195.  In the Book of Leinster.

196.  For a description of Navan Fort see a paper by M. de Jubainville in the Revue Celtique, Vol. XVI.

197.  Cuchulainn, the Irish Achilles. By Alfred Nutt. Popular Studies in Mythology, Romance, and Folklore, No. 8.

198.  See a series of interesting parallels between Cuchulainn and Heracles in Studies in the Arthurian Legend, chap. IX and X.

199.  The Táin Bó Chuailgné. Translated by Standish Hayes O’Grady.

200.  The Irish romances relating to Cuchulainn and his cycle, nearly a hundred in number, need hardly be referred to severally in this chapter. Of many of the tales, too, there exist several slightly-varying versions. Many of them have been translated by different scholars. The reader desiring a more complete survey of the Cuchulainn legend is referred to Miss Hull’s Cuchullin Saga or to Lady Gregory’s Cuchulain of Muirthemne.

201.  Pronounced Avair.

202.  Usually identified, however, with the Isle of Skye.

203.  Pronounced Eefa.

204.  A literal translation by Miss Winifred Faraday of the Táin Bo Chuailgné from the Book of the Dun Cow and the Yellow Book of Lecan has been published by Mr. Nutt—Grimm Library, No. 16.

205.  Pronounced Cooley.

206.  This prophecy (here much abridged) is, in the original, in verse.

207.  Finnavár.

208.  “Bellows-dart”, apparently a kind of harpoon. It had thirty barbs.

209.  It is contained in the Book of the Dun Cow story called the “Phantom Chariot”.

210.  See chap. XX—“The Victories of Light over Darkness”.

211.  Pronounced Conla.

212.  A kind of mystic prohibition or taboo; singular, geis.

213.  Now called Dundalk.

214.  Pronounced Lewy.

215.  Pronounced Glen na Mower.

216.  The romance of the Wooing of Emer, a fragment of which is contained in the Book of the Dun Cow, has been translated by Dr. Kuno Meyer, and published by him in the Archæological Review, Vol. I, 1888. Miss Hull has included this translation in her Cuchullin Saga. Another version of it from a Bodleian MS., translated by the same scholar, will be found in the Revue Celtique, Vol. XI.

217.  This story, known as the Sick-Bed of Cuchulainn, translated into French by M. d’Arbois de Jubainville, will be found in his L’Épopée Celtique en Irlande, the fifth volume of Cour de Littérature Celtique. Another translation, into English, by Eugene O’Curry is in Atlantis, Vols. I and II.

218.  For the full story of Baile and Ailinn see Dr. Kuno Meyer’s translation in Vol. XIII of the Revue Celtique.

219.  There are not only numerous translations of this romance, but also many Gaelic versions. The oldest of the latter is in the Book of Leinster, while the fullest are in two MSS. in the Advocates’ Library at Edinburgh. The version followed here is from one of these, the so-called Glenn Masáin MS., translated by Dr. Whitley Stokes, and contained in Miss Hull’s Cuchullin Saga.

220.  Pronounced Naisi.

221.  Pronounced Usna.

222.  It will be found in full in Miss Hull’s Cuchullin Saga. The version there given was first translated into French by M. Ponsinet from the Book of Leinster.

223.  The translations of Fenian stories are numerous. The reader will find many of them popularly retold in Lady Gregory’s Gods and Fighting Men. Thence he may pass on to Mr. Standish Hayes O’Grady’s Silva Gadelica; the Waifs and Strays of Celtic Tradition, especially Vol. IV; Mr. J. G. Campbell’s The Fians; as well as the volumes of the Revue Celtique and the Transactions of the Ossianic Society.

224.  See O’Curry’s translation in Appendix CXXVIII to his MS. Materials.

225.  The story, found in the Book of the Dun Cow, appears in French in De Jubainville’s Épopée Celtique.

226.  This famous story is told in several MSS. of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. For translations see Dr. Whitley Stokes, Irische Texte, and Standish Hayes O’Grady, Transactions of the Ossianic Society, Vol. III.

227.  In Gaelic spelling, Fionn mac Cumhail.

228.  Pronounced Fēna.

229.  O’Curry: MS. Materials, Lecture XIV, p. 303.

230.  Pronounced Coul or Cooal.

231.  Agalamh na Senórach. Under the title The Colloquy of the Ancients, there is an excellent translation of it, from the Book of Lismore, in Standish Hayes O’Grady’s Silva Gadelica.

232.  O’Grady: Silva Gadelica.

233.  Hibbert Lectures, p. 355.

234.  See The Enumeration of Finn’s Household, translated by O’Grady in Silva Gadelica.

235.  For a good account, see J. G. Campbell’s The Fians, pp. 10-80.

236.  In more correct spelling, Oisin, and pronounced Usheen or Isheen.

237.  Pronounced Kylta or Cweeltia.

238.  Pronounced Gaul.

239.  Pronounced Dermat O’Dyna.

240.  Pronounced Grania.

241.  Pronounced Baskin.

242.  Now Castleknock, near Dublin.

243.  Pronounced Demna.

244.  This and other “boy-exploits” of Finn mac Cumhail are contained in a little tract written upon a fragment of the ninth century Psalter of Cashel. It is translated in Vol. IV of the Transactions of the Ossianic Society.

