Hero-tales of IrelandThis extraordinary volume features 24 authentic tales of Fin MacCool. Each exciting story centers around superhuman heroes battling dragons and giants, outwitting sorcerers, and even overcoming death itself. |
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Common terms and phrases
Arthur asked Fin Balor Blaiman blow borabu Breogan bring brothers brought Cahal castle cattle Ceadach champion child Cian Coldfeet coming County Donegal cried Dark King daugh deer dinner door drink druid Dyeermud Eastern World Elin Gow enchantment fairy fort Faolan father Fenians of Erin Fin MacCool forest Gaelic gave giant give Glas Gainach gruagach hand head heard hero High King horse hound Hung Up Naked island JEREMIAH CURTIN Kaisusherrit killed King of Leinster king's daughter kingdom Klakherrit knew land Lawn Dyarrig lived Lochlin looked mare marry Miach Lay Micky Mor Mor's morning mother never stopped night Pitis queen rose rushed sailed scolog sent Shawn ship sleep sprang Sprisawn story strand struck sword tell threw told took tree twelve walking White Nation wife young Conal
Popular passages
Page 383 - ... they]. Fionn sent an hundred to fight with them, and when they had reached the place of that strife those youths rushed under them, through them, and over them, and made three heaps of them, namely, a heap of their heads, a heap of their bodies, and a heap of their arms and armour.
Page x - As to the content of these American Indian tales and legends, Mr. Curtin says : What is the substance and sense of these Indian tales, of what do they treat? To begin with, they give an account of how the present order of things arose in the world, and are taken up with the exploits, adventures, and struggles of various elements, animals, birds, reptiles, insects, plants, rocks, and other objects before they became what they are. . . . According to the earliest tales of North America, this world...
Page ix - ... remarks : We have now in North America a number of groups of tales obtained from the Indians which, when considered together, Illustrate and supplement one another ; they constitute. In fact, a whole system. These tales we may describe as forming collectively the creation myth of the New World. ... In some cases, simple and transparent. It is not difficult to recognize the heroes; they are distinguishable at once either by their names or their actions or both. In other cases, these tales are...
Page xiv - The war between the gods continued till it produced on land, in the water, and the air, all creatures that move, and all plants that grow. There is not a beast, bird, fish, reptile, insect, or plant which is not a fallen divinity; and for every one noted there is a story of its previous existence. This transformation of the former people, or divinities, of America was finished just before the present race of men — that is, the Indians — appeared.
Page xlviii - In the United States, little was accomplished till recent years; of late, however, public interest has been roused somewhat, and, since Major Powell entered the field, and became Director of the Bureau of Ethnology, more has been done in studying the native races of America than had been done from the discovery of the country up to that time.
Page xi - ... wish, it was accomplished immediately; nay, if he even thought of a thing, it was there before him. Endowed with such powers and qualities, it would seem that their struggles would be endless and indecisive; but such was not the case. Though opponents might be equally dextrous, and have the power of the wish or the word in a similar degree, one of them would conquer in the end through wishing for more effective and better things, and 5 Ibid., p.
Page xiii - ... first people" of the Indian tales correspond to the earliest gods of other races.8 In the theory of spiritual evolution, worked out by the aboriginal mind of America, all kinds of moral quality and character are represented as coming from an internal movement through which the latent, unevolved personality of each individual of these "first people," or gods, is produced. Once that personality is produced, every species of dramatic situation and tragic catastrophe follows as an inevitable sequence....
Page xv - ... or metamorphosis, which is the vital element in the American system. In many, perhaps in all the mythologies, there is an account of how some of the former people, or gods, instead of fighting and taking part in the struggle of creation and being transformed, retained their original character, and either went above the sky or sailed away westward to where the sky comes down, and passed out under it, and beyond, to a pleasant region where they live in delight. This is that contingent to which...
Page xiii - ... outline, and provisionally, that early system of belief which was common to all races: a system which, though expressed in many languages and in endlessly varying details, has one meaning, and was, in the fullest sense of the word, one — a religion truly catholic and oecumenical, for it was believed...