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major-mads · 4 months

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100th Bomber Boys: Major Robert 'Rosie' Rosenthal: Pt. 2

If you missed part 1, you can find it here!!

Following the Munster mission in October of 1943 that decimated the 100th bomb group, Rosenthal took on a leadership role among the men. With Egan and Cleven gone, the men needed someone they could look up to for strength and guidance. Even though the Münster mission was only his third, he and his crew were sent on a week's leave. Following their leave, the 100th was one of the first to bomb the capital city of Berlin.

The next objective for the 8th Air Force was to achieve total European air supremacy in order to prepare for the D-Day landings. Their job was to take out the Luftwaffe, starting with the factories and plants that manufactured various parts for various MEs and other German fighter planes. The introduction of the P-51 Mustang, a long-range fighter plane that could accompany the B-17s to their targets. These planes ended up changing the tide of the air war.

The Mustangs were taking out Luftwaffe planes at an astounding rate with small loss rates. This development led to the B-17s essentially being used as bait for the Luftwaffe planes to attack so that the Mustangs could swoop in and destroy the withering German air force. The Luftwaffe was losing its veteran pilots, making the force less lethal than it was at the beginning of the war.

(pg. 281: Don Miller's Masters of the Air)

In May 1944, two months after completing twenty-five missions with the crew of Rosie's Riveters, he took over the 350th Bomb Squadron of the Hundredth, whose morale and efficiency had slipped badly, and began to restore the unit to peak performance. "After the first Berlin raids, we had men who were banged up mentally, and a few of them didn't want to fly anymore. I told them they had a moral obligation to fly, and that I would fly with them. We were here to beat Hitler. I also told them that if they didn't fly they would be letting down friends who had helped to keep them alive up to now. The appeal to their pride and respect worked better than the one to their patriotism." Rosenthal knew that without group loyalty-the responsibility that fighting men feel to the men next to them - wars would be impossible. Gale Cleven and John Egan "gave the 100th its personality," wrote Harry Crosby. "Bob Rosenthal helped us want to win the war." In the end, however, Eighth Air Force morale improved markedly only when casualty rates declined. That began to happen in May 1944, after American fighter pilots had reduced the Luftwaffe's effectiveness. "We did the bombing-the dirty work," said Rosenthal, "We were the decoys, and they took care of the bad boys that had been beating us up. They were guys who made D-Day possible?""

In early May, the 8th took the war to synthetic oil refineries in Germany, knocking a major blow to the Nazi war machine. The Germans did not have much natural oil in their territory, and even when they invaded Poland in '39, they only had enough oil reserves to last the army, air force, and navy for a few weeks. With their addition of conquered territories, the shortage became less of a problem, but in a military that mainly used oil (instead of coal like the rest of Germany) any shortage was a problem. In response, they began manufacturing synthetic oil in hydrogenation plants using the Bergius process, named after its inventor, Nobel-Prize-Winning Friedrich Bergius (that I am not smart enough to explain). This oil was keeping the Nazi military going, and striking it made a huge dent in their war-making capabilities. Unfortunately, Gen. Carl 'Tooey' Spaatz's bombing offensive was put on hold to prepare for the Normandy invasion. This time, the 8th and 15th Air Forces would be bombing Germany's important industries in France.

It was the last week of May, and the time had arrived to soften the Germans up for D-Day. The plan was to hit the main points of German transportation in occupied France, including railroad marshaling yards in Northern France and Belgium. This was supposed to delay the enemy's ability to bring reinforcements, tanks, and other supplies that would be needed to fight the Allied invasion on June 6th. The offensive turned out to be a major success. "Allied heavy and medium bombers almost completely dismembered the rail network of northern Belgium and France, choking off the main supply channel that fed the German army (Miller, 2007, pg. 291)." Bridges over the Loire and the Seine were also smashed, "cutting off most of Normandy and Brittany from the rest of France (Miller, 2007, pg. 291)."

Then on June 6th, 1944, the 100th was tasked with bombing the German strongholds along the beachheads. They were not very successful, but their earlier missions were the things that made the invasion possible.

(pg. 294: Don Miller's Masters of the Air)

For nearly every Allied airman who flew that day, it was the greatest experience of the war. "I briefed the crews of the 100th," recalls Rosie Rosenthal, "and I had never seen such a reaction from them. They stood and cheered and roared. This is the day they had been looking toward. I led the group on the third bombing mission of D-Day, toward dusk. We had a rule. No one could talk on the intercom unless it was absolutely necessary-radio discipline. But as we passed over that vast armada and headed over the beaches, a member of our crew started to say a prayer for the people down below and we all joined in. It was one of the most emotional moments of my life."

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pinturas-sgm-aviacion · 1 year

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1944 11 02 Into the Cloak of Darkness - Nicolas Trudgian

A Heinkel 219 and a Messerschmitt 110 of NJG-1 climbing out from their base a Munster Hansdorf, as they set out on a deadly mission. Ten aircraft took off to intercept a major raid on Dusseldorf, the night witnessing a fierce battle high above the darkened city. NJG-1 crews assisted with the downing of 19 RAF bombers, one Luftwaffe pilot being credited with no fewer than 6 victories that night. Below them the spectacular Ruhr Valley is vibrant in its mantle of winter's first snowfall on the night of November 2, 1944.

#nicolas trudgian #nacht jager

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tipsycad147 · 5 months

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Fairy Bloodlines: Do You Descend from a Celtic Fairy Queen?

posted by : kitty fields

While researching a customer’s ancestral goddess, I came across something intriguing. There was an Irish sept, the Corcu Loigde, that claimed descent from a Fairy Queen named Cliodhna. It turns out, my Irish ancestors were part of the sept and I am able to claim fairy blood! What’s even more amazing is that MOST people of Irish descent can claim a legendary hero, fairy, god, or goddess as their ancestor. In this article, I’m providing you a look at my research of the Irish clans and their descent from Fairy Queens. Check if YOUR Irish or Scottish ancestors’ names are on this list and find out if YOU were born in a fairy bloodline!

(Check out this article and compare your Irish surnames against a list of clans who claim gods and goddesses as ancestors!)

READ THIS FIRST: Check the variations of each of your surnames and compare to what I have listed here. You can Google your surnames and find the variations. Why is this important? There are multiple versions of most Irish surnames. For example, my ancestors’ last name was McNally. Variations of McNally include: MacNally, MacNall, and MacAnally, etc. This is not an all-inclusive list as there are thousands of Irish surnames that could literally take up a book.

1. Cliodhna: Celtic Fairy Queen and Goddess of Cork

I have to put Cliodhna at the top, as she’s been the inspiration and voice behind this project. If you have any of the following Irish surnames in your ancestry AND your ancestors came from Cork, Ireland, they are part of an ancient sept called the Corcu Loigde. And it means YOU are a grandchild of Cliodhna the Fairy Queen! Cliodhna is an ancient sovereignty goddess of what is now Cork, Ireland. She is a goddess of beauty, love, healing, dreams, music, and the Celtic Otherworld. She is also considered a fairy queen, witch and mermaid. Read all about Cliodhna and how to work with her here.

Do you have any of these Irish surnames from Cork in your ancestry? If so, you descend from Cliodhna!

