The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends (21 page)

Suddenly, Rígbaddán realized there was someone standing at his side.

“What do you seek here, young man?” asked a low melodious voice.

Rígbaddán looked up and was shocked to see no one but an old beggar-woman looking kindly at him.

He told her that he was trying to summon Áine and why he was doing so.

“Go back to Cellachain,” instructed the old woman, “and tell him on the morning of the third day from now, he may go to the gate of Cashel and knock on it with his sword-hilt
three times. The door will be opened and he and his men may go inside. Mór shall not be harmed.”

So Rígbaddán hurried back to Cellachain with this news.

Alone in her tower, Mór wiped the tears from her eyes and looked down on the encamped army of her lover as it gathered around the Rock. She knew that the reason why the war horns did not
sound, nor swords beat on the shields, was that Sitric had said that her life would be forfeited. She was in a black despair, wondering what she could do to help Cellachain overcome the enemies of
Mumhan.

She sang softly, to keep up her spirits, but the words that came forth were sad ones:

Then the door opened and an old woman hobbled in.

“If you are a maidservant in Sitric’s house, I want none of you,” Mór told her immediately.

The old woman chuckled. It was a curious, melodious chuckle and not really that of an old woman at all.

“I am thinking that you have no liking for Sitric?”

“Nor any man of Lochlann,” avowed Mór. “I am of the Eóghanachta.”

“Ah, but do you tell me right?”

“You have no reason to doubt my word. But if you do, it will not make it any the less the truth.”

“True for you,” the old woman agreed. “Yes, you do have the Eóghanachta sureness in you.”

Mór tossed her head in annoyance. “Be about your business, old woman, and leave me to my sorrow.”

“Your sorrow being that you are separated from your lover, Cellachain?”

Mór blushed but stuck out her chin defiantly. “Never my lover. Would that it be true. I saw him only once and gave him my heart. But. . .” she shrugged, “he never
promised me more than a glance.”

“Then you are a foolish child. Much may be read in a single glance. On such things are battles fought and won, or lost. And is it not written that you shall bear forth a line of
Eóghanachta kings?”

Mór was startled as to how the old woman would know this.

“That was once foretold by the goddess Áine to my father, Aedh, when he visited Cnoc Áine.”

“Indeed.”

Then the old woman sang softly:

“How do you know the prophecy?” demanded Mór.

The old woman shook her head sadly.

At that moment the door opened and in came Torna the Magician.

“What are you doing here, woman?” he frowned, catching sight of the old one.

“I am returning gift for gift,” she replied.

“What gift has the girl given you, that you must return a gift?”

“She has given me the gift of generations of Eóghanachta,” smiled the old one.

With a cry, showing that he recognised her as an enemy, Torna sprang forward, drawing his knife but the old woman dissolved into a black cat and leapt from his grasp. Torna, using his magic
power, turned himself into a black cat so that there was no difference between them and jumped at the other. Then the first black cat turned into a giant black raven.

To and fro, shape-changing, the two creatures sped around the room, so that it made Mór dizzy as she attempted to keep track as to who was who.

Soon exhaustion overcame the contestants.

The magician and the old woman paused in their human forms.

“A truce,” cried Torna. “And a proposition.”

“What proposition is that?” demanded the old woman.

“It is unseemly for the likes of us to be fighting over this girl,” Torna said. “Let us resolve the matter in a more gentle form.”

“What form have you in mind, wizard of Lochlann?”

“Let us shape-change and change to a similar form and see if the girl can choose between us. If she is able to discern the difference, then, on my honour, she shall be released.”

The old woman turned to Mór.

“It is for you to approve the conditions, Mór, daughter of Aedh.”

With little enthusiasm, but realizing it was the only hope she had of getting out of Sitric’s prison, Mór reluctantly agreed.

“Remember, your choice is for Cellachain of the bright head and does not my name also mean ‘brightness’?”

