FOOTNOTES:

British. From Akerman.

FOOTNOTES:[996]Mythology of the Celtic Races,p. 68.[997]The Mistletoe, p. 30.[998]Budge, W.,Legends of the Gods, lxxii.[999]P. 234.[1000]Smith, Prof. Elliot,The Evolution of the Dragon, p. 157.[1001]Ibid., p. 176.[1002]Notably at Solutre—the Sol uter?[1003]Wright, Miss E. M.,Rustic Speech and Folklore, p. 303.[1004]Odin was essentially aWindGod: in Rutlandshire gales are termedAshwinds.N. and Q., 1876, p. 363.[1005]The Age of the Saints, p. xxvii.[1006]Cf.Christmas, H. C.,Universal Mythology, p. 43.[1007]InWambehwe again seem to detectwomb.[1008]Quoted from Donnelly, I.,Atlantis.[1009]Henry Kilgour, Notes and Queries, 8th January and 19th February, 1876.[1010]The Prehistoric Remains of Caithness, pp. 70, 71.[1011]Macnamara, N. C.,Origin and Character of the British People, p. 179.[1012]Read, Sir H.,A Guide to Antiquities of Bronze Age, p. 17.[1013]Races of Britain, p. 46.[1014]Strabo, III., lv., 5.[1015]Smith, L. P.,The English Language, p. 1.[1016]Triad, 4.[1017]Proceedings of Royal Irish Academy, xxxiv., C. 10, 11, p. 387.[1018]Ibid.[1019]Myths of Crete and Pre-Hellenic Europe, p. 235.[1020]Myths of Crete and Pre-Hellenic Europe, p. 232.[1021]Ilios, p. xii.[1022]There were peoples in the Caucasus known as the Britani or Burtani.[1023]Celtic Britain, p. 268.[1024]In a subsequent volume I shall trace the Iberianperroor dog toPeru, where the perro or dog was the supreme object of devotion.[1025]The capital of old Ceylon was Candy: I am unable to trace the origin of the port of Colombo.[1026]Baring-Gould, S.,Curious Myths, p. 527.[1027]The inhabitants of Tukopia are described as: “Tall, light-coloured men with thick manes of long, golden hair ... wonderful giants, with soft dark eyes, kind smiles, and child-like countenances”. The surroundings of the villages of this Polynesian island were like well-tended parks, all brushwood having been carefully removed. “They presented sights so different in blissful simplicity from what were to be seen in Melanesia, they all looked so happy, gay, and alluring, that it hardly needed the invitations of the kind people, without weapons or suspicion, and with wreaths of sweet-scented flowers round their heads and bodies, to incline us to stay.” This exquisite morsel of Arcadia was, like other parts of pure Polynesia, governed by a dynasty of hereditary chieftains, who were looked up to with the greatest respect, and to whom honours were paid almost as to demi-gods.—Cf.Sir Harry Johnston inThe Westminster Gazette.[1028]“I think that the Eponymus of the Argive Danaia was no other than that of the Israelite Tribe of Dan; only we are so used to confine ourselves to the soil of Palestine in our consideration of the Israelites that we treat them as if they were adscriptigleboe, and ignore the share they may have taken in the history of the world.”—Ethnology of Europe, p. 137.[1029]Cæsar says it took twenty years’ study to acquire: other writers say the Druids taught 20,000 verses.[1030]Cf.Evenings with a Reviewer.[1031]Y Cymmroder, xxiii.[1032]Cf.Davies, E.,Celtic Researches, p. 183.[1033]InRagnarokDonnelly argues that the glacial epoch and the “drift” were due to the earth’s collision with one of the many million comets which are careering through the solar universe. It would certainly appear probable that such abnormous masses of ice as are evidenced by the Glacial Period, must have been the result of abnormous heat first sucking up the lakes and rivers, and then returning them in the form of clouds, rain, and snow. Practically all mythologies contain an account of some unparalleled catastrophe, and in the opinion of Donnelly the widespread story of man’s progenitors emerging from a cave is based upon the literal probability of man—if he survived at all—surviving in caverns. Among the numerous myths which Donnelly cites in support of his ingenious theory is the following British one: “The profligacy of mankind had provoked the great Supreme to send a pestilential wind upon the earth. A pure poison descended, every blast was death. At this time the patriarch, distinguished for his integrity, was shut up, together with his select company, in the inclosure with the strong door (the cave?). Here the just ones were safe from injury. Presently a tempest of fire arose. It split the earth asunder to the great deep. The lake Llion burst its bounds, and the waves of the sea lifted themselves on high around the borders of Britain, the rain poured down from heaven, and the waters covered the earth.” Donnelly believes that comets were the origin of the world-wide fiery-dragon myth. In support of this theory he might have instanced the following Scotch legend: “There lived once upon a time in Sutherland a great dragon, very fierce and strong. It was this dragon that burnt all the fir woods in Ross, Sutherland, and the Reay country, of which the remains charred, blackened, and half-decayed may be found in every moss. Magnificent forests they must have been, but the dragon set fire to them with his fiery breath and rolled over the whole land. Men fled from before his face and women fainted when his shadow crossed the sky-line. He made the whole land desert.”