Studia Celtica Fennica No. XIV 2017 STUDIA CELTICA FENNICA XIV 2017 CONTENTS Esipuhe | Editorial 5 Phillip A. Bernhardt-House Binding the Wolf, Leashing the Hound: Canid Eschatologies in Irish and Norse Myth 7 George Broderick The Last Native Manx Gaelic Speakers. The Final Phase: ‘Full’ or ‘Terminal’ in speech?* 18 John R. Collis Celts Ancient and Modern: Recent Controversies in Celtic Studies 58 Grigory Grigoryev Bachal Ísu: the Symbolism of St. Patrick’s Crosier in Early-Medieval Irish Hagiography 71 Mikhail Kiselev Some Notes on the Origin of the Motif of the Ulaid’s False Beards in Cáth Áenaig Macha and Cóir Anmann 85 Ksenia Kudenko Tochmarc Moméra as Echtra to the Otherworld 92 Eugene McKendry Celtic Languages in Education in the United Kingdom’s Devolved Jurisdictions of Northern Ireland, Wales, and Scotland 111 Kevin Murray H and the First Recension of the Táin 127 Joseph Falaky Nagy The Pride of Heroes and the Problems of Readers of Medieval Celtic Literature 139 Tomás Ó Cathasaigh The Ulster Exiles and Thematic Symmetry in Recension I of Táin Bó Cúailnge 154 Jouna Pyysalo A Minor Sound Law for Celtic: PIE *VNHK → OIr. Vcc: OCymr. Vnc 170 KIRJA-ARVOSTELUJA – BOOK REVIEWS 183 Esipuhe Tämän Studia Celtica Fennican numeron artikkelit perustuvat Helsingissä 24.- 26.8.2016 järjestetyssä XV International Symposium of Societas Celtologica Nordica –symposiumissa pidettyihin esitelmiin. Symposiumi juhlisti Suomen Keltologisen Seuran 25-vuotista taivalta ja siihen osallistui noin 50 tutkijaa Suomesta, Ruotsista, Norjasta, Venäjältä, Irlannista, Skotlannista, Englannista, Pohjois-Irlannista, Yhdysvalloista, Belgiasta, Itävallasta ja Sveitsistä. Kolmen päivän aikana pidettiin 28 esitelmää ja lisäksi saimme nauttia kuudesta keynote- esitelmästä, jotka pitivät Máire Herbert, John Carey, Robin Chapman Stacey, Tomás Ó Cathasaigh, Jan Erik Rekdal ja Joseph Nagy. Onnistuneen tapahtuman järjestäminen ei olisi ollut mahdollista ilman Suomen Keltologisen Seuran aktiivisten jäsenten ja muiden vapaaehtoisten panosta. Haluamme kiittää myös Tieteellisten Seurain Valtuuskuntaa, Suomen Kulttuurirahastoa, Suomen Tiedeseuraa ja Letterstedtska Föreningiä avokätisestä tuesta, joka mahdollisti symposiumin järjestämisen. Lisäksi olemme kiitollisia Tieteellisten Seurain Valtuuskunnalle ja Helsingin yliopiston Tutkijakollegiumille tiloista ja Irlannin suurlähetystölle Suomessa vastaanoton järjestämisestä symposiumin osallistujille. Editorial The articles in this volume of Studia Celtica Fennica are based on papers given at the XV International Symposium of Studia Celtica Fennica held in Helsinki in 24.- 24.8.2016. The symposium celebrated the 25-year history of the Finnish Society for Celtic Studies and gathered together about 50 scholars from Finland, Sweden, Norway, Russia, Ireland, Scotland, England, Northern Ireland, United States, Belgium, Austria, and Switzerland. During the three days there were 28 papers presented and we also got to enjoy six keynote lectures held by Máire Herbert, John Carey, Robin Chapman Stacey, Tomás Ó Cathasaigh, Jan Erik Rekdal, and Joseph Nagy. Organising this successful event would not have been possible without the help of the active members of The Finnish Society for Celtic Studies and other volunteers. We wish to thank Federation of Finnish Learned Societies, Finnish Cultural Foundation, the Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters, and Letterstedtska Förening for their generous funding, which enabled us to organise the symposium. We are also grateful for Federation of Finnish Learned Societies and the Collegium for Advanced Studies of University of Helsinki for giving us the venues and for the Embassy of Ireland in Finland for hosting a reception for the delegates of the symposium. Studia Celtica Fennica XIV (2017), ISSN 1795–097X, © Finnish Society for Celtic Studies 6 Binding the Wolf, Leashing the Hound: Canid Eschatologies in Irish and Norse Myth Phillip A. Bernhardt-House Medieval Irish Christian culture had a great interest in eschatology, the study of which has been tremendously aided by University College Cork’s De Finibus project, and in particular its production, under the editorship of John Carey, Emma Nic Cárthaigh, and Caitríona Ó Dochartaigh, of the two-volume collection The End and Beyond—a major accomplishment indeed, and an invaluable resource to anyone interested in these subjects. Outside of Christian traditions, however, Irish culture does not appear to have definite, surviving creation or eschatological myths.1 The same is not true of certain other Indo-European cultures, with probably the most notable European instance of eschatological myth being the Norse account of Ragnarök, the “doom of the gods,” which will end the current era and usher in a new one. At least four different canids feature prominently in this myth: Sköll, the wolf who will devour the sun goddess Sunna; Hati, the wolf