ISWÜ Symposium “The Animal in Ireland, Real and Imagined”
Panel 5: Animals in Myths, Legends, and Fairy-Tales
Speakers:
02:50 – Juliana Leibold (Sciences Po Paris, France):
“Concepts of Nature and Culture in Selected Irish Fairy Tales: Selected Irish Fairy Tales as Examples of a Narrative Tradition Documenting Indigenous Learning-with and Becoming-with the More-than-human World”
24:00 – Síle Ní Mhurchú (University College Cork, Ireland):
“Animals in the Fionn Cycle of Irish Mythology”
Discussion:
-Klára Witzany Hutková (Charles University Prague, Czech Republic)
-Juliana Leibold (Sciences Po Paris, France)
-Síle Ní Mhurchú (University College Cork, Ireland)
Chair: Camille Lavoix (University of Würzburg, Germany)
More information: https://www.phil.uni-wuerzburg.de/irish-studies/aktuelles/single/news/symposium-the-animal-in-ireland-real-and-imagined/
D [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] the Oh hello and welcome to the panel animal Legend and fairy tale um it’s my pleasure to introduce all first Jana Li so I’m gonna say a few words about her um so Jana is currently completing a master’s degree in environmental policy at the S SCH in Paris today’s
Presentation is uh the Theses she submitted to her ba in language literature and culture with the subjects English sociology and politics from the jusus leing University in gon uh the topic of today’s paper was inspired by a semester abroad in Ireland spent at the University College Cork and her research
Interests were further developed during her work as a student assistant at the inter interdisplinary Research Institute iar 3r yeah where she work for two years assisting the literary research and editing translation and submission of articles and the human animal um nature relationship in addition she has co-rated and supported the editing of
Catarina am monography multispecies ethnography methodology of the holistic research approach of human animals nature and culture the floor is yours thank you very much um first thank you for the introduction and thank you for the opportunity uh to the organizers uh to present this today um and thank you
Overall to everyone um for the interesting presentations and for um the very friendly atmosphere at the conference um so my presentation uh focuses on the complex interactions between human and animal and nature actions in Irish fairy tales and in my bachelor thesis on which this presentation builds I analyzed the three
Fairy tales fiaa the S of knowledge and the wing of e um sorry for the pronunciation I’m not an Irish speaker uh I wish was um and using G Julian’s gri attention model combined with Brun to’s actual Network Theory um I um analyzed those Tales um and for this presentation I will focus
Mainly on the analysis of one of the tales because of the limited time uh the salmon of knowledge uh before presenting the results of the comparative analysis of the three um and taking an econ narratological approach I will highlight the interconnectedness between nature and culture Which shapes these narrative
Networks and I will connect these narrative networks to the concept of webs of reciprocal relationships present in different indigenous cosmologies and lastly considering characteristics of the oral storytelling tradition and Native science I ask how dis Sage Irish vars portray concepts of Nature and culture and then how far they document
Indigenous practices of learning with and becoming with the morning human world I’m sorry it’s a little bit heavy on sociology um so the fairy tale is considered one of the most famous and loved and influential literary genres as also one of the oldest narrative Traditions as before it existed in its
Written form orally shared fairy tals were present in nearly every culture um fairy TS tend to cl to pass classical genre barrias because their continual Evolution inherent to oral transmission which characterized um and this is especially true for Irish fairy tales which are shown to flow seamlessly from
Myth to Legend to history blending various St telling t fit the definition of an explanatory tales as their stories try to um explain the natural words of Ireland and the origin of Irish and Irish fairy tales are considered particularly original amongst um European folktales and as vassi States
Um Ireland um stands out as a nation that has managed to preserve the most conspicuous and significant traditional patrimony and the strictest relationship with between it and its literary reworking uh F can also be interpreted as narrative tradition that is documenting and conveying um experiential cultural learning as they’ve been molded over centuries
Through reciting and retelling and have hence and I’m quoting Stephen Jones achieved a basic narrative form that is a distillation of Human Experience Eric James uh Aaron James and aric morale highlight or storytelling tradition as an essential medium that relies on physical proximity and engaging is the body in the transmission
And comprehension of narratives and because of this um they’re seen as able to document potentially Dynamic relationship a culture has to specific place or its natural environment overall the transmission and creation of arish f was um overall inherently Open Access open end and bottom up in its early oral
Stages and V carassi also suggest that the pre-christian and Indigenous dimension of Irish Society allowed for a broader range of possibilities and a deeper ction with spiritual and natural aspects of existence and this is contrasted with limitations um of and barriers imposed by colonization and Christianity in the age of modernity the
Oral tradition was weakened significantly um as philosophical movements and modern scientific advances questions speculative experiential and subjective knowledge and the educated Elite sought to establish the ideological and cultural Authority through literary and scientist take discourse and M Sam sites this development as significant for the loss of the harmonious coexistence with
Nature and the individuals capability of free emotional expression in order to examine the concept of webs of reciprocal relationships in the analyzed fairy tale are turned to indigenous theories and nature science this will be a very brief overview because of course this field is huge um and I have to say
At this point as well that there is limited Publications on indigenous theories primarily because many ous peoples have had limited access to International uh research and publication opportunities and this is also uh connected to the hegemonic position of Western science which internationally controls what is considered science um and of course
Colonialism also played a significant role in the repression and destruction of indigenous knowledge and thought um one notable difference between Western science and Native science that I want to draw your attention to is the lack of strict boundaries in um nature science uh while Western tradition separates natural and social sciences very
