Celtic mythology and religion, with chapters upon Druid circles and Celtic burial

Front matter

LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAICN

CENTRAL CIRCULATION BOOKSTACKS

The person charging this material is re¬ sponsible for its return to the library from which it was borrowed on or before the Latest Date stamped below.

Introduction

Alexander MacBain, generally and rightly regarded as the greatest of our Scottish Celtic scholars, was born in Glenfeshie, in Badenoch, on 22nd July, 1855, and died on 3rd April, 1907, at Stirling. The an¬ cestors of his father, John MacBain, were reputed to hail from Lochaber. His mother was Margaret Mackintosh, whose people were of the Mackintoshes of Tirinie in Glen Tilt, descendants or connections of the ancient Tdiseach of that ilk. In MacBain 's boyhood his district was so thoroughly Gaelic speaking that at the age of eight or nine he knew no English, while at fifteen his English was still hesitating, and though he was quick to observe the errors of others, he himself could not avoid similar mistakes of grammar and idiom. He was bred in a Gaelic atmosphere and in a district which in virtue of its central position was full of the clan spirit and clan traditions, an environment which influenced him strongly throughout his life. In his early years, he had his full share of the joys and the hardships of the Highland lad of humble station, and more than his share of the perfervid energy and determination which have raised so many such lads to honour and fame. Some day the full story of MacBain ’s early career may be given more completely as related by himself in his Journal, a document of

VI

INTRODUCTION.

great interest and value. “ In the Introduction,” he says, “ I give all my early life up to the time I commenced keeping a Journal, or the year 1870, when the Journal proper commences ; and, moreover, I also give an account of my ‘ ancestors ’ in the said Introduction.” Here only a short sketch of these early days can be given. He entered Insh School on 25th November, 1863, and left it on 8th August, 1870. From December of 1870 till mid- April 1871, he taught, quite alone, the school of Dunmullie, Boat of Garten, which under him rose from twentythree to fifty-seven pupils. His salary consisted of the fees. After this experience and some months of attendance at Baldow School, where he began Greek, he got work on the Ordnance Survey, first in Scot¬ land, then in Wales. He had, however, no intention of remaining permanently in the Survey; his aim all along was, somehow or other, to work his way to the University. His craving for knowledge of every kind was intense ; his means of gratifying it were slender; but he never lost an opportunity. Before leaving Badenoch he had made good progress in English, History, Latin and Mathematics, and had contrived, by dint of purchase and borrowing, to read a great deal of sound but exceedingly mis¬ cellaneous literature. He had tried his hand at poetry and had given it up. He had read astronomy and done some architectural drawing, stirred thereto by seeing the plans of some new buildings on the Mackintosh estate. He had even tried painting. He

INTRODUCTION.

Vll had the habit of taking stock from time to time of his attainments, his personal belongings, books, etc., and his physical development and appearance. He looked upon his little world with the same appraising, critical but kindly eye. He kept a full and careful note of his correspondence with his father, who had gone to better his fortune in America, and was deeply solicitous for his son's welfare. On the Ordnance Survey he added materially to his stock of knowledge and became expert in the operations of surveying, but in so far as his main purpose was concerned, the service was a failure, for he left it in 1873 as poor as when he entered it. He now studied for a short time at Baldow School, and succeeded in obtaining one of the Grammar School Bursaries provided under the scheme of the Reverend Dr. J. Calder Macphail. With this assistance, in autumn of 1874 he entered the Grammar School of Old Aberdeen, famous then, under the Rectorship of Dr. William Dey, as a preparatory school for Aberdeen University. Two years later he entered King's College as second Bursar, and could at last look forward with confidence to some realisation of his ambition. Here he is said to have impressed his fellow students as the ablest man of his year, a year which included James Adam, afterwards of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, foremost Platonist of his time. Though a good classical scholar, MacBain read for honours in philosophy, a subject which in after life he reckoned one of the most barren

Vlll

INTRODUCTION.

of studies, and graduated in 1880. For a short time he assisted Dr. Dey in the Grammar School ; there¬ after, in 1880, he was appointed Rector of Raining's School, Inverness, under the government of the Highland Trust. He occupied this post till 1894, when Raining’s School was transferred to the Inver¬ ness Burgh School Board, and thereafter was officially connected with the Secondary Department of the Inverness High Public School. In 1901 his Uni¬ versity of Aberdeen honoured him with the honorary degree of LL.D. In 1905 Mr. Arthur J. Balfour, then Prime Minister, in consideration of his great services to Celtic, and specially Gaelic, philology, history and literature, recommended him to the King for a Civil List Pension of £90, as from 1st April of that year. Two years later he died suddenly in Stirling, where he had gone on business during the Easter vacation.