Coffey

Flynn

O’Donovan

O’Driscoll

O’Leary

2. The Fairy Bloodlines of Queen Medb

Queen Medb is the queen of Conacht in the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology. She started the infamous Cattle Raid of Cooley in her attempts to capture the kingdom of Ulster’s prized bull. Scholars believe she is a variation of a sovereignty goddess and may even be the war goddess The Morrigan. In later centuries, she became a Celtic Fairy Queen. This may be because of Shakespeare’s fairy Queen Mab character. To many modern pagans, Queen Medb is more than a mythical figure or queen, she is a warrior goddess and an ancestor to the following Irish clans.

Do you have any of these surnames in your Irish heritage? Then you descend from Queen Medb!

Ainnsin

Beglin

Calbrain

Ciaracan

Connick

Cronan

Curnin

Doonan

Dunnan

Finn

Finnigan

Foaley

Geoffrey

Herry

Jeffries

Kearon

Keegan

MacCogan

MacConkeel

MacEnhill

MacLeavy

MacMurrow

MacShaffrey

MacShane

Moraine

Moran

Morey

Mulhooley

Mullock

Murray

Murrow

O’Quinn

Sharry

Sullihan

Tarmey

Tormey

Woods

3. Fairy Bloodlines of Queen Una (Oonagh)

Another goddess of the Tuatha De Dannan who was demoted to Fairy Queen over the centuries is Una (sometimes spelled Oonagh or Oona). She’s a fairy queen of Munster and is a goddess of music, love, and fidelity. And she protects young animals and children. Queen Una lives under Knockshegowna in County Tipperary (also called the Fairy Mound of Una). She is the last queen of the Daoine Sidhe and the wife to the High Fairy King Finvarra.

Do your Irish ancestors have this name? If so, you’re a descendant of Una and part of an ancient fairy bloodline:

O’Carroll

4. Aine: Midsummer Fairy Queen and Ancestor

Aine is a Celtic Irish goddess of summer, sovereignty, animals, crops, fertility, Midsummer and the sun. She resides in County Limerick, where her sacred hill Knockaine is located. Yet her memory is preserved in many place-names throughout Ireland. Aine rides an otherworldly red mare and sometimes shifts forms and becomes the red mare. In some myths, Aine is married to or was impregnated by the King of Munster Ailil Aulom, and his descendants the septs of the Eoganachta, claim Aine as their ancestor. The Eoganachta was a dynasty originating in Southern Ireland, in the kingdom of Munster in Medieval Times.

These are the clans of the Eoganachta. Do You Have Irish ancestors with any of these clan names? If they originate in Southern Ireland, you have an even higher chance they delineate from the Eoganachta septs. Which means Aine is your Fairy Queen ancestor and you have fairy blood!

Connelly

Lynch

MacAnliffe

MacCarthy

MacGillycuddy

Morgan

O’Bogue

O’Cahalane

O’Callaghan

O’Cannifree

O’Connell

O’Cronin

O’Dennehy

O’Donnell

O’Donoghue

O’Dwyer

O’Feehan

O’Flahiffe

O’Flynn

O’Hea

O’Keefe

O’Kirby

O’Leary

O’Mahoney

O’Moriarty

O’Quirke

O’Sullivan

The Fairy Bridge of the MacLeod Clan – Isle of Skye

The MacLeod Scottish Clan’s Fairy Bloodline

The MacLeod clan from the Isle of Skye, Scotland, claims they have fairy blood. The story comes from a centuries-old relic the family still has in their possession – the Fairy Flag. Legend says the flag was given to the MacLeod clan by a fairy woman who had married a MacLeod chief. She was married to him for twenty years and was forced to leave him and return to the Otherworld. The fairy woman said goodbye to the chief on the fairy bridge and gave him the flag. She told him to wave the flag whenever they were in dire need of help and it would be granted three times.

If you have the MacLeod last name or it’s in your family tree, you can claim fairy blood. Unfortunately, we don’t know enough about this fairy woman to provide a name or anything else. But the clan claims they descend from her. Learn more about the fairy flag of Dunvegan here.

You Have Fairy Blood…Now What?

Maybe you realized you’re part of a fairy bloodline. But now you’re wondering what to do with this information? It’s up to you what you do with the information. I’m not saying anyone is necessarily a fairy or that your ancestor was a fairy, I��m saying that these clans claimed it. This is similar to how the Egyptian pharaohs claimed to be gods or descend from the gods. It gave people status and probably fueled their religious rites and beliefs. Aside from telling people your ancestor was a fairy, consider working with your ancestor in your spiritual or magical practice. Research and study their lore and history. Set up an altar space. Provide offerings. Ask your ancestor to send you messages in your dreams and life. Immerse yourself in Irish Celtic culture.

Why Are There Only Irish and Scottish Surnames Here?

Unfortunately, if you don’t have Irish or Scottish ancestors, you might be wondering where the other names are. I wish I could find the same information for ALL cultures and heritages, but it doesn’t exist at this magnitude. Ireland had a Renaissance right before the Viking Age in which their clergy (who could read and write) began documenting Irish folklore, mythology, and history. Geneaology including names and locations of septs and clans was recorded, and we are lucky to have this information still today. While I can’t supply you with other European fairy bloodlines, I can help you find out more about your magical and pagan ancestors. Read the links below to learn more!

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historydailyfrancischappellblack · 8 months

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Six American Airmen Were Murdered by the Townspeople of Russelsheim, Germany, During World War II. August 26, 1944.

Image: Five Germans were condemned to death for the killing of six American flyers, who were seized from their German military captors. Joseph Harzgen is led to execution by hanging at Bruchsal, Germany. (Wikimedia Commons.)

On this day in history, six American airmen were murdered by the townspeople of Russelsheim, Germany, during World War II. The war crime happened two days after nine USAAF crew members of a B-24 Liberator were shot down over Hanover. They parachuted to the ground and were captured and held by German Luftwaffe personnel. Unable to transfer the downed airmen to a POW facility due to the train tracks being heavily damaged by RAF bombing the night before, the crew was forced to march through the already devastated town of Russelsheim to catch another train. The townspeople, already angered by the previous night's raid, started attacking the unarmed airmen with rocks, hammers, sticks, and shovels, resulting in six airmen dying.

History Daily: 365 Fascinating Happenings Volume 1 & Volume 2 - August 26, 1944

During World War II, the RAF bombed Russelsheim, an industrial town that housed many vital targets, including the Opel plant. The RAF carried out a policy of "area bombing" of cities at night, while the USAAF relied on "precision bombing" by day. On August 24, 1944, an American B-24 bomber named Wham! Bam! Thank you, Ma’am was shot down while taking part in an attack over Hanover, and the crew parachuted down near Hutterup. The airfield's local fire brigade and military detachment were alerted and dispatched to find the downed airmen. One of the nine airmen had serious flak injuries to his abdomen. After landing on a farm, the airman found was given medical assistance by an elderly couple, and in return, the airman gave the couple his silk parachute as a gift. Within a few hours, most of the crew had been captured and taken to an interrogation room in the town hall in Greven. After that, most crewmembers were taken to an airbase near the town, where they slept for the night. The injured crewman was taken to a medical clinic where his wounds were looked after and then shipped to a hospital in Munster to undergo an operation. The following day, the rest of the airmen were loaded on a train for a trip south to the Dulag Luft in Oberursel, north of Frankfurt. After German civilians noticed the Americans on the train at every stop, crowds would form at the windows, yelling angrily at the "terror fliers" and shaking their fists while spitting on the windows. On the evening of August 25, the RAF sent 116 Lancaster bombers to Russelsheim to attack the Opel plant, dropping 674 2,000-lb bombs and more than 400,000 incendiaries on the city, destroying the plant and damaging the rail tracks.