245.  Campbell’s Fians, p. 22.

246.  See chap. XI—“The Gods in Exile”.

247.  From the Colloquy of the Ancients in O’Grady’s Silva Gadelica.

248.  It is translated in Vol. VI of the Transactions of the Ossianic Society.

249.  Pronounced Brăn, not Brān.

250.  Pronounced Skōlaun or Scolaing.

251.  A fine translation of the Pursuit of Diarmait and Grainne has been published by S. H. O’Grady in Vol. III of the Transactions of the Ossianic Society.

252.  Pronounced Navin or Nowin.

253.  The mountain-ash, or rowan.

254.  Now called Benbulben. It is near Sligo.

255.  Pronounced Gavra.

256.  See O’Grady’s Silva Gadelica.

257.  Pronounced Nee-av.

258.  The Lay of Oisin in the Land of Youth, translated by Brian O’Looney for the Ossianic Society—Transactions, Vol. IV. A fine modern poem on the same subject is W. B. Yeats’ Wanderings of Oisin.

259.  See the Transactions of the Ossianic Society. They are generally called the Dialogues of Oisin and Patrick.

260.  The story, contained in the Book of the Dun Cow, is called The Phantom Chariot. It has been translated by Mr. O’Beirne Crowe, and is included in Miss Hull’s Cuchulinn Saga.

261.  See Elton, Origins of English History, pp. 269-271.

262.  Caius Julius Solinus, known as Polyhistor, chap. XXIV.

263.  It is appended to his translation of the tale of the Exile of the Children of Usnach in Atlantis, Vol. III.

264.  See Cusack’s History of Ireland, pp. 160-162.

265.  I.e. from Heaven.

266.  Thomas D’Arcy M‘Gee: Poems, p. 78, “The Gobhan Saer”.

267.  Larminie: West Irish Folk-Tales, pp. 1-9.

268.  Pronounced Ildāna.

269.  It is told in Rhys’s Hibbert Lectures, pp. 314-317.

270.  For still other folk-tale versions of this same myth see Curtin’s Hero Tales of Ireland.

271.  A Donegal story, collected by Mr. David Fitzgerald and published in the Revue Celtique, Vol. IV, p. 177.

272.  The paper is called “Sea-Magic and Running Water”.

273.  Moore: Folklore of the Isle of Man.

274.  See an article in the Dublin University Magazine for June, 1864

275.  The story is among those told by Lady Wilde in her Ancient Legends of Ireland, Vol. I, pp. 77-82.

276.  Dublin University Magazine, June, 1864.

277.  Pronounced Cleena.

278.  Pronounced Evin.

279.  See Fitzgerald, Popular Tales of Ireland, in Vol. IV of the Revue Celtique.

280.  Dublin University Magazine, June, 1864.

281.  For stories of these two Norman-Irish heroes, see Crofton Croker’s Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland.

282.  Lady Guest’s Mabinogion, a note to Math, the Son of Mathonwy.

283.  The Story of Lludd and Llevelys. See chap. XXIV—“The Decline and Fall of the Gods”.

284.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 128.

285.  See a monograph by the Right Hon. Charles Bathurst: Roman Antiquities in Lydney Park, Gloucestershire.

286.  chap. XXIV—“The Decline and Fall of the Gods”.

287.  Hibbert Lectures, pp. 178, 179.

288.  So translated by Lady Guest. Professor Rhys, however, renders it, “in whom God has put the instinct of the demons of Annwn”. Arthurian Legend, p. 341.

289.  Lady Guest’s Mabinogion. Note to “Kulhwch and Olwen”.

290.  Black Book of Caermarthen, poem XXXIII. Vol. I, p. 293, of Skene’s Four Ancient Books.

291.  I have taken the liberty of omitting a few lines whose connection with their context is not very apparent.

292.  Gwyn was said to specially frequent the summits of hills.

293.  This line is Professor Rhys’s. Skene translates it: “Whilst I am called Gwyn the son of Nudd”.

294.  I have here preferred Rhys’s rendering: Arthurian Legend, p. 364.

295.  A name for Hades, of unknown meaning.

296.  Dormarth means “Death’s Door”. Rhys: Arthurian Legend, pp. 156-158.

297.  Rhys has it:

298.  Rhys: Arthurian Legend, p. 383. Skene translates: “I am alive, they in their graves!”

299.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 561.

300.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, pp. 561-563.