As Headmaster of Raining’s School, MacBain succeeded in making his school occupy for the North of Scotland a position similar to that held by the Grammar School of Old Aberdeen under Dr. Dey. His reputation attracted to it many of the ablest lads from the whole Highland area. He taught them to think for themselves, to insist on having not only facts, but also, so far as in them lay, the reasons why these things are so. Keen young men were not slow to kindle at the master’s quickening fire. They gladly lived laborious nights and days, doing with all their might that which was given

INTRODUCTION.

IX them to do. Raining’s School became in those days a nursery of students who subsequently took the highest positions in the University classes, and became useful and distinguished men in their various callings. Some idea of the work is afforded by the fact that in MacBain ’s time the school, which began under him in 1880 with a secondary department of three, by 1890 had sent over one hundred to the Universities.

While thus actively and successfully engaged in the work of an arduous profession, MacBain was at the same time carrying on with extraordinary vigour those Celtic studies which won him a world-wide reputation. When he came to Inverness in 1880, the scientific study of Scottish Gaelic had already begun under Dr. Alexander Cameron of Brodick (ob. 1888), but little substantial progress had been made. In February of 1882, in his first speech at the annual dinner of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, MacBain said : “ Hitherto the Highlanders have

been too much inclined to guess, and too little in¬ clined to accurate scientific research. We want a good critical edition of the Gaelic poets ; we want also a scientific Gaelic Dictionary dealing with the philology of the language.” He was then twentyseven, and was rapidly qualifying himself to deal with the philological requirements. On New Year’s Day, 1875, being then a student at the Grammar School, he had written in his diary : " I think that I have now a good chance of yet appearing as an

X

INTRODUCTION.

M.A. on equal terms in education with the other literary men of our day, a goal which has always been my ambition to arrive at, that I may have confidence in discussing the topics which engross the attention of mankind. I dread to commit myself through ignorance, and ere I will appear (if ever I shall) in public, I will be backed up with a complete knowledge of the facts I speak on. This is high talking for a poor student in the second class of the Grammar School of Old Aberdeen." Here he enunciates a guiding principle from which he never swerved. He had ever the true scientific spirit in his respect for facts, and in the pains he took, and would have others take, in verifying them. No statement of his is made at haphazard. This reverence for truth he had the knack of inspiring in some, at least, of those who came in contact with him.

In Inverness he lived far from University centres and far from libraries. He made up for this partly by an expenditure on books which must have been out of proportion to his income, and partly by the direction he was able to give to the purchases of the local Free Library, as a result of which its reference department is exceedingly complete and useful on the historical side. Inverness itself was at that time rich in men of native talent and literary instincts. ' In particular the Gaelic Society, founded in 1871, by the discussions at its meetings and by the field for publication offered by its Transactions, exercised

INTRODUCTION.

XI an important influence. There MacBain found companionship that was much to his taste ; he attended the meetings regularly, and contributed eighteen valuable papers to its Transactions, the first of which was that on Celtic Mythology read on 23rd February, 1883. Of the others, some of the most important are his edition of the Book of Deer (volume xi.) ; Badenoch History, Clans and Place Names (vol. xvi.) ; Ptolemy's Geography (xviii.) ; the last of which he himself considered “ the best thing he had done ; ” the Norse Element in Highland Place Names (xix.) ; Early Highland Personal Names (xxii) ; Place Names of Inverness-shire (xxv.). In addition, he wrote the introductions to volumes x.-xxv. of the Society's Transactions, constituting a history of Gaelic literature and of the Gaelic move¬ ment for the period covered by them. To the Transactions of the Inverness Scientific Society and Field Club he contributed papers on Celtic Burial (vol. iii.) ; Who were the Piets ? (vol. iv.) ; The Chieftainship of Clan Chattan (vol. v.). He wrote many articles and reviews for the local newspapers. In addition to all this MacBain became, in 1886, editor of the Celtic Magazine, and was also for five years joint editor of the Highland Monthly. All MacBain ’s articles show how firmly he held to his guiding principle, verified knowledge of the facts.

