Lebor Gabála Érenn
Lebor Gabála Érenn is a collection of poems and prose narratives that purports to be a history of Ireland and the Irish from the creation of the world to the Middle Ages. There are a number of versions, the earliest of, compiled by an anonymous writer in the 11th century, it synthesized narratives, developing over the foregoing centuries. The Lebor Gabála tells of Ireland being settled six times by six groups of people: the people of Cessair, the people of Partholón, the people of Nemed, the Fir Bolg, the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Milesians; the first four groups are wiped out or forced to abandon the island, the fifth group represent Ireland's pagan gods, while the final group represent the Irish people. Today, most scholars regard the Lebor Gabála as myth rather than history, it appears to be based on medieval Christian pseudo-histories, but it incorporates some of Ireland's native pagan mythology. Scholars believe the goal of its writers was to provide an epic history for Ireland that could compare to that of the Israelites or the Romans, which reconciled native myth with the Christian view of history.
It is suggested, for example, that there are six'takings' to match the "Six Ages of the World". Lebor Gabála Érenn is considered a "highly influential Middle Irish prose-and-verse treatise written in order to bridge the chasm between Christian world-chronology and the prehistory of Ireland"; the Lebor Gabála is known in English as The Book of Invasions or The Book of Conquests, in Modern Irish as Leabhar Gabhála Éireann or Leabhar Gabhála na hÉireann. Purporting to be a history of Ireland and the Irish, a critical analysis by Thomas F O'Rahilly claims the purpose of Lebor Gabála Érenn was three-fold: firstly to unite the population by obliterating the memory of previous and different ethnic groups, secondly to weaken the influence of pre-Christian pagan religions by converting their gods into mere mortals, thirdly to manufacture pedigrees into which the various dynastic groups could conveniently be fitted It has been described as an attempt to provide the Irish with a written history comparable to that which the Israelites provided for themselves in the Old Testament.
Drawing upon the pagan myths of Gaelic Ireland but reinterpreting them in the light of Judeo-Christian theology and historiography, it describes how the island was settled six times by six groups of people. Biblical paradigms provided the mythologers with ready-made stories which could be adapted to their purpose, thus we find the ancestors of the Irish enslaved in a foreign land, or fleeing into exile, or wandering in the wilderness, or sighting the "Promised Land" from afar. Four Christian works in particular seem to have had a significant bearing on the formation of LGE: St Augustine's De Civitate Dei, The City of God, Orosius's Historiae adversum paganos, "Histories," Eusebius's Chronicon, translated into Latin by St Jerome as the Temporum liber Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae, or Origines The pre-Christian elements, were never effaced. One of the poems in LGE, for instance, recounts how goddesses from among the Tuatha Dé Danann took husbands from the Gaeil when they'invaded' and'colonised' Ireland.
Furthermore, the pattern of successive invasions which LGE preserves is reminiscent of Timagenes of Alexandria's account of the origins of the Gauls of continental Europe. Cited by the 4th-century historian Ammianus Marcellinus, Timagenes describes how the ancestors of the Gauls were driven from their native lands in eastern Europe by a succession of wars and floods. Numerous fragments of Ireland's mythological history are scattered throughout the 7th and 8th centuries. In his Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History, Eugene O'Curry, Professor of Irish History and Archaeology at the Catholic University of Ireland, discusses various genres of historical tales mentioned in the manuscripts: The Tochomladh was an Immigration or arrival of a Colony, it is from the original records of these ancient stories that the early part of the various Books of Invasions has been compiled. The earliest extant account of the purported history of Ireland is to be found in the Historia Brittonum or "History of the Britons,", once thought to have been written by the Welsh priest Nennius in 829–830.
