WOLF 229 



"Beinn Bhuirich nam madadh mor." The wolf is mentioned in 

 the First Book of Fingal, and also alluded to in poems of Clann 

 Uisnich and Cuthon as follows : — " Gadhair is fiadhchoin nan 

 earn." " 'S air chuilen na fiadhchoin." One of the characters in 

 Fingal, Duan I., is named " Faobhaidh/' Anglicised " Foivi/' the 

 spoiler, from faobh, spoil. Faolan, little wolf, was a personal 

 name in olden times, now Fillan. Though Fillan is one of Ossian's 

 characters, no more direct mention is made in his poems of 

 this animal. The Macmillan name is just Mac-gill- Fholain or 

 Fhaolain, the son or descendant of the servant of Faolan, the 

 wolf saint. Faelcu or Faolchu, wolf or wolf-dog, was the name of 

 one of the Columban abbots. Ossian, when dying, is said to have 

 compared himself to a wolf being helplessly sucked under a weir. 

 The mediaeval Irish are reported to have taken wolves as "gossips," 

 i.e., godfathers and godmothers, and also to have tamed and made 

 use of them. A quondam king of, or in, Ireland, about 74 a.d., 

 named Ruidruide, had a horse named "Tonn," but afterwards, 

 while on his back, changed his name to "Mactire," son of the 

 land, having, with his aid and brave demeanour, killed a fierce 

 wolf. Etymologists in this as in many other cases have made 

 some wild guesses and assertions as to this name or word, among 

 which it is stated that the Irish surname, M^Tear, was from 

 Mactire. A somewhat better-informed writer, however, says that 

 M^Tear is merely a contraction of M^Ateer, which again is a 

 contraction of M^Anteer or Mac-an-t-saoir, the carpenter's son — 

 M^Intyre. The term Mactire can also be traced in the proper 

 name " Drummatier " in Galloway. In Ireland there is a fort 

 called " Cathair na mac tirech," the fort of the wolves, and a place 

 now called '^Glen conveth" is a corruption of Gleann Con-fhiadh, 

 Glen wild-dog or wolf, so called from that animal having been 

 slain there ; while " sod mac-tire " means she-wolf-sod, a bitch, lit. 

 a bitch of a son of earth, the wolf being so prevalent in the olden 

 times that it literally was indigenous to the soil ; while the month 

 of January was called the " wolf-month." It has been thought 

 worthy of notice by some writers to mention that the wolf's tail 

 is shorter than that of the fox, which at one time it equalled in 

 length, the alleged cause of this discrepancy being owing to the 

 alleged fact that the fox persuaded the wolf to insert his tail in 

 a hole in the ice, for some purpose or other, where it froze fast, 

 and whence he had to tear it by force when his false friend the 

 fox set the hounds on him, part of the tail only being left behind. 

 The wolf figures also in coats-of-arms ; and as many are attributed 

 to the Twelve Tribes, it may be interesting to state that the 

 wolf is that of Benjamin. "Struan" arms contains, inter alia, 

 " Gules, 3 wolves' heads erased argent." Among the ancient 

 Celts, as said to be derived from the Danes, the wolf signified 

 " tyrant," and was in the coat-of-arras of the kingdom of Macedonia. 

 In folk-lore generally wolves are of importance, and the traditions 



