Ireland
1: Beatha Fhinn
Muirne was the daughter of a druid called Tadhg who lived in a white mansion on the Hill of Allen, near Kildare in the middle of Ireland. A warrior called Cumhall was head of all the heroes of Ireland, who were called the Fianna. This Cumhall sought Muirne as wife, but this was refused by her father, and then Cumhall abducted her. Seeking assistance, Tadhg went to the High-King Conn, whose court and citadel was at the great centre of Tara, in the north midlands of Ireland. As a result, Conn dismissed Cumhall from his command of the Fianna. Deserted by all but his closest friends, Cumhall had to fight a battle against Conn’s forces at Castleknock, near Dublin. In this battle Cumhall, heavily outnumbered, was defeated and slain, but his wife Muirne soon after gave birth to the child Fionn. For the child’s protection, she gave it into the keeping of Bodhmhall, a nurse of young Fianna heroes.
So little Fionn was reared for six years on the forested mountains called Slieve Bloom, where he showed great skill and strength for his age. So skilled a hurler was he that he could, with one stroke of his hurley-stick, accurately drive the ball through a small hoop at a distance of a hundred metres. When he was seven years old, he went to the court of the High-King, and overcame all the youths there at hurling. They tried to drown him in a pond, but he drenched nine of them in the water. He then ran away, and the king asked the other boys who he was. They said they did not know his name, but that he was fionn, ‘fair-haired’. ‘That will be his name!’ said the king. Soldiers on horseback were sent after him, but Fionn nurse took him on her shoulders and they raced away through the forests. Soon she got tired, so the little boy took her onto his shoulders, and in this way they outran the horsemen and reached the safety of Slieve Bloom.
The heroic youth had by this time grown so agile that he could outrun deer, and thus he did the hunting for his guardian. Then the young Fionn went towards the river Boyne to learn the craft of poetry. For seven years an old wizard called Finnéigeas had been on that river seeking a special salmon there, for it had been prophesied to him that if he ate that salmon nothing would remain unknown to him. He had just caught the salmon when Fionn arived on the scene, and Fionnéigeas asked the boy to cook the salmon on a spit for him but not to eat any of it. The boy brought the salmon to him after it had been cooked. ‘Did you eat anything of the salmon, lad?’ said the old man. ‘No’, said the lad, ‘except that I burned my thumb and then put it in my mouth!’ ‘Then eat it all!’ said the old man angrily. He did so, and that is what gave the knowledge to Fionn. Ever after, when he put his thumb into his mouth and chewed it, he could find out anything he wished.
When he was ten years of age, Fionn went to the court of the High-King Conn at Tara for the feast of November. The king was desperate, for every year on that night the citadel was burned by a spirit called Ailléan. This Aillén used to arrive playing magical music which put everyone to sleep, and then used to blow fire from his mouth to affect his purpose. Fionn undertook to face the burner, was given a shield and spear, and stood on guard. Before long he heard the magical music, and he placed the sharp point of the spear to his forehead. Ailléan was playing his harp to put everybody to sleep as usual, and then he released a blaze of fire from his mouth to burn Tara. Fionn saw that, and he placed his purple-fringed cloak before the blaze and made it fall from the air. When Ailléan realised that his magic had been overcome, he raced away northwards towards an otherworld fort on a hill-top. Fionn followed him, and as the spirit was passing in by the door of the fort Fionn flung his spear after him. Ailléan fell in through the door. We don’t know whether or not he was hurt by the spear, but he never again came out of the fortress to burn Tara.
The High-King was delighted that his court at Tara had been saved, and all the warriors gathered around the young Fionn and demanded that he be made their leader. So the High-King appoointed Fionn as leader of the Fianna warriors, just as his father Fionn had been before him. Even the earlier leader, Goll Mac Morna, who had been a great enemy of Cumhall, accepted young Fionn as his leader. ‘Upon my word,’ said Goll, ‘my hand will be put in the hand of Fionn!’ And they shook hands and became friends.
There was great peace in Ireland with young Fionn at the head of the Fianna band. When he had grown to manhood he met and fell in love with a beautiful girl called Bláth Dearg (‘Red Flower’). They married, and within a year she was expecting a baby. Then, however, a foreign Emperor landed a large army in Ireland, and Fionn had to go with all his Fianna warriors to defend the country. While he was away, his house was visited by a druid, who cast a long dark shadow. Bláth Dearg was terrified, but before she could run away, the druid struick her with a magic wand and turned her into a deer. Full of fear and shame, she raced away to the mountains in that shape. When Fionn returned home, great was his grief to find that his beautiful young wife was nowhere to be seen. He was told by a herdsman that a strange man had been seen to enter his house. Unable to believe that his wife had gone away with another man, Fionn searched all of Ireland, but he could not find Bláth Dearg. He spent a whole year searching, and then he had to accept that he would never see her again.