This text gives two separate accounts of early Irish history. The first consists of a series of successive colonisations from Iberia by the pre-Gaelic peoples of Ireland, all of which found their way into LGE; the second recounts the origins of the Gaeil themselves, tells how they in turn came to be the masters of the country and'ancestors' of all the Irish. These two stories continued to be enriched and elaborated upon by Irish historian-poets throughout the 9th century. In the 10th and 11th centuries, several long historical poems were written that were incorporated into the scheme of LGE. Most of the poems on which the 11th-12th century version of LGE was based were written by the following four poets: Eochaidh Ua Floinn from Armagh – Poems 30, 41, 53, 65, 98, 109, 111 Flann Mainistrech mac Echthigrin and historian of Monasterboice Abbey – Poems?42, 56, 67,?82 Tanaide – Poems 47, 54, 86 Gilla Cómáin mac Gilla Samthainde – Poems 13, 96, 115It was late in the 11th century that a single anonymous scholar appears to have brought together these and numerous other poems and fitted the
The Dagda
The Dagda is an important god in Irish mythology. One of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Dagda is portrayed as a father-figure and druid, he is associated with fertility, agriculture and strength, as well as magic and wisdom. He is said to have control over life and death, the weather and crops, as well as time and the seasons, he is described as a large bearded man or giant wearing a hooded cloak. He owns a magic staff or club which can kill with one end and bring to life with the other, a cauldron which never runs empty, a magic harp which can control men's emotions and change the seasons, he is said to dwell in Brú na Bóinne. Other places associated with or named after him include Uisneach, Grianan of Aileach, Assaroe Falls and Lough Neagh; the Dagda is said to be husband of the Boann. His children include Aengus, Bodb Derg, Cermait and Midir, he is said to have two brothers and Ogma, but this may be an instance of the tendency to triplicate deities. The name Dagda is believed to come from Proto-Celtic: *Dagodeiwos, "the good god" or "the great god".
He has several other epithets which reflect aspects of his character. These include Eochu or Eochaid Ollathair, Ruad Rofhessa, Dáire, Fer Benn, Cerrce and Eogabal, it is argued that the death and ancestral god Donn was a form of the Dagda, he has similarities with the harvest figure Crom Dubh. Several tribal groupings saw the Dagda as an ancestor and were named after him, such as the Uí Echach and the Dáirine; the Dagda has been likened to the Germanic god Odin, the Gaulish god Sucellos, the Roman god Dīs Pater. Tales depict the Dagda as a figure of immense power, he is said to own a magic club or mace which could kill nine men with one blow. It was called the lorg anfaid, his magic cauldron was known as the coire ansic and was said to be bottomless, from which no man left unsatisfied. It was said to have a ladle so big. Uaithne known as "the Four Angled Music", was a richly ornamented magic harp made of oak which, when the Dagda played it, put the seasons in their correct order, he possessed two pigs, one of, always growing whilst the other was always roasting, ever-laden fruit trees.
The Dagda was one of the kings of the Tuatha De Danann. The Tuatha Dé Danann are the race of supernatural beings who conquered the Fomorians, who inhabited Ireland prior to the coming of the Milesians; the Mórrígan is described as his wife, his daughter was Brígh, his lover was Boann, after whom the River Boyne is named, though she was married to Elcmar. Prior to the battle with the Fomorians, he coupled with the goddess of war, the Mórrígan, on Samhain in exchange for a plan of battle. Despite his great power and prestige, the Dagda is sometimes depicted as oafish and crude comical, wearing a short, rough tunic that covers his rump, dragging his great penis on the ground; such features are thought to be the additions of Christian redactors for comedic purposes. The Middle Irish language Coir Anmann paints a less clownish picture: "He was a beautiful god of the heathens, for the Tuatha Dé Danann worshipped him: for he was an earth-god to them because of the greatness of his power." The name Dagda may be derived from the Proto-Indo-European *Dhagho-deiwos "shining divinity", the first element being cognate with the English word "day", a byword for a deification of a notion such as "splendour".