who will devour the moon god Máni; Garmr, the hound who fights the god Týr, each dying as the result of the other; and the Fenrisúlfr, the son of Loki, who will devour Óðinn.2 Much more will be said of the Fenrisúlfr in particular, but it would be interesting to take a short detour based on that particular canid for a moment. Some variety of eschatological thinking in pre-Christian Celtic myth may potentially involve wolves, and might have left a few interesting traces in both iconography and in language. The Welsh term gweilgi, cognate with the Irish fáelchú, does not mean ‘wolf’ (or, more literally, ‘howler-dog’) as it does in Irish, but instead is a term used to mean ‘the sea’.3 In 1913’s volume of Revue Celtique, H. Hubert discussed this term, and how it might relate to several figures in later Insular Celtic narratives who are connected with canids as well as with water or the sea. He likewise pointed towards a panel on the Gundestrup Cauldron showing a two-headed wolf-figure devouring youthful warriors, which in that context might in some way suggest a canid figure connected to the sea, flooding, or drowning.4 While a great deal more could be said in relation to this on the basis of various 1 Mac Cana 1970, 136-137. Why these might not have survived, or if they existed at all for the pre-Christian Irish, is a matter too large for the present inquiry. 2 Sturluson, Edda (Young 1984), 86-88. 3 Bernhardt-House 2010, 347-349. 4 Hubert 1913. On the potential Thracian (or perhaps Thraco-Celtic/Gallo-Thracian) origins of the cauldron, see Mazarov 1991, 50 (where this panel is discussed), 67-68 (where wolf imagery in general is discussed). Phillip A. Bernhardt-House, Skagit Valley College, [email protected] Studia Celtica Fennica XIV (2017), 7-17, ISSN 1795-097X, ©Finnish Society for Celtic Studies Phillip A. Bernhardt-House medieval Welsh sources, something intriguing about the entirety is that the finding of the Gundestrup Cauldron in a Danish bog (which is more circumstantial than substantial evidence in the present case, but is nonetheless noteworthy), potential sea- or water-connections and canids, and the Fenrisúlfr’s name seems to indicate a fen or marsh-dwelling creature of some sort,5 all of which may suggest that there is some common background to the elements of flooding, wolves, and a potential eschatological scenario. It is well to remember that in Strabo’s Geography 4.4.4, there is a formulation of Gaulish eschatological beliefs which he attributes to the teachings of the druids, wherein fire and water occasionally overcome the eternal world and immortal souls.6 Such a fiery-and-watery cosmic destruction is part of the Norse Ragnarök,7 and is likewise indicated in a number of Irish medieval narratives as well, whether 8 separately or together, including in Immram Snedgusa 7 Mac Ríagla. However, long before any of this in narrative terms, something else involving the monstrous Fenrir occurs, detailed in Snorri Sturluson’s Gylfaginning and also alluded to in the Lokasenna: because it was seen that the wolf was able to cause a great deal of death and destruction, he is bound by a chain made of improbable materials, and only agrees to be restrained by it via the surety of Týr’s hand being placed in his mouth while it is done, which then results in the Fenrisúlfr biting off Týr’s hand and devouring it when he learns that he will not be able to break free.9 While an interesting and indeed under-studied tangent could be inserted here reflecting another binding until Ragnarök of the Fenrisúlfr’s father, Loki, by the entrails of his son Narfi who was slain by his other son Váli when the latter had been turned into a wolf after Loki’s slaying of Baldr, which is also found in Snorri’s Gylfaginning and is alluded to in Lokasenna.10 I leave that matter aside for the moment, but hope to return to it in a future study. It was suggested by Mary Gerstein that Óðinn, Loki, and the Fenrisúlfr are all different aspects of a proto-Germanic ‘binder wolf god’,11 which is an interesting idea, since Óðinn has wolves (Geri and Freki) and is associated with them as well as with magical bindings (including in his hanging from Yggdrasill in obtaining the knowledge of the runes). Loki also is a father of a wolf (the Fenrisúlfr) and of another son who becomes a wolf (Váli), and is also bound for his crime of the slaying of Baldr; the Fenrisúlfr is a wolf that ends up being bound in advance 5 Jacoby 1974, 69-77; Simek 1993, 81. 6 Str. 4.4.4. Fortson 2003, 18. 7 Caution might be warranted here on placing too much emphasis on this similarity, or on positing influences of one culture on the other—see Egeler 2013, 50-53, especially 52. 8 Murray 2014. 9 Sturluson, Edda (Young 1984), 56-59; Hollander 1962, 98 §39. 10 Sturluson, Edda (Young 1984), 85; Hollander 1962, 100 §49, 103. 11 Gerstein 1974, 144. 8 Canid Eschatologies in Irish and Norse Myth of Ragnarök.