NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #16/NN_1992_16.iso/spool/alt/mytholog/1501

Internet Message Format | 1992-07-21 | 5.4 KB

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From: [e-mail]
Newsgroups: alt.mythology
Subject: Re: Who was Chu-Chu-Lain?
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 21 Jul 92 23:30:37 -0300
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Organization: Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Lines: 104

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail]
(Peter Corless) writes:
> From: [e-mail] (Linda Floren)
> Subject: Who was Chu-Chu-Lain?
>> Who was Chu-Chu-Lain? (Spelling is only a wild guess!)
>> He must have been an Irish hero in the times of Finn McCool.
>
> I just went through the same deal... let me summize:
>
> The "Tain bo Cuailgne" ("The Cattle Raid of Cuailgne") is the central tale of
> the Ulster Cycle; it features Cuchulainn as the Ulster hero. The best-regarded
> translation into modern English is by Kinsella, and is simply titled "The
> Tain."
>
> The plot:
>
> Cuchulainn (various spellings) was the solar hero of Celtic mythology. He was
> the best warrior of Ulster although he was just a boy. It was prophesied that
> he would be a great warrior, but die young. When Queen Medb (or Maev, or other
> spellings) of Connaught invaded Ulster during a time when all the men of
> Ulster were helpless due to a curse laid on them -- but that's *another*
> story -- to sieze the great Brown Bull of Cuailgne (Cooley), Cuchulainn was
> the only warrior in Ulster able to respond. Since he was a boy, he was not
> afflicted by the curse. He fights off the invading hordes for most of the
> story, but is eventually overcome and killed. ...A good-old Irish tragedy.
>
Small correction - he fights off whatever Medb sends against him. Finally
she sends his boyhood friend, Ferdia (check sp. I don't have a reference
here), bribing him with the promise of her daughter Finnabair . . . Cuchullainn
fights Ferdia all day, for, I think two days, with neither gaining the
advantage. Each night they stop, drnk and eat together, but Ferdia
knows that on the third day Cuchullainn will kill him with the Gae Bolg -
which he does.

By this time the warriors of Ulster are recovering from their weakness,
and so Cuchullainn can let them get on with it, and mourn his friend.  His
immunity comes not because he is a boy (though the boys of Ulster are
immune, form their own regiment, and are slaughtered) but because he is
not, technically, an Ulsterman as his father was Lugh the sun god. He is young,
but married and with a son (not from the marriage, though).

Cuchullain's death is another episode, sometime after the cattle raid.
> He uses the fearsome "Gae Bolg" in battle, a foot-cast-spear tactic to which
> there is no defense. (It can penetrate cast-iron plate and stone boulders!)
> He rides in a chariot, drawn by the two finest horses in the land, and driven
> by the best charioteer in the world. The Grey of Macha was one of his horses,
> the other was Black (can't remember it's name, though...).
>
>
Some more bits and pieces -
    His mother was Dechtire

     His father was Lugh, and there are various versions of his conception
and birth.

    His childhood name was Setenta or Setanta. "Cuchullainn" means
"the hound of Cullen" and as a young boy he killed Cullen's hound, then
offered to guard Cullen's house in the place of the hound to atone.( The
hound was monstrous.)

    He was trained as a warrior by Scathach. So was Ferdia. Scathach
taught him the hero's salmon leap. He was her best trainee, and she gave him
the Gae Bolg but warned him against using it.

    He was the lover of Aife, Scathach's enemy, after he led Scathach's
warriors against her in battle. Aife bore him a son, Connla, whom he didn't
see until very much later. He laid a geas (sort of taboo) on the child Aife
would bear that he would never refuse a battle, and never tell his name to
a stranger who demanded it. Connla as an adolescent was trained by Scathach
also, and then set off to meet his father . . . you can guess the rest of
the story. When Cuchullain found he couldn't defeat the boy in battle, he used
the Gae Bolg and killed him with it.

    He used the Gae Bolg only twice. The first time he killed his best
friend, and the second his only son.

    He married Emer.

    He was himself under a number of geas. He couldn't eat the meat of
a dog, and some others I forget. He incurred the wrath of the Morrigan,
who is an aspect of the great Goddess of Ireland (as probably are Aife,
Emer and Scathach and Dechtire. The Cuchulainn story seems to be a late
retelling with patriarchal overtones of some earlier material which may have
been very different) and who plotted to have him break every geas . . .
The Grey of Macha died with him.


I saw the original posting but thought I probably couldn't remember enough
to make posting worthwhile - it's about twenty years since I read most of
this!  Do get hold of the Tain . . .


    Jenny        Jblain @ ac.dal.ca
__________________________________________________________________________
    I was in many shapes before I was released:
    .....
    I was a path, I was an eagle, I was a coracle in seas;
    I was a bubble in beer, I was a drop in a shower;
    I was a sword in hand, I was a shield in battle.
    I was a string in a harp enchanted nine years, in the water as foam;
    I was a spark in fire, I was wood in a bonfire;
    I am not one who does not sing; I have sung since I was small.

                        [from The Book of Taliesin]