Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race - Knowledge Rush

CHAPTER III: THE IRISH INVASION MYTHS 107With door and window open wide, where friendly stars maylook;The rabbit shy may patter in, the winds may enter freeWho roam around the mountain throne in living ecstasy.“And when the sun sets dimmed in eve, and purple fills the air,I think the sacred hazel-tree is dropping berries there,From starry fruitage, waved aloft where Connla's Wello'erflows;For sure, the immortal waters run through every wind thatblows.“I think when Night towers up aloft and shakes the tremblingdew,How every high and lonely thought that thrills my spirit throughIs but a shining berry dropped down through the purple air,And from the magic tree of life the fruit falls everywhere.”The Coming of the MilesiansAfter the Second Battle of Moytura the Danaans held rule inIreland until the coming of the Milesians, the sons of Miled.These are conceived in Irish legend as an entirely human race,yet in their origin they, like the other invaders of Ireland, go backto a divine and mythical ancestry. Miled, whose name occurs asa god in a Celtic inscription from Hungary, is represented as ason of Bilé. Bilé, like Balor, is one of the names of the god ofDeath, i.e., of the Underworld. They come from “Spain”—theusual term employed by the later rationalising historians for theLand of the Dead.The manner of their coming into Ireland was as follows: Ith,the grandfather of Miled, dwelt in a great tower which his father,Bregon, had built in “Spain.” One clear winter's day, whenlooking out westwards from this lofty tower, he saw the coast ofIreland in the distance, and resolved to sail to the unknown land. [131]