In 1892, in conjunction with his lifelong friend, the Rev. John Kennedy, Caticol, Arran, a Badenoch man, MacBain published Reliquiae Celticae (two

Xll

INTRODUCTION.

volumes), being the literary remains of the Rev. Dr. Alexander Cameron, Brodick, also a native of Badenoch. In connection with this undertaking, he completed and printed the transcription of the Fernaig MS ., which Cameron had not lived to finish. His Etymological Gaelic Dictionary appeared in 1896. On this, of course, he had spent much time ; in his usual manner, he both mastered the principles and made himself acquainted with all that had been done by scholars, British, French, German and Italian. The Dictionary was his crown¬ ing achievement, and was at once recognised as marking an era in Celtic Philology. A second edition, which he did not live to superintend, was published by Mr. Eneas Mackay, Stirling, in 1911. In 1902 he edited Skene’s Highlanders of Scotland, with valuable and characteristic but all too brief notes. In the same year, in conjunction with Mr. John Whyte, he edited MacEachen’s Gaelic Dictionary, a most useful work. Along with Mr. Whyte he also brought out How to Learn Gaelic, with a brief but scientific outline of Gaelic grammar. This handbook is now in its fourth edition.

The bare statement of MacBain’s achievement in respect of output marks him as possessing extra¬ ordinary power of application. Yet it would be a complete mistake to regard him as a student only. He was a full-blooded man, with a keen enjoyment of life, and, it is only fair to say, with a distinctly Bohemian temperament. His leisure for social inter-

INTRODUCTION.

Xlll course was small ; but he had his own circle of intimates, which for many years met weekly in a spirit of good fellowship reminiscent at once of the old London coffee-house days and of the Highland ciilidh. In congenial company, MacBain became discursive, humorous, satirical, charming in manner and personality, with the power of making others feel at their best. Argument he disliked, especially on matters within his own domain, whence he was sometimes accused of “ dogmatism.” His dogma¬ tism, however, was that of a man who has based his opinion on a wide induction and knows what is meant by proof, but on the other hand does not choose always to rehearse the process by which his judgment has been arrived at, especially to such as, in any case, would not appreciate that process. No man could be more generous in helping others. Either by letter or by conversation, the stores of his knowledge were open to all fellow-students. Of jealousy he was wholly free : his one aim was to add to the sum total of scientific knowledge, to enlarge the kingdom of facts. Sometimes his gener¬ osity was poorly rewarded ; this, knowing human nature, he took philosophically. He had the power characteristic of great minds of getting straight to the essentials of a question, and of seeing things in true perspective. He had the insight of the philo¬ sopher into the significance of the facts he dealt with, and the consequent power to correlate and illumine them. His mind was powerfully analytic,

XIV

INTRODUCTION.

and in nearly, if not quite, as high a degree synthetic. As a critic, while highly appreciative of good work, he was not lenient to error, especially if the error arose from negligence in verifying facts that ought to have been verified. Charlatans found to their cost that he could wield a grievous cudgel. But he was fair in statement, and with native courtesy and nobility of heart he was ready to recognise the good points even of a weakling. His reputation among scholars all over Europe was very high, as I have occasion to know from appreciations of his work by practically all the leading Celtists of his day in connection with his Civil List pension. In his later years, though his brain was active and his interest unabated, he no longer possessed the physical elasticity necessary to continue the strain to which he had subjected himself. From his youth upwards he had lived a full and hard life, and had indeed overtaxed a strong constitution. MacBain had more than achieved the ambitions of his boyhood. The poor struggling Badenoch lad had taken his place among the scholars of Europe ; he had won the highest academic distinction and national recognition. His premature death was a disaster which to those who knew him well was full of pathos. The portrait which appears at the beginning of this book represents him in his prime. My own recol¬ lection of him may be quoted from an article in the Celtic Review written a few days after his death : “ And now he is gone, and Inverness is a less interest-

INTRODUCTION.

