[106] Extracted from the Lebor na h-Udri, by O’Curry, Manners and Customs, etc., vol. iii.
[107] A similar caldron was a favourite property of supernatural beings in the heroic tales of Ireland as of Wales; indeed, so desirable a possession enters into the folklore of most nations.
[108] Aislinge Meic Conglinne,‘The Vision of Mac Conglinne,’ edited, with translation, notes, and glossary, by Prof. Kuno Meyer, 1892.
[109] Ante, note 3, p. 44. The work is edited, with translation, notes, and glossary, by Prof. Kuno Meyer, who dates the composition of the tale in its present form in the seventh century; Mr. Nutt suggests the eighth century (op. cit., i. 141). Fragments of the tale exist in the L.U. Prof. Rhys identifies Bran with Cernunnos, the divine ancestor of the ancient Celts (Hibbert Lectures, pp. 85-95). Mr. Nutt further suggests an identity with Brons, the Fisher King, and keeper of the Graal (Studies on the Legend of the Holy Graal, 1888, p. 208).
[110] In the disputation between Neid and Fercertue which was to decide which of them should be Árd Ollamh (Chief Doctor) of Ulster, Fercertue put the riddling question, ‘What is it that thou traversest in haste?’ Neid replied, ‘The plain of age, the mountain of youth, the course of the ages, in pursuit of the King in the house of earth and stones, between the candle and its ending, between the combat and the hatred of combat, amid the brave warriors of Tethra.’
[111] Transcribed into the L.U. before 1103 A.D. from the earlier Book of Slane, now lost: edited (without a translation) by Professor Windisch in Irische Texte, vol. i. pp. 197 sqq. Professor Windisch, who states that the tale is composed of materials from several distinct sources (op. cit., pp. 202-3), calls attention to the thoroughly pagan character of it, despite the introduction of a passing allusion to Adam on p. 219. Portions of the descriptions of the Tír Tairngire contained in this tale and in the story of Mider have been rendered in metre by Dr. Douglas Hyde, Literary History of Ireland, pp. 202-3.
[112] As Zeus was brother to Pluto, and as the strife between the Olympian and Chthonian powers—the powers of light and darkness—are typified, in most mythologies, by discord between a pair of divine brothers; a conception surviving in such creations of the popular or the lettered imagination as Valentine and Orson, Alcina and Logistilla, etc.
[113] The episode is contained in the Tochmarc Emere, The Wooing of Emer, dated eighth century, by Professor K. Meyer. Miss Eleanor Hull translates the L.U. version in her Cuchullin Saga, pp. 56 sqq. Professor Meyer publishes a shorter version, with translation, in the Revue Celtique, xi. 442 sq.
[114] Mr. Nutt gives abstracts of these stories in the Voyage of Bran, i. 297 sqq.
[115] In the Perceval legend, a bridge of glass occurs in Gautier’s continuation of the Conte du Graal (Nutt, Studies, etc., p. 17).