Strictly um this separation is currently also in Western research um discussed as a hindrance to science and the anthrop scene and I will come back to this later um netive science um emphasizes the observation as a fundamental element that informs knowledge and ways of acting uh the emphasis is on being
Present experiencing perceiving and documenting what’s own knowledge uh and experiences and this approach may lead to a different understanding of human beings and their place in the world with indigenous people typically exhibiting a less hierarchical view of superiority over animal and nature indigenous theories and the underlying cosmologies challenge hierarchical Frameworks and
Promote a more holistic and relational understanding of the world and human nature interactions in it these cosmologies also emphasize the interconnectedness of all beings within an environmental system um which is often called called a web of reciprocal relationships and Kyle white describes this as relatives that have responsibility to support the conditions
Needed for other relatives to practice their roles within a system of relationships that produce important environmental outcomes and this is what we will be looking at um so all actors of fud is able to interact and influence each other and animals and nature receive agency these World Views are
Also clearly visible in indigenous declarations such as theistic Lake de ation of 2009 and these ethics of entanglement as G calls them promoted by indigenous understandings of Nature and education might lead test to understand culture as something nature does in Irish fairy tales the Irish landscape is often
Portrayed as a guardian protecting its resources and upholding Justice D Celtic animism fairy human environmental relations and the motive of the other world to to Fairy Land which is closely tied to Natural spaces and phenomena and which can be interpreted as giving agency to the reciprocity and Inter subjectivity of
Nature make Irish Fair Tales very interesting in this context um agency is also a crucial aspect of environmental storytelling and traditional narrative theories tend to exclude non-human agency um but in the context of econ narratology recognizing the agency of nonhuman and inanimate entities allows for a more compehensive comprehensive analysis of Storytelling
About nature and as I said before I used G Julian SC as potential model which many of you probably know better than I do because I since moved on to a different area but just so that we’re all on the same page there’s basically two schema we have the subject to object
Schema and we have the sender to object to receiver schema and one the subject to object schema um is usually narrative where subject the agent performs an object under the patient or Target um the sender to object to receiver schema focuses on narratives involving the transmission of something from a sender
To receiver which might be um knowledge um a basic object or even more abstract Concepts and the focus of transib and gma’s model which is based on a dualistic world viiew and closely tied to anthropocentric assumptions can be viewed as limiting when trying to move beyond the subject object binary and
Explore the interconnectedness of human and non-human realities and sh narratives and understanding the world because of that considering non-human characters as actants according to prun L actor Network Theory and incorporating this in Grandma’s model can open the way for new analyses and ecology as we will
See in my analysis and I will now give you an overview of my analysis of the tail the S of knowledge and I have to mention that sadly I worked with translated versions of all tales and it’s obviously possible that there’s information symbolism or sistic devices
That have been lost in the process of translation especially since translating originally Irish fairy tales poses a great challenge because of their deep interweaving with language and culture the S of knowledge functions as the origin tale of f the leader of the F which we will hear much more about in a
Moment from the actual expert on this um and um it tells the story of F’s acquisition of the worlds of Tri knowledge which he obtains exponentially when cooking the salmon of knowledge for Meed pinus in the exposition of the tale the salmon of knowledge is introduced as
Living in a still dark pool in the shade of the overhanging Hazel trees it was the result of eating these nuts of these magical trees that the salmon had acquired in knowledge of the world um this contrasts with the limitations of even the wisest human beings as finit is described as knowing
More about the world including the secrets of the birds and animals and plants and stars than any other Mana Ireland while still he did not know everything a prophecy finan relates to F his student states that whoever consumes the salmon will receive this knowledge but it turns out later actually that the
Salmon doesn’t need to be eaten but that the knowledge is already transmitted when Fon touches the fish and because he burns his time takes the fish as he play this this F in his mouth so we have rather a point of contact than an actual eating as mentioned previously the
Opening of the tale introduces the more than human weal as having Secrets the secrets of the birds and animals plants and stars and here we can draw a parallel to the other world a realm of nature Beyond human control or comprehension where the boundaries between the human realm and
The spiritual realm are blurt um and the salmon being a fish is strongly connected to the element of water which is frequently associated with the other world and the Magical hazelnut trees connected to the ground and water by their roots are another connection to the underground ch um in CTIC mythology also the
Hazelnut tree is often associated with wisdom and mystical knowledge and in other versions of the tale the connection to the fairy f is actually um confirmed directly as you can see in this quote the salmon has immense influence on both the human characters in detail as finus moving to the r b
Adapt a big part of his life to catching it and F’s later interaction with the salmon of knowledge has profound impact on his life and Destiny uh F’s connection to the Hazel n which held the knowledge before is also evident in the fact that in later Tales his she is made
From Haz wood without the expansion of prma model using the analysis um of to take could look as follows it’s very simple we have just uh different subjects performing actions on the objects so for example the salmon of knowledge or the knowledge of the world
In this case um we can see that the salmon is considered an object without any agency or influence but using anent and incorporating the salmon as a non-human activ with agency the structure becomes much more complicated and diverse uh we now have for example a situation where previously the S as a
Subject consumes the Hazel M we also have the transmission of the knowledge of the world to rather than just a pure consumption so the salmon actually gives the knowledge of the world as the sender to the receiver of P um but we can even incorporate the Hazel as another nonhuman accent because