This etymology would tie in well with Dagda's mythic association with the sun and the earth, with kingship and excellence in general. *Dhago-deiwos would have been inherited into Proto-Celtic as *Dago-deiwos, thereby punning with the Proto-Celtic word *dago-s "good". Under the name Aed of Ess Ruaid, the Dagda is named as the son of Badurn, the Lord of Emain, the Grandson of Argatmar; the rapids in which he drowned were named Ess Ruaid and were called Ess Duind after Dond, the grandson of Bile. The Dagda had an affair with wife of Elcmar. In order to hide their affair, Dagda made. He, along with Bóand, helped Aengus search for his love. Whilst Aengus was away the Dagda shared out his land among his children, but Aengus returned to discover that nothing had been saved for him. Aengus tricked his father out of his home at the Brú na Bóinne. Aengus asked his father if he could live in the Brú for láa ogus oidhche " day and night", which in Irish is ambiguous, could refer to either "a day and a night", or "day and night", which means for all time, so Aengus took possession of the Brú permanently.
In The Wooing of Étaín, on the other hand, Aengus uses the same ploy to trick Elcmar out of Brú na Bóinne, with the Dagda's connivance. The Dagda was the father of Bodb Dearg, Midir, Áine, Brigit, he was the brother or father of Oghma, related to the Gaulish god Ogmios. Another Gaulish god who may be related to the Dagda is Sucellus, the striker, depicted with a hammer and cup, he is credited with a sevent
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths told by the ancient Greeks. These stories concern the origin and the nature of the world, the lives and activities of deities and mythological creatures, the origins and significance of the ancient Greeks' own cult and ritual practices. Modern scholars study the myths in an attempt to shed light on the religious and political institutions of ancient Greece and its civilization, to gain understanding of the nature of myth-making itself; the Greek myths were propagated in an oral-poetic tradition most by Minoan and Mycenaean singers starting in the 18th century BC. Two poems by Homer's near contemporary Hesiod, the Theogony and the Works and Days, contain accounts of the genesis of the world, the succession of divine rulers, the succession of human ages, the origin of human woes, the origin of sacrificial practices. Myths are preserved in the Homeric Hymns, in fragments of epic poems of the Epic Cycle, in lyric poems, in the works of the tragedians and comedians of the fifth century BC, in writings of scholars and poets of the Hellenistic Age, in texts from the time of the Roman Empire by writers such as Plutarch and Pausanias.
Aside from this narrative deposit in ancient Greek literature, pictorial representations of gods and mythic episodes featured prominently in ancient vase-paintings and the decoration of votive gifts and many other artifacts. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles. In the succeeding Archaic and Hellenistic periods and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has had an extensive influence on the culture and literature of Western civilization and remains part of Western heritage and language. Poets and artists from ancient times to the present have derived inspiration from Greek mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the themes. Greek mythology is known today from Greek literature and representations on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c. 900 BC to c. 800 BC onward. In fact and archaeological sources integrate, sometimes mutually supportive and sometimes in conflict.
Mythical narration plays an important role in nearly every genre of Greek literature. The only general mythographical handbook to survive from Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus; this work attempts to reconcile the contradictory tales of the poets and provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. Apollodorus of Athens wrote on many of these topics, his writings may have formed the basis for the collection. Among the earliest literary sources are the Iliad and the Odyssey. Other poets completed the "epic cycle", but these and lesser poems now are lost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the "Homeric Hymns" have no direct connection with Homer, they are choral hymns from the earlier part of the so-called Lyric age. Hesiod, a possible contemporary with Homer, offers in his Theogony the fullest account of the earliest Greek myths, dealing with the creation of the world. Hesiod's Works and Days, a didactic poem about farming life includes the myths of Prometheus and the Five Ages.