On the morning of August 26, most crewmembers were still proceeding to their original destination. However, the RAF heavily damaged the train line from the previous night's bombing, so the airmen were forced off the train and made to walk to Russelsheim to catch another train. Two German soldiers escorted them. As the crew marched towards the devastated town of Russelsheim, the townspeople, assuming that the fliers were Canadians from the previous night bombing raid, quickly formed and immediately became an unruly, angry mob. Two women shouted out, “There are the terror flyers. Tear them to pieces! Beat them to death! They have destroyed our houses!" One of the crewmembers replied in German, "It wasn't us! We didn't bomb Russelsheim!"

Nevertheless, one woman hurled a brick at the crew, precipitating a riot during which the townsfolk attacked the crew with rocks, hammers, sticks, and shovels. Three Opel workers arrived with iron bars and started beating the men to death to the cries of the crowd. The mob was joined by a German air raid warden, Joseph Hartgen, armed with a pistol. He would prove to be the crew’s worst nightmare. The German soldiers who guarded the airmen made no attempts to prevent the beatings; Hartgen lined them up and shot six in the head, then ran out of ammunition, leaving two of the airmen, William Adams and Sidney Brown, alive. The mob then put the airmen on a cart and took them to the cemetery. Those who moaned were beaten further. An air raid siren went off during the attack, and the mob ran for cover. The two surviving crewmembers managed to crawl from the bloody cart, fled toward the Rhine, and avoided capture for four days. However, they were found by a policeman and brought to their original destination, the camp in Oberursel, where they remained until the war's end.

After the war in Europe ended in 1945 when Russelsheim came under occupation by the American Army, the killings came to light, and the bodies were located on June 28, 1945. In the first war trials in Germany before the Nuremberg trials, eleven residents of Russelsheim, including Joseph Hartgen, were put on trial in late July 1945 in Darmstadt, a town devastated by a British night attack the previous September that had killed 8,500 residents and left 70,000 homeless. The defense argued that they had been incited to commit the crimes by Joseph Goebbels's propaganda, which encouraged the German people to take reprisals against the downed Allied pilots, and that they were not guilty of their actions. Lt. Colonel Leon Jaworski, who would achieve national fame three decades later as the special prosecutor in the Watergate scandal, argued that the townsfolk were responsible for their actions.

The trial lasted six days. The court heard eyewitness testimony to the cold-blooded assassinations and chilling accounts of the bludgeoning and shooting of the airmen. On August 2, Joseph Hartgen and six other townspeople were found guilty and sentenced to death. The remainder of the defendants were given varying prison terms, while the Commission acquitted one. The judge, however, commuted two of the death penalties to 30 years in prison. On November 10, 1945, Hartgen and four others were hanged at the prison in Bruchsal. A sixth, a German soldier, was convicted and executed in 1946.

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#history daily #1940s #Russelsheim Massacre #military history #world war 2

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mercurygray · 2 months

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Heyy, I'd love to read about Marion using Harding's first name for the first time, if you have the capacity 👀

I sure do, Kind Anonymous Friend. This is a direct follow up to this drabble, following the Munster raid.

Fair warning: 🌶️🌶️🌶️Consenting adults did consensual but not safe for work things under the cut.

---

He could hardly believe any of this was real.

He was still in bed, his eyes closed, unwilling to open them. In a moment, maybe, he would discover it was all a dream - the terrible news of yesterday, the things he'd done.

He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them slowly, the light filtering in around the curtains, just enough so that he could turn over in bed, see what damage had been done.

She was still here.

No dream, then.

He and Red and Jack Kidd and the rest of the Operations staff had spent too long last night in the control room, going over charts and calling in casualties to headquarters and trying to figure out just what in the hell one was supposed to do when one's entire operational strength was simply wiped off the map in two afternoons. It was one thing not to have enough planes, another thing not to shuffle around crew. Thorpe Abbotts had nothing, save its ground crews and its operations staff.

Dinner had been a sandwich, eaten while sitting with his shoulder hunched into his phone, and he'd shuffled off to bed well after the sun had gone down feeling drained and defeated, the day's single solitary bright spot (if indeed it could be called that) the kiss he'd given Marion.

It had hurt him more than words could say, to see Rosenthal and the others alone at the table, to see Red trying to ask the questions as kindly as he could. But Marion slowly collapsing under the weight of events was more than he could bear. She asked for so little, and gave so much, and who was ever there for her?

She hadn't refused him, anyway. Maybe things really were that bad. And last night he'd been just about ready to go to bed when there was a knock at the door.

He wasn't sure who he had been expecting, but it certainly wasn't her.

"Marion." The name had slipped out without a second thought this afternoon, and she hadn't said a thing about it then.

She'd had a kind of determined look on her face, a certain serious resolve that he'd never seen her show before. "I hoped we could…continue our …conversation, from earlier."

The shoe finally dropped. Our conversation! "You don't think -"

She fixed him with a desperate eye. "I don't want to think."

And how could he refuse?

No sooner had he locked the door then she was shedding her coat and loosening her tie, pulling the knot away from her throat with a snap and letting the fabric fall to the floor before starting on the buttons of her blouse.

"No," he'd said quickly, rushing to meet her in the middle of his room. "You're going to let me do that." He carefully pulled her hand away, caressing her wrist. "You let me think."

He'd carefully and tenderly undone each button on her shirt, finishing with the cuffs, pulling the tails of her shirt out of her waistband and her shirt away from her shoulders. Kissing her was done slowly and wonderfully, her hands reaching tentatively out to linger at his waist, and he'd reached around, slowly, and let his hands grope along the smooth curve of her skirt and squeeze appreciatively the way he couldn't have done this morning. She was a thing to be treasured, appreciated, and she gave a little moan that went straight down to his shorts and made him take his dear sweet time finding the zipper of her skirt and pulling it down, peeling the wool away so it, too, fell to the floor, and she was standing before him in a pale pink slip and her stockings, and he was realizing how long it had been since he'd seen a woman in her underwear.

"Why are you so goddamn pretty?" That thought had slipped out without his meaning to say it, too.

"Neil." It was part reprimand, part laugh. He'd realized later it the first time he'd ever heard her say his name.

"I'm gonna need you to say that," he'd said with a slow smile, "about a hundred times more."

She hadn't - not really. But she'd been …noisy in all the ways that mattered to help him forget most of the day, and there was a great pleasure, he found, in looking down and seeing that she was pink and smiling and gone, drunk on feelings that were not wine. Once quickly, and a second time slowly, while they were not too tired, and sleep still seemed far away.

And now it was morning, and she was still here, and no dream.

As was one other, slightly more…pressing matter.

Her eyes fluttered open, squinting in the sunlight, dark hair loose on the pillow. "Good morning," he said, smiling.