Previously as an in inanimate entity transmits the hair knowledge of the world to the salon and now we actually have a chain of acent that doesn’t even include a human actant so the transmitted knowledge links natural animal and human actants and the acquisition possession and transmission of knowledge is identical
For the non-human and the human characters F’s interaction with the seron of knowledge and the profound impact it has on his life signifies the potential for Meaningful connections between human and non-human beings and this also aligns with calic animistic beliefs attributing agency and sentience to elements of the natural world
Including trees rivers and animals and the element of the hazel nut suggests that there is inherent knowledge and wisdom in nature itself um when the tale clearly states as well that the natural world holds secrets and insights and these secrets are shown to be access by those who interact with the nature this
Connects to the native science or indigenous knowledge which as mentioned before centralizes observation and experience the research and knowledge acquisition and the theme of acquiring through multip knowledge through multispecies interactions and entanglement align with the concept of inters species Co Evolution and Donna haro’s concept of becoming with um
According to herway if we appreciate the foolishness of human exceptionalism then we know that becoming is always becoming with even if that is not F’s own intention as he acquires the knowledge accidentally after his interaction with the salon F has changed completely uh and to summarize the Tes
That interactions with the mod human world and knowledge acquired through this interaction can profoundly shave a person uh it furthermore knows um shows that knowledge is notated as something human specific but as something inherent in nature and able to cross species borders and the non-human animals actually portrayed as holding more
Knowledge than one of the wisest humans which opposes human superiority claims in some L tals about F he also is des as placing his thumb in his mouth when he needs to access the knowledge which is firstly quite funny imagine L Warrior Soldier leader sing his th on the
Battlefield but it also shows him returning to this point of multispecies contact when he’s in search for guidance and after this Exemplar analysis I want to present My overall findings from the analyses of the was good some of knowledge and the wi and T and Al one can find certain characteristics that
Are overall classical for the genre PR Tales as for example a strong focus on Morality In FKA the boundaries to other narrative traditions and po are blurred is typical for the Irish fairy tale and characteristics of the explanatory T these fairy tales are especially visible one prominent theme is the openness to
The unknown experience the own subconscious and the interaction with the other and water often associated with the other world and Irish faits plays a significant role in all three narrative symbolizing transformation and fluidity of boundaries in their interaction with the human well characters undergo physical and or metaphysical Transformations and this
Highlights trity and interconnectedness and CH challenges Rich categorization in all Tales the human characters exhibit complex relationships with nature animal and the other world and non-human acons play crucial role in The Narrative they are appreciated as having agency uh and sentience and they influence the events of the stories and the human characters
And the interaction between non-human and human actors shape the narratives um knowledge and memories in the case of the W of itain are shown to be able to cross species borders and multispecies entanglement highlights interconnectedness between the actant and the narrative network uh the Judgment of the well and inanimate act
In Thea for example connects the narrative networks directly to the concept of webs of reciprocal relationships and Indigenous cosmology and suggests a parallel between the actant and the narrative and the relatives connected in this web which hold responsible for other and the environmental outcomes resulting from their actions names also serve as
Powerful symbols that connect characters to the Natural World reinforcing their identities and influencing their interaction and the connection between names knowledge and nature underscores the notion of a profound bond between language cultural identity and the forces of the natural world all three narratives also emphasize the importance
Of Storytelling as a means of preserving cultur Heritage and connecting the past and present the existence of multiple versions of the tales also demonstrate the dynamic nature of all story and the collective authorship pass down through generations these narrative reflect the resilience and resistance of Irish Cultural memory against English Colonial oppression
Oppression of the Irish Language and Cultural dissemination as for example the Celtic atomism and the connection to the are still clearly visible in the narratives especially in the W of the tank as I mentioned before the S structure our fairy tale is the culture of people um according to Columbus Uya
Miss and tales can serve as means of cultural surviving preserving and transmitting indigenous knowledge and values and Wells um historical cultural and cognitive perspectives are very important for understanding fiction and separating it from factual narration so narratives that one group would interpret as fictional can be read as
Factional by another group belonging to a different time or culture and uh it’s possible that Elements which we interpret as fictional today were viewed as rather factual when those narratives originated um the tales also reflect a pre-christian and pre-colonial openness to experience and interpretation um and as typical for
Irish Fair Tale the narratives provide an experience and intuition based reading of the world which can be connected to Native science to conclude selected EMB body a narrative transition that presentent more entertainment they serve as cultural repository preserving and representing indigenous knowledge and cosmology as well as uh concepts of
Nature science theils highlight the interconnectedness of Nature and culture and exhibit networks of ACS that represent webs AC person relationships they clearly display themes of interconnectedness transformation experiential learning with and becoming with the more world and in today’s context they can Inspire and inform ecological thinking um and they can also help us
Um explore and embrace veral relationships with nature as we contemp we navigate contemporary environmental challenges um obviously the results from the analysis are limited to three select fairy tales and for a more conclusive study with more significant results for the overall genre of Irish fairy tales many more Tales would have to be
