MYTHS, FOLKTALES AND LEGENDS -
Through the Celtic Twilight
They say that the Irish have the gift of the gab. In fact, there is often a strong element of stage-Irishness in the idea of the loquacious, silver-tongued, twinkle-eyed Paddy. A certain irony exists here, because the image of the soft-talking Irishman is a distortion of the fact that Ireland can lay claim to one of the richest oral traditions in the world, and that Irish storytellers are amongst the finest modern-day exponents of their art.
Yet comparatively little is generally known about these storytellers or their repertoire. Instead we have a profusion of books on Celtic Myth, Gaelic Legends, Irish Fairytales etc. most of them based on a large amount of romantic speculation and very little fact. I hope to lift some of the early Irish mists and to replace the Celtic twilight with something a little easier to work in.
We'll start with the myth. Strictly speaking a myth relates to the sacred or divine. It deals with gods and demi-gods, with the creation of the world and with the origin and order of things. When we consider that Christianity took a firm grip on Ireland as early as 432 A.D. we would hardly expect very much of the original, pre-Christian mythology to have survived intact to the present day. Instead, what we find is traces of that mythology - lingering remnants of a pre-Christian concept of the cosmos and the otherworld. We find these traces in the oral tradition which has been handed down from one generation to another for perhaps thousands of years. Stories about such personages as, Fionn Mac Cumhail, Donn Firinne and the Goban Saor, show that these characters have been credited with supernatural powers and properties. They could even be the remains of fallen deities. Similarly, many of the legends about the fairies and their origins may be considered the remnants of what was once a more complete mythology.
If the myths have not survived in oral tradition, the folktales and legends have. The reasons for their survival here, long after their disappearance in most other parts of Europe, are many and varied. They must include our comparatively isolated geographical position, the suppression of Gaelic as a written language during our period of colonisation, and the fairly late arrival of the Industrial Revolution to this country.
In Ireland, the storyteller was a highly-regarded member of the community and his art was treated with due respect. Stories were usually told during the long winter nights and at social gatherings of one kind or another. The stories which were told on such occasions were of varying ages and background. Some of them were thousands of years old, some dated back to medieval times, while others were of more recent origin. Many of the greatest classics of world literature were originally taken from the oral traditions of various countries and peoples. These include the works of Virgil and Homer, Dante's Decameron and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.
A folk-tale like the modern-day novel, was probably originally composed by one individual and was passed on orally. It was then either accepted or rejected by tradition. If accepted, tradition itself had a hand in the shaping of it, as each different storyteller would change a detail here or a detail there, to suit his own circumstances and environment, while keeping to the basic plot and structure of the story. In this way, a tale could travel by word of mouth over many thousands of miles. At times, its journey may be speeded up by travelling people of one kind or another, whether they be tradesmen or tramps. In Ireland, for example, travelling seasonal labourers helped spread stories from place to place.
This resulted in a situation where many of the tales told by Irish storytellers were international stories, found in many other countries in and outside Europe. To regard Ireland's fund of stories as being exclusively Celtic is not at all accurate.
Tales of magical objects and events formed a very large part of the Irish storyteller's repertoire, as did romantic tales. The human spirit appears to hanker after a world of fantasy and make-believe, where the impossible becomes possible, and folktales catered admirably for this need, just as James Bond-type characters do today. Most of the magical or romantic tales are very long and involved - too long even to summarise here. Suffice it to say that one of the most popular of all folktales in Ireland was the story of the Dragon-Slayer which is the folk version of the classical tale of Perseus. The hero first kills three giants (and often their mother as well)! and then goes on to rescue a princess from a sea-monster or dragon. No prizes for guessing how the story ends!
Religious tales were also very popular in Ireland. These stories usually have a very definite moral point and were often used by clergy while preaching, which helped in their dissemination. They often contain a fascinating mixture of Christian and pre-Christian elements, thus betraying their (mostly) medieval origins.
Despite the international character of so many of the folktales told in Ireland, it should also be said that there are stories which appear to have been confined to Ireland or, at least, to the Gaelic-speaking peoples of Ireland and Scotland. Among these are the hundreds of tales told about Fionn Mac Cumhail and the Fianna. While it is difficult to say when most of these stories were composed, they appear to have become popular in Ireland from about the thirteenth century. Fionn and his band of warriors, the Fianna are, of course, always at the centre of the action, and the two occupations of hunting and fighting figure largely in the Fenian cycle of stories. The stories also often contain a strong element of magic. The principal characters in the stories - apart from Fionn himself - are his son, Oisin, his grandson, Oscar, and three members of the Fianna: Goll Mac Morna, Conan Maol and Diarmaid I Duibhne. The story of the Pursuit of Diarmaid and Grainne, and that of Oisin in Tir na n-Og are perhaps two of the best known stories of the Fenian cycle.
There is another cycle of stories which is also regarded as being indigenous to the Gaelic-speaking culture of Ireland and Scotland. This is the Ulster cycle, which centres around the exploits of King Conchobhar of Ulster, the warrior Cu Chulainn and his son, Conlaoch and others. This cycle is considered to be older than the Fenian cycle, with its scene set in the very early days of the Christian era. It is generally more aristocratic in nature and never attained the same widespread popularity as the stories of the Fenian cycle. For this reason not so many stories of the Ulster cycle have survived in oral tradition. Of the ones that have, the story of how Cu Chulainn got his name, and the tragic story of Deirdre and the Sons of Uisneach are probably the best known. The story of the Tain Bo Cuailnge, The Cattle-Raid of Cooley, has recently become more widely known due to the excellent translation of the story by Thomas Kinsella (The Tain, Dublin 1969). The story of The Tain was found in early Irish manuscripts but had never been recorded in the oral tradition.
As well as the Ulster and Fenian cycles, hero-tales about individual warriors were extremely popular with Irish and Scottish storytellers. One of the more widespread of these tales concerns the intricate and arduous adventures of one Conall Gulban.
So far we have been looking only at the folk-tales of Ireland, and not at the legends. The essential difference between a folk-tale and a legend is that the folk-tale is set "once upon a time," in the never-never land. It is not generally believed in by the people who recount it or hear it. A legend, on the other hand, is usually set in the fairly recent past. It is located in a definite area or place and is believed in, to a greater or lesser extent, by the people who tell it. Legends are told about many subjects. In Ireland, for example, legends about the fairies are very common, as are legends about other supernatural beings and occurrences. Equally common are legends about local holy wells or natural features. Legends are told about individuals such as Oliver Cromwell or Daniel O'Connell and about specific events such as the great famine or local tragedies.
And it is in legend form that the oral tradition survives best into our own day. Today, stories - frequently of the "international" variety - are still circulating by word of mouth only, in our offices, pubs and factories. These stories usually concern the gruesome events that befell a certain hitchiker, babysitter etc. and, like their counterparts of former days, they are generally believed in by those who tell and hear them. But then, as the man said, that is another story!