—(Henderson, Dr. G. H., Intro. toThe Celtic Dragon Myth, p. xxii.) The burnt forests found in Ireland were noted on p. 21.[1034]All these “heretics” claimed to be the real possessors of the true Christian doctrine, and they charged Rome with beingMère sotte, an ignorant and blatant usurper: the incessant and insidious conflict which was carried on between Gnosticism and Rome has been considered inA New Light on the Renaissance, also inThe Lost Language of Symbolism, and with the exception of a few surface errors there is little in those volumes which I should now rewrite. The murderous campaign which was launched against the Albigenses not only failed seemingly to stamp them out, but if Baring-Gould’s opinion is valid the descendants of the Albigenses are even to-day not extinct. InCliff Castleshe writes as follows: “There was a curious statement made in a work by E. Bose and L. Bonnemere in 1882, which if true would show that a lingering paganism is to be found among these people. It is to this effect: ‘What is unknown to most is that at the present day there exist adepts of the worship (of the Celts) as practised before the Roman invasion, with the sole exception of human sacrifices, which they have been forcibly obliged to renounce. They are to be found on the two banks of the Loire, on the confines of the departments of Allier and Saone-et-Loire, where they are still tolerably numerous, especially in the latter department. They are designated in the country as Les Blancs, because that in their ceremonies they cover their heads with a white hood, and their priests are vested like the Druids in a long robe of the same colour. They surround their proceedings with profound mystery; their gatherings take place at night in the heart of large forests, about an old oak, and as they are dispersed through the country over a great extent of land, they have to start for the assembly from different points at close of day so as to be able to reach home again before daybreak. They have four meetings in the year, but one, the most solemn, is held near the town of La Clayette under the presidence of the high priest. Those who come from the greatest distance do not reach their homes till the second night, and their absence during the intervening day alone reveals to the neighbours that they have attended an assembly of the Whites. Their priests are known, and are vulgarly designated as the bishops or archbishops of the Whites; they are actually druids or archdruids.... We have been able to verify these interesting facts brought to our notice by M. Parent, and our personal investigations into the matter enable us to affirm the exactitude of what has been advanced.’ If there be any truth in this strange story we are much more disposed to consider the Whites as relics of a Manichæan or Albigensian sect than as a survival of Druidism.” P. 46.[1035]Origin and Meaning of Apple Cults.[1036]“Lords and Commons of England—Consider what nation whereof ye are, and whereof ye are the Governors: a nation not slow and dull, but of a quick, ingenious and piercing spirit; acute to invent, subtle and sinewy to discourse, not beneath the reach of any point the highest that human capacity can soar to. Therefore, the studies of learning in her deepest sciences have been so ancient and so eminent among us, that writers of good antiquity and able judgment have been persuaded that the School of Pythagoras, and the Persian Wisdom, took beginning from the old philosophy of this Island, Britain.”—Milton.[1037]InThe Lost Language of SymbolismI anticipated this opinion.[1038]Writing of the Pied Piper story Mr. Ernest Rhys observes: “There is every reason to believe that Hamelin was as near home as Newton, Isle of Wight, and that the Weser, deep and wide, was the Solent”.—Preamble toFairy Gold(Ev. Library).[1039]Proc. of Royal Irish Academy, xxxiv., C., No. 8, p. 140.

