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CELTIC FAIRY TALES SELECTED AND EDITED BY JOSEPH JACOBS A P S E C S P ENN TATE LECTRONIC LASSICS ERIES UBLICATION Celtic Fairy Tales Selected and Edited by Joseph Jacobs is a publication of the Pennsylvania State University. This Portable Document file is furnished free and without any charge of any kind. Any person using this document file, for any purpose, and in any way does so at his or her own risk. Neither the Pennsylvania State University nor Jim Manis, Faculty Editor, nor anyone associ- ated with the Pennsylvania State University assumes any responsibility for the material con- tained within the document or for the file as an electronic transmission, in any way. Celtic Fairy Tales Selected and Edited by Joseph Jacobs, the Pennsylvania State University, Elec- tronic Classics Series, Jim Manis, Faculty Editor, Hazleton, PA 18202 is a Portable Document File produced as part of an ongoing student publication project to bring classical works of literature, in English, to free and easy access of those wishing to make use of them. Cover Design: Jim Manis Copyright © 2005 The Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University is an equal opportunity university. Contents PREFACE........................................................................................................................................... 5 CONNLA AND THE FAIRY MAIDEN.......................................................................................... 9 GULEESH.........................................................................................................................................11 THE FIELD OF BOLIAUNS......................................................................................................... 25 THE HORNED WOMEN............................................................................................................... 27 CONALL YELLOWCLAW ........................................................................................................... 30 HUDDEN AND DUDDEN .............................................................................................................. 39 AND DONALD O’NEARY............................................................................................................ 39 THE SHEPHERD OF MYDDVAI................................................................................................. 45 THE SPRIGHTLY TAILOR .......................................................................................................... 47 THE STORY OF DEIRDRE .......................................................................................................... 49 MUNACHAR AND MANACHAR................................................................................................ 61 GOLD-TREE AND SILVER-TREE.............................................................................................. 64 THE WOOING OF OLWEN.......................................................................................................... 70 JACK AND HIS COMRADES ...................................................................................................... 79 THE SHEE AN GANNON.............................................................................................................. 85 AND THE GRUAGACH GAIRE .................................................................................................. 85 THE STORY-TELLER AT FAULT .............................................................................................. 91 THE SEA-MAIDEN........................................................................................................................ 99 A LEGEND OF KNOCKMANY ................................................................................................. 106 FAIR, BROWN, AND TREMBLING ..........................................................................................114 JACK AND HIS MASTER........................................................................................................... 122 BETH GELLERT.......................................................................................................................... 129 THE TALE OF IVAN.................................................................................................................... 130 ANDREW COFFEY...................................................................................................................... 133 THE BATTLE OF THE BIRDS................................................................................................... 137 BREWERY OF EGGSHELLS..................................................................................................... 148 THE LAD WITH THE GOAT-SKIN.......................................................................................... 149 NOTES AND REFERENCES ...................................................................................................... 