Analyzed um I find it very interesting in the context of the anthropos in which the naal culture dichotomy is increasingly seen as a hindrance to science um and research on climate change and um I would also be very interested in research on the paril between Irish fairy tales and contemporary aspirations in citizen
Science as well as on the of Irish fairy tales on students views of Nature and culture and modern education especially since the beautiful connection between the T of Kusa and the economic Nobel PE Nobel economic Nobel Prize winner Elena ‘s work on the tragedy of the commons
And I want to finish with a quote from the British myologist Mar chel in his book entangled life which deals with fungi as he says our relationships with microorganisms could not be closer as we learn more about such connections our experience of our own bodies and our
Place in the world changes we are ecosystem that lead boundaries and transcend categories our eye grows out of an intricate web of relationships that we only gradually come to home thank you very I will ince our second speaker be you a senior lecturer and head of the department of Modern Irish and
University College C her research interests include the F cyle the studio of Irish manuscripts and iral poetry she’s stally interested in the F narratives points about F and the piano and has published a number of studies on this topic she’s coer of the G show to
The collection of essays on the F cycle published in 2022 by for course press and is currently working on a monograph on the Poetry fil cycle so I’ll be talking about the fil cycle today and you’ve already got T from julana the story of sumon of of knowledge belongs to that um
Categorization I suppose um but but I briefly explain anyway what what’s meant by the film cycle it’s the body of Laura narish centered on on the figure of the warrior FAL pool and his followers of the f um it’s a very long rich and diverse tradition um it consists of
Written texts and material collected from from or recitation long and short texts poetry Pros proos Metrum which we heard about Katherine’s talk um place name low and and much more so in this talk I want to draw attention again like julana to the F cycle as an excellent
Source for the study of the Irish animal both real and imaginary so fun and his piano spent much of time in natural surroundings interacting with animals both domesticated and wild sometimes they themselves are lik to animals and in some cases the fum cycle seems to reject the absolute division of of human
And and animal scholarship on the fum cycle has much to say about the importance of landscape and the natural world within it but I do think the texts are taking on new residences residences in the 21st century with with our experiences of of living in the anthropy
So I have something to say about that at the end of the paper now the narratives of the FI cycle are obviously fictional although some practitioners and early Scholars did believe that F actually existed apparently um but of course this has implication implications for what they
Tell us about the animal world uh now today my focus would mostly be on imaginary animals but I will mention at this point just out of Interest some work by other Scholars on F cycle which is added to our knowledge of real world human animal interaction so for example
Daman mcmanis of tcd has written an very interesting study on Hunting practices in GIC Ireland drawing extensively on on on on poems and text from cycle so while the texts are obviously Fantastical it appears that they do contain quite detailed information about how hunting practices were were carried out um so
That study was published in the journal Adu in in 2018 I’ll be referencing various works I didn’t put a biblography together of course you’re welcome to email me if if you’re curious about about anything I mention um another person who’s worked in this area is Professor Elizabeth ppatrick of gway and
A geographer she’s looked at Landscapes of the F cycle hunting ground in other areas and has found that the texts and and real landscape do in fact correspond um to a good degree and again a recent study by by um a woman named Sharon arbot um has shown has studied um a f
Cycle poem as a sour for ornithological terminology um upon that contains a long list of of bird names so again we see the both real ecological knowledge inced Within These very fictional poems and that book is that that study is to be found in the book The G I to mentioned
There by Kami so um that’s real world information um so I I return now maybe well place names maybe I’ll say something about place names so F and the F had travel all over Ireland and they appear to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the land and and all the animals that
Inhabit it in my abstract I mentioned the Modern English language poem by Austin Clark the black word of Jerry K it’s quite a well-known for it was on the leaving sech course in Ireland for years so it is strongly influenced by a f cycle poem um that features fum going on
An adventure in Norway when he blackb he deposits it in in the wood of Jerry Ken so we found this pattern of a particular animal Associated for the particular spot in irand elsewhere in the fum cycle so one example is a poem about their the favorite things of fum that gives a long
List I’ll just read out some examples he mentions he loves the warbling of the Blackbird of Le Lee the Belling of the Stag from M the bellowing of the fallone from GL B all and so on so um these places are defined by the presence in them of specific animals and forms F
Seems navigate Ireland through his knowledge of of these animals so I suppose again another example maybe of of of some level of realism as far as we know H these things match up that the placees mentioned do would seem to have had these animals in them at some point
In history although of course lot of the plac It’s Kind be difficult or impossible to identify so that’s real or realish aspects of the cycle now I’m kind of moving more towards imaginary aspects um so a lot of Scholars have the mark of the F on their
Role outside of of human society so in the 1940s Marie Lise suet um discussed them as as Heroes living outside the tribe and Joseph Nash um applied the theory of laly to them in the 1980s that said they not entirely wild f m is typically represented do inhabited the
Hill of Allen and he enjoys feasts and poetry and music so the fruits of civilization I suppose but they do spend a lot of time in the wild interacting with animals and in many ways they’re defined by these animal interactions sometimes they’re associated with Wolves taking on the
Wolf’s role as apex predator um killing deer in their hundreds of millions thousands but elsewhere the hunter Hunty relationship is complicated by human animal Transformations they’re quite common in the world of and I’ll mention some examples so first maybe the biography of oen I think L had a mention
Of this in a a similar maybe Tale in his slides um so Asen is one of the best known characters of the fun cycle he features in the famous story of of TI but but in many other tales as well and poems um so asen’s mother is is one of
