The figures beneath each entry give reference numbers for the Bibliography
Next Section
Prev Section
Table Of Contents
(agh-iski) See: AUGHISKY.
(ech-ooshkya) This, the Highland Water-Horse, is perhaps the fiercest and most dangerous of all water-horses, although the Cabyll Ushtey runs it close. It differs from the Kelpie in haunting the sea and lochs, while the Kelpie belongs to running water. It seems also to transform itself more readily. Its most usual form is that of a sleek and handsome horse, which almost offers itself to be ridden, but if anyone is so rash as to mount it, he is carried at headlong speed into the lake and devoured. Only his liver is rejected, and floats to shore. It is said that its skin is adhesive, and the rider cannot tear himself off it. It also appears sometimes as a gigantic bird and sometimes as a handsome young man. J. F. Campbell has a long passage devoted to the Each Uisge in POPULAR TALES OF THE WEST HIGHLANDS, VOL.IV. When we come to Each Uisge in his horse form, it is hard to select among the stories about him. A wide-spread tale which is possibly cautionary in origin is of several little girls being carried away by him. A good version is told of a small lochan near Aberfeldy. Seven little girls and a little boy were going for a walk on a Sunday afternoon when they saw a pretty little pony grazing beside the loch. One of the little girls mounted him, and then another and another until all seven were seated on his back. The little boy was more canny, and he noticed that the pony grew longer to accomodate each new rider. So he took refuge among the high rough rocks at the end of the loch. Suddenly the pony turned its head and noticed him. 'Come on little scabby-head,' it cried, 'get on my back!' The boy stayed in shelter and the pony rushed towards him, the little girls screaming, but unable to pull their hands from its back. To and fro they dodged among the rocks, but the pony could not reach the boy, and at lenght it tired of trying, and plunged into the loch with its sevenfold prey on its back. Next morning the livers of the seven children were washed up on the shore.
The tale of the killing of a water-horse is told in McKay's MORE WEST HIGHLAND TALES, VOL.II. There was a smith in Raasay. He had a herd of cattle and his own family herded it. One night his daughter did not return, and in the morning they found her heart and lungs on the loch side known to be haunted by the Each Uisge. The smith was heartbroken, and determined to destroy the monster. He set up a forge by the loch and he and his boy forged great iron hooks and made them redhot in the fire. They roasted a sheep on the fire and the scent of it went out over the water. A steaming mist arose, and the water-horse, like an ugly, shaggy yearling, rose out of the loch. It seized the sheep and they grappled it with the hooks and killed it there. But in the morning there were no bones nor hide, only a heap of what looked like star-shine. (Star-shine is a jelly-like substance found on the shore, probably the remnants of stranded jellyfish, but supposed by the Highlanders to be all that is left of a fallen star.)
# 100 - 130 - 464
When surmounting a pillar the eagle is an emblem of the Sky Gods as the sun dissipating the powers of darkness. The double-headed eagles are attributes of twin gods and can depict dual power or omniscience. The symbol is of Oriental origin, although the eagles appears in Irish and Welsh traditions, but less often in the Celtic.
# 161
The world's oldest creature which assisted Culhwch and his companions to find Mabon by introducing them to the Salmon of Llyn Llw.
# 156 - 346 - 562
It is an unfortunate fact that many orthodox archaeologists still persist in the outdated belief that early humankind was primitive, savage and brutish. However, it is also totally wrong to project our own modern wish-fulfilments of utopia back into the past and claim that in prehistory a perfect society or Golden Age existed which represented a paradise on Earth. The truth most ultimately lies between these two extreme views, although it seems that the concept of a Golden Age, a period when humanity lived in harmony with each other and the natural world, is found in the recurring pattern of creation myths belonging to the oldest cultures on Earth. The idea that this era of peaceful co-existence came to a sudden end when humanity 'fell' from grace and was separated from the natural world can also be found in world religious traditions and ancient mythologies. The field of Earth Mysteries is a wide and universal one, embracing such diverse subjects as ecology and environmental protection, planetary healing, quantum physics, ancient religion, folklore and mythology. These different areas of research and experience combine to produce a holistic vision of the cosmos, with humanity and the plant as one unit operating in universal harmony. Visits to all ancient sites should be seen in terms of the medieval pilgrimages to religious places. If you visit the sites wearing the mask of a tourist, their natural Earth Magic will mean nothing to you. Suspend belief in the normal and the rational which we are falsely taught to believe are the tools used to study tha natural world. Approach them instead in the manner in which the ancients viewed them, and a whole new experience of enchantment, mystery and magic will open up to you.
