In like manner the ancient Irish writers have made glorious the halls and fortresses of their mythical kings. Like the palaces of Priam, of Menelaus, and of Odysseus, they gleam with gold and gems. Conchobar,[[27]] the legendary King of Ulster in its golden age, had three such “houses” at Emain Macha. Of the one called the “Red Branch”, we are told that it contained nine compartments of red yew, partitioned by walls of bronze, all grouped around the king’s private chamber, which had a ceiling of silver, and bronze pillars adorned with gold and carbuncles.[[28]] But the far less magnificent accounts of the Latin writers have, no doubt, more truth in them than such lavish pictures. They described the Britons they knew as living in villages of bee-hive huts, roofed with fern or thatch, from which, at the approach of an enemy, they retired to the local dún. This, so far from being elaborate, merely consisted of a round or oval space fenced in with palisades and earthworks, and situated either upon the top of a hill or in the midst of a not easily traversable morass.[[29]] We may see the remains of such strongholds in many parts of England—notable ones are the “castles” of Amesbury, Avebury, and Old Sarum in Wiltshire, Saint Catherine’s Hill, near Winchester, and Saint George’s Hill, in Surrey—and it is probable that, in spite of the Celtic praisers of past days, the “palaces” of Emain Macha and of Tara were very like them.
The Celtic customs were, like the Homeric, those of the primitive world. All land (though it may have theoretically belonged to the chief) was cultivated in common. This community of possessions is stated by Caesar[[30]] to have extended to their wives; but the imputation cannot be said to have been proved. On the contrary, in the stories of both branches of the Celtic race, women seem to have taken a higher place in men’s estimation, and to have enjoyed far more personal liberty, than among the Homeric Greeks. The idea may have arisen from a misunderstanding of some of the curious Celtic customs. Descent seems to have been traced through the maternal rather than through the paternal line, a very un-Aryan procedure which some believe to have been borrowed from another race. The parental relation was still further lessened by the custom of sending children to be brought up outside the family in which they were born, so that they had foster-parents to whom they were as much, or even more, attached than to their natural ones.
Their political state, mirroring their family life, was not less primitive. There was no central tribunal. Disputes were settled within the families in which they occurred, while, in the case of graver injuries, the injured party or his nearest relation could kill the culprit or exact a fine from him. As families increased in number, they became petty tribes, often at war with one another. A defeated tribe had to recognize the sovereignty of the head man of the conquering tribe, and a succession of such victories exalted him into the position of a chief of his district. But even then, though his decision was the whole of the law, he was little more than the mouthpiece of public opinion.
CHAPTER IV
THE RELIGION OF THE ANCIENT BRITONS AND
DRUIDISM
The ancient inhabitants of Britain—the Gaelic and British Celts—have been already described as forming a branch of what are roughly called the “Aryans”. This name has, however, little reference to race, and really signifies the speakers of a group of languages which can be all shown to be connected, and to descend remotely from a single source—a hypothetical mother-tongue spoken by a hypothetical people which we term “Aryan”, or, more correctly, “Indo-European”. This primeval speech, evolved, probably, upon some part of the great plain which stretches from the mountains of Central Europe to the mountains of Central Asia, has spread, superseding, or amalgamating with the tongues of other races, until branches of it are spoken over almost the whole of Europe and a great portion of Asia. All the various Latin, Greek, Slavic, Teutonic, and Celtic languages are “Aryan”, as well as Persian and other Asiatic dialects derived from the ancient “Zend”, and the numerous Indian languages which trace their origin to Sanscrit.
Not very long ago, it was supposed that this common descent of language involved a common descent of blood. A real brotherhood was enthusiastically claimed for all the principal European nations, who were also invited to recognize Hindus and Persians as their long-lost cousins. Since then, it has been conceded that, while the Aryan speech survived, though greatly modified, the Aryan blood might well have disappeared, diluted beyond recognition by crossing with the other races whom the Aryans conquered, or among whom they more or less peacefully settled. As a matter of fact, there are no European nations—perhaps no people at all except a few remote savage tribes—which are not made up of the most diverse elements. Aryan and non-Aryan long ago blended inextricably, to form by their fusion new peoples.
But, just as the Aryan speech influenced the new languages, and the Aryan customs the new civilizations, so we can still discern in the religions of the Aryan-speaking nations similar ideas and expressions pointing to an original source of mythological conceptions. Hence, whether we investigate the mythology of the Hindus, the Greeks, the Teutons, or the Celts, we find the same mythological groundwork. In each, we see the powers of nature personified, and endowed with human form and attributes, though bearing, with few exceptions, different names. Like the Vedic brahmans, the Greek and Latin poets, and the Norse scalds, the Celtic bards—whether Gaels or Britons—imagined the sky, the sun, the moon, the earth, the sea, and the dark underworld, as well as the mountains, the streams and the woods, to be ruled by beings like their own chiefs, but infinitely more powerful; every passion, as War and Love, and every art, as Poetry and Smithcraft, had its divine founder, teacher, and exponent; and of all these deities and their imagined children, they wove the poetical and allegorical romances which form the subject of the present volume.
Like other nations, too, whether Aryan or non-Aryan, the Celts had, besides their mythology, a religion. It is not enough to tell tales of shadowy gods; they must be made visible by sculpture, housed in groves or temples, served with ritual, and propitiated with sacrifices, if one is to hope for their favours. Every cult must have its priests living by the altar.
The priests of the Celts are well-known to us by name as the “Druids”—a word derived from a root DR which signifies a tree, and especially the oak, in several Aryan languages.[[31]] This is generally—though not by all scholars—taken as proving that they paid an especial veneration to the king of trees. It is true that the mistletoe—that strange parasite upon the oak—was prominent among their “herbs of power”, and played a part in their ritual;[[32]] but this is equally true of other Aryan nations. By the Norse it was held sacred to the god Balder, while the Romans believed it to be the “golden bough” that gave access to Hades.[[33]]