The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends (22 page)

A study on Manx folklore had been published by A. W. Moore as
The Folklore of the Isle of Man,
back in 1891. However, no popular volume of Manx tales, along the lines found in other
Celtic countries, was to be found. So, to some
extent, Manx legends tend not to have the same “high profile” as those of other Celtic countries. Things altered
somewhat when the Celtic scholar, Dr George Broderick, a Manxman himself, directed
Ny Kirree Fo Naightey
(The Sheep Under the Snow) for Foillan Films, showing what could be done in bringing
Manx to people’s attention.

I also spent six weeks on the Island in 1988 researching and polishing up some of the tales included here. My thanks for advice and information must go to Leslie Quirk, who was raised by his
Manx-speaking grandparents at the age of three and became as near “a native speaker” as anyone can get. At the time, he was the warden of Thie ny Gaelgey, the Manx Language Centre, in
the former St Jude’s Schoolhouse. I also enjoyed the warm hospitality of Mrs Joyce Fargher, Douglas Fargher’s widow. Douglas had been of so much help over the years. Dr George
Broderick, Adrian Pilgrim, and Dr Brian Stowell were among many other Manx enthusiasts who have helped make my research tasks on the Island into a pleasant occupation.

8 Island of the Ocean God

M
ac Cuill, which means “son of the hazel”, was, in fact, the son of the great god of eloquence and literacy, Ogma. He had so named his
son, for the hazel is a mystical tree, and Ogma used it to signify the third letter of the alphabet which he had devised. And indeed, Mac Cuill was the third son of Ogma, for his brothers were Mac
Gréine, “son of the sun”, and Mac Cécht, “son of the plough”. The three brothers were married to three sisters; Mac Gréine was married to the goddess
Éire, while Mac Cécht was married to her sister Fótla and Mac Cuill was married to the youngest sister, named Banba.

There came a time when the gods themselves fell from grace, when the sons of Míl conquered them. And it was said that Mac Gréine was slain by the great Druid Amairgen; that Mac
Cécht met his end from the sword of Eremon; and that Mac Cuill was slain by the spear of Eber.

And when the gods were defeated by the sons of Míl, the wives of Mac Gréine, Mac Cécht and Mac Cuill – Éire, Fótla and Banba – went to greet the
conquerors of the land of Inisfáil, the Island of Destiny.

“Welcome, warriors,” cried Éire. “To you who have come from afar, this island shall henceforth belong, and from the setting to the rising sun there is no better land.
And your race will be the most perfect the world has ever seen.”

Amairgen the Druid asked her what she wanted in reward for this blessing.

“That you name this country after me,” replied Éire. But
her sisters chimed in that the country should be named after them. So Amairgen promised that
Éire would be the principal name for the country, while the poets of Míl would also hail the land by the names of Fótla and Banba. So it has been until this day.

Now the sons of Ogma were gods, and therefore “The Ever-Living Ones”. They could not die completely and so their souls were passed on through the aeons. And in the rebirths of Mac
Cuill, he began to lament the lost days of power, of the days he had been happy with Banba. He grew bitter and resentful with each rebirth until he was reborn as a petty thief in the kingdom of
Ulaidh, which is one of the five provincial kingdoms of Éire. Each province was called
cúige
or a fifth, and the five made up the whole, and the whole, one and indivisible, was
governed by the Ard-Rígh, or High King. There was no better thief in all Ulaidh than Mac Cuill, and he became the terror of the land. His deeds came to the ears of the High King himself and
he sent his personal Brehon, or judge, named Dubhtach, to the provincial king of Ulaidh, saying: “Mac Cuill must be captured and punished.”

Eventually, Mac Cuill the thief was caught, and he was taken before the High King’s Brehon. And there was a tall, white-haired man standing by the Brehon’s side. They called him by
the name of an ancient god of war, which is Sucat.

“Why should we not kill you for your evil life, Mac Cuill?” demanded Dubhtach the Brehon.

Now Mac Cuill was full of guile and he smiled.

“Kill me now, Brehon. I have reached my last rebirth on this earth. I cannot descend lower than a thief. I will have been wiped from the Brandubh board of this world.”