XV ing place than it was. The sturdy, square figure, the massive head, the rugged, kindly face, the shrewd grey eyes twinkling under bushy brows, are now but memories. We shall miss his sage counsel and his friendly clasp ; we shall long in vain for the light and leading that he alone could give in many depart¬ ments. He was a great man, and he deserved well of Scotland. We shall not look upon his like again/’ The value of Dr. MacBain’s work can be best appreciated by considering the condition in which Gaelic scholarship would now be without it. His researches and original contributions as embodied in his Dictionary have raised Gaelic philology to the highest scientific level, and — a service of equal importance — have brought the whole subject into convenient and accessible form for the student. Some misconceptions as to its design and scope are dealt with by MacBain himself in a prefatory note to Further Gaelic Words and Etymologies in volume xxi. of the Gaelic Society’s Transactions (incorporated in the second edition). “Nor did the work fail to meet with critics who acted on Goldsmith’s golden rule in the Citizen of the World — to ask of any comedy why it was not a tragedy, and of any tragedy why it was not a comedy. I was asked how I had not given derivative words, though for that matter most of the seven thousand words in the Dictionary are derivatives ; such a question overlooked the char¬ acter of the work. Manifest derivatives belong to ordinary dictionaries, not to an etymological one.

XVI

INTRODUCTION.

This was clearly indicated in the preface. . . . Another criticism was unscientific in the extreme. I was found fault with for excluding Irish words ! Why, it was the best service I could render to Celtic philology, to present a pure vocabulary of the Scottish dialect of Gaelic." As a matter of fact, the Dictionary is remarkably complete within the limits assigned to it. Its conclusions will, as a rule, re¬ main firm, for they are based on facts, and they can be criticised to any purpose only by experts of experi¬ ence. For the ordinary student the wisest course is to try to understand the principles on which the conclusions are based.

In the application of the principles of scientific philology to the two special departments of names of places and personal names, Dr. MacBain was, so far as Scotland is concerned, a pioneer. In dealing with Norse names as they appear now after many centuries of use in the mouths of Gaelic speakers, he came to realise what had not been realised previously, namely, that such changes as take, place between Norse and Gaelic do not occur at haphazard, but are on the whole regular and capable of being stated in detail. Certain changes are invariable ; others vary according to district ; others are impossible. It follows that the value of any proposed interpre¬ tation depends in the first instance on the accuracy with which the true pronunciation of the name in Gaelic has been ascertained. Additional data, often of value, may of course, be got from charters, etc..

INTRODUCTION.

XVII but the genuine Gaelic pronunciation comes first. In dealing with Celtic names, the same principle holds. Success depends on accurate data, inter¬ preted in the light of a historical knowledge of the language and its laws of sound. In all MacBain’s work these principles are operative, and it is this fact that makes his work a model.

Practically all our knowledge of Highland personal names is due to Dr. MacBain’s researches, as set forth in the Inverness Gaelic Society's Transactions and in the Celtic Review, volume ii. These papers, however, represent but a part of his industry and of his knowledge of the subject. He has left MS. collections from charter sources, etc., bearing on a vast number of Highland personal names, and forming a valuable basis of interpretation, but he himself did not commit the interpretation to paper.

With regard to the Pictish question, Dr. MacBain argued with much force on the one hand against Skene’s view that the language of the Piets was really Gaelic and on the other against the view expressed by Professor Rhys that the Pictish lan¬ guage was non- Aryan. MacBain’s statement of the case will be found in his papers (i) on Ptolemy's Geography ; (2) Who Were the Piets ? (Inverness

Field Club Transactions, vol. iv.) ; (3) The Ethnology of Celtic Scotland in his edition of Skene’s High¬ landers, pages 381-401. In his view the Piets were racially mixed, and linguistically Celtic, and the form of Celtic spoken by them was of the Brettonic

INTRODUCTION.

or Cymric branch, that is, Old Welsh, not Old Gaelic. With these views most scholars now agree.