These um we have a lot of examples in the cycle of women who transform into deer and vice versa o Sheen’s mother is one of these there are Illusions to this idea of of ain’s mother being a deer in in early text we get the fullest version
In a relatively late form and 18th century lay called the lore and upbringing of Asen so the 18th century is relatively late I suppose for the feud cycle so what happens is the F go out hunting one day and fun um is overcome by desire for a hind um man of
The text specify that this is an enchanted woman and fun father’s a child on this kind SL enchanted woman um the text itself isn’t actually comfort with the situation it’s it’s it’s described as scandalous I suppose understandably but then I I think it becomes more interesting moving on um we learned that
Jim was born of this deer but in human form he was born among the branches and trees and he’s rared for seven years on his dear Mod’s milk and spends a total 21 years living with the wild with his deer it’s only then when he’s discovered
By one of his human kins that he goes back to fun and the f um at first he doesn’t even look like a human being he’s described as a monster or an ogre or a terrible wild Shaggy man um but it’s interesting when the hounds of the
Fena find him they drive away the deer herd and then oen States oh I’m left it without a mother so there seems to be an incompatibility here he can either be with deer or with humans he can’t maybe be with both that said he retains a
Sense of loyalty to his dear Mother and to animals throughout his life there are um other Russ of the tale that describe how aim warrants his mother when she’s in danger of being killed during a hunt so in the context of this conference what does this tell us about animals of
Course as a topic that has already come up is that animal figures often maybe focus more on the human than the animal um and we can see this dear figure as symbolizing the marginalized presence of women in the fun cycle she sort of displaces the human mother that aen
Otherwise would have to have in his biography but that said we also see empathy with animals a recognition of a certain kinship although it doesn’t seem to survive contact with broader Human Society we see um as with the Bears we had yesterday maybe the experience of maternal as having features that are
Shared between human and animal and it has to be said it seems that that that that the dear mother has been quite successful o goes on to have a wonderful um heroic career among F and so forth so that’s one tale um so now I might focus
On some texts where F and the F have interactions with domesticated or captured animals there are so many animal references FS like it’s possible to cover them all I’m focusing on on certain ones I find interesting um so generally they’re happy to hunt kill and eat Wise animals but they’re not always
Comfortable with the idea of capturing or domesticating animals so we see this in the story of fumes favorite hunting dogs gr and skill long they’re treated nearly like human characters they’re able to communicate through their sounds they’re highly intelligent and and they’re deeply loved um so the tale of
How few Aquarius hounds features human animal transformation again with some Echoes of of the tale we already discussed um the version I’m referring to features in an early modern tale day the Feast of the House of K so F’s Aunt H FNA is pregnant and with twins and
She’s turned into a Hound by a jealous love rival um and then she gives birth to two to two puppies uh this forms part of a longer narrative I won’t go into it but the magic is eventually reverse and becomes human again but fun says he
Would rather leave his cousins um in in dark form he if I were their father I would prefer that they remain like that then become human so they remain dogs forever more and turn that goes on to have three other sons and then there’s reference to the sort of combined inter
Species family if you will um the the the the two dogs who have three human brothers or half Brothers maybe so I suppose um we see here that that the usual maybe master of head relationship he doesn’t apply with human at his favorite hounds it’s they’re more like family than friends
Um so the F sort of they’re sort of working with the F rather than sort of serving a purely functional purpose although of course they’re functional as well in that they help out with hunting and so on um then another narrative that I that has what I think is a very
Interesting depiction of captive animals is is a less known one named qu and the Animals it’s found in different sources that focus on one version um a that has been dated to the early 12th century it’s narrated by C Mar one of the main characters again of the F known for his
Swift running um but it’s it’s it’s CLE behaves in a very unhinged and destructive manner in this particular poem something which isn’t typical for him so it’s it’s a narrative poem 29 STS as long and not that long for a few cycle poem as it happens um so it opens
Up C to boting of the Lively play has instigated what is this Lively is just beheaded and then he speaks of his desires he wants to have the langle to waste he wants to inflict weeping on every household in Ireland he was just burn every M and kill in the land so um
As I said this level of violence is is sort of unusual um so his his his his desires here seem to be kind of an attack on what we might call established Society on Domesticity and as we’ll see on on animal husbandry he states that he’s let calves go loose to their go
He’s let the Cales bar and go to their cows and he that L the Swift horses of Ireland so again I wanted to check real life farming practices as a reference and and there is information on this separation of cow and calf in in Fergus Kelly’s book early Irish farming a very
Important book for the study of the Irish anal I would say so in in medieval Ireland CS were taken from their mothers they were only allowed to suckle twice a day um so I suppose we find a real world agricultural practice referenced to here um so C seem to be
Breaking down the normal practices of pharmacies releasing the horses letting the the Cals go back to their mothers as as they probably desire then he goes to the residence of kmak mcart king of Ireland where he Causes Chaos again he sneaks in um and and and tricks everyone and he he gives
The wife of one man to another man and he gives the wife of the king to to another man and all of this sorts of troublemaking um and he he recounts all of this very casually um and then we find out that fil has been made taken
Captive by by K mcart so that’s probably the reason why his Fury um but that said um his response seems to be over the top causing all of suffering for for one kidnapping um so then K SS C to what appears to be an impossible task if he
Wants fun to be set free he needs to provide pairs of animals from all over Ireland and again we find this kind of pairing a place and animal so there’s the long list I’ll just read a couple so um two STS from to Black words from Le to Rens from to