Years went by, and Fionn stayed at home all the time, sorrowing. Then his friends decided that they must do something to cheer him up, and they invited him to a great hunt which they were organising. After much persuasion, Fionn agreed to join the hunt. He was a great hunter, and after some time he and the hounds had left all the other hunters behind them. Through a fog, he saw a white female deer with one large red spot on her side. The hounds gave chase, and soon the hounds had disappeared into a forest. Fionn followed on at full speed. Suddenly, he heard the hounds barking furiously in the distance, and he raced there, to find himself in a clearing in the forest. The hounds were in a circle, snarling and with the hair standing straight on their necks. In the centre of the circle was a beautiful little boy, with long hair growing to his shoulders and no fear in his face.
Fionn called off the hounds, and he spoke to the boy, enquiring who he was. The boy said that he did not know his own name, and that all that he remembered was that he had been reared by a wild deer. The deer had loved him greatly, and once she had begun to lick him with affection. She gave one sweep of her tongue over his forehead, and a tuft of deer’s hair had grown there. She had stopped licking him then, however, saying that she wished him not to be a deer but to be a man, because his father was the great hero, Fionn Mac Cumhaill. Fionn threw his arms around the boy, and told him that he himself was Fionn. He brought the little boy home with him, and named him Oisín (which means ‘little fawn’). Oisín grew up to be, like his father, a great hero and a great poet.
Often they spoke of the lovely Bláth Dearg, but they never saw her again.
2: Corr-ImIrce Chaoilte
To join the Fianna troop, an applicant must be very educated and also very brave. He or she must know twelve books of poetry by heart, and must be a supreme athlete. These were some of the tests:-
A large hole was made and the applicant was put standing in it up to the waist, with a shield in one hand and a hazel-rod in the other hand. Nine warriors then throw their spears at the applicant, and if the applicant failed to ward off any spear he or she was not accepted. Then the person had to run through many woods, with all the Fianna in pursuit. If caught or injured, the applicant was refused, or if a single twig had cracked under his or her foot in the running or if the hair on his or her head had beenj touched by a tree-branch. Also, the applicant had to be able to jump over a branch as high as the forehead and bend under a branch as low as the knee. The most difficult task of all was to be able to draw the thorn from the foot with one’s finger-nail without slackening pace!
The greatest of all the Fianna athletes was Caoilte Mac Rónáin, who could run across Ireland from the south-west to the north-east in one single day. Caoilte could run faster than the wind in the month of March. When he was going at full speed, he was all a blur to onlookers. You would imagine that he had three heads, for his head would be bent down and his two shoulders would be rising up to the same height. Some people even say that he seemed to have five heads, because his feet would rise to the same height with his massive strides. He was sometimes called Caoilte cam, or ‘bow-legged Caoilte’, because he could twist his legs in all directions as he ran. Indeed, so fast was he even when walking that the Fianna used to ask him to tie up one leg so that they could keep alongside him!
Fionn Mac Cumhaill was a tremendously generous man. Anybody who ever needed help had but to ask him. The saying was that ‘if the leaves on the tree were gold, and if the waves of the sea were silver, Fionn would have given it all away!’ To him, indeed, it was shameful for one single day to pass without giving something to somebody in need. He was even so generous that he would seek out the most troublesome and cantankerous man in Ireland, would welcome him to his house, and would insist that he stay as a guest for seven years!
Nevertheless, Fionn could be very quick-tempered, and he would easily lose his patience in an argument. Once upon a time, he had a disagreement with the young High-King Cormac. The disagreement became so intense that they began to shout at each other, and Cormac ordered that Fionn be seized and held prisoner at Tara. Caoilte was a very faithful friend of Fionn, and he decided to dop all he could to have Fionn released. He began a campaign of mischief against the High-King. He let cows and calves out of their paddocks to wander the countryside, he set looses the king’s horses from their stalls all over Ireland, he burned mills and kilns, and he laid the countryside waste. The king sent all his soldiers to search for him and arrest him, but Caoilte was too swift for them and he could not be caught.