"Is it?" she asked, and he chuckled and leaned over to kiss her.

"Could be," he offered, the bed and his sheets hiding nothing of his current state. She gave a low laugh, and his hand came up to palm her breast while she moved her leg a little higher, smiling up at him with growing expectation for --

--a knock on the door, heavy with increasing urgency. "Colonel Harding? Colonel Harding, are you there?"

He closed his eyes and resisted the urge to kill whoever was on the other side of the door. "What is it?"

"It's nearly eight o'clock, sir. Are you feeling all right?"

He looked down and realized Marion was biting her lip, her hand held to her face trying not to laugh at him in between her legs and bellowing at the door, very much in flagrante. "Yes, I'm - " her smile was going to undo him - "I'm fine, I just overslept. Give me thirty minutes."

A vague affirmation from out in the hall, the sound of shoes moving off. There was nothing for it - duty called.

"I think we're late for work." God, but she was a tease. Had she always been this funny?

"I'm going to save this," he promised, looking down at her smiles, the pink tips of her breasts, "for later." You haven't forgotten the war, and there's things I haven't done to you yet. And I don't want to be alone after another day of phone calls, and I don't want you to be alone, either. Not when we can be alone together.

"Are you going to have time later?" she asked. "Am I?"

"I'll make some," he growled, giving her one last kiss before getting out of bed and going to find his towel and clean underwear and a new pair of pants. A quick cold shower, that was the ticket. The dream was over now, and everything ahead of him was real enough.

He turned back at the bathroom door and saw Marion retrieving her slip from where they'd thrown it on the floor. That was real, too - nothing dream about it - and more importantly, it was his, and he wasn't about to let it go easily.

#asked and answered #Kind Anonymous Friend #marion brennan #i have written a thing #mercurygraypresents

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chocolatesawfish · 2 years

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Hetalia World Stars The Ulster Cycle

(Cw: death and historical inaccuracy, ho!)

Once upon a time (the late Iron Age, specifically) there lived two sisters on two islands. The elder was named Britannia, and the younger, Hibernia.

Each sister bore five children. The sons of Britannia were Cambria, Caledonia, Loegria, Monapia and Dumnonia. Later, they were called Wales, Scotland, England, Mann and Cornwall. The children of Hibernia were Ulaid, Laigin, Connachta, Mumu and Mide. They were later to become Ulster, Leinster, Connacht, Munster and Meath.

After the passing of their mothers, the usual inheritance struggles broke out. Of the ten contenders, some were more favoured by geography and demographics than others. England and Scotland surpassed their kin in the east, while Ulster, Connacht and Munster rose to prominence in the west. The arrival of the Norsemen upset this whole, delicate balance of power.

When the Viking raids began to strike the coasts of Britain and Ireland, the response of Hibernia's children was to put aside their differences and consolidate a common front. An entirely unintended effect of this cooperation was the birth of a nation.

Emerging from the unity of the five provinces, Árdríocht na hÉireann, the High Kingdom of Ireland, stepped onto the scene. Though not directly of Hibernia's blood, he was still a sibling to them, and symbol of their resistance to foreign rule. And this talismanic determination would soon be put to the test.

Young Ireland reached the peak of his potential under that most famous high king, Brian Boru. With the battle of Clontarf, the Northmen ceased to be an issue, the ever more ambitious Leinster suffered a setback, and Munster seemed set to rule as most powerful of the five provinces. In a sad twist of fate, Brian Boru's death & the resulting fragmentation of his achievements led to the dwindling of Munster's power, leaving Connacht and Ulster as the major players on the island. Ireland attempted to keep them in line, but going behind the others’ backs, Leinster invited a foreign force to their island, ultimately sealing all of their fates.

Almost from the moment Wales set foot on the Emerald Isle, things spiralled out of control. Young, impressionable and filled with religious fervour from his time with Norman France, he reinstated Leinster in the position of power she craved, and proceeded to go much further. The campaigns of this invader drew Munster and Meath’s ire, and they attempted to force him into retreat, but with continental tactics and technology, Wales was a foe like none they’d fought before. Soon, an all-island battle royale was raging, with even Leinster burned by the dragon she had unleashed. Things were only resolved when England stepped in, using his princely authority to recall Wales, but the damage was done. In England’s view, the only way to stabilise the situation was to take charge himself. And so began the eight hundred years of colonisation.

The retreat of the Normans bought the five provinces, and Ireland as a whole, some breathing space, but it wasn’t to last. With the ascendancy of the House of Tudor, England exerted his control ever more fiercely, and the provinces, one by one, were either killed outright or had their power broken, and gradually dwindled away. All except Ulster.

All the provinces had their reasons for resisting, and resist they did. Whether they met their end at the tip of Anglo-Norman lances, or were felled by starvation, disease and internal strife, Leinster, Munster, Connacht and Meath fought till their last breath. Ulster prided himself as the finest warrior of all the island, but this wasn’t the sole reason he had held dominion for so long. He was pragmatic and shrewd, and saw no purpose in discarding his life for a lost cause. When he was defeated despite doing all he could, he reasoned that there was no disgrace in an honourable surrender, and submitted to his new lords.

With the Flight of the Earls and the winnowing of the last vestiges of his Gaelic culture, Ulster entered a period of profound mourning. The loss of his language, his traditions, the very soul of the nation, was enough to break his heart. He had acquiesced willingly, but on many occasions he regretted it, berated himself, questioned whether things could have gone differently. He was too subdued to make a fuss as England began moving settlers in, new customs and ways of life supplanting the old. It would take the arrival of one more nation on the island to break Ulster out of his downward spiral.

Scotland stood out from his brothers, yet there was something so familiar about him. He had none of Wales’ fervour, none of England’s offhand brutality, but was quiet, dignified and resolute. He was the single most impressive man Ulster had ever met. He could never put his finger on quite why his cousin’s arrival touched a chord with him, but deep down, it was because Scotland was everything he wished he could be. Here was a man who had stood up to England, Norway, had even, fighting at the side of his mother, held back the Roman Empire himself.

Ulster recalled Scotty’s face vaguely and fondly. Back in their youth, in untroubled days, they had crossed the North Channel to visit each other’s houses, romping through the Scottish Highlands and the Glens of Antrim. Although they had drifted apart as times changed and new challenges arose, they had tried to keep in contact. Scotland’s gallowglass warriors had been instrumental in countless Irish conflicts, and his campaigns under the Bruce family had provided an invaluable counterweight that kept Norman England in check.

Scotland was someone Ulster could actually talk to. Proud of his Gaelic roots and equally as nostalgic for their childhood, they had much to bond over. Ulster grew in confidence. The hollow absence of his old way of life still hurt, but with Scotland, he began to learn about the experiences of others, try new things and broaden his worldview. Eager to impress, he almost unwittingly began to adopt Scotland’s mannerisms, from his dress sense to his speech patterns. With trepidation and excitement, he even made the monumental leap of conversion, taking up his cousin’s Presbyterian faith.

For a time, life was good. Ulster and Scotland settled into their new life together, their cultures syncretizing and their love for each other deepening. Gradually, they ceased to see each other as cousins, and Ulster became the fourth brother of the British Family. But what of good old Éire?

