448 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



Aine to be the daughter of the mortal King Eogabal, a dweller in a 

 sidh, like her brother and herself (perhaps the three low conjoined " forts," 

 traceable on Knockainey Hill, were once devoted to their worship) ; all three 

 had to be reduced to mortality.' So the once divine Tuatha De Danann had 

 to be changed to mere mortal heroes. Uncritical sixteenth-century writers' 

 even pointed out their descendants, and laid down the colour of their hair 

 and complexion ; a nineteenth- century doctor-antiquary imagined he could 

 identify then- skulls and their forts.' Gods who were claimed as tribal 

 ancestors could be maintained in their latter form when their divinity was 

 lost in the brightness of the coming of the new faith, if indeed their repute 

 had not been on the wane earlier, as several early legends imply. The sun god 

 Lugh, son of Eithliu (the daughter of Balor, " baneful eye ") is ancestor of 

 the Corca Laighde in south-west Co. Cork.* To obliterate the divine descent 

 Eithliu was changed to a man, Ethniu. Lugh is also an ancestor of Breogan, 

 father of MUe, from whom in twenty-one generations derived Fergus mac 

 Eoigh, ancestor of the Corca Modruadh in north-west Co. Clare. Breogan's 

 race figures as " Brigantes " in Ptolemy's Atlas. The Ciarrhaighe in north 

 Kerry derived from King iTan, who was sixteen generations from Oirbsen 

 and Manannan mac Lir, the sea god, from whose descendant Eilidli also are 

 derived the Oilealys. Deiche is probably a divinity ; he gave his name to a 

 lake, a mountain, and a glen, to the tribes the Fear Dechet and the Ui maic 

 Deichead (the Maqi Decedda in oghaiu inscriptions), a sept of the Ciarrhaighe. 

 Was Cian, ancestor of the Cianachta, Cian, son of the god Lugh ? Conmac, 

 ancestor of the Coumaicne, was son of Mananann mac Lir. Ciar (it is true) 

 was given by others as sou of Fergus and Medbh, but this only shows an 

 uneasy anxiety to " write off" a divine descent,* though, as we saw, Fergus was 

 reputed to be descended from Lugh in any case. In fact, were the subject well 

 worked out, we could (ind numbers of tribes whose pedigree is derived from the 

 divinities of the " Gaulish pantheon." The Eoghanachta and Dal Cais claimed 



' Slain &idh folk are not uncommon in legends, e.g., The Dindsenchas of Sna da en ; 

 Oilioll and Eogabal ; the fairy King Sigmall of Sidh Nennta, "A. M. 5084," &c. I 

 hope to set out more fully this aspect of the case when describing Knockainey. 



- Like Mac Firbis. 



3 Sir W. Wilde, " Boyne and Blackwater " (2nd ed.), p. 239. Lady Wilde repeats 

 this, "Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions" (ed. 1887), vol. ii, 

 pp. 355-7. They had globular heads, and built the stone forts ; their predecessors built 

 the earthen ones. Some have identified them with the Scandinavians. 



* New Ireland Review, vol. xsvi, pp. 132 sqq., and Proc. R. I. Acad., vol. xxvii, pp. 

 334-339. 



^ The chipping away of the " maqi mucoi" termination of some ogmic epitaphs, while 

 leaving the name of the dead man and his father, most probably was a Christian attempt 

 to obliterate the divine tribal ancestor's name. 



