Pre-Christian Ireland

LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 941 o 5 B66p / The person charging this material is re- sponsible for its return to the library from which it was withdrawn on or before the Latest Date stamped below. Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books are reasons for disciplinary action and may result in dismissal from the University. UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN DEC 21 L161 — O-1096 i^'*''*^. aRO\»NC iNOLAN.LITH. PRE-CHRISTIAN IRELAND. BY CANON U. J. BOURKE, RR, M.R.I.A., EXAMINES IN KELTIO AND IN IBISH HISTOBT, BOYAI. TTNTVEBSIIY OF IBELANC. » BROWNE & NOLAN, NASSAU STREET, DUBLIN, Printers anD ûfiUsêrs. 1887. J BEOWNE AND NOLAN, PEINTEES, DUBLIN. — CONTENTS. Chapteb I. Certainty of Early Keltic Settlements in Eire ... 1 Chapteb II. The Kelts of Europe—Descendants^ of Japhet - - - 4 Chapteb III. The Firbolg or Belgae ...... 9 Chapteb TV. The Fate of the Firbolg ...... 17 Chapteb V. The Tuatha De Danann in power contrasted with the Firbolg The Fomorians ...... 36 Chapteb VI. Fomorians Defeated—Danann Dynasty continued - - 53 Chapteb VII. The Eponymous Character of the Danann Chiefs - - 64 Chapteb VIII. Sources of Historical Truth regarding the Danann People—They certainly built the Palace of Aileach, and perhaps, most of the Bound Towers .----. 69 Chapteb IX. Other Proofs—Manuscripts—Monumentary Mounds—Sites selected * by the Conquered Danann Chiefs, known to-day as ' Faery Hills," are footprints on the sands at the past period of Danann Power ------ 82 Chapteb j X. Had the Danann Tribes and Pre-Christian Gael any knowledge of Letters P—What Character or Alphabet did they use ? - 89 Chapteb XI. Ogham—What it was—Material for Writing—Origin of this Secret Art—Proofs of Pagan Parentage—Christian Ogham Inscriptions—The Letters—Greneral Character of the Danann Race . -.97 4S6843 —— IV Chaptee XII. Fable and Fact—Mythology reduced to a System—Three views The Danann an intelligent Pagan People—Their form of Government — Clan System — Kings — Laws — Religion Druidism—Social Habits—Music—The " Caoin" —Marriage Arts—Public Gatherings—Dwellings—How they lived - 113 Chaptee XIII. The Defeat of the Danann Dynasty by a Colony of Kelts from the South of Europe —Certainty of a Keltic Colonisation—Un- certainty of the record contained in Irish Manuscripts Heroic deeds of Milesians recounted by the Bards - - 124 Chaptee XIV. Mission from Spain to Ireland- -Ith —His death—Preparation for the Invasion of Inisfail—They come—Strange details Story of the Milesian landing - - - - 138 Chaptee XV. A Storm—Queen Scota unfurls the Sacred Banner—Battles of Mis, of Tailtean, of Druimlighean—Defeat of the Danann Tribes—How the Leaders of the Danann Clans select the " Sidhe " or best sites throughout the land—They finally settle amongst the people— Stories relative to that age - 144 Chaptee XVI. > Stories and Romances regarding the Early Irish Period - - 149 Chaptee XVII. Fate of the Children of Turenn—A story relating to the early Danann Period - - - - - -150 Chaptee XVIII. A new Dynasty—Heber and Heremon—Division of Ireland—New Possession—A falling out—Battle of GeashiU—Death of Heremon—Names of places teU to this day of the Milesian Dynasty ---.--- 161 Chaptee XIX. The Families descended from Heber Fionn—From Heremon—And from Ir, or Heber, son of Ir—The leading princely Milesian families of Ireland trace their descent from those three princely Houses of Heber Fionn, Heremon, and Ir—Length of time does not destroy certainty of connection—The chief Monarch^ up to the time of Conor Mac Nessa—A Kingly Government existed in Eire for over two thousand years, " eipe A|\'o, 1nif riA Tlig," Noble Eire.Island of Kings - 166 I / Chafteb XX. Ireland's Royal Backbone—Her line of Kings reaches nigh three thousand years—The nature and character of the Brehon Laws, best test and proof of the Social State and Manners of the Irish ia the far past—The Clan System—^The Eights of the Clan and of the Chief—Elective Power—Tanistry—Gavel- kind—Moral and Physical characteristics of the Irish People 177 Chaptbe XXI. The Question of the Round Towers of Ireland—Three leading opinions regarding them—The Christian Theory, as it is called, advocated by Dr. Petrie and his followers—The Pagan Theory—Â third Opinion, that many of the Towers were erected in the Christian Period, that others had come down from Pagan times, but in all, the figure and form of the edifices, and the purposes for which they were first erected were of Pre-Christian origin and growth—Reasons for the different opinions—The controversy not yet closed—The Towers described —Their probable number—Their durability- 192 Appendix I. [ A Summary of Dr. Petrie's History and Antiquities of Tara Hill - . - 205 ' Appendix II. A list of the