While Ulster prospered, his little brother suffered. Too weak to be seen as a serious threat, he escaped the fate of the provinces, though he fought just as valiantly. After the conquest, England set up a colonial administration in Dublin, made some perfunctory attempts to “civilise” the country and promptly forgot about him. Left to his own devices in a devastated landscape, Ireland experienced a tempestuous adolescence. Retreating west and living off the land, he came to resent all things British, but most of all his misguided sellout of a big brother.

Every so often, this discontent flared into violence. In the Irish Rebellions of 1641, 1798 and of course 1916, Ireland lashed out against the establishment, with predictably tragic results every time. What’s more, his land became a battlefield of larger powers, with the Williamite-Jacobite War seeing the Netherlands and France arrive to bolster their respective Protestant and Catholic allies.

With clockwork consistency, Ulster was caught in the middle. With how often he was at the centre of the conflict, he began to internalise that it was really all his fault, even when the wars were only a symptom of larger, Europe-wide machinations. Now, at least, he didn’t have to rely solely on himself. Whenever danger loomed, his brother was there, a staunch defender against all comers. In 1641, when Ireland laid waste to the province, Scotland sheltered Ulster behind the barricades of County Down and fought Ireland to a standstill outside them. Bizarrely, Ireland found himself allied to England when Arthur’s doppelgänger, Oliver, appeared on the scene, joining forces with Scotland and Ulster in his quest to depose the monarchy.

After the Williamite War, things returned to some semblance of normality, but discontent still brewed beneath the surface. The social structures of the Protestant Ascendancy excluded both Catholics and Presbyterians from government in favour of Anglicans, so while England extended his rule around the globe, Ireland, Scotland and Ulster languished in relative obscurity. For Ireland, this was a chance to recuperate and plan for his next uprising, while for the other two, free from the duties of politics, it was an opportunity to rebuild their lives together and continue to develop the Ulster-Scots identity of their community.

Yet another disaster was the Potato Famine. Scotland returned to his ancestral highlands to try and alleviate the suffering there, and Ulster stood on his own for the first time in hundreds of years, struggling to care for a devastated population. Worst-hit of all was Ireland. The starvation, the disease and the inaction of the British government was more than he could bear. He departed on a coffin ship for America.

In his absence, Ulster integrated himself further into the Anglo-Celtic family. But Ireland didn’t plan on staying away for ever. Returning across the Atlantic, having met diverse groups of peoples and been imbued with new ideas of nationalism and self-determination, he made one final push for freedom.

In keeping with this new spirit, he took a step unusual for him and dealt with the British government on their own terms. They were happy to receive him, as they much preferred a feisty but ineffectual political partner to a hostile and volatile colony. Ulster, though, was much aggrieved, not comprehending how they could show such favour to one who had been such a constant thorn in their side. With jealousy and unsettlement eating away at him, Ulster dug his heels in. Every push for greater autonomy that Ireland made, every concession granted to him, resulted in Ulster proclaiming in ever-stronger terms that he would never abandon his family.

And then, some damned foolish thing in the Balkans, that which the Great Powers dreaded, came to pass. It was 1914, and Europe was in flames.

England, Scotland and Wales threw all their might into supporting their continental allies, with the Irish right beside them. Ulster was attempting to prove his steadfast loyalty, while Éire was hoping that by being there in their hour of need, the British would reward him with independence. The war, however, only forestalled a proposed autonomy bill from being implemented, and Ireland’s frustrations grew. They spilled over in the Easter Rising, crushed like all before it, but sticking in the public imagination due to the cruelty with which the British suppressed it.

Once the war was over, Ireland saw his chance, and now, at last, he was successful. He automatically assumed that his brother Ulster would be coming with him, and was aghast to discover that he had no intention of doing so, a plain truth that Ireland had willfully blinded himself to. Their division, evident for so long, was now official, and Ulster took a new name for himself.

Northern Ireland.

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blackboar · 3 years

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Every rebellions, plots, conspiracies, and seditions against Henry VII, by chronological order.

1485: Henry VII becomes king after his victory at Bosworth. Two hundred men from the Calais garrison flee to Flanders.

1486: attempted murder against Henry VII at York. The Stafford brothers rebel and take Worcester, while viscount Lovell rebels in Richmondshire. Eventually, the Stafford brothers are captured and one executed, while Lovell flees in Flanders to the court of Margaret of York, dowager duchess of Burgundy.

1487: Lambert Simmel's rebellion. A Yorkist conspiracy proclaims a commoner Lambert Simmel to be the escaped earl of Warwick from the Tower (Edward Plantagenet, nephew of Richard III and Edward IV). He is proclaimed 'Edward V' in Dublin by the Anglo-Irish aristocracy and joined by 2,000 german mercenaries led by viscount Lovell and his cousin John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln. With a mixed german-irish force, Landing in Lancashire enjoyed limited defection in northern England (mainly lord Bolton of Scrope, lord Bolton of Masham, and Sir Thomas Broughton). Their ~8,000 force is beaten at Stoke by a Tudor army led by the king and the earl of Oxford. Death of Lincoln and Lovell, Simmel is spared. Before the rebellion, Henry VII preemptively jails some key Yorkists, including his mother-in-law Elizabeth Woodville and his brother-in-law the Marquess of Dorset.

1489: Anti-tax rebellion in Yorkshire. The rebels led by Sir John Egremont murder the earl of Northumberland and take York before dissolving at the arrival of the royal army. Egremont flees to the court of Margaret of York.

1491: At Cork, a man proclaims that he is Richard of Shrewsbury, the disappeared second son of Edward IV. His true identity remains unknown. ‘Richard’ receives immediate support nonetheless from some Yorkists such as John Taylor, a former supporter of the duke of Clarence (Edward IV's brother).

1492: 'Richard' land in France, where he was welcomed by Charles VIII, who is at war with England. Henry VII retaliate by an invasion from Calais and sign the treaty of Etaples. Charles VIII agreed to stop supporting English rebels and give the Tudor king a pension.

1492: The peace treaty is unpopular in England, and 'Richard' is welcomed in Flanders by Margaret of York and Maximilian of Habsburg, ruler of the Burgundian estates. Maximilian is angered by the separate peace Henry VII made without consulting him. He recognizes him as the rightful king of England. The news of Richard's survival and reappearance began to be known in England and test the allegiance of Henry VII's subjects.

1493: Henry VII retaliate by imposing a blockade on the Netherlands. Counter-measures ensued, leading to an embargo from both parties, which lead to riots in London. 'Richard' assists at Maximilian's coronation as Holy Roman emperor and is promised support for his restoration. Scotland and Denmark recognize his legitimacy.

1494: Maurice Fitzgerald, earl of Desmond, revolts against the Tudors and leads a rebellion in Munster.

1495: an essential group of plotters is arrested. It consists of the king's own Chamberlain and the most powerful knight in England, Sir William Stanley (he was mighty in Cheshire and had £10,000 of reserve in cash at his castle of Holt). Lord Fitzwater (important Calais official and landowner in East-Anglia), Sir Simon Mountford (significant landowner in Warwickshire), William D'Aubeney, Thomas Cressener, Thomas Astwode, and Robert Ratcliff. They were mainly former supporters of Edward IV, and some had connections with duchess Cecily's household. Sir Robert Clifford, one of the plotters, betrayed the entire plot and was pardoned. Others were fined or executed, like Stanley.