Nevertheless, king Cormac was not willing to release Fionn, and so Caoilte thought of another plan. He went to Tara and seized Cormac’s personal servant. He dressed himself up in the servant’s clothes, and, when night came, he went to serve the king at table. Cormac could not see him properly in the candle-light, but he was a little suspicious. Staring closely at the disguised Caoilte, he remarked that the servant seemed to have Caoilte’s two eyes in his head, but Caoilte imitated the servant’s voice and assured him that he was mistaken. Finally, when the feast was over, and Cormac was left alone with supposed servant, Caoilte drew a sword and demanded that Cormac should name his price for the release of Fionn. ‘If you are offering ransom to me,’ said the High-King, ‘I will tell you what I want! Within one day, you must bring the male and female of every animal in Ireland to the green of Tara for me, and if you do that I will release Fionn!’ ‘I will do it!’ said Caoilte.
Cormac was sure that nobody in the world could succeed in that task, but Caoilte set out. He hunted and chased every type of animal in Ireland, and within a half-day he had brought them all to Tara. This was called the Corr-imirce Chaoilte, or ‘the straggling drove of Caoilte’, for the animals were so different to each other, and they were always trying to get away from him as Caoilte drove them along the road. The High-King Cormac came out onto the green in the evening, and to his great surprise Caoilte was there before him with all the animals. ‘Which animal was the most difficult to bring?’ enquired Cormac. ‘Oh,’ said Caoilte, ‘the fox! For he is the cleverest and most elusive of all!’ But the High-King could not go back on his promise, and Fionn was set free. Just to show that he could have done even better if required, Caoilte then collected all the hares in Ireland, and kept them all night long at Tara in a house with twelve open doors. He did this by racing around the house all night at such a speed that no hare could manage to get out!
Some storytellers say that Caoilte once performed a greater task still with his speed. According to this story, the High-King Cormac wished to have a fistful of the sand from each shore of Ireland brought to him every morning - from north, south, east, and west. King Cormac was very wise and sharpsighted, and he would know by examining the sand if any foe had stepped over it and landed in the country during the night. Three men applied for the job as his messenger. ‘How long would it take you to collect the sands?’ said the king to the first man. ‘While the leaf is falling from a tree!’ said the man. ‘Oh, you would not be fast enough,’ said the king. The second man said he would collect the sands as fast as a cat slipping between two houses. ‘You are good,’ said the king, ‘but it is not fast enough!’ The third man was Caoilte. ‘How long would it take you to do it?’ the king asked. ‘As long as it takes a woman to change her mind!’ said Caoilte. ‘That is fast indeed!’ said the king. ‘Did you set out yet?’. ‘I returned just now,’ said Caoilte, ‘and here is the sand!’
Fionn Mac Cumhaill himself was a great athlete, but as he grew old he began to feel pains in his bones and joints. He would never admit it, however, and none of the Fianna dared to mention it to him. One day in the month of May, he met a young woman, and she told him that he was growing old. ‘I am not,’ he said, ‘in fact I am just as athletic as ever! And to prove it, I will jump across the great river Boyne and back again!’ He did so, and the woman challenged him to come there on May Day every year and to do the same. He did this for many years, but as he grew really old he found it more difficult. Then, one year, he managed to jump across the river again, but on his return jump he fell short and struck his head off a stone in the river. That was how the great Fionn Mac Cumhaill died.
3: Bruíon Cheise Corainn Agus Bruíon Chaorthainn
Ceis Chorainn is the name of a great circular mountain, near Sligo in the north-west of Ireland. The mountain is about 7 kilometres in circumference, and about 360 metres high. There is a cairn on its summit, and on the western side seventeen caves stand like portals of a great terrace.
During a hunt once, Fionn set up his camp on top of the mountain. He was accompanied by Conán Mac Morna, the great fool of the Fianna. The lord of the otherworld mansion in that hill, Conarán, ordered his three ugly daughters to wreak vengeance on the Fianna for hunting there. Going to the door of their cave, these three placed three great irons around three briar-trunks and began to twist them left-handed. At first Conán was laughing at their appearance, for he was well used to such enemies. On many occasions, the Fianna had given him the task of combatting such characters, and the saying was ‘scrawb for scrawb, like Conán fighting a hag!’ On this occasion, however, the appearance of the hags got more and more frightening, and their strange ritual more sinister, so that both Fionn and Conán were dumbfounded. Finally, in their terror the faces of the two warriors turned red, then white, and then black, and they both collapsed to the ground. The witches tied them up and brought them into the mansion. When several other Fianna warriors came to the hill, they were similarly captured, as in turn were four whole battalions of the Fianna.