The poet gives advice on the best way to succeed in a dangerous world, rendered yet more dangerous by its gods. Lyrical poets took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar and Simonides, bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion, relate individual mythological incidents. Additionally, myth was central to classical Athenian drama; the tragic playwrights Aeschylus and Euripides took most of their plots from myths of the age of heroes and the Trojan War. Many of the great tragic stories took on their classic form in these tragedies; the comic playwright Aristophanes used myths, in The Birds and The Frogs. Historians Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, geographers Pausanias and Strabo, who traveled throughout the Greek world and noted the stories they heard, supplied numerous local myths and legends giving little-known alternative versions. Herodotus in particular, searched the various traditions presented him and found the historical or mythological roots in the confrontation between Greece and the East.
Herodotus attempted to reconcile the blending of differing cultural concepts. The poetry of the Hellenistic and Roman ages was composed as a literary rather than cultic exercise, it contains many important details that would otherwise be lost. This category includes the works of: The Roman poets Ovid, Valerius Flaccus and Virgil with Servius's commentary; the Greek poets of the Late Antique period: Nonnus, Antoninus Liberalis, Quintus Smyrnaeus. The Greek poets of the Hellenistic period: Apollonius of Rhodes, Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Parthenius. Prose writers from the same periods who make reference to myths includ
Perseus
In Greek mythology, Perseus is the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Perseid dynasty. He saved Andromeda from the sea monster Cetus, he was the son of Zeus and the mortal Danaë, as well as the half-brother and great-grandfather of Heracles. Because of the obscurity of the name Perseus and the legendary character of its bearer, most etymologists presume that it might be pre-Greek. There is some idea. In that regard Robert Graves has proposed the only Greek derivation available. Perseus might be from the Greek verb, "πέρθειν", "to waste, sack, destroy", some form of which appears in Homeric epithets. According to Carl Darling Buck, the –eus suffix is used to form an agent noun, in this case from the aorist stem, pers-. Pers-eus therefore is a sacker of cities; the origin of perth- is more obscure. J. B. Hofmann lists the possible root as *bher-, from which Latin ferio, "strike"; this corresponds to Julius Pokorny’s *bher-, "scrape, cut." Ordinarily *bh- descends to Greek as ph-. This difficulty can be overcome by presuming a dissimilation from the –th– in perthein.
Graves carries the meaning still further, to the perse - in goddess of death. John Chadwick in the second edition of Documents in Mycenaean Greek speculates about the Mycenaean goddess pe-re-*82, attested on the PY Tn 316 tablet and tentatively reconstructed as *Preswa: "It is tempting to see...the classical Perse...daughter of Oceanus.... The native name, has always had an -a- in Persian. Herodotus recounts this story, devising a foreign son, from whom the Persians took the name; the Persians knew the story as Xerxes tried to use it to bribe the Argives during his invasion of Greece, but failed to do so. Perseus was the daughter of Acrisius, King of Argos. Disappointed by his lack of luck in having a son, Acrisius consulted the oracle at Delphi, who warned him that he would one day be killed by his daughter's son. In order to keep Danaë childless, Acrisius imprisoned her in a bronze chamber, open to the sky, in the courtyard of his palace: This mytheme is connected to Ares, Oenopion and others.
Zeus came to her in the form of a shower of gold, impregnated her. Soon after, their child was born. Fearful for his future, but unwilling to provoke the wrath of the gods by killing the offspring of Zeus and his daughter, Acrisius cast the two into the sea in a wooden chest. Danaë's fearful prayer, made while afloat in the darkness, has been expressed by the poet Simonides of Ceos. Mother and child washed ashore on the island of Serifos, where they were taken in by the fisherman Dictys, who raised the boy to manhood; the brother of Dictys was the king of the island. When Perseus was grown, Polydectes came to fall in love with the beautiful Danaë. Perseus believed Polydectes was less than honourable, protected his mother from him, he held a large banquet. Polydectes requested that the guests bring horses, under the pretense that he was collecting contributions for the hand of Hippodamia, daughter of Oinomaos. Perseus had no horse to give, so he asked Polydectes to name the gift. Polydectes held Perseus to his rash promise and demanded the head of the only mortal Gorgon, whose gaze turned people to stone.