'Richard' prepares to invade England by East-Anglia with a force of exiled and Flemish mercenaries. Stormy winds scattered his forces and made him land in Kent, and his force of 300 soldiers is beaten by the Earl of Oxford at his arrival at Deal. He flees and lands with the remainder of his troops in Ireland, where the revolted earl of Desmond joins him. Their combined forces fail to take Waterford. After this defeat, 'Richard' and his supporters arrive in Scotland.

1496: restoration of trade between The Netherlands and England, as Henry VII join the Holy League against France. The earl of Desmond also makes his peace with Henry VII. A Scottish army invades England as 'Richard' promised to give Berwick £50,000 to the Scottish king James IV. Little result ensues except for some small raidings.

1497: 'Richard' marries a cousin of the Scottish king, Catherine Gordon. As the king of Scotland makes a truce with England, he tries to land once again in Ireland with Sir James Ormond's support. However, Ormond's murder led to the failure of the uprising, and 'Richard' flee from Ireland with three ships. Taxation for the Scottish war led to the Cornish rising. A blacksmith, Michael Joseph, leads the revolt with lord Audley and brings many gentrymen from Cornwall to rebellion. The rebellion extends to neighboring counties as the rebel take Exeter and march to London, virtually unopposed. A 25,000 royal army face some ~15,000 rebels at Blackheath, near London, and triumph. Once again, the earl of Oxford's vanguard is instrumental for the victory against the rebel. 'Richard' finally land in Cornwall, hoping to bolster his support with the Cornish's discontent. An uprising in his favor occurs (second Cornish rebellion), and his 8,000 men fail to take Exeter. His attempted fleeing after the encirclement of his forces by the Tudors led to his capture at Bealieu abbey.

'Richard' confess he is an impostor and a Flemish by the name of Perkin Warbeck. He and his wife are welcomed at court.

1498: 'Richard' tries to escape court and is captured and jailed in the Tower of London. 1499: A Cambridge scholar by the name of Ralph Wiford dreamt that he would become king if he claimed he was the earl of Warwick. His uprising in East Anglia failed, and he is executed.

Edmund de la Pole, earl of Suffolk and brother of the Earl of Lincoln (thus nephew of Richard III), leave England for Flanders after killing a commoner in London before agreeing to come back.

The French hand over many supporters of 'Richard' in France, including John Taylor. Many are executed, but Taylor's life is spared.

An attempted escape made by 'Richard' and his cousin Edward, earl of Warwick, fail, and they are both executed.

1500-1503: Henry VII lost his wife in childbirth and two sons (Arthur and Edmund). Dynastic fragility ensue as Henry VII have only one surviving male heir.

1501: Edmond de la Pole and his brother Richard flee for the Flanders. Henry VII promptly jail their brother, William, with Sir James Tyrell and Lor William Courtenay. Royal officials are sent in East Anglia to monitor the de la Pole affinity. Sir James Tyrell 'confess' before his death the murder of the Princes in the Tower for Richard III.

1504: 'treasonous' talks between Calais officials. They argue about who would be the successor for a declining Henry VII and hesitate between the duke of Buckingham and the Earl of Suffolk, omitting Henry VII's children. 1506: The Habsburgs deliver Edmund de la Pole to Henry VII, who jail him at the Tower of London. In exchange, Henry VII loan them immense sums of cash, such as £108,000 in April.

1509: Henry VII dies, leaving the crown to his adult heir, Henry VIII.

I might have missed some small, aborted plot, but there it is.

With this chronology, it's evident that the War of the Roses (or, more accurately, the war of the succession crisis of 1483) didn't end at Bosworth. Henry VII could have been overthrown in 1487 or the late 1490s. There is also a clear distinction between the rebellions of the 1480s and those of the 1490s. The plot following HenryVII's advent is mainly coming from RichardIII's basis of power. It's his men (Lincoln, Lovell, many northerners), his bases of support (the North and Ireland) who try to overthrow the first Tudor. The plots of ''Perkin Warbeck'' known in historiography, were perilous for Henry VII. Most of his dynastical legitimacy comes from his marriage to Elizabeth of York. A true surviving son of Edward IV would nullify this and put into question the support of every former servant of the late Yorkist king. Hence, Henry VII tried to depict 'Richard' as an impostor and to demonstrate that the Princes of the Tower were dead. Still, he couldn't convince everyone and had to resort to force and the systematic use of a spy network.

Some of those plots might have been exaggerated. The 1504 Calais plot was undoubtedly not a carefully crafted conspiracy but more a manifestation of Henry VII's difficult succession. This chronology also doesn't show the dubious role that many magnates had during this period of unrest. The loyalty of Lord Abergavenny (dominant in Kent) was put into question, as was one of the earls of Derby in the 1490s and Lord Daubeney. Henry VII didn't have many magnates on whom he could truly count.

As you can see, Henry VII was never wholly free from dynastic uncertainty. At his death, Richard de la Pole was still free to push his claim if his brother Edmund died. Henry VIII himself was very wary of potential claimants toppling him. His execution of Edmund de la Pole in 1513 and the duke of Buckingham in 1521 are the best manifestations of this insecurity.

#henry vii of england #war of the roses #tudor era #Perkin Warbeck is named 'Richard'#we don't have definite proof of his identity #richard iii

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honourablejester · 3 years

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Celtic Pantheon/Campaigns (5e D&D)(Long Post)

Okay, so I’m just going to get this out there, because every time I glance at the Celtic Pantheon in the PHB I do giggle a bit. Mind you, it’s not anyone’s fault, but a couple of centuries of academics bundling stuff together under ‘Celtic’ has mightily confused just about everything, and it really shows here.

(Note: I have no academic qualifications regarding Celtic mythology/history/folklore whatsoever, I’m just Irish and grew up with a lot of the Irish myths and legends as a kid. This also means I know very little about the Welsh and other Celtic myths, just to say that in advance. This is all just what I’m familiar with from growing up and a little bit of research, and might have errors)

This post is also brought to you by my idly scanning lfg posts for Celtic campaigns and seeing a lot of historically inspired Celts-vs-Romans campaigns which is … doubly funny to me if they’re using the PHB pantheon list. This is because, as you’ll see in a minute, the majority of the PHB list uses the Irish gods and we … didn’t have those. Romans. We didn’t have them. So. Heh.

(We had Roman traders, especially around the Waterford area, it’s a relatively quick hop over from Wales/Cornwall, and we have evidence of Roman … tourists, probably? There are Roman offerings at various Irish prehistoric religious sites, in the Midlands especially. So we did have Romans, in the sense of we met them, but we didn’t have Romans, in the sense of invasion by the Roman Empire)

So. The thing about the PHB ‘pantheon’. It’s kind of borrowing gods from several different Celtic pantheons. ‘Celtic’ covers a lot of distinct regional cultures that are believed (I think for primarily linguistic and archaeological reasons) to be descended from an original proto-Celtic culture. For extra fun, there aren’t many primary historical sources for most of them, as in Celts writing about themselves and their faiths. Most of the texts we have are either medieval Christian (a lot of the Irish and Welsh) or Roman (a lot of the Gaulish, Iberian, Germanic, Brythonic), so there’s a lot of cross-cultural influence and interpretation muddling it up in there before you ever get to celtic-vs-celtic.

