Part 13 (1/2)

After two days' wandering they met Manannan Mac Lir They continued their journey until they came to an island dwelt in solely by women; their queen it ho had sent for Bran He stayed with her a while, and then came back to Ireland

But theof Manannan is that of Corendary annals place in the third century of our era, and bring into connection with Fionn The story, though only known to us from later MSS, can be traced back to the tenth century at least, as the title of it figures in a list preserved in the Book of Leinster, and as it is apparently alluded to by the eleventh century annalist, Tighernach[114] The following sulish translation by Mr Standish Hayes O'Grady, in the third volume of the Ossianic Society's publications

Of a ti in his hand a glittering fairy branch, with nine apples of red gold upon it[115] And this was the manner of that branch, that when any one shook it, men wounded and women with child would be lulled to sleep by the sound of the very sweet fairy music which those apples uttered, and no one on earth would bear in mind any want, woe, or weariness of soul when that branch was shaken for hihter, overco the branch But after a year, Cormac went in search of theht before his eyes, and he understood theth he came to a house wherein was a very tall couple, clothed in clothes of many colours, and they bade hi and a wild boar, and if a quarter of the boar was put under a quarter of the log, and a true story was told, the meat would be cooked

At Cormac's request the host told the first story, how that he had seven shich he could feed the world, for if the sere slain, and their bones put in the sty, on the ain; and the hostess the second, how that the milk of her seven white kine would satisfy the men of the world Cormac knew them for Manannan and his wife, and then told his story how he had lost and was seeking for wife and children Manannan brought in the latter, and told Cor him to that house Then they sat down to meat, and the table-cloth was such that no food, however delicate, ht be demanded of it, but it should be had without doubt; and the drinking cup was such that if a false story was told before it, it went in four pieces, and if a true one, it caain, and thereas the faith of Corave branch and cloth and goblet to Cormac, and thereafter they went to slumber and sweet sleep

Where they rose upon theexamples have been akin to the incident of the Maiden Castle We have seen the race of i out and alluring to themselves the brave and wise hero In the tales we are now about to examine the benefit conferred by the visitor upon the inic Castle is insisted upon But we must first notice a tale which presents many of the incidents of the Grail roroup as they In Ca Under the Waves, Diarmaid, the fairest and bravest of the Fenian heroes, weds a fay who, as her description indicates, belongs to the sas as the damsels who lure away Connla and Bran, the son of Febal She couise, and the other heroes shrink froives her the shelter of tent and bed and has his reward She builds for hiht of the Black Tomb (_supra_, p 17) builds for her lover But she warns him that after a threefold reproach as to how he found her she would have to leave hi of Fionn he is led to break the taboo and ”it was in a mosshole he awoke on the morrow There was no castle, or a stone left of it on another” Diar to death, and to be cured sheof the Plain of Wonder Helped by a little russet ets the talisman, as was prophesied of hiives the es their love into aversion, and he returns to the light of day

This last feature should be noted as characteristic The mortal lover always tires sooner than the fay ives but one night to the Lady of the Chessboard

We now co” stories, and I will cite in the first place one which is thetestimony I know of to the influence of this formula upon Celtic mythic lore There is a widely spread folk-tale of a hero robbed of threethees hirow, sets horns upon his head, or produces some equally unpleasant result Another herb he finds heals him Armed with specimens of either, he wins back his talismans In Grimm it is No 122, Der Krautesel, and in Vol III, p 201, variants are given In one the hero is one of three soldiers, and he receives the gifts froiven by Dr R Kohler (Orient und Occident, II, p 124) is the opening the same as in Campbell's No X--The Three Soldiers

The three coirls who keep the the day In the house is a table, overnight they eat off it, and when they rise the board is covered, and it would not be known that a bit had ever coets a purse never empty; at the second, the next one a cloth always filled withwhistle But as they leave he , ”They were under charhts with the a question--had he refrained they were free”

In one variant the time of probation lasts a year, and the talisht, the table-cloth of meat, and a bed for rest In another the damsels are swanmaids,[116] and the visitors are bidden ”not to think nor order one of us to be with you in lying down or rising up”[117]