156 Joseph Jacobs CELTIC FAIRY PREFACE LAST YEAR, in giving the young ones a volume of English TALES Fairy Tales, my difficulty was one of collection. This time, in offering them specimens of the rich folk-fancy of the Celts of these islands, my trouble has rather been one of selection. SELECTED AND EDITED BY Ireland began to collect her folk-tales almost as early as any country in Europe, and Croker has found a whole school of JOSEPH JACOBS successors in Carleton, Griffin, Kennedy, Curtin, and Dou- glas Hyde. Scotland had the great name of Campbell, and has still efficient followers in MacDougall, MacInnes, SAY THIS Carmichael, Macleod, and Campbell of Tiree. Gallant little Wales has no name to rank alongside these; in this depart- Three times, with your eyes shut ment the Cymru have shown less vigour than the Gaedhel. Perhaps the Eisteddfod, by offering prizes for the collection Mothuighim boladh an Éireannaigh bhinn bhreugaigh faoi m’fhóidín dúthaigh. of Welsh folk-tales, may remove this inferiority. Meanwhile Wales must be content to be somewhat scantily represented And you will see among the Fairy Tales of the Celts, while the extinct Cor- nish tongue has only contributed one tale. What you will see In making my selection I have chiefly tried to make the TO ALFRED NUTT stories characteristic. It would have been easy, especially from 5 Celtic Fairy Tales Kennedy, to have made up a volume entirely filled with felt myself more at liberty than the translators themselves, “Grimm’s Goblins” à la Celtique. But one can have too much who have generally been over-literal, in changing, excising, even of that very good thing, and I have therefore avoided as or modifying the original. I have even gone further. In order far as possible the more familiar “formulae” of folk-tale lit- that the tales should be characteristically Celtic, I have paid erature. To do this I had to withdraw from the English-speak- more particular attention to tales that are to be found on ing Pale both in Scotland and Ireland, and I laid down the both sides of the North Channel. rule to include only tales that have been taken down from In re-telling them I have had no scruple in interpolating Celtic peasants ignorant of English. now and then a Scotch incident into an Irish variant of the Having laid down the rule, I immediately proceeded to same story, or vice versa. Where the translators appealed to break it. The success of a fairy book, I am convinced, de- English folklorists and scholars, I am trying to attract En- pends on the due admixture of the comic and the romantic: glish children. They translated; I endeavoured to transfer. In Grimm and Asbjörnsen knew this secret, and they alone. short, I have tried to put myself into the position of an ollamh But the Celtic peasant who speaks Gaelic takes the pleasure or sheenachie familiar with both forms of Gaelic, and anx- of telling tales somewhat sadly: so far as he has been printed ious to put his stories in the best way to attract English chil- and translated, I found him, to my surprise, conspicuously dren. I trust I shall be forgiven by Celtic scholars for the lacking in humour. For the comic relief of this volume I changes I have had to make to effect this end. have therefore had to turn mainly to the Irish peasant of the The stories collected in this volume are longer and more Pale; and what richer source could I draw from? detailed than the English ones I brought together last Christ- For the more romantic tales I have depended on the Gaelic, mas. The romantic ones are certainly more romantic, and and, as I know about as much of Gaelic as an Irish Nation- the comic ones perhaps more comic, though there may be alist M. P., I have had to depend on translators. But I have room for a difference of opinion on this latter point. This 6 Joseph Jacobs superiority of the Celtic folk-tales is due as much to the narrative, as Mr. Kipling well knows. conditions under which they have been collected, as to any One characteristic of the Celtic folk-lore I have endeav- innate superiority of the folk-imagination. The folk-tale in oured to represent in my selection, because it is nearly unique England is in the last stages of exhaustion. The Celtic folk- at the present day in Europe. Nowhere else is there so large tales have been collected while the practice of story-telling is and consistent a body of oral tradition about the national still in full vigour, though there are every signs that its term and mythical heroes as amongst the Gaels. Only the byline, of life is already numbered. The more the reason why they or hero-songs of Russia, equal in extent the amount of knowl- should be collected and put on record while there is yet time. edge about the heroes of the past that still exists among the On the whole, the industry of the collectors of Celtic folk- Gaelic-speaking peasantry of Scotland and Ireland. And the lore is to be commended, as may be seen from the survey of Irish tales and ballads have this peculiarity, that some of them it I have prefixed to the Notes and References at the end of have been extant, and can be traced, for well nigh a thou- the volume. Among these, I would call attention to the study sand years. I have selected as a specimen of this class the of the legend of Beth Gellert, the origin of which, I believe, Story of Deirdre, collected among the Scotch