The witches went out to reconnoitre before beheading their captives, and they saw coming towards them a fine warrior. This was Goll mac Morna. They attacked him, and with one great stroke of his sword he killed two of them. The third witch, Iarnach, grabbed him from behind, and a titanic wrestling contest followed. Eventually Goll laid her low and bound her with the straps of his shield. She begged quarter, swearing to release the Fianna, and he set her free. Goll then went to the cave where the captives were being held, and they were released at his word. But, before they left the cave, they found its entrance blocked by the horrific Iarnach, who now demanded single combat. Fionn said that he himself would fight her, but Goll restrained him, saying that the loyal friend is discovered in hard circumstances. Goll himself took the field, and after a fierce encounter he killed her with a cast of his javelin. In appreciation of what he had done, Fionn gave Goll his own daughter Caon in marriage that very day.
Not all the hags that Irish heroes met up with were evil. One ancient story tells of how a young prince called Niall was one day hunting with his three half-brothers, who often bullied him. It was a very warm day, and the four young men grew very thirsty. They came to a well of fine spring water, but an ugly hag was guarding the well and she would not allow them to approach it. ‘I will only give a drink to the man who kisses me!’ she said. She was extremely ugly, with a long nose which dripped into her mouth, and she smelled foully. The three brothers recoiled in disgust from her, but Niall walked up to her, put his arms around her, and kissed her. Immediately she became a beautiful young lady. ‘You are beautiful,’ said Niall, ‘who are you?’ ‘I am the queen of the fairies,’ she said, ‘and you will be king of Ireland!’ Niall then gave a drink to each of his half-brothers, and they accepted him as king.
To return to Fionn Mac Cumhaill and his Fianna warriors. They were once approached by a strange warrior, who was splendidly dressed. He invited them to a feast that he was preparing in a great mansion on an island at the mouth of the river Shannon, near Limerick. The man was so gracious and well-mannered that they accepted the invitation, and when they arrived they found that the mansion was indeed wonderful, with seven fine doors inlaid with gold and silver. They began to eat, but soon they noticed that the place was changing and becoming darker. Finally, when they looked around, they found that the seven fine doors had disappeared, and in their place was a narrow miserable door facing north.
Fionn said that he did not like being in a house with only one door, and he ordered his men to cut their way out. But they then found that they were magically stuck to the ground. Goll Mac Morna asked Fionn to put his thumb into his mouth and to chew it, and when he did so he discovered who the stranger was. His name was Míogach, and he was the son of that same great Emperor, who had years before tried to invade Ireland but had been defeated by Fionn and the Fianna. Realising that Míogach had led them into a trap, Fionn heaved a great sigh, saying that they were now helpless and surrounded by a huge army. Worst of all, that army was headed by three wizards, who had designed the mansion and had worked the magic on them. From chewing his thumb of knowledge, Fionn also discovered that nothing could release the Fianna from the ground but the blood of these three wizards. Realising that they were soon to be beheaded, the captured Fianna heroes began a desolate cry, but Fionn told them to stop crying like cowards. They then pressed their lips together and struck up their special hum, the dord fiann, which they always chanted when they were in danger.
Meanwhile, Oisín had grown anxious at not having any news from his father Fionn, and had sent messengers to investigate. They soon found out what had happened, and Oisín gathered whatever help he could to try to rescue the Fianna. They were indeed lucky that Oisín had not gone hunting with them that day, and were even luckier still that Diarmaid had stayed at home. Diarmaid was the most handsome man of all the Fianna. He had a smiling bright face, and on his forehead was a little spot. Every woman who saw this spot used to fall hopelessly in love with him. But, much more important than all that in the present circumstances, Diarmaid was a tremendous swordsman. So, when Oisín and his supporters attacked the great army outside the mansion, Diarmaid slipped inside and slew the three wizards. Immediately, the huge army began to weaken, and they were put to flight in a headlong rush by Oisín and his men.
Diarmaid collected up the blood of the wizards into a bottle, and went towards the dark room where Fionn and his men were stuck to the ground. He heard Fionn’s voice inside, telling him to rub the blood of the wizards onto the door. The door opened immediately, and then Diarmaid rubbed the blood on all the captive Fianna, and they were released from the floor. All except Conán, for whom no blood remained. So Diarmaid had to pull him off the floor, leaving the skin of his heels, buttocks, shoulder-blades, and poll behind him. That is why he was ever after called Conán Maol, which means ‘Baldy Conán’. He was very angry, and threatened to kill Diarmaid for so depriving him of his skin.
But Diarmaid thought of a plan. He went and killed a sheep, and he tied its fleece onto Conán’s back. The fleece stuck to his back, and it began to grow on him. Ever after, Conán had to be sheared like a sheep each year, and that was good for the Fianna, because the wool made fine comfortable socks for Fionn and all his men!