Ovid's account of Medusa's mortality tells that she had once been a woman, vain of her beautiful hair. Poseidon, the god of the seas, raped her inside of a temple dedicated to Athena, as punishment for the desecration of her temple, Athena had changed Medusa's hair into hideous snakes "that she may alarm her surprised foes with terror". Athena instructed Perseus to find the Hesperides, who were entrusted with weapons needed to defeat the Gorgon. Following Athena's guidance, Perseus sought the Greae, sisters of the Gorgons, to demand the whereabouts of the Hesperides, the nymphs tending Hera's orchard; the Graeae were three perpetually old women. As the women passed the eye from one to another, Perseus snatched it from them, holding it for ransom in return for the location of the nymphs; when the sisters led him to the Hesperides, he returned. From the Hesperides he received a knapsack to safely contain Medusa's head. Zeus gave him Hades' helm of darkness to hide. Hermes lent Perseus winged sandals to fly, Athena gave him a polished shield.
Perseus proceeded to the Gorgons' cave. In the cave he came upon the sleeping Medusa. By viewing Medusa's reflection in his polished shield, he safely cut off her head. From her neck sprang Pegasus and Chrysaor, the result of Poseidon and Medusa's mating; the other two Gorgons pursued Perseus, wearing his helm of darkness, he escaped. From here he proceeded to visit King Atlas. On the way back to Seriphos, Perseus stopped
Aengus
In Irish mythology, Aengus is a member of the Tuatha Dé Danann and a god of love and poetic inspiration. He is traditionally described as having singing birds circling his head. In Old Irish his name is spelled Oíngus or Óengus, from Proto-Celtic *oino- "one" and gus "strength". In Middle Irish this became Áengus, in Modern Irish Aengus or Aonghus. Epithets include Óengus Óc/Aengus Óg, Mac ind Óg, Maccan o Mac Óg Aengus' parents were The Dagda and Boann, he was said to have lived at Newgrange by the River Boyne. The Dagda had an affair with wife of Nechtan. To hide her pregnancy, the Dagda made the sun stand still for nine months so that Aengus was conceived and born in one day. Midir was his foster-father; when he came of age Aengus dispossessed the Dagda of his home, Brú na Bóinne. He arrived after the Dagda had shared out his land among his children, none was left for Aengus, so Aengus asked his father if he could live in Brú na Bóinne – the central spiritual spot by the Boyne, the river whose goddess is Bóinne – for "a day and a night", the Dagda agreed.
Irish has no indefinite article, so "a day and a night" is the same as "day and night", which covers all time, so Aengus took possession of Brú na Bóinne permanently. In a different version of this story, appearing in The Wooing of Etain, Aengus uses the same ploy to trick Elcmar out of Brú na Bóinne, with the Dagda's connivance. In this version, Midir is Aengus's foster-father, while Elcmar is the husband of Boann cuckolded by the Dagda. According to Death Tales of the Tuatha de Danaan, Aengus killed his stepfather Elcmar for killing Midir. Aengus killed Lugh Lámhfhada's poet for lying about his brother Ogma an Cermait; the poet claimed. In The Wooing of Etain, Aengus was able to lift a spell against Étaín, the horse goddess he had won for his brother Midir. Midir's wife Fuamnach in a jealous rage had turned Etain into a beautiful fly. Turning her into a woman at night, Aengus made her his lover until Fuamnach found out about it and drove her away. Aengus killed his foster mother for her treachery.
Aengus fell in love with a girl he had seen in his dreams. His mother, goddess of the River Boyne, a cow goddess whose milk formed the Milky Way, searched Ireland for a year his father, the Dagda, did the same. King Bodb Derg of Munster found her after a further year. Aengus went to the lake of the Dragon's Mouth and found 150 girls chained in pairs, his girl, Caer Ibormeith, among them. On November 1, Caer and the other girls would turn into swans for every second Samhain. Aengus was told. Aengus turned himself into a swan and they flew away, singing beautiful music that put all listeners asleep for three days and nights. Aengus was the protector of Diarmuid Ua Duibhne of the Fianna, he rescued Gráinne during their pursuit by the Fianna. Aengus owned a sword named the Great Fury, given to him by Manannan mac Lir; this he gave to his foster-son Diarmuid Ua Duibhne, along with a sword named Beagalltach, the Little Fury, two spears of great power, Gáe Buide and Gáe Derg. When the young man died, Aengus took his body back to Brú na Bóinne where he breathed life into it when he wished to speak with Diarmuid.
