Conary, and that it shall be forbidden to him to go a-hunting after birds.

So Conary was born, and grew up into a wise and n.o.ble youth, and he was fostered with a lord named Desa, whose three great-grandsons grew up with him from childhood. Their names were Ferlee and Fergar and Ferrogan; and Conary, it is said, loved them well and taught them his wisdom.

*Conary the High King*

Then King Eterskel died, and a successor had to be appointed. In Ireland the eldest son did not succeed to the throne or chieftaincy as a matter of right, but the ablest and best of the family at the time was supposed to be selected by the clan. In this tale we have a curious account of this selection by means of divination. A bull-feast was held_i.e._, a bull was slain, and the diviner would eat his fill and drink its broth; then he went to bed, where a truth-compelling spell was chanted over him.

Whoever he saw in his dream would be king. So at gira, in Acha, as Whitley Stokes points out, the priestess of Earth drank the fresh blood of a bull before descending into the cave to prophesy. The dreamer cried in his sleep that he saw a naked man going towards Tara with a stone in his sling.

The bull-feast was held at Tara, but Conary was then with his three foster-brothers playing a game on the Plains of Liffey. They separated, Conary going towards Dublin, where he saw before him a flock of great birds, wonderful in colour and beauty. He drove after them in his chariot, but the birds would go a spear-cast in front and light, and fly on again, never letting him come up with them till they reached the sea-sh.o.r.e. Then he lighted down from his chariot and took out his sling to cast at them, whereupon they changed into armed men and turned on him with spears and swords. One of them, however, protected him, and said: I am Nemglan, king of thy fathers birds; and thou hast been forbidden to cast at birds, for here there is no one but is thy kin. Till to-day, said Conary, I knew not this.

Go to Tara to-night, said Nemglan; the bull-feast is there, and through it thou shalt be made king. A man stark naked, who shall go at the end of the night along one of the roads to Tara, having a stone and a slingtis he that shall be king.

So Conary stripped off his raiment and went naked through the night to Tara, where all the roads were being watched by chiefs having changes of royal raiment with them to clothe the man who should come according to the prophecy. When Conary meets them they clothe him and bring him in, and he is proclaimed King of Erin.

*Conarys Geise*

A long list of his _geise_ is here given, which are said to have been declared to him by Nemglan. The bird-reign shall be n.o.ble, said he, and these shall be thy _geise_:

Thou shalt not go right-handwise round Tara, nor left-handwise round Bregia,(130) Thou shalt not hunt the evil-beasts of Cerna, Thou shalt not go out every ninth night beyond Tara.