Brandubh, which means “black raven”, was a wooden board game, which many compare to the eastern game of chess.

“Yet,” he added with evasive craft, “kill me now and there will be no hope of redemption, no hope of reparation for my sins. Spare me and perhaps there is still some goodness
in my soul, whereby I might change my life for the better.”

Now Mac Cuill spoke with irony, in mocking tones, but his words held some truth. The Brehon pondered and could
reach no decision. Finally, it was Sucat who said: “The
decision is not for us to make, for man is often flawed in his perceptions of his fellows. What is justice for one is injustice for another. So let us leave it to the Creator to decide. You will
have the judgment of the sea.”

Now the judgment of the sea can be a terrifying thing. But Mac Cuill, who had lived many lifetimes, was not afraid. And Sucat had the wrists of Mac Cuill bound in a chain of iron, which he
fastened by a padlock with his own hand. And he flung the key into the waves of the sea, saying: “Loose not that chain until the key be found and brought to you.” The Brehon then had
Mac Cuill taken to a boat, which is called a curragh. The boat was without oars and without a sail, and no food nor drink was placed in it. This boat, containing Mac Cuill, was rowed several miles
from the coast of Ulaidh and cast adrift. The fate of Mac Cuill was left to whichever way the winds and tides took him. Whoever found him could make a slave of him.

Now of all the ancient gods, one of the last to live upon the Earth with their ancient powers was Manánnan Mac Lir, the tempestuous god of the oceans, who, with his angry breath, could
raise large white-crested waves that could wreck entire fleets of ships. At the time of the fall of the gods, Manánnan Mac Lir had retired to his favourite island, called Inis Falga, which
lay between Inisfáil and the Isle of the Mighty. Eventually, that island became called after the great Manánnan and every Manxman is called, in his own tongue, Maninagh.

Now Manánnan, seeing the plight of Mac Cuill, reborn in a weak human body, was moved to compassion. He remembered the ancient times when he and Mac Cuill and the other Children of Danu
had fought the evil Fomorii on the Plain of Towers to claim the Island of Destiny. So Manánnan breathed gently on the ship and sent a current which turned its bows towards his own
mist-shrouded island of Inis Falga.

But even Manánnan’s breath could not break the lock of the chain which bound Mac Cuill’s wrists.

After several days, the little boat, without oars or sails, and with Mac Cuill more dead than alive, bumped against a rocky shore.

Now on the island there were living two wise men named Conindri and Romuil. Both had heard the words of the Son of God, and preached the new religion of love and
forgiveness. They saw the half-dead Mac Cuill and realized that his crimes must be great for him to have been cast into the sea in such a fashion. Yet they took him from the boat and laid him in
their own beds and nursed him until he recovered his wit and strength.

As Mac Cuill was recovering, Conindri and Romuil spoke to him of the Creator and His Son and the new religion of love and brotherhood. And as they spoke, they did their best to unfasten the
chain about Mac Cuill’s wrists. But they could not do so, no matter how they tried.

Mac Cuill laughed. “In a previous life, I was a god. As I was once, so will your new God and His Son become – cast out and forgotten, when they no longer serve the needs of the
people.”

“You are proud, Mac Cuill. Our Lord taught: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.’ ”

Mac Cuill laughed again. “If poverty of spirit is a virtue, then it does man little good. When men are poor in spirit, then the proud and haughty oppress them. When I was a god, men were
true and determined in spirit and resisted oppression.”

“But to him that smiteth thee on the one cheek, offer also the other.”

Mac Cuill sneered. “He who courts oppression shares the crime. If that is the teaching, then you are inviting further injury at the hand of the oppressor and thief.”

“Him that taketh away thy cloak, forbid not to take thy coat also. Give to every man that asketh of thee. . .Blessed be the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Mac Cuill chuckled deeply, shaking his head. “Now this new religion is ideal for a thief such as me. It tells people to accept with good grace when I rob them. The poor in spirit will not
fight me. This is a good land and here I will prosper as a thief, if all believe as you do. I will set forth to find a smithy to break my chains asunder.”

