David MacRitchie - Fians, Fairies and Picts
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David MacRitchie >> Fians, Fairies and Picts
[Footnote 5: Similarly, the "little Bushmen" referred to by Miss Olive
Schreiner's _Waldo_ (as quoted by me on the title-page) would be
remembered with as much uncertainty a century hence if the modern
population of South Africa had nothing but tradition to depend upon. (It
may be explained, in case of misapprehension on the part of any
too-literal reader, that that quotation is not supposed to prove that
the earth-dwellers of the Hebrides were small and ugly, with "little
yellow faces," any more than it proves the reindeer of Scotland to have
been identical with the wild buck of South Africa. But the cases are
analogous, and the quotation seems _a propos_.)]
[Footnote 6: _Le Surnaturel dans les Contes Populaires_, Paris, 1891, p.
iv.]
[Footnote 7: Some portions of it I have already amplified: in a pamphlet
entitled "The Underground Life," Edinburgh, 1892 (privately printed); in
a paper on "Subterranean Dwellings," contributed to _The Antiquary_
(London: Elliot Stock) of August 1892; and at pp. 52-58 of "The Ainos,"
previously quoted.]
[Footnote 8: By "mankind" need only be understood the race to which
Einar Gudmund belonged. It is well known that many races apply the term
"men" to themselves alone. At the same time, Gudmund's words may denote
a very marked difference in the two types.]
[Footnote 9: Scott again quotes this story, in fuller detail, in the
Appendix to _The Lady of the Lake_, Note 3 C.]
[Footnote 10: "Primitive Culture," vol. i. p. 385 (3rd edition).]
[Footnote 11: London, Macmillan and Co., 1873.]
[Footnote 12: London, Truebner and Co., 1883.]
[Footnote 13: London, David Nutt, 1891.]
[Footnote 14: _Asiatic Quarterly Review_, July 1892.]
[Footnote 15: For an exhaustive account of "The Pygmy Tribes of Africa,"
treated from the purely scientific and ethnological point of view see
Dr. Henry Schlichter's articles in _The Scottish Geographical Magazine_
of June and July 1892.]
[Footnote 16: _Memoirs_ of the Anthropological Society of London, vol.
iii. 1870, pp. 320, 321.]
[Footnote 17: Blackwood and Sons, 1888.]
FIANS, FAIRIES AND PICTS.
The general belief at the present day is that, of the three designations
here classed together, only that of the Picts is really historical. The
Fians are regarded as merely legendary--perhaps altogether mythical
beings; and the Fairies as absolutely unreal. On the other hand, there
are those who believe that the three terms all relate to historical
people, closely akin to each other, if not actually one people under
three names.
To those unacquainted with the views of the realists, or euhemerists, it
is necessary to explain that the popular definition of Fairies as
"little people" is one which that school is quite ready to accept. But
the conception of such "little people" as tiny beings of aerial and
ethereal nature, able to fly on a bat's back, or to sip honey from the
flowers "where the bee sucks," is regarded by the realists as simply
the outcome of the imagination, working upon a basis of fact. An
illustration of this position may be seen in the Far East. There is a
tradition among the Ainos of Northern Japan that they were preceded by a
race of "little people," only a few inches in height, whose
pit-dwellings they still point out. But the pottery and the skeletons
associated with these habitations show that not only were their
occupants of a stature to be measured by feet rather than by inches, but
also that, by reason of a certain anatomical peculiarity common to both,
the traditional dwarfs were very clearly the ancestors of the Ainos--a
race which, though now blended, was once most distinctly a race of
dwarfs, if one is to believe the earliest Japanese pictures of them.
Similarly, the dwarfs of European tradition are believed to have had as
real an origin as the little people of Aino legend, at any rate by those
who hold the realistic theory.
Any attempt to reconcile the pygmies of the classic writers with actual
dwarfs of flesh and blood is outside my province. Moreover, this has
been admirably, and, as it seems to me, successfully done quite recently
by M. Paul Monceaux, in an article in the _Revue Historique,_[18]
wherein he compares the traditional and historical descriptions with the
statements of modern travellers, and draws the inference that the
pygmies of the Greek and Roman writers, sculptors and painters, are all
derived from actual dwarfs seen by their forefathers in Africa and
India. (Still less doubt is there with regard to the dwarfs in Ancient
Egyptian paintings.) And whereas Strabo is, says M. Monceaux, the only
writer of antiquity who questions the existence of the dwarfs, all the
others are on the side of Aristotle, who says--"This is no fable; there
really exists in that region (the sources of the Nile), as people
relate, a race of little men, who have small horses and who live in
holes." And these little men were of course the ancestors of
Schweinfurth's and Stanley's dwarfs.
