Around the world, we notice rich
oral traditions. A country’s oral tradition is marked by myths and legends. Folklore,
since the advent of mankind, has been transmitted orally, mostly sung. Oral traditions
encompass myths, legends, laws, matters of practical wisdom, folktales, epic
poems and such others. In the pre-historical times, before the written records,
the transmission was shared verbally through speech, song, proverbs and performances
maybe staged. The performers were called bards, known to amass cultural
knowledge. With memory serving as their only aid, the purpose was to preserve
culture, indigenous identity, and keep values alive.
Celtic Fairy Tales by Joseph
Jacobs is a collection of folktales from the four Celtic nations- Ireland,
Scotland, Wales and Cornwall- in the British Isles. The collection is an example
of these nations’ rich oral tradition. I have read about a wide array of
characters in the history of English literature as well as poetry. King Arthur
and the Knights of the Round Table, Beowulf, Robin Hood, the legend of Leda and the Swan and such others remained my favourites. This collection came to my attention
for its novelty and distinctness. The names that I had read were mostly from mainstream
literature and often did not cover all four nations of the British Isles.
Joseph Jacobs (1854-1916) was a
folklorist of repute from Australia. A literary critic and a historian as well,
he was an avid collector of folktales of not only English but also Indian, European,
Jewish and Celtic. The Celtic stories, here, are selected from two volumes:
Celtic Fairy Tales (1891) and More Celtic Fairy Tales (1894). Eight in number, at
least one story is drawn from each of the four Celtic nations.
This Dover edition, first published
in 199,4 has four stories common in both Erin (Ireland) and Alba (Scotland): ‘The
Fate of the Children of Lir’, ‘Morraha’, ‘The Story of Deirdre’ and ‘The
Sea-Maiden’. ‘The Tale of Ivan’ is from Cornwall, and ‘The Shepherd of Myddvai’,
‘The Llanfabon Changeling’ and ‘Beth Gellert’ are Welsh tales. Each of these
stories are treasures, remarkable in depth. The use of language has the flavour
of it being a folklore, carrying the aroma of times. For example, Fingula in ‘The
Fate of the Children of Lir’ sang her woes:
“Woe upon me that I am alive!
My wings are frozen to my sides”
This is reflective of the oral tradition where the accounts were mostly sung with the help of rhyme, rhythm and meter with music as an accompaniment. ‘Beth Gellert’ or the Grave of Gellert is a famous Welsh folktale, especially in the village of Snowdonia, Wales. The grave was named after the legendary greyhound, Gellert, Prince Llewelyn’s favourite, killed mistakenly by him. In grief and remorse, Prince erected ‘a great cairn of stones.’ The tale was even popularised by William Robert Spencer in his ballad, ‘Beth Gelert’. For centuries, it has been a popular tourist destination. In all, the use of pagan language, alliteration, repetition to create musicality, vocabulary and grammatical structures are remnants of Old English with universal themes.