The present volume contains three of his earlier essays. The essay on Celtic Mythology was his first contribution to the Transactions of the Gaelic Society, and while it is interesting historically and contains much valuable matter, both its general attitude and its conclusions have to be considered in the light of subsequent researches, especially Sir J. G. Frazer’s Golden Bough. Of this Dr. MacBain himself was well aware, and he had, in point of fact, largely ceased to hold by the theories which were in favour at the date when the essay was written. In justice to MacBain, this qualification has to be kept in view. No such qualification attaches to the other two essays, The Druid Circles, and Celtic Burial. False ideas about the Druids he considered, rightly, to be the source of much vain and erroneous speculation, and in this respect he was wont to speak of them, together with the Culdees and the Piets of Galloway, as the “ three frauds ” of Scoto-Celtic history. The essay on Celtic Burial is another token of the keen interest taken by MacBain in the archaeological side of Celtic studies.

The publication of these essays will, it is hoped, be welcomed by many. There is among MacBain 's papers abundant material for several further volumes.

Edinburgh, May, 1916.

William J. Watson.

COIVTE^IVTS

Introduction, -

■+ Character of Myth, - /Cause of Myth, - /Spread of Myth,

The Aryan Nation, - Aryan Myths, -

/kesults of the General Principles, - Sources of Information,

The Celts,

Celtic Religion in Britain and Ireland,

Gods of the Gaels, - The Celtic Elysium, - Welsh and Gaelic Elysium, - Celtic Worship and Rites,

The “ Druid ” Circles, Celtic Burial, -

Page

V

“ 27

- 54 61

69 *

- 85/

- *87.

- 150*

IvIST or' IrrUSTRATIOIVS

Dr. Mac Bain and his Students, - Druid Temple from the North, - Clava Cairns, ground plan,

,, ,, North and South, -

Clava, Northern Cairn,

Crainish Circle and Cairn, Stonehenge, ground plan,

Rude Stone Monuments in India,

Facing Page

- Frontispiece

CELTIC MYTHOLOGY AND

religion.

This -work was first published in the “ Celtic Magazine ” in 188J-4. First published in book form , /SSj.

CELTIC MYTHOLOGY

AND RELIGION

The field of Mythology, strictly defined, embraces the fabulous events believed in by a nation and the religious doctrines implied in these. But the term is for convenience’ sake extended so as to include the kindred subject of folk-lore. Now folk-lore includes all those popular stories of which the fairy tales of our nursery arc a good illustration, and where the religious element implied in Mythology is absent. The term Celtic Mythology, in these papers, is under¬ stood, therefore, to include the popular traditions and legendary tales of the Celts, the fabulous actions and exploits of their heroes and deities, the traditions of their early migrations, their fairy tales, and the popular beliefs in regard to the supernatural world. The scope of the discussion will include an intro¬ ductory section or two on the general principles of Mythology — its cause and spread, and the con¬ nection of the Mythology of the Celts with those of the kindred nations of Europe and Asia.

B o lo

CELTIC MYTHOLOGY AND RELIGION.

CHARACTER OF MYTH.

“ There was once a farmer, and he had three daughters. They were washing clothes at a river. A hoodie crow came round, and he said to the eldest one, ‘ ’M-pos-u-mi — Will you marry me — farmer’s daughter ? ’ ‘I won’t, indeed, you ugly brute ; an ugly brute is a hoodie,’ said she. He came to the second one on the morrow, and he said to her, ‘ ’M-pos-u-mi — Wilt thou wed me ? ’ ‘ Not I, in¬

deed,’ said she ; ‘ an ugly brute is a hoodie.’ The third day he said to the youngest, ‘ ’ M-pos-u-mi — Wilt thou wed me — farmer’s daughter ? ’ ‘I will wed thee,’ said she ; ‘ a pretty creature is the hoodie.’ And on the morrow they married.

“ The hoodie said to her, ‘ Whether wouldst thou rather that I should be a hoodie by day and a man at night ; or be a hoodie at night and a man by day ? ‘ I would rather that thou wert a man by day and a hoodie at night,’ says she. After this he was a splen¬ did fellow by day and a hoodie at night. A few days after he got married he took her to his own house.

“ At the birth of the first child, there came at night the very finest music that ever was heard about the house. Every one slept, and the child was taken away. Her father came to the door in the morning, and he was both sorrowful and wrathful that the child was taken away.

CHARACTER OF MYTH.