Those pilgrims in search of ancient wisdom who visit our sacred centres to contact the dragon energy which flows along the lines of power know the meaning of the words of the Irish poet and mystic W. B. Yeats, who said, 'The borders of the mind are ever shifting, and many minds can flow into one another, and create or reveal a single mind, a single energy.'
# 325
He was the King of the Golden Pillars whose seven magical pigs were endlessly renewed after having been eaten. The finding of these was one of the tasks set by Lugh for the Sons of Tuirenn.
# 454
(Brown Eber) Milesian Lord; his brutal exultation and its sequel; In # 562 p 148: reference to Eber Donn as one of Milesian leaders. See: AMERGIN.
# 562
(Fair Eber). One of the Milesian leaders, slain by Eremon.
# 562
Founder of the Castle of Mount Agned, later known as the Castle of Maidens.
# 156 - 243
(ec'nay) The god whose grandmother was Dana.
# 562
Arthur's foster-father and the father of Kay. Ector is the Welsh form of the name Hector.
# 156 - 418
Son of Ban whom he succeeded as King of Benwick. The brother of Lancelot, he loved Perse whom he rescued from Zelotes to whom she had been promised by her father.
# 156 - 418
The British Museum Harleian MS 4181 (entry 42) says that this was the name of the killer of Arthur.
# 156
The name given to two Norse compositions, the POETIC EDDA and the PROSE EDDA. An eccentric writer, L. A. Waddell, maintained that the former was not an epic of the Norse gods, as is generally supposed, but a recording of the doings of an early Sumerian hero whose exploits formed the basis of the Arthurian saga. This contention has not met with approbation from mainstream scholars.
# 156 - 698
A river. See: UTHER.
# 156
This city was known in the Middle Ages as Castellum Puellarum. See: CASTLE OF MAIDENS.
# 156
(841-69) King of East Anglia. He led his army against the Danes and was defeated and captured. He was martyred either by being shot full of arrows, or by being spread-eagled after the Viking fashion and offered to their gods. His body was enshrined at Bury St Edmunds where a popular cult grew up about him. His emblem is the arrow and he is remembered on 20 November.
# 454
An ancestor of Lot.
# 156 - 344
(962-79) Called 'the Martyr', he was King of England and was assassinated at Corfe Castle by his brother, Ethelred's retainers. Miracles soon alerted churchmen that his unjust death, though not in defence of the faith, merited greater attention. His youth may well have contributed to his veneration, as did the unholy spilling of royal blood of an anointed sovereign.
# 454
# 156: An Irish saint mentioned by Le Grand, a hagiologist whose work is not deemed wholly dependable as he may have altered some of his source material. Efflam came to Brittany to find himself facing an unfriend-ly dragon. Arthur, equipped with a club and lionskin shield, came to his aid but could not prevail against the monster. Efflam, after blessing Arthur, put the dragon to flight.
# 454: He lived in the sixth century. After an unsuccessful attempt to subdue a serpent, Arthur was thirsty. Saint Efflam not only caused a spring to rise but he also defeated the serpent himself.
# 156 - 378 - 454
(ave nees eye yen) Son of Eurosswyd and Penardun; mutilates horses of Matholwch; atonement made by Bran for his outrage; slays the warriors hidden in the meal bags; dies in the magic cauldron.
# 562
Father of Perceval in PEREDUR (see MABINOGION). This seems to be a title ('York') rather than a name, indicating that this was the place he ruled.
# 156 - 346
The twin sister of Urien of Rheged.
# 104 - 156
A poor knight at the court of Sir Prinsamour who made his castle a centre of Chivalric excellence. Eglamour loved his daughter Chrystabell and was told that he could only win her if he achieves three adventures. First he must slay the giant Marrock, then a huge boar who has been ravaging the lands of Prinsamour. His third adventure is to kill a dragon which has been threatening Rome. Eglamour is successful in all his endeavours but meanwhile Chrystabell gives birth to a son and both she and her lover are banished. Her son is stolen by a griffin and Chrystabell herself wanders for years until she again meets up with her lover and their son and all ends happily after many adventures.
# 454
The mother of Dodinel the Savage.
# 156
Next Section
Prev Section
Table Of Contents