[996]Mythology of the Celtic Races,p. 68.

[997]The Mistletoe, p. 30.

[998]Budge, W.,Legends of the Gods, lxxii.

[999]P. 234.

[1000]Smith, Prof. Elliot,The Evolution of the Dragon, p. 157.

[1001]Ibid., p. 176.

[1002]Notably at Solutre—the Sol uter?

[1003]Wright, Miss E. M.,Rustic Speech and Folklore, p. 303.

[1004]Odin was essentially aWindGod: in Rutlandshire gales are termedAshwinds.N. and Q., 1876, p. 363.

[1005]The Age of the Saints, p. xxvii.

[1006]Cf.Christmas, H. C.,Universal Mythology, p. 43.

[1007]InWambehwe again seem to detectwomb.

[1008]Quoted from Donnelly, I.,Atlantis.

[1009]Henry Kilgour, Notes and Queries, 8th January and 19th February, 1876.

[1010]The Prehistoric Remains of Caithness, pp. 70, 71.

[1011]Macnamara, N. C.,Origin and Character of the British People, p. 179.

[1012]Read, Sir H.,A Guide to Antiquities of Bronze Age, p. 17.

[1013]Races of Britain, p. 46.

[1014]Strabo, III., lv., 5.

[1015]Smith, L. P.,The English Language, p. 1.

[1016]Triad, 4.

[1017]Proceedings of Royal Irish Academy, xxxiv., C. 10, 11, p. 387.

[1018]Ibid.

[1019]Myths of Crete and Pre-Hellenic Europe, p. 235.

[1020]Myths of Crete and Pre-Hellenic Europe, p. 232.

[1021]Ilios, p. xii.

[1022]There were peoples in the Caucasus known as the Britani or Burtani.

[1023]Celtic Britain, p. 268.

[1024]In a subsequent volume I shall trace the Iberianperroor dog toPeru, where the perro or dog was the supreme object of devotion.

[1025]The capital of old Ceylon was Candy: I am unable to trace the origin of the port of Colombo.

[1026]Baring-Gould, S.,Curious Myths, p. 527.

[1027]The inhabitants of Tukopia are described as: “Tall, light-coloured men with thick manes of long, golden hair ... wonderful giants, with soft dark eyes, kind smiles, and child-like countenances”. The surroundings of the villages of this Polynesian island were like well-tended parks, all brushwood having been carefully removed. “They presented sights so different in blissful simplicity from what were to be seen in Melanesia, they all looked so happy, gay, and alluring, that it hardly needed the invitations of the kind people, without weapons or suspicion, and with wreaths of sweet-scented flowers round their heads and bodies, to incline us to stay.” This exquisite morsel of Arcadia was, like other parts of pure Polynesia, governed by a dynasty of hereditary chieftains, who were looked up to with the greatest respect, and to whom honours were paid almost as to demi-gods.—Cf.Sir Harry Johnston inThe Westminster Gazette.

[1028]“I think that the Eponymus of the Argive Danaia was no other than that of the Israelite Tribe of Dan; only we are so used to confine ourselves to the soil of Palestine in our consideration of the Israelites that we treat them as if they were adscriptigleboe, and ignore the share they may have taken in the history of the world.”—Ethnology of Europe, p. 137.

[1029]Cæsar says it took twenty years’ study to acquire: other writers say the Druids taught 20,000 verses.

[1030]Cf.Evenings with a Reviewer.

[1031]Y Cymmroder, xxiii.

[1032]Cf.Davies, E.,Celtic Researches, p. 183.