But although M. Monceaux confines his identification to equatorial
Africa and to India, he does not omit to state that Pliny and other
writers speak of dwarf tribes in other localities, and among these are
"the vague regions of the north, designated by the name of Thule." This
area, vague enough certainly, is the territory with which Fians and
Picts are both associated; as, also, of course, the Fairies of North
European tradition.
The attributes with which the "little people" of North Europe are
accredited cannot be given in detail here. It is enough to note that
they were believed to live in houses wholly or partly underground, the
latter kind being described as "hollow" mounds, or hills; that when
people of taller race entered such subterranean dwellings (as
occasionally they did) they found the domestic utensils of the dwarfs
were of the kind labelled "pre-historic" in our antiquarian museums;
that the copper vessels which dwarf women sometimes left behind them
when discovered surreptitiously milking the cows of their neighbours,
were likewise of an antique form; further, that they helped themselves
to the beef and mutton of their neighbours, after having shot the
animals with flint-headed arrows; that melodies peculiar to them are
still sung by the peasants of certain localities; that words used by
them are still employed by children in their games; and that many
families in many districts are believed to have inherited some of their
blood.[19] Of this intercourse between the taller races and the dwarfs,
there are many records in old traditions. In the days of King Arthur,
when, as Chaucer tells us, the land was "ful-filled of faerie," the
knights errant had usually a dwarf as attendant. One of King Arthur's
own knights was a Fairy.[20] According to Highland tradition, every
high-caste family of pure Gaelic descent had an attendant dwarf. These
examples show the "little people" in a not unfriendly light. But many
other stories speak of them as "malignant" foes, and as dreaded
oppressors. Of which the rational explanation is that these various
tales relate to various localities and epochs.
The connection visible between Fians and Fairies, between Fians and
Picts, and between Picts and Fairies, may now briefly be stated.
The earliest known association of the first two classes occurs in an
Irish manuscript of the eleventh or twelfth century,[21] wherein it is
stated that when the ninth-century Danes overran and plundered Ireland,
there was nothing "in concealment under ground in Erinn, or in the
various secret places belonging to Fians or to Fairies" that they did
not discover and appropriate. This statement receives strong
confirmation from a Scandinavian record, the _Landnama-bok_, which
says[22] that, in or about the year 870, a well-known Norse chief named
Leif
"went on warfare in the west. He made war in Ireland, and there
found a large underground house; he went down into it, and it was
dark until light shone from a sword in the hand of a man. Leif
killed the man, and took the sword and much property.... He made
war widely in Ireland, and got much property. He took ten thralls."
Although the Scandinavian record does not speak of the owner of the
earth-house as either a "Fian" or a "Fairy," it is quite evident that
this is an example of the plundering referred to in the Irish chronicle,
and that the Gaels of Ireland seven or eight centuries ago, if not a
thousand years ago, regarded the underground people as indifferently
Fians and Fairies.[23]
Many other associations of Fians with Fairies are to be seen. In one of
the old traditional ballads regarding the Fians, they are described as
feasting with Fairies in one of their "hollow" mounds.[24] A
Sutherlandshire story relates the adventures of the son of a Fairy
woman, who took service with Ossian, the king of the Fians.[25] One of
the Fians (Caoilte) had a Fairy sweet-heart.[26] Another of them (Oscar)
has an interview with a washerwoman who is a Fairy.[27] A Fenian story
recounts how one day the Fians were working in the harvest-field, in the
Argyleshire island of Tiree, and on that occasion they had "left their
weapons of war in the armoury of the Fairy Hill of Caolas";[28] from
which one is to infer that the Fians made use of Fairy dwellings. In the
same collection of tales we are told[29] that one time when the Fians
were hunting in the Isle of Skye, they left their wives in a dwelling
which bore a title "applied to dwellings of the Elfin race." It is
further stated that one popular belief in the Scottish Highlands is that
the Fians are still lying in the hill of Tomnahurich, near Inverness,
and that "others say they are lying in Glenorchy, Argyleshire."[30] Now,
both the Inverness-shire mound and the mounds in Glenorchy are also
popularly regarded as the abodes of Fairies.[31] The vitrified fort on
Knock-Farril, in Ross-shire, is said to have been one of Fin McCoul's
castles;[32] and Knock-Farril, or rather "a knoll opposite Knock-Farril"
is remembered as the abode of the Fairies of that district.[33]
Glenshee, in Perthshire, is celebrated equally as a Fairy haunt and as a
favourite hunting-ground of the Fians. The Fians, indeed, were said to
have lived by deer-hunting, so much so that Campbell of Islay suggests
that their name signifies "the deer men"; and the deer, it is believed,
"were a fairy race."[34] The famous hound of the famous leader of the
Fians was "a Fairy or Elfin dog." In short, the connection between Fians
and Fairies, recognised in the Gaelic manuscript of eight or ten
centuries ago, is apparent throughout the traditions of the
Gaelic-speaking people.
