Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 17, 1906.djvu/155

 The European Sky-God. 143

Isle of Man ^ ; and Manawyddan, his counterpart in Wales, shared the realm of Dyved with Pryderi, son of Pwyll.2 In view of the series of Irish kings named Nuada,^ of Dumnonian kings named Nudd or Nud or Nudos,* of British kings named Lludd or Lud or Loth or Lot,^ and of Pictish kings named Bile or Bili or Beli,^ it would be unsafe to conclude that the kingship of Manannan and Manawyddan existed merely in the brains of mediaeval euhemerists. It may well have been that certain kings of the Insular Celts posed as embodiments of the god Manannan or Manawyddan.

Manannan, like Nuada and Bile, had his sacred trees. His palace on a sea-girt isle was known as Emhain of the Apple-trees '^ ; and of those who were privileged to visit it several fascinating folk-tales are told. These tales are indeed more or less familiar to English readers, thanks to the charming translations of Lady Gregory^ and the scholarly investigations of Mr, A. Nutt.^ But they have such an important bearing on the subject now in hand, that I must briefly summarise them before proceeding further with my argument

^ Rhys Hibbert Lectures p. 663, Squire Mythology of the British Islands p. 241. G. W. Larminie West Irish Folk-tales and Romances (London 1898) p. 64 ff. "King Mananaun."

2 The Mabinogion trans. Lady Charlotte Guest ed. A. Nutt London 1904 p. 43 ff. ' Manawyddan the Son of Llyr. '

^Folk-lore xvii. 32 ff. ^ lb. xvii. 35 ff.

^ lb. xvii. 48 ff. ^ lb. xvii. 70.

^ Squire Mythology of the British Islands p. 60, Lady Gregory Gods and Fighting Men p. loi. Manannan had the reputation of wandering through Ireland in human form doing tricks and wonders : on such occasions ' all the food he would use would be a vessel of sour milk and a few crab-apples ' {ead. ib. p. no).

124 ff., 126 ff., 136 ff., 431 ft"., and Cuchulain of Muirthemne London 1903 p. 276 ff.
 * Lady Gregory Gods and Fighting Men London 1904 pp. Iioff., 115 ff.,

^ A. Nutt The Voyage of Bran Son of Febal London 1895- 1897.