The cycle of the mythological stories which group themselves round the early invasions of Erin is sparsely represented in Irish manuscripts. Not only is their number less, but their substance is more confused than that of the other cycles. To the comparative mythologist and the folk-lorist, however, they are perhaps the most interesting of all, as throwing more light than any of the others upon the early religious ideas of the race. Most of the sagas connected with this pre-Milesian cycle are now to be found only in brief digests preserved in the Leabhar Gabhála,[1] or Book of Invasions of Ireland, of which large fragments exist in the Books of Leinster and Ballymote, and which Michael O'Clery (collecting from all the ancient sources which he could find in his day) rewrote about the year 1630.
This tells us all the early history of Ireland and of the races that inhabited it before our forefathers landed. It tells us of how first a man called Partholan made a settlement in Ireland, but how in time he and his people all died of the plague, leaving the land deserted; and how after that the Nemedians, or children of Nemed, colonised the island and multiplied in it,[Pg 282] until they began to be oppressed by the Fomorians, who are usually described as African sea-robbers, but the etymology of whose name seems to point to a mythological origin "men from under sea."[2] A number of battles took place between the rival hosts, and the Fomorians were defeated in three battles, but after the death of Nemed, who, like Partholan, died of a plague, the Fomorians oppressed his people again, and, led by a chief called Conaing, built a great tower upon Tory, i.e., Tower Island, off the north-west coast of Donegal. On the eve of every Samhain [Sou-an, or All Hallow's] the wretched Nemedians had to deliver up to these masters two-thirds of their children, corn, and cattle. Driven to desperation by these exactions they rose in arms, stormed the tower, and slew Conaing, all which the Book of Invasions describes at length. The Fomorians being reinforced, the Nemedians fought them a second time in the same place, but in this battle most of them were killed or drowned, the tide having come in and washed over them and their foes alike. The crew of one ship, however, escaped, and these, after a further sojourn of seven years in Ireland, led out of it the surviving remnants of their race with the exception of a very few who remained behind subject to the Fomorians. Those who left Ireland divided into three bands: one sought refuge in Greece, where they again fell into slavery; the second went—some say—to the north of Europe; and the third, headed by a chief called Briton Mael—Hence, say the Irish, the name of Great Britain—found refuge in Scotland, where their descendants remained until the Cruithni, or Picts, overcame them.
After a couple of hundred years the Nemedians who had fled to Greece came back again, calling themselves Firbolg,[3] i.e., "sack" or "bag" men, and held Ireland for[Pg 283] about thirty-five years in peace, when another tribe of invaders appeared upon the scene. These were no less than the celebrated Tuatha De Danann, who turned out to be, in fact, the descendants of the second band of Nemedians who had fled to the north of Europe, and who returned about thirty-six years later than their kinsmen, the Firbolg.
The Tuatha De Danann soon overcame the Firbolg, and drove them, after the Battle of North Moytura,[4] into the islands along the coast, to Aran, Islay, Rachlin, and the Hebrides,[5] after which they assumed the sovereignty of the island to themselves.
This sovereignty they maintained for about two hundred[Pg 284] years, until the ancestors of the present Irish, the Scots, or Gaels, or Milesians, as they are variously called, landed and beat the Tuatha De Danann, and reigned in their stead until they, too, in their turn were conquered by the English. The Book of Conquests is largely concerned with their landing and first settlements and their battles with the De Danann people whom they ended in completely overcoming, after which the Tuatha Dé assume a very obscure position. They appear to have for the most part retired off the surface of the country into the green hills and mounds, and lived in these, often appearing amongst the Milesian population, and sometimes giving their daughters in marriage to them. From this out they are confounded with the Sidhe [Shee], or spirits, now called fairies, and to this very day I have heard old men, when speaking of the fairies who inhabit ancient raths and interfere occasionally in mortal concerns either for good or evil, call them by the name of the Tuatha De Danann.
The first battle of Moytura was fought between the Tuatha De Danann and the Firbolg, who were utterly routed, but Nuada, the king of the Tuatha Dé, lost his hand in the battle. As he was thus suffering from a personal blemish, he could be no longer king, and the people accordingly decided to bestow the sovereignty on Breas [Bras],[6] whose mother was a De Danann, but whose father was a king of the Fomorians, a people who had apparently never lost sight of or wholly left Ireland since the time of their battles with the Nemedians over two hundred years before. The mother of Breas, Eiriu,[7] was a person of authority, and her son was elected to the sovereignty on the understanding that if his reign was found unsatisfactory he should resign. He gave seven pledges of his intention of doing so. At this time the Fomorians again[Pg 285] smote Ireland heavily with their imposts and taxes, as they had done before when the Nemedians inhabited it. The unfortunate De Dannan people were reduced to a state of misery. Ogma[8] was obliged to carry wood, and the Dagda himself to build raths for their masters, and they were so far reduced as to be weak with hunger.
In the meantime the kingship of Breas was not successful. He was hard and niggardly. As the saga of the second battle of Moytura puts it—
"The chiefs of the Tuatha De Danann were dissatisfied, for Breas did not grease their knives; in vain came they to visit Breas; their breaths did not smell of ale. Neither their poets, nor bards, nor druids, nor harpers, nor flute-players, nor musicians, nor jugglers, nor fools appeared before them, nor came into the palace to amuse them."