But if the Fians were either identical with, or closely akin to the
Fairies, they must have been "little people." The belief that they were
so is supported by one traditional Fenian story. This is the well-known
tale of the visit of Fin, the famous chief of the Fians, to a country
known to him and his people as "The Land of the Big Men." The story
tells how Fin sailed from Dublin Bay in his skin-boat, crossed the sea
to that country, and shortly after landing was captured and taken to the
palace of the king, where he was appointed court dwarf,[35] and remained
for a considerable time the attached and faithful adherent of the king.
The collector of this story has assumed that it is purely imaginary. But
let it be contrasted with the following extract from the _Heimskringla_.
The period is the early part of the eleventh century, and the scene
Norway: "There was a man from the Uplands called Fin the Little, and
some said of him that he was of Finnish race. He was a remarkable [?
remarkably] little man, but so swift of foot that no horse could
overtake him.... He had long been in the service of King Hrorek, and
often employed in errands of trust.... Now when King Hrorek was set
under guards on the journey Fin would often slip in among the men of
the guard, and followed, in general, with the lads and serving-men; but
as often as he could he waited upon Hrorek, and entered into
conversation with him."[36] And, like Fin the dwarf in the Gaelic story,
this little Fin rendered great service to his king. Now, the
_Heimskringla_ Fin is unquestionably a historical personage, and the
account of him was written by a twelfth century historian. The Gaelic
story was only obtained in the Hebrides, and reduced to writing
twenty-three years ago. Although Fin of the Fians is stated in Irish
records to be the grandson of a Finland woman,[37] and although the
Scandinavian and the Hebridean tales look very much like two versions of
one story, this cannot precisely be the case, as the Fenian Fin is
placed in an earlier era than his namesake of Norway. A dwarf king named
Fin is also remembered in Frisian tradition;[38] and that he and his
race were small men is pretty clearly proved by the fact that when one
of the earth-houses attributed to him was opened some years ago, it was
found to contain the bones of a little man.[39] Both of these dwarf
Fins, Little Fin of Norway and Little Fin of Denmark, are undoubtedly
real; and there seems no good reason to suppose that the dwarf Fin of
Hebridean tradition was not equally real. Whether they were three
separate people is a problem. "Fin" appears to have been at one time a
not uncommon name, whatever its etymology and that of "Fian" may be. At
any rate, there is nothing in history (which speaks of a close
intercourse between Scandinavia and the British Isles, in former times),
and nothing in the ethnology of North-Western Europe, to make us regard
as mythical the capture and enthralment of any one of these three
"little Fins." If Fin of the Fians, therefore, was a typical Fian, they
were little people.[40]
In regarding the Fians as a race of dwarfs, I do not overlook the fact
that they are also spoken of as "giants." But to assume them to have
been of gigantic stature is both totally at variance with the bulk of
the evidence regarding them, and at variance with the fact that the word
"giant" has very frequently been used to denote a savage, or a
cave-dweller.[41] No more appropriate illustration of this can be found
than the local tradition that a certain artificially hollowed rock in
the island of Hoy, Orkney, was the abode of "a giant and his wife." Now,
this same "giant" is also remembered as a "dwarf," and the largest cell
in his dwelling is only 5 feet 8 inches long. Similarly, there is in
Iceland a certain _Troellakyrkia_ (literally "the dwarfs' church") which
is translated "the _giants'_ church."[42] For these reasons, then, I do
not regard any reference to the Fians as "giants" as indicating that
they were of tall stature; although I see no objection to the assumption
that they were savages and cave-dwellers.
Fians, then, are closely connected with the "little people" called
"Fairies." The connection between Fians and Picts is equally well
marked.
