Compare the fine poem of a modern Celtic writer (Sir Samuel Ferguson), “The Widow's Cloak”—i.e., the British Empire in the days of Queen Victoria.
“Critical History of Ireland,” p. 180.
Pronounced “El´yill.”
The ending ster in three of the names of the Irish provinces is of Norse origin, and is a relic of the Viking conquests in Ireland. Connacht, where the Vikings did not penetrate, alone preserves its Irish name unmodified. Ulster (in Irish Ulaidh) is supposed to derive its name from Ollav Fōla, Munster (Mumhan) from King Eocho Mumho, tenth in succession from Eremon, and Connacht was “the land of the children of Conn”—he who was called Conn of the Hundred Battles, and who died A.D. 157.
The reader may, however, be referred to the tale of Etain and Midir as given in full by A.H. Leahy (“Heroic Romances of Ireland”), and by the writer in his “High Deeds of Finn,” and to the tale of Conary rendered by Sir S. Ferguson (“Poems,” 1886), in what Dr. Whitley Stokes has described as the noblest poem ever written by an Irishman.
Pronounced “Yeo´hee.”
I quote Mr. A.H. Leahy's translation from a fifteenth-century Egerton manuscript (“Heroic Romances of Ireland,” vol. i. p. 12). The story is, however, found in much more ancient authorities.
Ogham letters, which were composed of straight lines arranged in a certain order about the axis formed by the edge of a squared pillar-stone, were used for sepulchral inscription and writing generally before the introduction of the Roman alphabet in Ireland.
The reference is to the magic swine of Mananan, which were killed and eaten afresh every day, and whose meat preserved the eternal youth of the People of Dana.
See [p. 124].