Best Hundred Irish Books - - - - 211 PKEFACE. Before the time of Copernicus, Canon and Priest of Frauenberg. (A.D. 1473-1543), and for some years after his death, a variety of problems, difficult then to be solved, regarding the sun, the planets and the stars, presented themselves to those who made the science of the heavens their study. The power of solving all the difficulties that arose to the minds of intelligent scholars, appeared then to be beyond the limits of human understanding. This was of necessity the outcome under the Ptolemaic teaching. Directly that the system of astronomy taught by Copernicus was established, these difficulties, like filmy clouds before the noon-day sun, vanished. The discoveries made by Sir Isaac Newton (a.d. 1642- 1727) over a century later, simplified other problems which at one time appeared as if they could never be solved. , At a still later period, say one hundred years ago, few indeed covdd tell what is lightning or thunder which accompanies it, or the northern lights, or how it is that a magnet possesses the property of attraction and repulsion, and in every part of the globe points in the direction of the poles. The discoveries in. the walk of electrical science have made these things now-a-days quite plain ; those questions are known at present by ordinary college students. The science of comparative philology is to the histprian and anti- quarian of the present time, what the correct system of astronomy has been to those who wander in safety and certainty amidst the sta Things that before appeared difficult and uncertain to the antiqu to-day are plain and pleasant. Take for instance amongst the ablest historians of the early past Livy as an example. He could not account for the beginnings of the first inhabitants of Latium, or the Sabine territory ; or for those who had flourished some centuries anterior to the period when Romulus and Remus are supposed to have lived. The ancient Etrurians were a people of whom the earliest Roman writers knew very little ; yet they at one time enjoyed power, and a civilisation not inferior to that possessed by the Romans during the age of the Gracchi. The ancient writers could not tell who were the Felasgi, the Egyptians, the peoples of Ninivethtnd Babylon, or what connection existed between the Greeks and the inhabitants living east and west of the Appennines. — vm Those primitive states taken separately were to our ancient historians what the severed joints and members of an organised body appear to an uneducated boy—a perfect puzzle. The earth and the different peoples that dwelt upon it were to them a complete mystery. No one could rightly tell what the eari;h was, or where the people first came from who dwelt on its surface. At a later period, even our own Dr. Keating—the author of the History of Ireland in Irish knew very little of the geography of the earth, and much less concemiffg the languages which the different nations in the past had employed as a vehicle of thought. It was not his fault : he was up to the teaching of the period in which he lived (16th century). The modem science of comparative philology makes those ethnical and lingual difficulties which historians or antiquarians, in past centuries, were unable to solve, regarding individual nations, plain and clear. This science shows that we have all come from one primitive and primeval habitat, separating as the earliest emigrants proceeded westward into different clans or large families, and settling down in some new territory, efformating there in process of time a new race and a distinct people. Had Livy had any idea of this scientific view of early mankind, apart from any knowledge furnished by Hebrew writers, he would have known that all European tongues are sister languages, that Latin, so called, had in its beginnings the start of Greek, not only in the race westward, but in its more robust and imaffected phonetic forms of speech which Komulus and those who flourished in the eighth century|before the Christian era, had used as a language on the banks of the Tiber and the Anio. If he had had any notion of the light which comparative philology throws over the m^p of Europe two thousand years before the coming of the Christian era, he would not have thought that the earliest inhabitant of his own beautiful Italy had grown out of the soil of that charming country; and if our own Irish historian, Dr. Keating, had any forecast of such a science, he would not have written so readily, or copied the unmeaning views of earlier annalists in their vague Btatements regarding the primitive languages of mankind, and the geographical relations that existed between the kingdoms and nations of the world as known to the ancients.

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