In other legends Aengus was able to repair broken return life to them. In the Dindsenchas, Aengus shaped his kisses into four birds that followed Cairbre wherever he went to mock him each day before sunrise; this mockery continued until Cairbre's druid enchanted a tree from Fid Frosmuine with song, which caused the tree to grow above all others and detain Aengus' birds. Aengus is considered to be connected to the ancient Celtic god Maponos and his Welsh equivalent, Mabon ap Modron; the Old Irish name Óengus is attested in Adomnán's Life of St. Columba as Oinogusius, showing that its etymology is from the Proto-Celtic roots *oino- "one" and *guss- "choice"; the Old Irish spelling of the name was Óengus. Middle Irish spellings included Áengus; the Early Modern Irish form was Aonghus. Modern Irish spellings are Aonghus. Aonghas is the Scots Gaelic spelling. Aengus appears in the Irish poet William Butler Yeats's poem "The Song of Wandering Aengus", which describes Aengus's endless search for his lover.
Angus Og appears in James Stephens' novel The Crock of Gold, where his aid is solicited by the Philosopher. In the Copper episode "Husbands and Fathers", Corcoran tells O'Brien to take Annie upstairs and tell her a story. O'Brien says to Annie, "I shall tell you about the Dream of Aengus and the Wooing of Etain." Aengus and his father the Dagda appear in Kate Thompson's young adult novel The New Policeman. Aengus helps him restore it to its timeless state. Aengus is the primary antagonist of Book 1 of The Iron Druid Chronicles. Angus makes a brief appearance leading his father's funeral in Hellboy: The Wild Hunt. Although Angus himself never speaks, his father Dagda is a frequent character in other Hellboy stories; the name of Aengus appears in the song of Johnny Flynn "Wandering Aengus" from album "Sillion". Aengus is a popular Irish and Scots Gaelic name, borne by a variety of historical and legendary figures, including: Aislingi Oengusai original text from Egerton 1782 at Thesaurus Linguae Hibernicae.
Tochmarc Étaíne: The Wooing of Étaín De
Augusta, Lady Gregory
Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory was an Irish dramatist and theatre manager. With William Butler Yeats and Edward Martyn, she co-founded the Irish Literary Theatre and the Abbey Theatre, wrote numerous short works for both companies. Lady Gregory produced a number of books of retellings of stories taken from Irish mythology. Born into a class that identified with British rule, she turned against it, her conversion to cultural nationalism, as evidenced by her writings, was emblematic of many of the political struggles to occur in Ireland during her lifetime. Lady Gregory is remembered for her work behind the Irish Literary Revival, her home at Coole Park in County Galway served as an important meeting place for leading Revival figures, her early work as a member of the board of the Abbey was at least as important as her creative writings for that theatre's development. Lady Gregory's motto was taken from Aristotle: "To think like a wise man, but to express oneself like the common people.". Gregory was born at Roxborough, County Galway, the youngest daughter of the Anglo-Irish gentry family Persse.