Then, while Mór watched breathlessly, the old woman and Torna the wizard began to shape-change so rapidly, moving quickly around the room, that she grew dizzy again trying to keep track
of who they were and where they were.

Then, when she had shut her eyes to prevent the dizziness overtaking her, she sat back on the edge of the bed and said:

“No more, no more. The changes have made me so dizzy that I cannot look upon you any more.”

“We have stopped,” replied a voice.

Mór looked up.

Before her sat two black cats, so identical she had no way of telling which was which.

“You may choose between us,” came the old woman’s voice from one cat.

“But be assured, nothing is easy,” came the same old woman’s voice from the other.

Mór was disappointed for she had hoped, in that moment, to have chosen the old woman. But both cats were the same.

“Come, don’t take all day,” said one of the cats.

Mór stared from one to another. Then she pursed her lips.

“I will choose. You are the old woman,” she cried pointing to one of the cats. She did so because that cat’s eyes shone more brightly than those of the other cat, and the old
woman had told her that her name meant “brightness”.

In a flash, the old woman was back. Mór had chosen correctly. She turned to find the evil wizard, Torna, running towards her with a knife upheld in his hand. Before she could scream, the
old woman was a great raven and its claws descended into the face of the wizard. He cried loudly and went reeling backwards, dropping his knife on the floor.

Then the old woman was back and, before Mór had time to
adjust to her, a young and radiantly beautiful woman stood in her place.

“Take my hand, Mór,” she said sweetly, “and trust in me, for I am Áine, protectoress of all who love truly.”

There seemed to be a bright light and Mór blinked. When she opened her eyes, she was standing near a tent. Even as she looked on, the handsome, fair-haired figure of Cellachain came out.
His surprise was replaced by a look of wondrous rejoicing.

He simply held out his hands to her. No words needed to be said between them.

It happened on the third morning that Cellachain went to the gates of Cashel and struck the door three times with the hilt of his sword. The door shuddered and swung open. In marched the
warriors of the Eóghanachta, to reclaim their treasured castle and seat of the kingdom of Mumhan.

So the kingdom of Mumhan was wrested back from the hands of the men of Lochlann and so the Dál gCais went quietly back to Thomond. Cennedig promised to keep the peace with Cashel and this
he did. Torna died of his magical confrontation, for there is no action that does not demand a counter-action. And Sitric set sail in his longships back to Lochlann’s shores.

So did the fortunes of the Eóghanachta rise up once again and Cellachain and Mór gave birth to many sons. As it had been foretold, so it came to be.

Isle of Man (Ellan Vannin)

The Isle of Man: Preface

U
ntil the eighteenth century, it is generally thought that most Manx folklore was transmitted orally. However, I would argue that, prior to the end
of the sixteenth century, the evidence, fragmentary as it is, points to the fact that those islanders who were literate in their language would turn to Irish texts.

There certainly exists a poem in praise of the Manx King, Raghnal I (1187–1226), by an unknown poet, where the language is identified as Middle Irish. We also have the interesting case of
Archbishop Aodh Mac Cathmhaoil (1571–1626), appointed Primate of All Ireland. Although he was born in Co. Down, it is recorded that he was sent to the Isle of Man when he was about thirteen
years old “to obtain . . . the education that was denied him at home”. We are told that he distinguished himself at his Manx school and remained as a teacher on the Island until he was
twenty-six years old.

Now Mac Cathmhaoil’s poems and prose, seen as part of the Ulster literary ethos, are still highly regarded and his works, such as
Scathán Shacramuinte na h-Aithridhe
(The
Mirror of Penance), were published in Louvain in the early seventeenth century.

Most printing in Irish was carried out on the Continent during this time, as the language was being systematically repressed in Ireland. Other Irish writers, such as Tuathal O hUiginn (d.1450)
had lived and worked on the Island. This, I believe, indicates that a standard literary Gaelic was being used.

