Part 54 (1/2)

116 See p. 85.

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

118 Compare the fine poem of a modern Celtic writer (Sir Samuel Ferguson), The Widows Cloak_i.e._, the British Empire in the days of Queen Victoria.

119 Critical History of Ireland, p. 180.

120 p.r.o.nounced Elyill.

121 The ending _ster_ in three of the names of the Irish provinces is of Norse origin, and is a relic of the Viking conquests in Ireland.

Connacht, where the Vikings did not penetrate, alone preserves its Irish name unmodified. Ulster (in Irish _Ulaidh_) is supposed to derive its name from Ollav Fola, Munster (_Mumhan_) from King Eocho Mumho, tenth in succession from Eremon, and Connacht was the land of the children of Connhe who was called Conn of the Hundred Battles, and who died A.D. 157.

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

123 p.r.o.nounced Yeohee.

124 I quote Mr. A.H. Leahys translation from a fifteenth-century Egerton ma.n.u.script (Heroic Romances of Ireland, vol. i. p. 12).

The story is, however, found in much more ancient authorities.

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

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

127 See p. 124.

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

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

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

131 The Destruction of Da Dergas Hostel.

132 p.r.o.nounced Koohoolin.

133 See p. 150.

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

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

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

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

138 This, of course, was Cuchulains father, Lugh.

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