Myths and legends ; the Celtic race . terisation. The accounts which are givenof them are many and conflicting, and out of these wccan only give here the more ancient narratives. The Coming of Partholan The Celts, as we have learned from Caesar, believedthemselves to be descended from the God of the Under-world, the God of the Dead. Partholan is said to havecome into Ireland from the West, where beyond thevast, unsailed Atlantic Ocean the Irish Fairyland, theLand of the Living—/.(?., the land of the Happy Dead—was placed. His fathers name was Sera (? the West).He came with his queen Dalny^ and
Myths and legends ; the Celtic race . terisation. The accounts which are givenof them are many and conflicting, and out of these wccan only give here the more ancient narratives. The Coming of Partholan The Celts, as we have learned from Caesar, believedthemselves to be descended from the God of the Under-world, the God of the Dead. Partholan is said to havecome into Ireland from the West, where beyond thevast, unsailed Atlantic Ocean the Irish Fairyland, theLand of the Living—/.(?., the land of the Happy Dead—was placed. His fathers name was Sera (? the West).He came with his queen Dalny^ and a number of com-panions of both sexes. Ireland—and this is an imagina-tive touch intended to suggest extreme antiquity—wasthen a different country, physically, from what it is were then but three lakes in Ireland, nine rivers,and only one plain. Others were added gradually ^ Dealgnaid. 1 have been obliged here, as occasionally elsewhere,to modify the Irish names so as to make them pronounceable byEnglish St. Finnen and the Pagan Chief 96 THE LEGEND OF TUAN MAC CARELLduring the reign of the Partholanians. One, LakeRury, was said to have burst out as a grave was beingdug for Rury, son of Partholan. The Fomorians The Partholanians, it is said, had to do battle with astrange race, called the Fomorians, of whom we shallhear much in later sections of this book. They were ahuge, misshapen, violent and cruel people, representing,we may believe, the powers of evil. One of these wassurnamed Cenchos^ which means The Footless, and thusappears to be related to Vitra, the God of Evil in Vedan-tic mythology, who had neither feet nor hands. With ahost of these demons Partholan fought for the lordshipof Ireland, and drove them out to the northern seas,whence they occasionally harried the country under itslater rulers. The end of the race of Partholan was that they wereafflicted by pestilence, and having gathered together onthe Old Plain (Senmag) for convenience of
Size: 1309px × 1908px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectcelticl, bookyear1910
