By the Gods!
RSSPosts tagged with "myth"
The Children of Lir
An Irish Legend
There once was a man called Lir, who was happily married with three children. The eldest a girl and the two youngest boys. He loved his family with all his heart until one day, his wife passed away. Horrified at the thought of his children living without a mother, Lir married a beautiful woman named Aoife.
Aoife was terribly jealous of her new husband’s love for his children as he adored them far more than he did her. Consumed by jealousy, she ordered one of the servants to kill the children. When he refused, she used her magic instead to turn them into swans.
The children were doomed to wander until the spell could be broken if they were blessed by a monk. To stay together, their father fashioned a gold chain to fit around all three of their necks so they would not be tossed apart on the raging waters. They spent 300 years on Lough Derravaragh, 300 years in the Sea of Moyle and 300 years in Irrus Domnann Erris.
Eventually, the swans were found by monks belonging to a monastery on an island. They blessed the swans and they changed back into humans, but being 900 years old, they were withered and ancient. They three were buried together, the gold chain still linking their necks.
——-
Thanks for the great submission! To submit your own post to By the Gods, click here! For more info on celtic myth, check out our store to get the proper tomes!
The Cŵn Annwn, found in ancient Welsh folklore, were spectral hounds thought to be associated the Annwn, the Otherworld of Welsh folklore. Annwn was, unlike most modern Otherworld myths, a land of delights and eternal youth beyond the imagination of mortal man.
The hounds were supposed to hunt only on specific nights of the year, roaming the Welsh countryside in packs. It was said that the hounds were louder at a distance, their growling and howling fading as the neared their target. At the moment they were no longer audible, it was said that your death was a certainty.
(I would humbly suggest to the reader that they make no attempt to pronounce the Welsh words here. It’s just embarrassing for everyone involved.)
—-
Thanks for the submission! If you want your article up on By the Gods, submit it here! For further reading on Welsh mythology, check this out!
The Churning of the Ocean
In Indian mythology, the demons were older than their half-brothers, the Gods.
The Gods and the Demons knew that they could gain the Amrit, the Water of Life, if they churned up one of the seven oceans that, ring beyond ring, encircles the worlds. They came down to the Ocean of Milk. They took the Mountain Mandara for a churning-pole and the hundred-headed serpent Vasuki for a churning-rope.
For a thousand years the Gods and the demons churned the Ocean of Milk. All the time Vasuki, the serpent, from his hundred heads spat venom. The venom bit into the rocks and broke them up; it flowed down, destroying the worlds of Gods and men. Then all creation would have been destroyed in that flood of venom if it had not been for the act of Shiva
Shiva took up the venom in a cup and drank it. His throat became blue with that draught of bitterness.
Still they churned.
And then there appeared the sage Dhanvantri, and in his hands was the cup that held the Amrit, the Water of Life. The demons strove to seize it. They almost overpowered the Gods in their efforts to seize the Amrit. Then Vishnu changed himself into a ravishing form; he seemed to be the loveliest of the nymphs of Heaven. The demons went towards where the seeming nymph postured for them. Even as they fought amongst each other for the maiden, the Gods took the cup, and, sharing it, they drank the Amrit.
And now they were filled with such vigour that the demons could not overpower them. Many they drove down into hell. That was the beginning of the wars between the Gods and the Demons…wars that went on for ages.
————-
Thanks for the submission! If you want to write up an article of your own, submit it here!
The Salmon of Knowledge - An Irish Legend
A young lad named Fionn (pronounced Fyun) was a promising youth. After his father died, his mother brought him to a poet named Finnegas to learn all he could so that in time, he could join the Fianna. The Fianna was a band of Irish warriors. But in order to join, a man needed to have wisdom and a wide knowledge of poetry, art and history.
Finnegas taught Fionn all he knew and the lad grew to be a fine young man. One thing that Finnegas talked about often was the myth of the salmon of knowledge. The salmon of knowledge was a fish that swam through the rivers of Ireland, the myth went that anyone who ate the salmon would gain all the wisdom of the world. Finnegas often sat by the river outside the hut where he and Fionn lived, fishing in hope to catch the salmon.
One day, Fionn heard Finnegas calling him from outside, running to the river, he saw that Finnegas had caught none other than the salmon of knowledge! Finnegas instructed the boy to cook it for him to eat, but warned him not to taste the fish at all, or he would gain the wisdom. Fionn did as he was told and began cooking the fish over a crude fire. he watched it carefully so as not to burn it. Suddenly, a bubble rose on the fish’s skin. Reaching out, Fionn burst it with his thumb. The bubble popped and burned his finger. Instinctively, Fionn stuck his thumb in his mouth and sucked it to soothe the burn.
When Finnegas saw what the boy had done, he grew very sad that he would never gain all the wisdom of the world, but was cheered at the thoguht that Fionn would be the greatest warrior the Fianna had ever known.
Fionn grew to be the leader of the Fianna. It is said that they sleep in a cave beneath Dublin and will rise when Ireland is in his greatest need. Their coming will be alerted by the sound of his hunting horn.
——-
Thanks for the submission! We can always use more Celtic mythology on here!
The Wendigo
The Wendigo is a malevolent, cannibalistic spirit from Algonquian mythology that has been popping up more and more in popular culture (the X-men canon of all places), so here is what you readers need to know to stay safe.
The Wendigo is depicted as an enormous creature with an insatiable appetite for man-flesh. It most often appears in First Nations mythology in the Northern United States and parts of Canada, ever-seeking its next meal. The beast represents famine, starvation, and the cold, so is most often seen as emaciated or skeletal in appearance, with an ash coloured hide. To really drive the point home on how unpleasant this thing is, it gives off a constant odour of decay, death, and corruption.