[1033]InRagnarokDonnelly argues that the glacial epoch and the “drift” were due to the earth’s collision with one of the many million comets which are careering through the solar universe. It would certainly appear probable that such abnormous masses of ice as are evidenced by the Glacial Period, must have been the result of abnormous heat first sucking up the lakes and rivers, and then returning them in the form of clouds, rain, and snow. Practically all mythologies contain an account of some unparalleled catastrophe, and in the opinion of Donnelly the widespread story of man’s progenitors emerging from a cave is based upon the literal probability of man—if he survived at all—surviving in caverns. Among the numerous myths which Donnelly cites in support of his ingenious theory is the following British one: “The profligacy of mankind had provoked the great Supreme to send a pestilential wind upon the earth. A pure poison descended, every blast was death. At this time the patriarch, distinguished for his integrity, was shut up, together with his select company, in the inclosure with the strong door (the cave?). Here the just ones were safe from injury. Presently a tempest of fire arose. It split the earth asunder to the great deep. The lake Llion burst its bounds, and the waves of the sea lifted themselves on high around the borders of Britain, the rain poured down from heaven, and the waters covered the earth.” Donnelly believes that comets were the origin of the world-wide fiery-dragon myth. In support of this theory he might have instanced the following Scotch legend: “There lived once upon a time in Sutherland a great dragon, very fierce and strong. It was this dragon that burnt all the fir woods in Ross, Sutherland, and the Reay country, of which the remains charred, blackened, and half-decayed may be found in every moss. Magnificent forests they must have been, but the dragon set fire to them with his fiery breath and rolled over the whole land. Men fled from before his face and women fainted when his shadow crossed the sky-line. He made the whole land desert.”—(Henderson, Dr. G. H., Intro. toThe Celtic Dragon Myth, p. xxii.) The burnt forests found in Ireland were noted on p. 21.

[1034]All these “heretics” claimed to be the real possessors of the true Christian doctrine, and they charged Rome with beingMère sotte, an ignorant and blatant usurper: the incessant and insidious conflict which was carried on between Gnosticism and Rome has been considered inA New Light on the Renaissance, also inThe Lost Language of Symbolism, and with the exception of a few surface errors there is little in those volumes which I should now rewrite. The murderous campaign which was launched against the Albigenses not only failed seemingly to stamp them out, but if Baring-Gould’s opinion is valid the descendants of the Albigenses are even to-day not extinct. InCliff Castleshe writes as follows: “There was a curious statement made in a work by E. Bose and L. Bonnemere in 1882, which if true would show that a lingering paganism is to be found among these people. It is to this effect: ‘What is unknown to most is that at the present day there exist adepts of the worship (of the Celts) as practised before the Roman invasion, with the sole exception of human sacrifices, which they have been forcibly obliged to renounce. They are to be found on the two banks of the Loire, on the confines of the departments of Allier and Saone-et-Loire, where they are still tolerably numerous, especially in the latter department. They are designated in the country as Les Blancs, because that in their ceremonies they cover their heads with a white hood, and their priests are vested like the Druids in a long robe of the same colour. They surround their proceedings with profound mystery; their gatherings take place at night in the heart of large forests, about an old oak, and as they are dispersed through the country over a great extent of land, they have to start for the assembly from different points at close of day so as to be able to reach home again before daybreak. They have four meetings in the year, but one, the most solemn, is held near the town of La Clayette under the presidence of the high priest. Those who come from the greatest distance do not reach their homes till the second night, and their absence during the intervening day alone reveals to the neighbours that they have attended an assembly of the Whites. Their priests are known, and are vulgarly designated as the bishops or archbishops of the Whites; they are actually druids or archdruids.... We have been able to verify these interesting facts brought to our notice by M. Parent, and our personal investigations into the matter enable us to affirm the exactitude of what has been advanced.’ If there be any truth in this strange story we are much more disposed to consider the Whites as relics of a Manichæan or Albigensian sect than as a survival of Druidism.” P. 46.

[1035]Origin and Meaning of Apple Cults.