Her mother, Frances Barry, was related to Viscount Guillamore, her family home, was a 6,000-acre estate located between Gort and Loughrea, the main house of, burnt down during the Irish Civil War. She was educated at home, her future career was influenced by the family nurse, Mary Sheridan, a Catholic and a native Irish speaker, who introduced the young Augusta to the history and legends of the local area, she married Sir William Henry Gregory, a widower with an estate at Coole Park, near Gort, on 4 March 1880 in St Matthias' Church, Dublin. Sir William, 35 years her elder, had just retired from his position as Governor of Ceylon, having served several terms as Member of Parliament for County Galway, he was a well-educated man with many literary and artistic interests, the house at Coole Park housed a large library and extensive art collection, both of which Lady Gregory was eager to explore. He had a house in London, where the couple spent a considerable amount of time, holding weekly salons frequented by many leading literary and artistic figures of the day, including Robert Browning, Lord Tennyson, John Everett Millais and Henry James.
Their only child, Robert Gregory, was born in 1881. He was killed during the First World War while serving as a pilot, an event which inspired W. B. Yeats's poems "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death", "In Memory of Major Robert Gregory" and "Shepherd and Goatherd"; the Gregorys travelled in Ceylon, Spain and Egypt. While in Egypt, Lady Gregory had an affair with the English poet Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, during which she wrote a series of love poems, A Woman's Sonnets, her earliest work to appear under her own name was Arabi and His Household, a pamphlet—originally a letter to The Times—in support of Ahmed Orabi Pasha, leader of what has come to be known as the Urabi Revolt, an 1879 Egyptian nationalist revolt against the oppressive regime of the Khedive and the European domination of Egypt. She said of this booklet, "whatever political indignation or energy was born with me may have run its course in that Egyptian year and worn itself out". Despite this, in 1893 she published A Phantom's Pilgrimage, or Home Ruin, an anti-Nationalist pamphlet against William Ewart Gladstone's proposed second Home Rule Act.
She continued to write prose during the period of her marriage. During the winter of 1883, whilst her husband was in Ceylon, she worked on a series of memoirs of her childhood home, with a view to publishing them under the title An Emigrant's Notebook, but this plan was abandoned, she wrote a series of pamphlets in 1887 called Over the River, in which she appealed for funds for the parish of St. Stephens in Southwark, south London, she wrote a number of short stories in the years 1890 and 1891, although these never appeared in print. A number of unpublished poems from this period have survived; when Sir William Gregory died in March 1892, Lady Gregory went into mourning and returned to Coole Park. She was to write "If I had not married I should not have learned the quick enrichment of sentences that one gets in conversation. Loneliness made me rich—'full', as Bacon says.". A trip to Inisheer in the Aran Islands in 1893 re-awoke for Lady Gregory an interest in the Irish language and in the folklore of the area in which she lived.
She organised Irish lessons at the school at Coole, began collecting tales from the area around her home from the residents of Gort workhouse. One of the tutors she employed was Norma Borthwick; this activity led to the publication of a number of volumes of folk material, including A Book of Saints and Wonders, The Kiltartan History Book and The Kiltartan Wonder Book. She produced a number of collections of "Kiltartanese" versions of Irish myths, including Cuchulain of Muirthemne and Gods and Fighting Men. In his introduction to the former, Yeats wrote "I think this book is the best that has come out of Ireland in my time.". James Joyce was to parody this claim in the Scylla and Charybdis chapter of his novel Ulysses. Towards the end of 1894, encouraged by the positive reception of the editing of her husband's autobiography, Lady Gregory turned her attention to another
Whitley Stokes
Whitley Stokes, CSI, CIE, FBA was an Irish lawyer and Celtic scholar. He was a son of William Stokes, a grandson of Whitley Stokes, each of whom was Regius Professor of Physic at the University of Dublin, his sister Margaret Stokes was a archaeologist. He was born at 5 Merrion Square and educated at St Columba's College where he was taught Irish by Denis Coffey, author of a Primer of the Irish Language. Through his father he came to know the Irish antiquaries Samuel Ferguson, Eugene O'Curry, John O'Donovan and George Petrie, he entered Trinity College, Dublin in 1846 and graduated with a BA in 1851. His friend and contemporary Rudolf Thomas Siegfried became assistant librarian in Trinity College in 1855, the college's first professor of Sanskrit in 1858, it is that Stokes learnt both Sanskrit and comparative philology from Siegfried, thus acquiring a skill-set rare among Celtic scholars in Ireland at the time. Stokes qualified for the bar at Inner Temple, his instructors in the law were Arthur Cayley, Hugh McCalmont Hughes, Thomas Chitty.