When a distinctive Manx literature began to emerge, the similarities of theme and personality were easily observed.
Mannánan Beg, Mac Y Leirr, ny slane coontey yeh
Ellan Vannin
was written down by John Kelly in 1770. This translates as “Little Mannánan, Son of Leirr, or an account of the Isle of Man”. This is the earliest surviving tale
of the ocean god, after whom the Island is said to have been named. Scholars analysing the text of this poem believe that it was first composed in the early sixteenth century, for it describes an
event in 1504.

Even the stories of Fionn Mac Cumhaill and Ossian, the great Irish heroes, were told in the Island.
Fin as Oshin
was written down by Reverend Philip Moore in 1789. This was transcribed by
Moore from the recitation of an old Manx woman and incorporated “King Orry” (the Manx king Godred Crovan – 1079–1095) into the Fenian saga.

Most of the Manx stories retold in this volume are mainly drawn from oral traditions and they have interesting echoes in tales found in both Ireland, particularly in Donegal, and in Scotland.
Island of the Ocean God
relates to the hagiography of St Maughold, who appears in the stories of St Patrick as Mac Cuill and Mac Goill.

Y Chadee,
in a variant form, was first recorded by W. Ralf Hall Caine’s
Annals of the Magic Isle,
Cecil Palmer, 1926. Ralf was the brother of the famous Manx novelist Thomas
Hall Caine, to whom the Irishman, Bram Stoker, dedicated his novel
Dracula
(1897) for he was known as “Little Tommy” to his Manx-speaking family – i.e. “Hommy
Beg”. “Y Chadee” is the Manx name for the botanical plant
Anaphilis margaritacea,
which is known as “pearly everlasting”, and it seems a curious transposition
in the story for the name of the young woman.

The Ben-Varrey
(The Mermaid) seems to be a Manx version of a tale which appears both in the Western Isles of Scotland and in Ireland and Brittany, and seems a favourite among Celtic
story-tellers. This was passed on to me by Douglas Fargher. Another story he first introduced to me was
The Lossyr-ny-Keylley,
which is a goldfinch. This certainly has similarities with
several stories found in Ireland.

Poagey Liaur jeh Caillagh
is actually a Manx version of a Donegal tale of nearly the same title,
The Old Hag’s Long Leather Bag.
But the Manx bag is not
a long one. Seumas MacManus picked up the Donegal version in his
Donegal Fairy Stories
collection in 1900. The saga of
Gilaspick Qualtrough
has moments that are reflective of
Barny
O’Rierdon, the Navigator,
collected in Samuel Lover’s
Legends and Stories of Ireland
(1831). But Gilaspick is altogether a different character from Barny!

Most of these versions I noted down from various sources during my visits to the Island.

I first visited the Isle of Man in 1964, when the late Douglas C. Fargher, the compiler of
Fargher’s English-Manx Dictionary
, 1979, introduced me to some of the tales. He also
introduced me to Mona Douglas, who had been Alfred P. Graves’ secretary. Graves was the father of Robert Graves and an assiduous collector of Irish folktales. Mona Douglas, in turn, was a
leading exponent of the Manx language and its culture and also a collector of its folktales.

In the 1960s there was a great deal of activity on the Island in tracking down the cultural heritage, at a period when the last native speakers of the language were dying out. The last
acknowledged native speaker was Ned Maddrell, who died on December 27, 1974, and is buried in his native Rushen. But, of course, a language is not snuffed out in such a fashion and many inhabitants
of the island are still fluent speakers of the language.

However, many texts in Manx were published prior to that time: such as the stories of Neddy Beg Horn Ruy (Edward Faragher of Cregneash – 1831–1908), which were lodged in the Manx
National Museum. Some stories were already printed in the early 1950s, due to the efforts of Arthur S. B. Davies of the Cardiff Board of Celtic Studies. These were
Skeaalyn Cheeil-Chiolllee
(1952) and
Juan Doo Shiauilteyr as Daa Skeeal Elley
(1954).