Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/323

Rh CELTIC LITERATURE 311 stage in the composition of national epics, that is, when the isolated poems fashioned by different rhyme-smiths are first welded into some kind of connected whole. A second stage would be the linking together of the separate episodes by a permanent setting of prose which would connect, continue, and expand the stories of the separate poems into a continuous coherent narrative. A third stage would be the forging of the whole material, poems and prose settings, into one continuous epic poem. The elder Edda, which consists of thirty-eight poems collected from the mouths of the Skalds, perhaps in part composed by Saemund Sigfusson, towards the end of the llth century, gives us the first or embryonic stage of growth. Snorro- Sturleson s prose Edda, made in the beginning of the 13th century out of the poetic Edda and other materials, gives us a second stage ; and after a long interval a third stage was reached in Oehlenschlager s Nordens Guder, or &quot; Gods of the North.&quot; In this case the original materials under went complete fusion in each stage. The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer are examples of epics in a third stage, but we do not know their previous stages. The Finnish Epic, Kalevala, made in the present century shows us that an epic may be fashioned directly from the popular poems without passing through a prose stage at all. The Tain Bo Cuailnge is clearly in the second stage, a fact which should not be for gotten in comparing it with other national epics, as for instance with the Xibelungen Lay, which is an epic in the third stage. But the Irish epic not only belongs to a different stage of poetic workmanship, but, owing to the comparatively isolated position of Ireland, to a relatively much earlier and more archaic type of society than that of the German epic, which moreover was recast, or at all events reached its third stage in the 12th century in the times of the brilliant Hohenstaufen. Who the author of the Tain Bo Cuailnge or of any of the tales of the heroic period was is not known. A curious legend points to Senchdn Torpeist, a poet who flourished about 600, as the person who gave the Tain its present form; another tradition assigns the work to St Ciaran of Clonmacnoise. The language of the portion of the Tain in the Book of the Dun Cow is not older at most than the beginning of the 10th century; the text of the Book of Leinster, which contains the whole story, is more modern, although the two manuscripts do not differ in age perhaps fifty years, the language of each copy evidently following, as we have before pointed out, the current of the spoken language. The tales of the heroic cycle, whenever originally written, are essentially pagan, and represent an early state of society still unaffected by Christianity or by Roman influence. That real persons may become the heroes of legends, and very simple everyday acts the roots of myths, is too well known to require proof. Indeed, it may be doubted whether a real personage may not always be necessary as a lay figure for the myths to gather round in the first instance. Be this as it may, Cuchulaind, Medb, and the rest of the personages of the heroic period, not withstanding their complete anthropomorphism, are a phase of Irish mythology. The connection of the Tuailia De Danann pantheon and the actors in the heroic tales is direct and explicit. Thus the rival bulls, which are the direct cause of the war, are but metamorphoses of two hostile personages among the inhabitants of the Side, the representatives perhaps of the Teutonic ^Esir and Vanir. Fedelm, the Ben Fdth, prophetess, from the Sid of Cruachan,. appears to Medb and describes to her Cuchulaind ; Badh, the M6r Rigu, forewarns Cuchulaind of his death ; the latter in the tale of the Bed of Decline, which we have re ferred to in speaking of the mythological tales, is bewitched by the woman of the Sid ; Fand, wife of Manandan Mac Lir, falls in love with him ; he visits Tir Tairngire, or the Land of Promise, and assists the people of the Side in a battle against their enemies. Medb, too, has power over the Geiniti Glindi, or Spirits of the Glen, and in many ways shows her divine nature. The poems and tales which we have called Fennian, or Fennian Oisianic, form a cycle entirely distinct from the heroic Oisia ic one. Their history, too, is curious. Finn, or Find, the son e8 &quot;- of Cumall, the chief hero of the tales, is supposed to have flourished in the second half of the 3d century and to have acted as commander of a body of mercenaries. He there fore lived at a time which may be considered, if not actually within the historic period, at least upon its threshold. The struggle of the various races for mastery was ended, and this militia or standing army was evidently intended to keep the subject races in check. That the idea of such a force was suggested by the Roman army in Britain there can be little doubt. Perhaps to the existence of this. body is due the considerable scale upon which the sub sequent invasions of Britain by the Scots took place. As Finn appears in the accounts of the battles which he is supposed to have fought, lie has all the air of an historical character, and is almost entirely devoid of legendary accessories. The same may be said of his son Oisin, the poet, and of his grandson Oscar. In the Book of Leinster are two poems ascribed to Oisin, and only two or three tales belonging to the Fennian cycle one of which has reached the present time are mentioned. Indeed in the older manuscripts there are few references to Finn, or to any of the personages of the Fennian romances. In the 1 2th century it would appear, therefore, that Finn and the other Fenuians had only just begun to become the heroes of romance. But between the end of the 12th and the middle of the 15th century a rich body of poems and tales came into existence. This new Fennian epos possessed considerable vitality, for it continued to grow even down to the present century, and at least one entirely new tale belongs to the 18th century, and many received considerable expansion during the same time. The cause of this very remarkable growth of legend is obscure, and would be well worth investigating in connec tion with the history of romance. The two streams of romance are perfectly distinct and never mingle ; at least we never find any of the heroes of the heroic period mentioned as actors in genuine Fennian tales. No better proof of the spurious character of a legend could be given than the co-existence in the same poem or story of actors belonging to the two romantic cycles. The Fennian or Oisianic legends are very numerous and very romantic, and there is a distinct Fenuian toponomy, which has not obscured or invaded that of the heroic period. Finn is still a popular hero, while Cuchulaind has become a shadow. In the current Fennian literature, as distinguished from the mere corrupt popular plastic legend on the one hand, and the Fennian poems and tales con tained in good manuscripts of the 15th century on the other, there is an increasing disregard of relative chron ology, and of consistent toponomy. There is not the same terseness and clearness of expression in the new as in the old stories ; they are evidently the work of a people who are no longer in the same stage of Culture. The descrip tions of the dress and arms of the actors are vague, the number of those slain in battle is greater. The romances of the 14th and 15th centuries are full of magic and wild prodigies, but nevertheless they have the aroma of the forest and the mountain heather; one hears the echo of the huntsman s horn, and sees the rude life of the Dun, and the deep drinking of the chief s ale-house. The prose tales lack the refinement of the Welsh Mabinogion, and the poems the polish of the Welsh ones, but they are truer products of the national culture of the period.