Stokes became an English barrister on 17 November 1855, practicing in London before going to India in 1862, where he filled several official positions. In 1865 he married Mary Bazely by whom he had two daughters. One of his daughters, Maïve, compiled a book of Indian Fairy Tales in 1879 based on stories told to her by her Indian ayahs and a man-servant, it included some notes by Mrs. Mary Stokes. Mary died. In 1877, Stokes was appointed legal member of the viceroy's council, he drafted the codes of civil and criminal procedure and did much other valuable work of the same nature. In 1879 he became president of the commission on Indian law. Nine books by Stokes on Celtic studies were published in India, he returned to settle permanently in London in 1881 and married Elizabeth Temple in 1884. In 1887 he was made a CSI, two years a CIE He was an original fellow of the British Academy, an honorary fellow of Jesus College and foreign associate of the Institut de France. Whitley Stokes is most famous as a Celtic scholar, in this field he worked both in India and in England.
He studied Irish and Cornish texts. His chief interest in Irish was as a source of material for comparative philology. Despite his learning in Old Irish and Middle Irish, he never acquired Irish pronunciation and never mastered Modern Irish. In the hundred years since his death he has continued to be a central figure in Celtic scholarship. Many of his editions have not been superseded in that time and his total output in Celtic studies comes to over 15,000 pages, he was a close friend of Kuno Meyer from 1881 onwards. With Meyer he established the journal Archiv für celtische Lexicographie and was the co-editor, with Ernst Windisch, of the Irische Texte series. In 1862 he was awarded the Cunningham Gold Medal by the Royal Irish Academy. Stokes died at his London home, 15 Grenville Place, Kensington, in 1909 and is buried in Paddington Old Cemetery. Willesden Lane, where his grave is marked by a Celtic cross. Another Celtic cross was erected as a memorial to him at St Fintan's, Dublin; the Gaelic League paper An Claidheamh Soluis called Stokes "the greatest of the Celtologists" and expressed pride that an Irishman should have excelled in a field, at that time dominated by continental scholars.
In 1929 the Canadian scholar James F. Kenney described Stokes as "the greatest scholar in philology that Ireland has produced, the only one that may be ranked with the most famous of continental savants". A conference entitled "Ireland, London: The Tripartite Life Of Whitley Stokes" took place at the University of Cambridge from 18–19 September 2009; the event was organised to mark the centenary of Stokes's death. A volume of essays based on the papers delivered at this conference, The tripartite life of Whitley Stokes, was published by Four Courts Press in autumn 2011. In 2010 Dáibhí Ó Cróinín published Whitley Stokes:the Lost Celtic Notebooks Rediscovered, a volume based on the scholarship in Stokes's 150 notebooks, resting unnoticed at the University Library, Leipzig since 1919; the Passion: Middle Cornish Poem Three Irish Glossaries Gwreans an Bys: the Creation of the World Translation of William Jordan's 1611 Cornish play Beunans Meriasek The Life of Saint Meriasek Bishop and Confessor - Editor Three Middle-Irish Homilies Old Irish Glosses at Merzburg and Carlsruhe Irische Texte published at Leipzig, co-editor with Ernst Windisch The Anglo-Indian Codes.
Lives of Saints from the Book of Lismore translator Urkeltischer Sprachschatz with Adalbert Bezzenberger Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus with John Strachan This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Stokes, Whitley". Encyclopædia Britannica. 25. Cambridge University Press. P. 953. Stokes bibliography at University College Cork's CELT project Irish Texts edited, some translated, by Whitley Stokes, CELT project, retrieved 23 May 2007 Works by or about Whitley Stokes at Internet Archive