Mac Cuill set out and walked along the sea-shore, leaving
the wise good men, Conindri and Romuil, in sorrow behind him.

As he walked on the foreshore, he heard a gentle singing and around a headland of rocks he came across a beautiful woman. The spot was called Langness in the parish of Kirk Malew. The girl sang
sweetly.

Mac Cuill stopped and gazed upon the beautiful sad face. It reminded him of the one whom he had loved so long ago – the face of his wife in a former life – of
Banba.

“Who are you, young maiden?” he demanded.

The young girl started and looked upon Mac Cuill and her eyes lit up in a smile of happiness. “I am for you, son of the hazel,” she said.

“That cannot be. Nothing is for me unless I steal it. I am a thief and will take what I want.”

“I am Blaanid,” went on the girl and, reaching down beside the rock on which she sat, she drew forth a basket filled with coral and precious stones and other fabulous metals garnered
from the ocean bed. “You may have these, for we are all thieves now.”

“I will not accept that which is given when it is my place to take,” cried Mac Cuill in disgust. “But if you can break the chains on my wrists, I will accept your
gifts.”

Suddenly, Blaanid threw her arms around Mac Cuill and so surprised was he, and so great her strength, that she dragged him to the edge of the sea and plunged in. Though he struggled, she drew
him downwards to the dwellings of the merfolk that lived beneath the waves. And Blaanid took Mac Cuill to a beautiful city under the sea.

It was a place of many towers and gilded minarets and stood in all magnificence. It was deep down, beyond the
region of the fishes, where there was air which was strangely
clear and the atmosphere serene. The streets were paved in coral and a shining kind of pebble which glittered like the sunbeams reflecting on glass. Streets and squares were on every side.
Buildings were embossed with mother-of-pearl and shells of numerous colours and there were flashing crystals to decorate their walls.

But around the circle perimeter were countless wrecks of ships. Fearful wrecks, strewn on the slimy bottom, yet the city was protected from them. And among the wrecks, Mac Cuill saw the
decomposing bodies of men, women and children. There were countless eyeless skeletons, all scattered and on which the fishes gnawed. And from the dead people’s skulls, which worms and fish
inhabited, there arose a fearful wailing sound. The noise was so penetrating that Mac Cuill had to stop his ears.

“What manner of place is this?” he gasped.

Blaanid smiled and pointed. He could see people moving through the streets. He gasped, for he recognised his brothers and the other Children of Danu.

“This is our home now, and this could be your home. For you wish to exist by what you steal. The gods and goddesses are only left with theft in this new world. We have built our city from
the ships that we entice to our mist-shrouded island and wreck upon the rocks above. Each ship comes tumbling through the seas to our city and we may take from them great heaps of pearl, wedges of
gold, inestimable stones, unvalued jewels . . . thus our city prospers.”

Mac Cuill swallowed hard. “And the souls of the dead sailors? Look at the bodies of the dead, of the drowned women and the children! Do you not hear their cries?”

“They are but poor in spirit,” Blaanid said. “We grow accustomed to their wailing and take what we must.”

Mac Cuill grew sick in his soul. He stared into the face of Blaanid and he saw in it the face of Banba. “Is this what we are reduced to?” he whispered.

Where once the Children of Danu had bestrode the earth in goodness and strength of spirit, Mac Cuill realised they had
descended to thieves who preyed on the spiritual
tragedy of others.

“This is but a shadow-show of the choice you can make,” replied Blaanid.

“If there are choices still, then I shall choose to be released from my purgatory,” cried Mac Cuill. And he held out his chained wrists.

“Alas, wealth and prosperity can be yours, but we cannot unchain your wrists,” replied Blaanid. “You may remain in the realm of the Ocean God as you are, or you may be reborn
in the new religion and release your soul from its eternal bitterness. Here we have only illusions of the past.”

With that, he found himself back on the headland of Langness in Kirk Malew.

He found himself staring at the grey seas and thought that he heard a whispering sound.

Slowly he retraced his footsteps to where he had left Conindri and Romuil. They were standing as he had left them, for in earthly time he had not been long gone from their
sight.