peasantry a I have settled. few years ago, into which I have been able to insert a passage While I have endeavoured to render the language of the taken from an Irish vellum of the twelfth century. I could tales simple and free from bookish artifice, I have not felt at have more than filled this volume with similar oral tradi- liberty to retell the tales in the English way. I have not scrupled tions about Finn (the Fingal of Macpherson’s “Ossian”). But to retain a Celtic turn of speech, and here and there a Celtic the story of Finn, as told by the Gaelic peasantry of to-day, word, which I have not explained within brackets—a prac- deserves a volume by itself, while the adventures of the tice to be abhorred of all good men. A few words unknown Ultonian hero, Cuchulain, could easily fill another. to the reader only add effectiveness and local colour to a I have endeavoured to include in this volume the best and 7 Celtic Fairy Tales most typical stories told by the chief masters of the Celtic friend, Mr. J. D. Batten, in giving form to the creations of folk-tale, Campbell, Kennedy, Hyde, and Curtin, and to these the folk-fancy. He has endeavoured in his illustrations to I have added the best tales scattered elsewhere. By this means retain as much as possible of Celtic ornamentation; for all I hope I have put together a volume, containing both the details of Celtic archaeology he has authority. Yet both he best, and the best known folk-tales of the Celts. I have only and I have striven to give Celtic things as they appear to, been enabled to do this by the courtesy of those who owned and attract, the English mind, rather than attempt the hope- the copyright of these stories. Lady Wilde has kindly granted less task of representing them as they are to Celts. The fate me the use of her effective version of “The Horned Women;” of the Celt in the British Empire bids fair to resemble that of and I have specially to thank Messrs. Macmillan for right to the Greeks among the Romans. “They went forth to battle, use Kennedy’s “Legendary Fictions,” and Messrs. Sampson but they always fell,” yet the captive Celt has enslaved his Low & Co., for the use of Mr. Curtin’s Tales. captor in the realm of imagination. The present volume at- In making my selection, and in all doubtful points of treat- tempts to begin the pleasant captivity from the earliest years. ment, I have had resource to the wide knowledge of my If it could succeed in giving a common fund of imaginative friend Mr. Alfred Nutt in all branches of Celtic folk-lore. If wealth to the Celtic and the Saxon children of these isles, it this volume does anything to represent to English children might do more for a true union of hearts than all your poli- the vision and colour, the magic and charm, of the Celtic tics. folk-imagination, this is due in large measure to the care with which Mr. Nutt has watched its inception and progress. JOSEPH JACOBS. With him by my side I could venture into regions where the non-Celt wanders at his own risk. Lastly, I have again to rejoice in the co-operation of my 8 Joseph Jacobs CONNLA AND THE FAIRY MAIDEN ship. Oh, come with me, Connla of the Fiery Hair, ruddy as the dawn with thy tawny skin. A fairy crown awaits thee to CONNLA OF THE FIERY HAIR was son of Conn of the Hun- grace thy comely face and royal form. Come, and never shall dred Fights. One day as he stood by the side of his father on thy comeliness fade, nor thy youth, till the last awful day of the height of Usna, he saw a maiden clad in strange attire judgment.” coming towards him. The king in fear at what the maiden said, which he heard “Whence comest thou, maiden?” said Connla. though he could not see her, called aloud to his Druid, Coran “I come from the Plains of the Ever Living,” she said, “there by name. where there is neither death nor sin. There we keep holiday “Oh, Coran of the many spells,” he said, “and of the cun- alway, nor need we help from any in our joy. And in all our ning magic, I call upon thy aid. A task is upon me too great pleasure we have no strife. And because we have our homes for all my skill and wit, greater than any laid upon me since in the round green hills, men call us the Hill Folk.” I seized the kingship. A maiden unseen has met us, and by The king and all with him wondered much to hear a voice her power would take from me my dear, my comely son. If when they saw no one. For save Connla alone, none saw the thou help not, he will be taken from thy king by woman’s Fairy Maiden. wiles and witchery.” “To whom art thou talking, my son?” said Conn the king. Then Coran the Druid stood forth and chanted his spells Then the maiden answered, “Connla speaks to a young, towards the spot where the maiden’s voice had been heard. fair maid, whom neither death nor old age awaits. I love And none heard her voice again, nor could Connla see her Connla, and now I call him away to the Plain of Pleasure, longer. Only as she vanished before the Druid’s mighty spell, Moy Mell, where Boadag is king for aye, nor has there been she threw an apple to Connla. complaint or sorrow in that land since he has held the king- For a whole month from that day Connla would take noth- 9