So they’re all Celtic, but they’re all very distinct in terms of stories, culture and the attributes of their gods. There are some gods that were broadly shared under similar names between various of the regional pantheons (Lugh and Brigantia are two examples), although they could be very different in portrayal between, say, the Irish and Gaulish stories. (Where the PHB uses one of these, I’m going with what name they’re using for guidance)

(The various attributes given to them by the PHB are a different muddle of influences again, with I think a lot of it being straight D&D invention, but that’s its own story)

So, to have a look at the D&D breakdown:

5e PHB Celtic Pantheon

Arawn (Welsh)

Belenus (Gaulish/Romano-British)

Brigantia (Gaulish/Romano-British)

Diancecht (Irish)

Dunatis (???)(Can’t find or remember this guy at all. Only thing I’ve got is that the Irish for ‘fort’ is ‘dún’, so maybe Irish?)

Goibhniu (Irish)

Lugh (Irish)

Manannan Mac Lir (Irish)

Math Mathonwy (Welsh)

Morrigan (Irish)

Nuada (Irish)

Oghma (Irish)

Silvanus (???)(Don’t know at all. I’m going to guess continental because I think ‘silva’ is the latin for ‘forest’, hence ‘Transylvania’ or ‘Beyond the Forest’, so the dude has a latin name)(… looking this up, he’s actually straight-up a Roman god, okay then)

The Daghdha (Irish)(I usually see it spelled ‘Dagda’, mind)

This all shakes out as follows:

Irish: Daghdha, Diancecht, Goibhniu, Lugh, Manannan, Morrigan, Nuada, Oghma

Not Sure/Maybe Irish?: Dunatis

Welsh: Arawn, Math Mathonwy

Gaulish/Romano-British: Belenus, Brigantia

Straight Roman: Silvanus

So that’s more than half the list being figures from Irish mythology. And that … there’s nothing wrong with using them for an Asterix-and-Obelix Romans-vs-Celts sort of campaign. I mean, it’s your own private fantasy game, not a history lesson. Go nuts! It just … reads oddly to me. Heh. Historically speaking, very few people with Irish names calling on Irish gods would have had much cause to fight Romans. Not on any large scale, anyway.

Campaign Inspirations:

I’m going to just say, though. If you want a more historical and/or mythological feeling Celtic campaign. You have a couple of options. I’d say the easiest thing is to just look up the specific pantheons and cherry-pick your gods from there (there’s a handy Wikipedia list here)

If you want continental Romans vs Celts a-la Asterix and Obelix, use the Gaulish/Brythonic list.

If you want Romans vs Celts more along the lines of various modern interpretations of King Arthur, use the Gaulish/Brythonic and/or Pictish lists.

If you want Celtic more along the lines of full Arthurian, Excalibur, BBC Merlin, ‘dragons, druids, knights and romance’, a lot of actual Arthurian legend used Welsh myths as a base, so it’s a nice start, then throw some Brythonic on top (particularly if you want to do an 80s Robin Hood on it and throw in Cernunnos/Herne the Hunter in). If your setting is more of a fully mixed ‘Medieval England’ sort of setting, Robin Hood, King Arthur, etc, you can mix and match a whole bunch of folklore and mythology of various sources, Welsh, Roman, Norse, etc. (Alan Garner is a fantasy author who does this very well, if you want a high-fantasy example)

And if you want Celtic as in Irish myth to match the names …

If you’re going relatively low-fantasy for a more historical feel, use the Irish pantheon, and the sources you want to inspire the setting would be the Cattle Raid of Cooley and the Fenian Cycle/stories of Fionn Mac Cumhaill and the Fianna. The Five Kingdoms of Ireland (Ulster, Connacht, Leinster, Munster and Meath, with the High King sitting at Tara in Meath) makes a pretty good setting.

If you’re going more high fantasy, like the Arthurian example, use the Irish pantheon, and you want the Book of Invasions and the Battle of Magh Tuireadh as inspiration. Setting elements you can have here are the Five Kingdoms of Ireland, the Four Cities that the Treasures of Ireland came from, Tir na nOg, and the Otherworld. (Note on the four cities and their treasures: they were each guarded by a legendary bard (poet/scholar/mage), so you could go classic archmage wizard or you could throw in some high level NPC bards for fun)

There’s some very cool magic items in Irish myth too, like the aforementioned four treasures, the magic pigskin (waterskin) Lugh had the sons of Tuireann quest for (heals all wounds, but charges of various healing spells per day would probably work), the sword Fragarach (I think other D&D editions had a version, but I’m particularly interested in its sword of truth aspect that forces anyone threatened by it to tell the truth), Cuchulainn’s Gae Bolg spear, aka Belly Spear (which is made from a bone of a sea monster and is nasty – it basically grows barbs/spines once it’s in someone’s body), and basically every item ever owned/gifted by Manannan Mac Lir, who is basically the Irish god of giving away cool magic items (as well as sea god, trickster god, elder god, and the god often in charge of starting quests). If you need a quest-starter god or a god to litter magic items around your world, Manannan Mac Lir is your dude.

If you want a fantasy author that I quite like who does great loosely-based-on-Irish-myth high fantasy, I would say Michael Scott, particularly (from my reading) the De Danaan tales and Tales of the Bard. I also grew up reading Cormac Mac Raois’ Giltspur trilogy, which is an awesome kid’s portal fantasy involving some Wicklow kids winding up in Tir na nOg and fighting the forces of the Morrigan, but that’s pretty much impossible to get outside Ireland, I think.

And I promise I’m not only saying this because I personally feel like a low-fantasy ‘historical’ campaign is about the least interesting thing you could do with any of the Celtic pantheons. Honest.

#d&d #dnd #5e #celtic mythology #irish mythology #history #inspirations #fantasy

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irelandseyeonmythology · 2 years

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Is there any timeline around for when surviving versions of the Ulster Cycle's stories were written? I wonder if they were more or less clustered in time compared to tales of the Fianna.

Okay, so this is actually interesting! Because I’ve been dealing a bit with Fenian material recently and it’s something that me and one of my lecturers have talked a fair bit about. I apologize in advance for the lack of sources -- I’m currently away from my books for the holiday. Also I should probably start this off with the reminder that the idea of “Cycles” is very much our classification for the sake of convenience -- in the Middle Ages, there was some notion of stories of the Fianna VS stories of Cú Chulainn, etc., but it was very.....loose. They were more likely to sort these things into categories like “Wooings”, “Death-Tales”, “Courtships”, “Cattle-Raids”, etc. Again, doesn’t mean that they had NO concept of these things, just means that it’s something to keep in mind.

The Ulster Cycle was REALLY prominent early on. You have the Táin and the assorted remscéla (Fore-Tales, prequels), Aided Con Roí (9th century?),Echtra Nerai (10th century), Síaburcharpat Con Culaind (10th century), etc. Meanwhile, the Fenian Cycle, while we have some material on them from the 8th/9th centuries, gets off to a slow start. It’s been speculated that the church did not particularly like the Fianna and that, essentially, the Fianna only became safe to consume after the actual, real-life bands of warriors had died out. Think of it -- You have these groups of aristocratic young men with nothing else to do roving around outside the boundaries of law and order, living in the wilderness, bound to a single leader. Basically...a toss-up between a gang and a frat house.