There can, I think, be little doubt that this last variant represents the oldest for to the otherworld, as do the daughter of King Under the Waves and thein swan the object of a taboo, this is so invariably the case in myth and folk-lore that it is needless to accue, I speak under correction, is the fact of these da in possession of the talismans, one of which is so obviously connected with the Grail

It ation laid upon the hero is the direct opposite of that in the Grail romances, in the one case a question must not be asked, in the other it must In this respect Campbell's tale of course falls into line with all the widely spread and varying versions of the Melusine legend The supernatural wife always forbids her husband some special act which, as is perhaps natural, he can never refrain froend is one which has attained far greater celebrity than any other on account of its traditional association with historical personages It pictures the in, with his warriors around hinal to coend will be more familiar in connection with Frederick Barbarossa[118]

or with Holger the Dane than with any Celtic worthy Yet the oldest historic instance is that of Arthur[119] I have quoted (_supra_, p 122) Gerald's words relating to the mountain seat of Arthur Athe episode in the Grail romances, is the one noted by Gervasius of Tilbury[120] (c 1211 AD) A groo a runaway horse even to the su plain, full of all things delightful A marvellous castle rose before hi from the wound inflicted upon him by Modred his nephew, and Childeric the Saxon, and this wound broke out afresh each year The King caused the horse to be given to the groom, and made him many rich presents[121]

This tradition of Arthur in Sicily raises so it is a fresh example of the treend It also shohat rapidity a tradition, however rein from a particular spot, may associate itself with that Of more immediate interest to us is the question whether this tradition has any direct connection with the Grail romances, whether it has shaped or been shaped by the of the ro in Etna or in Avalon till his wound be healed and he come forth

It seems to me more likely that in so far as the wound is concerned there is a coincidencebelongs properly to the feud quest I do not, however, deny that the fact of the Lord of the Bespelled Castle, of the otherworld, being so from an incurable wound, end which we find in the romances

It is not my purpose to examine here in detail the innumerable versions of this widely-spread tradition[122], the more so as I have been able to trace no exact parallel to that presentment of the story found in Heinrich von dem Turlin and in the Didot-Perceval No other version of this for as awaiting the deliverance of death at the hands of his visitor Before endeavouring to find a reason for the singularity of Heinrich's account, I will first quote one variant of the coend which has not been printed before save by myself in the Folk-Lore Journal, Vol I, p

193[123] King Arthur sleeps bespelled in the ruins of (Richmond) Castle

Many have tried to find hi one night a and his men around a table upon which lay a horn and a sword

Terrified, he turned and fled, and as he did so a voice sounded in his ears--

”Potter Thompson, Potter Thoreatest man That ever was born”

for then he would have freed Arthur froain could he reach that hall

This version, besides being practically inedited has thethat association of the sith the Lord of the Bespelled Castle to which I have already alluded