Regarding them historically, Dr. Skene identifies the Fians with one or
other of two historical races believed to have occupied Ireland before
the coming of the Gaels. These two races are known in Irish story as the
Tuatha De and the Cruithne.[43] Now, the Tuatha De _are_ the Fairies of
Ireland.[44] Therefore, according to Dr. Skene, the Fians were either
Fairies or Cruithne. Now, Cruithne is simply a Gaelic name for the
Picts. Consequently, the Fians were either Fairies or Picts--according
to Dr. Skene. In one traditional story, already referred to, the Fians
seem to be unhesitatingly regarded as Picts. This story, obtained in
Sutherlandshire, tells how a certain king lived for a year with a
_banshee_, or fairy woman,[45] by whom he had a son. When this son grew
up he went to the country of the Fians,[46] and there he entered into
the service of their king, who was no other than the celebrated Oisin.
The Gaelic narrator calls him "Oisin, Righ na Feinne," that is, "Ossian,
King of the Fians"; but the collector of the story,[47] who had no doubt
obtained the translation on the spot, renders _Righ na Feinne_ as "King
of the Picts." No explanation or comment is given, and one is therefore
led to infer that in Sutherlandshire _Feinne_ is without question
regarded as a Gaelic name for the Picts. This identity is, indeed, borne
out otherwise. There is a Gaelic saying in Glenlyon, Perthshire, to the
effect that "Fin had twelve castles" in that glen, and the remains of
these "castles," all said to have been built by him and his Fians, and
of which one in particular is styled "Castle Fin,"[48] are known to the
English-speaking people of Scotland as "Picts'" houses. For they belong
to a peculiar class of structures, all radically alike, and all known,
in certain districts, as "Picts' houses." The term "Picts' house" is
unknown in the Hebrides, says one writer. "In the Hebrides tradition is
entirely silent concerning the Picts ... there the Fenian heroes are the
builders of the duns."[49] Yet the self-same class of building is
elsewhere assigned to the Picts. To these structures I shall presently
refer more particularly; but it is enough to note in passing that, just
as Oisin, King of the Fians, is translated into Ossian, King of the
Picts, so the dwellings ascribed to the Fians in one locality, are in
another said to have been made and inhabited by the Picts.
Fians, then, are associated or identified with Fairies, and also with
Picts. To complete my equilateral triangle, the Picts ought also to be
regarded as Fairies, or as akin to them.
This undoubtedly is a popular belief. The earliest alleged reference of
this kind is placed by one writer in the middle of the fifteenth
century, before the Orkney Islands had passed from the crown of Denmark
to the crown of Scotland. A manuscript of the then Bishop of Orkney,
dated Kirkwall 1443, states that when Harald Haarfagr conquered the
Orkneys in the ninth century, the inhabitants were the two "nations" of
the _Papae_ and the _Peti_, both of whom were exterminated. By the former
name is understood the Irish missionaries: the _Peti_ were certainly the
Picts, or Pehts.[50] Now, of these Picts of Orkney it is said, that they
"were only a little exceeding pigmies in stature, and worked wonderfully
in the construction of their cities, evening and morning, but in
mid-day, being quite destitute of strength, they hid themselves through
fear in little houses under ground."[51]
The exact date of this statement is at present doubtful, but it is quite
in accordance with the widespread ideas held throughout Scotland and
Northumberland with regard to the Picts: that they were great as
builders, but were of very low stature, and closely akin to Fairies.[52]
Moreover, they are famous for doing their work during the night.
Whatever be the explanation of the above curious statement that at
mid-day they lost their strength and withdrew to their underground
houses, it is at any rate interesting to compare with it the remark made
by the traveller Pennant as he was passing along Glenorchy in 1772. This
is the entry in his journal:--"See frequently on the road-sides small
verdant hillocks, styled by the common people shi an (_sithean_), or the
Fairy-haunt, because here, say they, the fairies, who love not the glare
of day, make their retreat after the celebration of their nocturnal
revels."[53] Now, as the "Picts' houses" are, to outward appearance,
"small verdant hillocks," the parallel is very exact. With these two
references compare also the mention, in a quaint old gazetteer printed
at Cambridge in 1693,[54] of the tribe of the "Germara," defined as "a
people of the Celtae, who in the day-time cannot see." Although the
author usually gives the sources of his information, in this instance he
gives none. But the statement agrees perfectly with the belief found
everywhere throughout Northern Europe that "the dwarfs could not bear
daylight, and during the day hid in their holes."[55] It really seems
impossible to avoid the inference that all this was perfectly true. When
Leif went down into the underground house in Ireland, he could not see
at first, though at length he saw in the obscurity the glimmer of his
opponent's sword. Consequently, the denizens and builders of these
subterranean retreats must either have had something very like "cat's
eyes," or else they must in general have had numerous lamps burning.
