Lecture VI.
GODS, DEMONS AND HEROES.
Irish Mythography on the Gods and their Foes.
It will be convenient now to devote some space to a general consideration of the gods and heroes associated with the name of Danu and those which Irish mythology opposes to them; for the latter had its demons, so to say, as well as its gods and heroes of a more or less divine origin. The term Tuatha Dé Danann, or the Tribes of the goddess Danu, is somewhat vague, as are also others of the same import, such as Tuath Déa, 'the Tribe of the Goddess,' and Fir Déa, 'the Men of the Goddess;' but the important figures among them were never very numerous.[1] The Tuatha Dé Danann are represented fighting successively against other inhabitants or invaders of Ireland: these last bear the names of Fir Bolg, of Fomori, and of the Children of Mile or the Milesians, as they are sometimes called. The nature of their struggles has an interest which reaches beyond the limits of Celtic
- ↑ They were Echaid Ollathar or the Dagda Mór, Nuada of the Silver Hand, Ogma, Dian Cecht, Goibniu, Lug, Bodb the Red, Lir, Mider, Echald Airem and Echaid Feidlech, and the triad Mac Cuill, Mac Cecht and Mac Gréine, together with a few others, including Danu herself and a sister sometimes ascribed to her, called Bé-Cuill or the Wife of Coll.