[1036]“Lords and Commons of England—Consider what nation whereof ye are, and whereof ye are the Governors: a nation not slow and dull, but of a quick, ingenious and piercing spirit; acute to invent, subtle and sinewy to discourse, not beneath the reach of any point the highest that human capacity can soar to. Therefore, the studies of learning in her deepest sciences have been so ancient and so eminent among us, that writers of good antiquity and able judgment have been persuaded that the School of Pythagoras, and the Persian Wisdom, took beginning from the old philosophy of this Island, Britain.”—Milton.

[1037]InThe Lost Language of SymbolismI anticipated this opinion.

[1038]Writing of the Pied Piper story Mr. Ernest Rhys observes: “There is every reason to believe that Hamelin was as near home as Newton, Isle of Wight, and that the Weser, deep and wide, was the Solent”.—Preamble toFairy Gold(Ev. Library).

[1039]Proc. of Royal Irish Academy, xxxiv., C., No. 8, p. 140.

The following extract is taken fromBritain and the Gael: or Notices of Old and Successive Races; but with special reference to the Ancient Men of Britain and its Isles.—Wm. Beal, London, 1860.

Plautus, a dramatic writer, and one of the great poets of antiquity, who lived from one to two centuries before the Christian era; was mentioned in the last section. In his Pænulus, is the tale of some young persons said to have been stolen from Carthage, by pirates, taken to Calydonia, and there sold; one of these was Agorastocles, a young man; the others were two daughters of Hanno, and Giddeneme, their nurse. Hanno, after long search, discovered the place where his daughters were concealed, and by the help of servants who understood the Punic language, rescued his children from captivity. Plautus gives the supposed appeal of Hanno, to the gods of the country for help, and his conversations with servants in the Punic language, are accompanied with a Latin translation. The Punic, as a language, is lost, and those long noticed, but strange lines had long defied the skill of learned men. But at length, by attending to their vocal formation (and all language, Wills states, is addressed to the ear). It was discovered by O’Neachtan, or some Irish scholar, that they were resolvable into words, which exhibited but slight differences from the language of Keltic Ireland. The words were put into syllables, then translated by several persons, and these translations not only accorded with the drama, but also, with the Plautine Latin version. The lines were put to the test of more rigid examination, placed in the hands of different persons one of whom was Dr. Percy, bishop of Dromore. They were also given to different Irish scholars for translation, to persons who had no correspondence with each other on this subject, nor knew the principal object in view; and by the whole the same meaning was given.

Bohn’s edition, by H. T. Riley, B.A., is before the writer; but from the edition used by the late Sir W. Betham, some few lines from Plautus, with the Gaelic or Irish underneath, are given, and the eye will at once perceive how closely the one resembles the other. Milphio, the servant of Agorastocles, addressed Hanno and his servants in Punic, and asked them “of what country are you, or from what city?”

The following is the reply, and the supposed appeal of Hanno to the god, or gods of the country:—

This alleged work of Plautus, and these strange lines, have long been before the world, and under the notice of men of letters. Is there any reason to doubt whether it is genuine? If not, can it be supposed that the writer purposely placed some strange jargon before his readers to bewilder them? and if so, by what singular hazzard should it so closely resemble the language of the Gael. Plautus avers, that Milphio addressed the strangers (Hanno and servants), in Punic, and declared to Agorastocles, his master, that “no Punic or Carthaginian man speaks Punic better than I”. Unless these statements can be proved to be worthless, will they not as connecting links appear to say, probably the Gaels of Britain, and the Punic people of Carthage, were branches of the old and once celebrated race, known as Phenicians?

On page 312 I stated that in Kent the light cloudlets of a summer day were known as “Perry-dancers”: as I am unable to trace any printed authority for this statement it is possible that it was a mis-remembrance of the following passage from Ritson’s “Dissertation on Fairies,” prefacingEnglish Folklore and Legends, London, 1890: “Le Grand is of opinion that what is called Fairy comes to us from the Orientals, and that it is their genies which have produced our fairies ... whether this be so or not, it is certain that we call the auroræ boreales, or active clouds in the night, perry-dancers.”

