{"id":293,"date":"2018-08-21T20:47:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-21T20:47:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-08-29T21:42:08","modified_gmt":"2020-08-29T21:42:08","slug":"excerpt-from-the-hounds-betwixt-and-between-cu-chulainn-and-finn-as-liminal-heroes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/2018\/08\/21\/excerpt-from-the-hounds-betwixt-and-between-cu-chulainn-and-finn-as-liminal-heroes\/","title":{"rendered":"Excerpt from: The Hounds Betwixt and Between: C\u00fa Chulainn and Finn as Liminal Heroes"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Published in <\/i>Air n-Aithesc,Volume  4, Issue 2 Lugnasadh 2017<\/a>. An earlier version, titled The Hero Betwixt and Between, appeared in Keltria Journal<\/span> #43,”Heroes & Heroines,” 2013.  <\/span><\/o:p><\/i><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/i><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/i><\/div>\n
C\u00fa Chulainn of the Ulster Cycle and Finn Mac Cumhail of the Fenian Cycle are the two early Irish warriors that are most familiar, who have the greatest number of stories told. Many other warriors in the literature boast heroic quests of their own, including the warrior-kings; however, these make up a smaller amount of known literature. There are other warriors known only for their relationships with C\u00fa Chulainn or Finn, as fighting beside them or dying at their hands, while many warriors are only names in long lists. There are also many villains and semi-villains and a, sadly, small number of warrior-women, either protagonist or antagonist.[1]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>These two heroes have large bodies of material focused on them and what makes them such important heroes compared to the others is of interest.  <\/o:p><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
When they are brought up together, it is often to describe C\u00fa Chulainn and Finn as very different, even opposites. This may have originated from Marie Louise Sjoestedt\u2019s declaration that C\u00fa Chulainn was a \u201cHero of the Tribe\u201d[2]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>while Finn was a \u201cHero Outside the Tribe.\u201d[3]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>The distinctions Sjoestedt noted may be useful in exploring each of these heroes individually,[4]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>  and they certainly are<\/i> individuals; however, her designation of C\u00fa Chulainn as a \u201ctribal\u201d insider and assertion that the two warriors\u2019 stories were \u201cirreconcilable\u201d are questionable. [5]<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span>Both of these heroes were liminal and quite dangerous to the culture they defended, but were outsiders of. In the different times their tales were recorded, they represent views of those warriors who stood between society and the wilderness, being never fully part of either.  <\/o:p><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
It is difficult in a casual study such as this to sort out what might be similarities due to the nature of the tales and what might be influences of the earlier stories.  C\u00fa Chulainn\u2019s tales were written centuries before Finn\u2019s. We do not have evidence that C\u00fa Chulainn\u2019s stories truly come from oral traditions or whether they were told orally after they were written. Both seem likely, at least to some extent. Finn\u2019s stories continued in oral tradition, which gives us even more variations. While knowledge of C\u00fa Chulainn\u2019s stories may have influenced the tellers and writers of Finn\u2019s, the latter are clearly not reproductions. This may be influences of the time, but also may be a hint that they were seen as warriors of a certain nature and place, similar but not identical. Therefore, I believe the comparisons where we find the similarities yet note the differences help us understand the archetype of the Outlaw Warrior in this literature, without losing sight of the individual nature of both C\u00fa Chulainn and Finn.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
To read more you can purchase a copy of Air n-Aithesc,Volume  4, Issue 2 Lugnasadh 2017<\/a> <\/i>or a PDF from me via the website<\/a> <\/div>\n

<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
[1]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a> I have written about some of these female warriors  in \u201c\u2018By Force in the Battlefield\u2019: Finding the Irish Female Hero,\u201d Air n-Aithesc<\/i> Volume 1 Issue 1 Imbolc 2014; \u201cMuimmecha<\/i> naFiann: <\/i>Foster-mothers of the heroes,\u201d Air n-Aithesc<\/i> Volume 1 Issue 2 Lughnasadh 2014; \u201cThe War Goddess\u2019s Bitch,\u201d Air n-Aithesc<\/i> Volume 3 Issue 1 Imbolc\/Beltaine 2016;  \u201cThere Was Not Found a Man to Withstand Her,\u201d Air n-Aithesc<\/i> Volume 3 Issue 2 Lughnasadh\/Samhain 2016. <\/o:p><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
[2]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, Celtic Gods and Heroes<\/i>, New York: Dover Publications, Inc., Mineola 2000, pg. 57-80.<\/o:p><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
[3]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>Sjoestedt, Celtic Gods and Heroes<\/i>, pg. 81-91.<\/o:p><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
[4]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>As is noted by Joseph Falaky Nagy. The Wisdom of the Outlaw: The Boyhood Deeds of Finn in Gaelic Narrative Tradition,<\/i>Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985, pg. 10. <\/o:p><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
[5]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>Kim McCone, \u201cWerewolves, Cyclopes, D\u00edberga<\/i> and F\u00edanna<\/i>: Juvenile Delinquency in Early Ireland\u201d Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies<\/i>, issue 12, 1986, pg. 8.<\/span><\/o:p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Published in Air n-Aithesc,Volume  4, Issue 2 Lugnasadh 2017. An earlier version, titled The Hero Betwixt and Between, appeared in Keltria Journal #43,”Heroes & Heroines,” 2013.  C\u00fa Chulainn of the Ulster Cycle and Finn Mac Cumhail of the Fenian Cycle are the two early Irish warriors that are most familiar, who have the greatest number […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[19,11,7,13,3,12,20,14,4,18,17,15,16,8,9,10],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pad6Py-4J","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":388,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions\/388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dunsgathan.net\/feannog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}