Dohe heads from kif to trks from to Turtle dos from do Ros and so on there’s big of of animal plus PL um so qu under goes his task it’s it’s not easy for him he’s shown the struggling but but he manages it um I think there’s an interesting quadring where he describes
His capturing up the train um and and we feel that maybe he has a certain empathy are feeling for the the animals he’s chasing he States quoting I cut the crane by the neck though she did not like it she came and I brought her with
Me under my control to Ransom so again he seems to feel for this quean who doesn’t maybe enjoy the experience of being captured so the PO ends rather suddenly but it seems that pleas is successful and that f is set free um there is a longer verion that gives us
More information this is actually an got in the 16th century book of the dean of missm something else to consider with a human cyle it also belongs to Scotland and we find Scottish landscapes in there as well so that’s another angle um this verion anyway gives gives a more
Complete ending King kach is cast he’s criticized for his desire to acquire the captured animals the poem reads quote kach had no joy of them to see them gathered side by side so his desire for this sort of menagerie of animals just dep picted something futile something
Silly and then once you is rescued they actually managed to escape and they go back I suppose to their home places so again the whole Quest is is is sort of shown to be be a sort of a fule attempt at Mastery of of wild animals of course
This idea of parents of animals brings the story of Noah’s Arc to to to mind it it was probably an influence que to maybe could be seen or or maybe form up as sort of an anti-oa Gathering animals together not for a good reason but for
For a sort of a Mad reason um but um I I just think it’s interesting because the the are very much outside Society in this particular text and and qu seems to be far more in tune with the animals than with all the humans that that he has sort of treated quite
Badly um again it’s not specified if the pars are breeding animals but but I think that’s poly implied so in this regard it’s it’s it’s worth thinking back to the section where ca squats uh human Partners husbands and wives he’s sort of treating humans here as breeding
Pairs like a farmer might do might do with animals so I I think there’s a deliberate sort of a comparison there um so it’s it’s quite an EXT the F that aren’t usually that violent but but I think it’s interesting how they’re presented as being aligned with animals
Now we don’t know who compos the poem nearly all of the poems are Anonymous whoever they were we can assume that they enjoy the products of Farm and Dairy meat other animal D Goods they were likely happy with the status quo I I don’t think this is a sort of a um
Critique of farming in the social order per se but maybe rather an example of thinking about animals and the artificiality of farming and attempt to see the world through through not through human eyes but through those of creatures whose interests may not always be aligned with ours who have their own
Inherent existence independently of the human world so while it is a disturbing poem and with sort of implications of sexual violence that that the poet’s level of of imagination is impressive so there is sort of thought about animals within this form I believe so again as I
Said there are many more animals in in the field cyle they all over the place but um certainly I would suggest if if you’re interested in putting together a reading list on on the Irish animal the F cycle is worth taking a look at um I put up some text there that are
Reasonbly accessible the translation translations if people are interested um so now I’ll turn briefly to a separate but related issue the way we read these animal texts during the current ecological crisis so F’s world is teaming with animals and wild places that said they’re always thought of having taken place centuries before the
Time of composition so we can’t take them too literally um and of course land has long been an area of contention in Ireland and even medieval Petty Kings didn’t have such free access to land as be and his F let alone people of lower classes so there’s always an element of
Fantasy in in disc control and not really control the sort of freedom to to roam the land um so we have to be critical H we can’t just see these texts that’s representing some long lost Eden that wouldn’t really be satisfactory that said their depiction of a lush
Natural world is striking and beautiful and inspiring and I think it does inspire something of a feeling of Eco anst um uh to the modern reader when when we’re becoming very aware of of the ecological depletion of of of the world and Ireland especially I suppose going
Up we told irand was green but actually it turns out it’s one of the most otally depleted countries in Europe um so it’s literally green but maybe not figuratively green um and even a lot of the Landscapes we prayed with their natural YY have actually been firly
Transformed by by human practices so I’m inspired here especially by P F the Whitt away are in Vanishing nature where he gives a lot of details of different animal species and how they’ve been been depleted over the centuries um again I suppose the sheep that again I suppose
Could be taken as symbol I in this they’re very beloved of our tourist board they’re one thing that’s started out to tourists IR but they do cause a lot of Devastation they prevent um plant growth and so on so maybe they’re not as innocent as us to leave um so again
Specifically with reference to the FI cycle again because there are so many fud cycle Landscapes all over Ireland many of them have have been damaged so this is the hill of Allen as it stands today so you can see it’s quite Bly destroyed one side of us by by this mining
Operation um and again another place where few um goes hunting a lot would be around card on the lakes of kar so where Kar National Park is today so again um it’s not as fun a place that you would think um just to get this to show
Properly um there’s been a lot of of of discussion of of this par in the news recently there are a lot of problems with the invasive species the renderin which is PR preventing the growth of other plants and then there is a problem of of the over reproduction of deer as
Well there are too many deer and and there are a lot of problems with this park as well so it’ be naive to think that that this Wildlife Park represents anything really close to watch what people might have experienced in the past and that we find indirectly
In the fun cycle so um I’m not suggesting we should aim to recreate the Landscapes of f it would be impossible and not necessarily desirable however I do think it’s interesting to read these texts in conjunction with reading our L past present and maybe into the future
Um so George Mambo in his book pering the land sea and human life evokes the sense of the of lot of lots of wilderness he feels in the world world and I think we do find a sense of this buness in the fun cycle indirectly not
