134 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



to help us. All that is clear is that, unlike the dark " Fir Bolg races," the 

 two Cashel tribes were fair, ruddy, large men, with golden, or red, hair, and 

 blue, or green, eyes ; the same is told of the Tara tribes. 1 The legends, unlike 

 the Red Branch ones, belong to the " horse-riding period." Much may yet be 

 done by our scientific colleagues to solve racial questions ; till then, archaeology 

 alone, can do but little. 



Myth- are to be in early tales; the goddess Edaoin, making her 



favourite M g Xnadat. appear like a stone pillar while his enemies hacked 

 actual rocks aud pillars;' Oilioll's ear bitten off' by the outraged goddess of 

 the Mairtene; Cormai I - md his singular medical treatment, can easily be 

 classed, but a few other more intrusive matters in the more historic parts call 

 for a note. I am not ready to believe that the mere name "Lugaid" marks 

 a god; "Lug " (of Lugaid) i< common on the ogmic pillars, and 



I . _iid in the later history ; " Nuada," on the contrary, nearly always conno- 

 tate- the idea of the Severn .'"d." Nuada Argetlamh. There is a legendary 

 " Lugaid Lamhdearg" in the chaotic past of the Dal Cais descent; 3 the epithet 

 IB ti 1 to Lugaid Meann, on the edge of the historic period ; the pride 



funster and opprobrium of Connacht, he is entirely devoid of more super- 

 natural ■'■ than attach to most favourite conquerors. Lugaid macCon, 

 though in a mythic past, seems a mere mortal ; as for his epithet we have 

 " (.'unogenus " in Gaulish inscriptions, and "Mae< in "among the descendants 

 of his stepfather, the M N imaras and others, to this day. With his sons, 

 however, we have pure god myth, though, I think, rather late, when the triad 



. their names are Oendia, Caindia, Trendia' (one god, 



d. might but they are evidently intruded into some of the 



kin_' lists (not all) merely to assert the poisonous myth of the alternate 



ession, f'>r which history (even in the tenth century) was falsified and 

 warped. 1 ' Lugaid Delbaeth " seems an old god,* returned too late to earth. 



golden hair, like blue bulls were his eyes " ; " his eyes were 

 like be Teste, Ser. i, p. 204). The Dal Cam— " Lachtna, a 



fair nun From Cragliath " (B M I J47) J '* Dalchaia of the yellow 



hair' p. 81); " fair-skinned " (Wars of the Gaedhil, 



],. 79 : and m their red and golden hair and green or blue eyes, in 



reim Thoirdealbaith from 1240 1318). 

 ■ M igh Leana," pp. 30-31. 

 3 The Cedraige, evidently from their name i 'ns. are stated to be a branch 



of the DhI Cais Battle of M 



' rfew Ireland Review, xxvi. p. II 

 ir-bringer, Smfle-bringer, and Bleep-brii jei (Kev. Celt., xxiv. p. 27o; ; and the 

 gate-keepers of T-tra are ' K P • md Valve " (ibid., xzii, p. ! 



* Aa by the alleged "Dall I tahel, Aedh, 573, :>n<l Lorcan, son "f Conligan. 



(See tupra, xxxiii, p. . 



i»t-lbaeth. son he war god (Leab. Gabhal, p. 1 