301.  Dyer: Studies of the Gods in Greece, p. 48.

Gwyn, son of Nudd, had a brother, Edeyrn, of whom so little has come down to us that he finds his most suitable place in a foot-note. Unmentioned in the earliest Welsh legends, he first appears as a knight of Arthur’s court in the Red Book stories of “Kulhwch and Olwen”, the “Dream of Rhonabwy”, and “Geraint, the Son of Erbin”. He accompanied Arthur on his expedition to Rome, and is said also to have slain “three most atrocious giants” at Brentenol (Brent Knoll), near Glastonbury. His name occurs in a catalogue of Welsh saints, where he is described as a bard, and the chapel of Bodedyrn, near Holyhead, still stands to his honour. Modern readers will know him from Tennyson’s Idyll of “Geraint and Enid”, which follows very closely the Welsh romance of “Geraint, the Son of Erbin”.

302.  Rhys—who calls him “a Cambrian Pluto”: Lectures on Welsh Philology, p. 414.

303.  Book of Taliesin, XLIII. The Death-song of Dylan, Son of the Wave, Vol. I, p. 288 of Skene.

304.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 387.

305.  Rhys: Celtic Folklore, p. 210.

306.  i.e. The Lion with the Steady Hand.

307.  See Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, note to p. 237.

308.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 240.

309.  Retold from the Mabinogi of Math, Son of Mathonwy, in Lady Guest’s Mabinogion.

310.  The Iolo Manuscripts: collected by Edward Williams, the bard, at about the beginning of the nineteenth century—The Tale of Rhitta Gawr.

311.  See Chapter VII—“The Rise of the Sun-God”.

312.  Rhys: Studies in the Arthurian Legend, p. 130.

313.  Rhys: Arthurian Legend, p. 130.

314.  The old Irish tract called Coir Anmann (the Choice of Names) says: “Manannan mac Lir ... the Britons and the men of Erin deemed that he was the god of the sea”.

315.  Iolo MSS., stanza 18 of The Stanzas of the Achievements, composed by the Azure Bard of the Chair.

316.  See note to chap. XXII—“The Treasures of Britain”.

317.  Mabinogi of Branwen, Daughter of Llyr.

318.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 245.

319.  Book of Taliesin, poem XLVIII, in Skene’s Four Ancient Books of Wales, Vol. I, p. 297.

320.  The Verses of the Graves of the Warriors, in the Black Book of Caermarthen. See also Rhys: Arthurian Legend, p. 347.

321.  Rhys: Studies in the Arthurian Legend, p. 160.

322.  Mabinogi of Manawyddan, Son of Llyr.

323.  Book of Taliesin, poem xiv, Vol. I, p. 276, of Skene.

324.  Rhys: Studies in the Arthurian Legend, p. 48 and note.

325.  See a paper in the Edinburgh Review for July, 1851—“The Romans in Britain”.

326.  It is said that the “Old King Cole” of the popular ballad, who “was a merry old soul”, represents the last faint tradition of the Celtic god.

327.  Geoffrey of Monmouth, Book III, chap. I.

328.  Morte Darthur, Book I, chap. XVI.

329.  For full account of Gaulish gods, and their Gaelic and British affinities, see Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, I and II—“The Gaulish Pantheon”.

330.  Rhys: Studies in the Arthurian Legend, p. 282.

331.  It is constantly so-called by the fourteenth-century Welsh poet, Dafydd ab Gwilym, so much admired by George Borrow.

332.  This chapter is retold from Lady Guest’s translation of the Mabinogi of Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed.

333.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 678.

334.  Rhys: Hibbert Lectures, p. 123 and note. Clûd was probably the goddess of the River Clyde. See Rhys: Arthurian Legend, p. 294.

335.  Pronounced Pridaíry.

336.  Retold from Lady Guest’s translation of the Mabinogi of Branwen, the Daughter of Llyr.

337.  Rhys—Lectures on Welsh Philology—compares Matholwch with Mâth, and the story, generally, with the Greek myth of Persephoné.

338.  A bardic name for Britain.

339.  This personage may have been the same as the Gaulish god Taranis. Mention, too, is made in an ancient Irish glossary of “Etirun, an idol of the Britons”.

340.  This spot, called by a twelfth-century Welsh poet “The White Eminence of London, a place of splendid fame”, was probably the hill on which the Tower of London now stands.

341.  The island of Gresholm, off the coast of Pembrokeshire.

342.  The Gododin of Aneurin, as translated by T. Stephens. Branwen is there called “the lady Bradwen”.

343.  See note to Branwen, the Daughter of Llyr in Lady Guest’s Mabinogion.

344.  Tennyson: Idylls of the King—“Guinevere”.

345.  Retold from Lady Guest’s translation of the Mabinogi of Manawyddan, the Son of Llyr.

346.  Saxon Britain—England.

347.  Or the Celtic Elysium, “a mythical country beneath the waves of the sea”.

348.  See the Spoiling of Annwn, quoted in chap. XXI—“The Mythological ‘Coming of Arthur’”.