To take it too literally but you clearly a lot of the people who compos attex did have a level of experience that probably a few people if any would have today um again another point that that Momo discusses in that book is the idea of the shifting Baseline every generation
Thinks that nature as it was when they were children is is is the correct State and that that an education is is is is a sort of a a loss but maybe they don’t realize that if you went back multiple Generations that the level of depletion
Is a lot greater it’s harder to imagine it’s it’s difficult to imagine these things and so again I think we can get a sense of that reading the film cycle um another writer that brings to mind is the Icelandic ecological writer Andre snare Magnuson he’s written a book on
Time and water where he writes very touchingly again on our need to sort of think on a wider expanse of time not just our generation and our grandparents children grandchildren whatever but but to sort of to see the bigger picture again I I think these older texts can
Can can be part of that process maybe um so yes I think we can get a sense of of wildness through reading texts of the FI and other texts of course and these can Inspire us to ponder what what what could be done in the future do we want
To return some of that to the world how might that be done however it’s it’ll be quite different to what we’ve had in the past but we’re thinking about so to can the F Insite the tals and poems are composed mostly for entertainment really in most cases that would be their
Primary purpose but I do believe that they contain deep thinking about animals um some expressing the AL alter alterity of animals other others exploring interest species commonalities always talk provoking so there are historical philosophical and literary interest um and also in in this time of eological
Crisis we can’t help but relas them to our own increasingly narrow experiences of the natural ual and animal world so in that sense I think they do speak to us louder than ever so perhaps we should all go and listen to the song of Black of J thank you for another
Amazing until half pass for questions without further Ado then the is open questions yes first of all thank you for your great talks all of you um I have the question to all of you but I think to julana and cl julana in particular you mentioned water as kind of
Transformation and also in Europe talk um water Road l and rivers and um people or being living in between um country of um um being outside of water or inside water what role would you say does water play the text you mention go first you want um so I think
Um for me it’s a little B particular because I just focus on one of the three fairy tales now but I think the the role of water is the strongest in I’m struggling so much with this because we actually have the character like um coming in contact with watch so
She’s transformed by a jealous exwife of her lover um from a fair of T to um sometimes a butterfly sometimes a fly which falls into the cup of a woman who drinks it up and then she is actually pregnant with a baby that still has connections to the fairy and
The Butterfly of like being golden hair the butterfly wasn’t like she used to be in general as well and she uh can remember all of her her memories um they come back to her when she’s like confronted by some poetry that that revolves around her and I think there
It’s just clearly she’s like the the water just makes all of those borders between the modern human world which is maybe the fairy world maybe the animal world and maybe the then the human world um it just make them dis here because she’s literally going from one species
To the other while the important things of like the stories the memories and the knowledge they actually stay with her while she’s so I think it’s just very much like the transformation and fluidity uh there and since the water is anyway tied to the underground you know
You you have this connection to the other world yeah that’s what I found as well that actually The Escape of the other worlds fairy wife or the that um other world woman often happens through a well or a lake or the sea often in the mermaid and fisherman type so there
Seems to be the potential of the bodies of water to be portals basically um and then in uh in car’s place um I think especially in the Midlands place there’s this um mat Melissa s who’s a big scholar in onar um speaks of this m mat tral landscape where Watcher serves this
Purpose of um feminizing also the the landscape yeah thank you all three for your papers um and my question kind of picks up on that the Mia line and you showed very convinced this kind of the the web of of references especially also to earlier female figures um in car’s
Place and I wondered actually about the names of the two other um um um fale pist pora and eser both of which are very prominent names also in not necessarily I but POR in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Ven in the letter so I wondered if you know apart from animals
Apart from the Irish whether there’s more or whether this kind of mat line also covers a wider wider even wider web of of references inter refer I think so I um also for my research in Marina cars archive um in international Library uh in Dublin it seems that um
She had this phase of a year at least where she just kept reading on what she considered to be the basic stuff that she needs to know as a playright and I think in the Midland Trilogy that came soon after it’s really clear that she’s full of this material and I think it
Kind of goes away later on where she either writes her own plays or adaptations of like her own like creates completely new narratives or she adapts a specific player specific novel and I think the Midlands plays are these like there are so many different references and certainly Porsche has been linked to
The Merchant of Venice um with the May it’s not sure some people have suggested that it has this um Celtic Chieftain kind of um um element because of the use of the definite article which I don’t know if that’s actually um someone would argue against that that’s something I’ve come
Across um and that she say chap and figure and with u he yeah it’s he friend probably because she’s also an outcast and kind of all both of them being trapped in the the patriar Societies in the different ways again yes thank you uh for the for
The panel and kind of maybe picking up on you I just was um asking you all how much you’re aware of um especially maybe the first two speakers and then I have a a suggestion for but um you know around the turn of the 20th century and I think
Up until current times like women writers in Ireland are trying to kind of make sure that in the you know the kind of the Revival of the fin cycle for nationalist purposes you know around the turn of the century really focused on male Warriors and people like Alice