Meanwhile, Cú Chulainn, great hero of Ulster...well, he’s not what anyone would call particularly child friendly, but he isn’t THAT kind of threat to law and order.

But, into the 10th-11th centuries, we see this BURST of Fenian material, while the Ulster Cycle, while it never DIES (it was thought that that happened for some time, but we have Ulster Cycle material being written down well into the Early Modern period -- a particular favorite is “Toruigheacht Gruaidhe Griansholus, which is estimated to be 17th century and is BREATHTAKINGLY chivalric.

And there are a variety of reasons we think this might have happened -- Part of it might very well be that, simply put, the Ulster Cycle was centered in Ulster. Yes, Connacht can get in the game with Medb and Aillil, which is where you get some positive depictions; Munster can even get in the game a little with Cú Roí, but overall, the Ulster Cycle is about....Ulster. Conall Cernach (who actually shows up in more texts than The Other One), Cú Chulainn, Conchobar, Emer, etc. Why would the other provinces care about some teenaged twink’s exploits? They have their own heroes to prop up.

Meanwhile, the Fianna could be everywhere -- The tradition isn’t anchored anywhere, which allowed their exploits to be taken up by anyone, especially in the folk tradition. There’s a reason why there are so many locations in Ireland that are labelled “the bed of Diarmaid and Gráinne” and it’s because they all adapted the legend as it suited them. Finn and his band could have been anywhere, at any time, sleeping, hunting, fighting. Much easier to localize, essentially. And so you have the oral tradition supporting the manuscript tradition and vice versa (people often seem to think of them as two separate traditions -- they weren’t. It wasn’t uncommon for a manuscript to, say, be read out loud.) Sometimes, you even get Cú Chulainn and Fionn facing off in the oral tradition -- I recall one example where, for example, Cú Chulainn takes the place of the Scottish giant that Fionn was going to fight when Giant’s Causeway was formed. In general, though, WHILE there is an oral tradition around the Ulster Cycle, it was massively eclipsed by that of the Fianna.

#The Fenian cycle #The Ulster Cycle

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usaac-official · 3 years

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Luftwaffe members pose with the remains of Cash and Carry of the 390th Bomb Group after it was shot down on a raid over Munster, October 1943

#usaac #usaaf #B-17 #Flying Fortress #warbird #crash landing #aviation history #390 BG

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probablyacreep · 4 years

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The Giant’s Sconce - Local Folklore

Political intrigue, crazy parties and religious tension on a single hill in Ireland

The Giant’s Sconce - also known as “Dun Cethern” “Dun Ceithern” “Dun da Benn” or “The Hill of the Two Forts” is a hill fort in the north-west of Ulster. It sits a few minutes walk away from its twin, another hill fort on the same mountain - together they are believed to make up the “Hill of the Two Forts” (previously believed to have been Mountsandel Fort) They would have commanded the area and controlled passage over the northern edge of the Sperrins from east to west Ulster. The fort appears both in folklore and in history, and has a turbulent past.

In myth, the site was said in the Ulster Cycle of stories to have belonged to Niall of the Shining Deeds, a member of the Craobh Rua - the Red Branch. It was then inherited by his son, Fintan, and his grandson, Cethern. The fort has a special position in these stories as a liminal, border site - the west of Ireland is seen as dangerous and hostile, associated with the Formorians and the enemies of the Red Branch, and Dun Cethern is the first line of defense. Under Niall it is the site of the Mesca Ulad - “the insane drunkenness of the men of north-east Ireland.”

The story begins in Navan, where Fintan and Cu Chulainn have agreed to hand over their portions of the Ulaid’s land to make Conchobhar mac Nessa king of the whole region. They decide to throw a party to celebrate, but both men want to host it. After returning home they both plan their events, get the food ready and return to present their invitations on the same day. A fight results which is only broken up when the King gets a child to stand and cry very loudly about how sad the fighting is making him. They decide that there’s only one thing to do about it - they’ll just have to have both parties in one night. They all go to Dun da Benn and get extremely drunk, and at midnight they all set out at a gallop for Dun Delgan, the location of Cu Chulainn’s feast - only to ride in totally the opposite direction and end up somewhere they begin to notice they don’t recognise, which turns out to be Munster. When it can’t get any worse it begins to snow. And then, as they hike through enemy territory in the snow, it turns out that Queen Medb is visiting Munster to have her own party and they’ve ended up right beside her. They’re spotted by her bodyguards and invited in, but this is a trick - in the end they have to fight their way out and begin the journey home.

The second mention of Dun da Benn, now called Dun Cethern, is during the Cattle Raid of Cooley, when Cethern, Niall’s grandson, is the first warrior to recover from the curse affecting the men of Ulster and turn up to help Cu Chulainn fight the army of Medb. He does so naked and almost succeeds in killing Ailill, Medb’s husband, but the King had realised what was happening and put his clothing on a standing stone, which is attacked in his place.

The final mythological mention of the Giant’s Sconce is more vague. St Colmcille (St Columba) was visiting the area to preside over a meeting regarding the rights of bards, and the tensions between the O’Neill’s in Donegal and the kingdom of Dal Riada in eastern Ulster and Scotland. He was visiting Dun Cethern when he was approached by a beautiful young man, who seemed to come from nowhere. This man was identified as either Mongan mac Fiachnai, Manannan’s son, or Manannan mac Lir himself. The man says he comes from another world, and can speak to the dead and the living. He describes the wealth of his people, and how rich he remembers the surrounding area being in the distant past - he then goes away with Colmcille and they sit together and spend hours talking. When they return the man leaves; Colmcille refuses to tell his followers the secrets the man had told him, saying it was better if they didn’t know. Colmcille goes on to make a prophecy that the hill will run red with the blood of his kindred, which brings us to the final, historical events that occurred on the hill.

Fifty or sixty years later, in the 630s, the northern O’Neills begin to expand. The tensions discussed at the meeting years before reach their peak, and a battle occurs at Dun Cethern, where a king of Dal Riada and the king of the Ciannacht, a territory sandwiched between the eastern Dal Riada and the western O’Neills, are meeting. Some say the wooden hall was locked and burned with them still inside - The Burning of the Kings - hence the modern name of the hill “The Sconce” or “The Giant’s Sconce.” They were defeated, anyway, part of the campaign of expansion which helped allow the O’Neill dynasty to rule for hundreds of years to come.

In modern times the hill is treated with suspicion. There are rumours of unexplored souterrains (the “caves” or tunnels found in hill forts and burial mounds) under both hills filled with treasure, and it’s believed that the hill is a gateway to the Otherworld - the path to reach it runs through a tunnel of hawthorn trees which adds to the atmosphere. Many people still avoid visiting or discussing the hill, and the area of countryside it sits in, including the road beside it, are commonly thought to be haunted - the association with the Red Branch, Mongan/Manannan and the Tuatha dé still remains, half remembered, not fully believed, but best avoided.

#local folklore collection #Manannán mac Lir #Manannan #irish history #cu chulainn

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