The instances of the visit to the otherworld which have thus far been collected from Celtic mythic literature, and which have been used as parallels to the unspelling quest of the romances, are more closely akin to one example of this incident, Perceval's visit to the Castle of Maidens, than to that found in Heinrich and the Didot-Perceval None, indeed, throw any light upon that death-in-life which is the special feature in these torks All are of one kind in so far as the disposition of the inmates towards the visitor is concerned; he is received with courtesy when he is not actually allured into the castle, and the trials to which he is subjected are neither painful nor hu But it will not have escaped attention that the Conte du Graal contains another form of the visit, one which I have hitherto left unnoticed, in Gawain's visit to the Magic Castle A new conception is here introduced: the Lord of the Castle[124] is an evil being, who holds captive fair dames and damsels; they it is, and not he, whom the hero must deliver, and the act of deliverance subjects him to trial and peril (_supra_, p 14, Chr Inc 17) Let us see if this form affords any explanation of the mysterious features of Heinrich's version This incident may, it is easily conceivable, be treated in tays; the hero ht and succeed, or a caitiff and fail A story of this latter kind ic Castle The story in question (The Son of Bad Counsel) is ascribed by Kennedy, Legendary Fictions, pp 132, _et seq_, to an author of the early eighteenth century, Brian Dhu O'Reilly, and traced back to an older Ossianic legend--Conan's delusions in Ceash, of which Kennedy prints a version, pp 232, _et seq_ The hero of the story coach, nahter to the King of the Lonesome Land The name of the castle is the Uncertain Castle Very fair is their daughter, and she is proffered to the hero for his pro at backgaach, the hero lays hiers fro, finds hiht with his lady-love, and the other folk of the castle laughing at hirass of a es in the story at once recall those of the romances--the Waste Land or Forest, the Castle Perillous, and the like--and one of the trials, the being shot at with fairy darts, is the same as that to which Gawain is exposed in the Conte du Graal But it is interesting chiefly as being a version of a wide-spread tale of how Gods or heroes penetrating to the other world are y the story is well-known as Thor's visit to Utgarth Loki It is equally well-known in the Fionn saga, and, considering the many points of contact we have hitherto found between Fionn and the Grail hero, the Fenian form claims our notice The oldest preserved form of the story, that in the Book of Leinster, has been printed with translation by Mr Whitley Stokes, Revue Celt, Vol VII, pp 289, _et seq_--Fionn cohtfall with Cailte and Oisin to a house he had never heard of in that glen, knowing though he was A grey giant greets the with three heads on her thin neck, and a headlessfrom his breast Nine bodies rise out of a recess, and the hideous crew sing a strain to the guests; ”not iant slays their horses; raw meat is offered them, which they refuse; the inmates of the house attack them; they had been dead had it not been for Fionn alone They struggle until the sun lights up the house, then a mist falls into every one's head, so that he was dead upon the spot The champions rise up whole, and the house is hidden from them, and every one of the household is hidden--In the later Fenian saga (later that is as far as the form in which it has come down to us is concerned) the story closely resembles Thor's visit Kennedy (Bardic Stories, pp 132, _et seq_) has a good version[125]--Fionn and his coiant, on his shoulders an iron fork with a pig screeching between the prongs, behind hi hied hoary-headed , and an oldtwelve eyes in his head, a white-haired raarment

Two fountains are before the house: Fionn drinks of one which at first tastes sweet, but afterwards bitter to death; froh he never suffered as , when he puts the vessel fro is then shared; the rauest's share, and smite it with their swords as theythen throws her -headed oldremoved they resuiant is _sloth_, urged on by _energy_; the twelve-eyed old uilt of e_

The warriors sleep and in the aill with their hounds and their arin at once; and, though there is no reason to doubt that the Irish Celts had a counterpart to Thor's journey to Giantland, I am inclined to look upon the version just sua Certain it is that the popular version of Fionn's visit to Giantland is much more like the eleventh century poem, preserved in the Book of Leinster, than it is like the mediaeval, ”How Fionn fared in the House of Cuana” I have already alluded (_supra_, p 186) to one feature of the tale of Fionn's enchantment, but the whole tale is of interest to us--As Fionn and hisof their prowess in comes a slender brown hare and tosses up the ashes, and out she goes They follow her, a dozen, to the house of the Yellow Face, a giant that lived upon the flesh of one before the Face returns, but Fionn will not flee In coers Six of the Fenians he strikes with a ic rod, ”and they are pillars of stone to stop the sleety wind” He then cooks and devours a boar, and the bones he throws to the Fenians They play at ball with a golden apple, and the Face puts an end to Fionn's other coriddle is put on the fire till it is red hot, and they all get about Fionn and set his are burnt to the hips ('twas then he said, ”a h both his hams, so that he could neither rise nor sit, and cast hies to crawl out and sound his horn, and Diarmaid hears it and comes to his aid, and does to the Face as the Face did to Fionn, and with the cup of balsam which he wins from him makes Fionn whole--It is not necessary to dwell on the parallel between Diarh the two thighs, by winning the cup of balsanie des II cuisses) by the question as to the Grail This, alone, would be sufficient to shohat _role_ the Grail played in the oldest form of the feud quest before the latter was influenced by the visit to the Bespelled Castle