Milligan and AA G booth and const marovich you know were uh making sure that we didn’t forget about Queen M female warriors and like the Moran who like really was already frustrating the the Warriors in various ways um uh and we see this kind of I think persisting
Into 20th century Irish woman’s writing especially and wondering maybe especially um ulana uh if you’re aware of Al who was she’s trained as a folklorist she has a degree from UCD in folklore uh but she’s a novelist short story writer and she has several collections of short stories where she
Inter weaves and especially focusing on animals into weaves like ancient uh Irish and even sometimes made up Legend into like very contemporary narratives so I mean I suppose that’s more observation anything but I just think it’s interesting you know kind of coming off of what you’re saying about the
Patriarchy um because I would have a suggestion for maybe a possible parallel between the children of L and uh by the B of cats whether it persuades you or not uh because in all those plays one of the themes is intergenerational conflict and and competition between women which
Patriarchy encourages you know I mean you know very very creepy in gap between carage and his mother you know she’s trying to be the bride you know she’s there in her bridal gown at the wedding you know um and of course the children of Lear why they’re made into swamps is
Because their stepmother EA does not want to compete with them so she turns them into swamp so I mean it’s a quite buried parallel but I I I would suggest that maybe that’s a possible way of thinking about it as is informing in some on some level informing the the
Themes maybe even of the whole trilogy I think swans come into yes yeah absolutely I think it it does um tying it to heester through that parallel with Swan it that wasn’t working for me and just SE that that’s not what her relationship with Josie was yeah yeah
About but yeah I I think and that’s interesting with Mrs K yeah yeah but I mean even to an extent um you know Caroline and even his are kind of different Generations really I mean Hester used to babysit oh actually that’s really interesting Caroline and this is all for all the trilogy there’s
This constant like jockeying for position between grandmothers and granddaughters and mothers and daughters like it’s it’s a a thing that runs very powerfully yeah thank you thank you got kind of than you for these shape shifting question I’m always troubled by the this for all of you but I also want
To ask a specific question about the th your great thin contribution so the shape shifters um you know quite often it seems like in the stories like selfies they get sort of trapped on one side right if it seems like the preferable side to be on it’s the human side and
You get your skin confiscated and you can’t go back to the elements it’s always of and it’s a human animal binary that seems like it’s why is the difficulty of being able to go back and forth between right that’s a troubling idea um but I but I was thinking when you were describing
The T cycle that somehow um he doesn’t forget the deer he doesn’t forget the Dear Mother which when I think about um I’m seeing that gilam mesh at in do I don’t know if that’s a bizarre connection to made but um Inu is very happy with the animals he’s get kind of
Commandeered by and lured into Human Society by yoga’s mother and he loses contact and that’s the source of all kinds of tragedy later on in that uh early ancient story so but it seemed to me like in the P Cycle at least there was a a he doesn’t forget what she said
Was he doesn’t forget the mother and so I guess it’s a broader question about the shape shifter right in the role of the shape shifter and um I guess the uh you know maybe one way to think about the shape Shure I’ve heard it described as oh well if you
Want to go back to the animal world then that’s not individuation and that’s not becoming fully human but I think the source of enchantment in the shape shifters is the ability to go back and forth right between the animal and the England so I don’t know if you have any
Thoughts about that that made some sense but it’s just I been thinking about Shape Shifter figures for a while and and wondering yeah it’s it’s very interesting I look into that g much records um yeah it’s it’s well in I mean there’s obviously shape shifting all over Irish literature where there’s so many
Different circumstances but um it’s always sort of um constrain maybe have one shift or two but but not that many it’s it’s right so there’s something there you kind of have to make your choice and um sometimes you have a choice or sometimes your shake shifted and somebody else shifts you
Into yeah so so yeah oen is is kind of a rare character where he seems to to a certain point yeah yeah he sort of overcomes that limitation manages to keep something and um as I said that the the text I was talking about it’s not one of the better known
Ones um but I was it’s interesting to think of B in his wider representation you know he’s he’s also the one who he does have something different he’s the one who survived all the rest of them die and he he goes on to turn the not he
Cooks back he meets St Patrick he has he obviously has something yeah he has this kind of adaptability um so again see you don’t have one biographical tale you have for fil M you have you have sort of well well it’s about a which has a lot
Of his life and childhood with she there’s kind of bits all over the place so I I don’t think we really fully kind of integrated all the L to former picture of this character but I I would sort to think that there’s something fundamental in in that that sort of
Childhood he had in in the wild yeah and again yeah yeah that baby needs to be looked at more that that sort of makes him gives him some sort of I don’t know flexibility or durability that that that that he can kind of go through all these
Different shifts and sort of still come out you know and he’s the one who preserves all the door as well so the idea is that he’s telling St Patrick about the fear if it wasn’t for him it would be G he’s really the one who creates it in in a sense you know
So but but it all comes from a deer so there’s something there maybe if I can just come in on that I think I I for me that because there was some ship ship shifting in the meloine Legends with the mermaid for sure and um when she doesn’t have her
Her tail or her comb is taken away by the husband then she she can’t shap ship but even in the other ones where she uh is there voluntarily so there’s no item um stealing um it seems to be the children and the and the and the partner
That are kind of keeping her in this world and when she decides to or has to return she’s confronted with the uh question of what to do with the children and how to take them with her and that’s usually the the issue with the doubt stones for example version um leading to
The children being transformed into rocks on the shore and and and her escaping alone for example you very much I’ve been told some of you have friends to C on time so thank you so much for a wonderful in session and think we can go on well right or