Matters reached a crisis when the poet Coirpné came to demand hospitality and was shown "into a little house, small, narrow, black, dark, where was neither fire nor furniture nor bed. He was given three little dry loaves on a little plate. When he rose in the morning he was not thankful." He gave vent then to the first satire ever uttered in Ireland, which is still preserved in eight lines which would be absolutely unintelligible except for the ancient glosses.
After this the people of the De Danann race demanded the abdication of Breas, which he had promised in case his reign did not please them. He acknowledged his obligation to them, but requested a delay of seven years, which they allowed him, on condition that he gave them guarantees to touch nothing belonging to them during that time, "neither our houses nor our lands, nor our gold, nor our silver, nor our cattle, nor anything eatable, we shall pay thee neither rent nor fine to the end of seven years." This was agreed to.
But the intention of Breas in demanding a delay of seven years was a treacherous one; he meant to approach his father's[Pg 286] kindred the Fomorians, and move them to reinstate him at the point of the sword. He goes to his mother who tells him who his father is, for up to that time he had remained in ignorance of it; and she gives him a ring whereby his father Elatha, a king of the Fomorians, may recognise him. He departs to the Fomorians, discovers his father and appeals to him for succour. By his father he is sent to Balor, a king of the Fomorians of the Isles of Norway—a locality probably ascribed to the Fomorians after the invasions of the Northmen—and there gathered together an immense army to subdue the Tuatha De Danann and give the island to their relation Breas.
In the meantime Nuada, whose hand had been replaced by a silver one, reascends the throne and is joined by Lugh of the Long-hand, the "Ildana" or "man of various arts." This Lugh was a brother of the Dagda and of Ogma, and is perhaps the best-known figure among the De Danann personalities. Lugh and the Dagda and Ogma and Goibniu the smith and Diancécht the leech met secretly every day at a place in Meath for a whole year, and deliberated how best to shake off the yoke of the Fomorians. Then they held a general meeting of the Tuatha De and spoke with each one in secret.
"'How wilt thou show thy power?' said Lugh, to the sorcerer Mathgen.
"'By my art,' answered Mathgen, 'I shall throw down the mountains of Ireland upon the Fomorians, and they shall fall with their heads to the earth;' then told he to Lugh the names of the twelve principal mountains of Ireland which were ready to do the bidding of the goddess Dana[9] and to smite their enemies on every side.
[Pg 287]
"Lugh asked the cup-bearer: 'In what way wilt thou show thy power?'
"'I shall place,' answered the cup-bearer, 'the twelve principal lakes of Ireland under the eyes of the Fomorians, but they shall find no water in them, however great the thirst which they may feel;' and he enumerated the lakes, 'from the Fomorians the water shall hide itself, they shall not be able to take a drop of it; but the same lakes will furnish the Tuatha De Danann with water to drink during the whole war, though it should last seven years.'
"The Druid Figal, the son of Mamos, said, 'I shall make three rains of fire fall on the faces of the Fomorian warriors; I shall take from them two-thirds of their valour and courage, but so often as the warriors of the De Danann shall breathe out the air from their breasts, so often shall they feel their courage and valour and strength increase. Even though the war should last seven years it shall not fatigue them.'
"The Dagda answered, 'All the feats which you three, sorcerer, cup-bearer, druid, say you can do, I myself alone shall do them.'
"'It is you then are the Dagda,'[10] said those present, whence came the name of the Dagda which he afterwards bore."
Lugh then went in search of the three gods of Dana—Brian, Iuchar, and Iucharba (whom he afterwards put to death for slaying his father, as is recorded at length in the saga of the "Fate of the Children of Tuireann"[11]) and with these and his other allies he spent the next seven years in making preparations for the great struggle with the Fomorians.
This saga and the whole story of the Tuatha De Danann contending with the Fomorians, who are in one place in the saga actually called sidhe, or spirits, is all obviously mythological, and has usually been explained, by D'Arbois de Jubainville and others, as the struggle between the gods or good spirits and the evil deities.
[Pg 288]
The following episode also shows the wild mythological character of the whole.
"Dagda," says the saga, "had a habitation at Glenn-Etin in the north. He had arranged to meet a woman at Glenn-Etin on the day of Samhan [November day] just a year, day for day, before the battle of Moytura. The Unius, a river of Connacht, flows close beside Glenn-Etin, to the south. Dagda saw the woman bathe herself in the Unius at [Kesh] Coran. One of the woman's feet in the water touched Allod Eche, that is to say Echumech to the south, the other foot also in the water touched Lescuin in the north. Nine tresses floated loose around her head. Dagda approached and accosted her. From thenceforth the place has been named the Couple's Bed. The woman was the goddess Mór-rígu"—
the goddess of war, of whom we shall hear more in connection with Cuchulain.
As for the Dagda himself, his character appears somewhat contradictory. Just as the most opposite accounts of Zeus are met with in Greek mythology, some glorifying him as throning in Olympus supreme over gods and men, others as playing low and indecent tricks disguised as a cuckoo or a ............