This will be understood by an examination of one or two of the
accompanying diagrams. It seems to me beyond question that a people
living this underground life must have differed very distinctly from
ourselves in the matter of vision; and to them the brightness of noonday
must have been blinding. This physical fact--if it be a fact--would
explain much that is otherwise strange and incredible in the traditions
relating to the Picts--or Pechts, as they were formerly called in
Scotland. However, it is sufficient for my present purpose to note that
this peculiarity associates, and indeed identifies, the Picts with the
dwarfs or fairies of tradition.
Having thus shown that Fians, Fairies, and Picts are so closely
associated as to be, in some aspects, almost indistinguishable from one
another, I shall now refer to the structures which are popularly
believed to have been their dwellings. Some of these are wholly
underground, others partly so, and others quite above ground. In many
other ways, also, they vary. But all of them are unquestionably links
in one special style of structure; of which the most marked feature, or
at any rate that which is common to all, is the use of what is called
the "cyclopean" arch. This is formed by the overlapping of the stones in
the wall until they almost meet at the dome or apex of the building,
when a heavy "keystone" completes this rude arch. The principle of the
arch proper was obviously quite unknown to the originators of such
structures.
Of the various Hebridean specimens of these buildings, very interesting
and complete descriptions have been given by the late Captain Thomas,
R.N.,[56] and Sir Arthur Mitchell,[57] who visited some of them together
in 1866. Referring to the most modern examples of this kind of
structure, the latter writer says:--"They are commonly spoken of as
beehive houses, but their Gaelic name is _bo'h_ or _bothan_. They are
now only used as temporary residences or shealings by those who herd
the cattle at their summer pasturage; but at a time not very remote they
are believed to have been the permanent dwellings of the people." And he
thus describes his first sight of the beehive houses:--
"I do not think I ever came upon a scene which more surprised me,
and I scarcely know where or how to begin my description of it.
"By the side of a burn which flowed through a little grassy glen
... we saw two small round hive-like hillocks, not much higher than
a man, joined together, and covered with grass and weeds. Out of
the top of one of them a column of smoke slowly rose, and at its
base there was a hole about three feet high and two feet wide,
which seemed to lead into the interior of the hillock--its
hollowness, and the possibility of its having a human creature
within it being thus suggested. There was no one, however, actually
within the _bo'h_, the three girls, when we came in sight, being
seated on a knoll by the burn-side, but it was really in the inside
of these two green hillocks that they slept, and cooked their food,
and carried on their work, and--dwelt, in short."[58]
These two "green hillocks," and other structures of the same nature, are
shown in the accompanying diagrams[59] (Plates I.-XVI.), which explain
their formation better than any written description. It is enough here
to state that they are built of rough stone, without any mortar. "Though
the stone walls are very thick," says my authority (p. 62), "they are
covered on the outside with turf, which soon becomes grassy like the
land round about, and thus secures perfect wind and water tightness."
Sometimes they occur in groups, as those shown in Plate III.; of which
scene Captain Thomas justly remarks that "at first sight it may be taken
for a picture of a Hottentot village rather than a hamlet in the British
Isles."[60] Here there is little or no grassy covering outside, however;
and consequently none of the hillock-like effect. But this is very well
shown in Plates VI. and VIII. Of the "agglomeration of beehives"
pictured in the latter, Sir Arthur Mitchell observes:--"It has several
entrances, and would accommodate many families, who might be spoken of
as living in one mound, rather than under one roof" (_op. cit._ pp.
64-5). Of another such dwelling, now ruined, he says that it could have
accommodated "from forty to fifty people."
This last, however (Plates XI. and XII.), represents another variety of
earth-house, the chambered mound or beehive, with an underground gallery
leading to it. Of this kind two examples are here shown. And in Plates
I. and XIII. will be seen specimens of wholly subterranean structures.
It is difficult, and indeed hardly necessary, to distinguish between one
variety and another of what is practically the same kind of building;
but to this last class the term "earth-house" is most frequently
accorded in Scotland. In the broader dialect it is "yird-house" or
"eirde-house," which at once recalls the form "jord-hus" in the saga
which tells of Leif's adventure underground in Ireland. The term _weem_
is also applied to these places in Scotland. This is merely a quickened
pronunciation of the Gaelic _uam_ (or _uamh_), a cave; and it reminds
one that, both in Gaelic and in English, the word "cave" is by no means
restricted to a _natural_ cavity. Indeed, one of the two artificial
structures under consideration is known as _Uamh Sgalabhad_, "the _cave_
of Sgalabhad." Another old Gaelic name for those underground galleries
is "_tung_ or _tunga_";[61] while another name, by which they are known
in Lewis is _tigh fo thalaimh_,[62] or "house beneath the ground."