In connection with my suggestion that Stonehengles, now Stonehenge, of which the outer circle consists of thirty stones, meantStone Angels, may be considered the repeated statements of Pausanias that the oldest gods of all were rude stones in the temple, or the temple precincts. In AchaeanPharaehe found some thirty squared stonesnamed each after a god: obviously these were phairy or peri stones, and the chief stone presumably stood for thepherepolis.

Thatangeoringevaried intoinkis implied not only byInkpen Beacon figuring in old records asIngepenne andHingepene, but alsoby Ritson’s statement: “In days of yore, when the church atInkberrow was taken down and rebuilt upon a new site, the fairies,whose haunt was near the latter place, took offence at the change”. The following passage quoted by Keightley from Aubrey’sNatural History of Surreyis of interest apart from the significant names: “In the vestry of Frensham Church, in Surrey, on the north side of the chancel is an extraordinary great kettle or cauldron, which the inhabitants say, by tradition, was brought hither by the fairies, time out of mind, from Borough-hill about a mile hence. To this place, if anyone went to borrow a yoke of oxen, money, etc., he might have it for a year or longer, so he kept his word to return it. There is a cave where some have fancied to hear music. In this Borough-hill is a great stone lying along of the length of about 6 feet. They went to this stone and knocked at it, and declared what they would borrow, and when they would repay, and a voice would answer when they should come, and that they should find what they desired to borrow at that stone. This cauldron, with the trivet, was borrowed here, after the manner aforesaid, and not returned according to promise; and though the cauldron was afterwards carried to the stone, it could not be received, and ever since that time no borrowing there.”

InWookey HoleMr. H. E. Balch quotes the following important passage from Gildas: “A blind people [the Britons], they paid divine honour to the mountains, wells, and streams. Their altars were pillars of stone inscribed with emblems of the sun and moon, or of a beast or birdwhich symbolised some force of nature”. This passage justifies the supposition that the inscribed “barnacles,” elephants, etc., were symbolic, and supports the contention that a people using such subtleties were far from “blind”. The Museum at Glastonbury contains a bronze ring about 3 inches in diameter, in the form of a serpent with its tail in its mouth. Obviously this object, which was found at Stanton Drew,i.e.,the stone town of the Druids, was symbolic, probably, of the Eternal Wisdom.

In view of the fact that Halifax claimed to possess the Holy Face of St. John, and that four roads centred there in the form of a cross at the chapel of St. John, it is interesting to note that the four cross-roads of Glastonbury are similarly associated with St. John. In the words of a local guidebook, “From the Tor, a walk will bring you to Weary-All Hill to view the town, and it is curious to note that from this hill it seems to be laid out as a perfect cross, St. John’s Church being the central point”.

The probability is that there was some connection between the St. John of modern Glastonbury and the Fairy King Gwyn who was exorcised from the neighbouring Tor by a certain St. Collen.

Since the preceding pages were in the press I have come into the possession ofLa Religion des Gauloisby Jacques Martin (Paris, 1727). This standard writer favours the idea thatdruidis derived from the Celticderu, meaning an oak, but he also makes a remarkable statement to the following effect: “If the opinion of P. Pezron was well founded one should also say that certain people of Crete whom one calledDruites, because their country was full of oaks, made a trade of magic and enchantment, which is far removed from the truth and perhaps also from good sense” (vol. i., p. 176). In the same volume (pp. 406-7) Martin illustrates a Gaulish god whose name Dolichenius is curiously suggestive of Dalgeon, Telchin, Talgean, and Telchinea.

Now if any brother or well-wisher shall conscientiously doubt or be dissatisfied, touching any particular point contained in this treatise, because of my speaking to many things in a little room: and if he or they shall be serious in so doing, and will befriend me so far, and do me that courtesy, to send to me before they condemn me, and let me know their scruples in a few words of writing, I shall look upon myself obliged both in affection and reason, to endeavour to give them full satisfaction.

H. B.

Overbye,Church Cobham,Surrey.

Back to Index Next