The worst part, however, is that the Wendigo spirit isn’t just a roaming physical form looking to gobble you up; people who have indulged in cannibalism are susceptible to Wendigo-possession. Scientists speculate that the experience varies from “horrifying” to “really really spooky.” So the next time you’re at a party and a plate of people-pops is passed around, remember: just say no, else Wen-di-go.
Beowulf Vs. the Dragon
Beowulf’s next big fight takes place fifty years after he’s uprooted the Grendel family tree, and our favourite Anglo-Saxon-Written-Swede has returned home and become king of the Geats in his own land. Everything is going great for him until a slave steals a shiny goblet from the lair of a local unnamed dragon. For those of you who don’t have much experience with dragons, here’s a general tip to avoid incurring their fiery wrath: Don’t steal their sh*t.
The dragon (predictably) flips out after finding his treasure hoard invaded, and sets fire to the countryside. A significantly older Beowulf gathers his men to once more slay a monster for the good of his people, and as usual he asks his soldiers to stay back so that he might further increase his fame and renown (a lifetime of slaying “un-killable” monsters does that to one’s ego).
This time, however, Beowulf finds himself outmatched by the dragon and desperately defends himself with a rapidly-melting shield, thanks to the dragon’s fire. Seeing their lord in dire need, most of his soldiers heroically retreat to the woods, but one man, Wiglaf, remembers his oaths and rushes to his king’s aid.
Beowulf has recurring trouble with swords; he is described as simply too strong to use them properly, and his super manly grip breaks the blade uselessly on the dragon’s scaly hide. Luckily, Wiglaf doesn’t have this problem and is able to stab into the beast’s belly, thus bleeding out the fire that had been roasting his lord. This allowed Beowulf get good and close to the dread lizard and stab it in the face (for some reason, his dagger isn’t susceptible to his sword-breaking problem).
The two are victorious, but not without cost: Beowulf’s armour could not withstand the power of the dragon and he lay mortally wounded in Wiglaf’s arms. Beowulf reassures his distressed thane, tells him to have courage in the coming days, and then dies like a champ. He is buried with all the treasures of the dragon’s hoard, and is laid to rest at what scholars suspect is now the barrow of Skalunda. Beowulf is remembered as “most gracious and fair-minded, kindest to his people and keenest to win fame.” Rest in Peace, you magnificent bastard.
Beowulf vs. Grendel’s Mother
The celebration of Beowulf’s victory against Grendel was like an Anglo-Saxon rock star: it partied incredibly hard and died young.
The very next night, after Hrothgar’s people and Beowulf’s thanes went to sleep in Herot, Grendel’s mother crept in and slaughtered a good portion of the partygoers. After all the rewards that had been heaped on Beowulf for slaying Grendel, he felt obligated to help Hrothgar again, and in the morning everyone who could hold a sword set out to track Grendel’s mother to her lair.
Beowulf and the Geats and Hrothgar and his Danes followed her tracks to the water, frothing red with blood, and filled to the brim with monsters. Hrothgar himself shot and killed one aquatic-beast with an arrow, but no one was especially eager to follow Grendel’s mother into her wet home. Luckily, “bloody and full of monsters” is exactly how Beowulf gets his bath-time on. In he jumped, thrashing about with an ancestral sword lent him by one of Hrothgar’s men. His armour protected him from the claws and tusks of the sea-beasts, but once Grendel’s mother grappled him and dragged him into her own monstrous hall the game changed entirely; the gifted sword broke against her magic hide, and she hit him hard enough to send the hero sprawling.
From his new vantage point on the ground, Beowulf spotted a magic sword among the hoarded treasure splayed around the hall. Lose one enchanted blade, find another; the universe never closes a door without opening a window, I guess. It was an ancient sword of the Eotens (giants) that Beowulf managed to lift with his vast strength, and in one mighty swing he finished the fight by decapitating his foe. His blade melted like ice under her corrupted blood, so Beowulf returned victorious with her head as his only trophy. In fact, it was a two-for-one head sale that day: the corpse of Grendel had been displayed by the late Grendel’s Mom in her cavernous abode as an attempt to brighten up the place, and it was just begging to have its head removed.
So finally, up comes Beowulf after nine hours to at last celebrate his victory and the safety of the Danes. There aren’t words in the English language to accurately describe how much mead was consumed that night, but most scholars estimate is was close to “a buttload.”
Sango
Alright, let me level with you here: when it comes to the mythic structure of the Yoruba religion (the Yoruba being one of the largest ethnic group in West Africa), I’m not exactly in my comfort zone. I’m familiar with the concepts, but the specifics are new for me, as I’d imagine they’d be for many of you. That said, we’re setting on the proverbial goldmine of interesting info, so let’s dive in by talking about Sango, the god of thunder and lightning, and the progenitor of the Yorubas themselves.
Sango (also Shango) has a variety of stories floating around about between different cultural groups, and it’s difficult to hammer down any consistency in the myths, but there was definitely somethin’ going on with those wives of his, Oba, Oshun, and Oya. Sango had three wives and three families, who in some stories he lived with at the same time in the same compound, thus creating the first Full House scenario centuries before it would be popularized and perfected by Saget and Stamos.
In one of the Yoruba stories, Sango is trying to get rid of his powerful and ambitious generals, Timi and Gbonka, by pitting them against each other. Each of them wields the power of fire, and after what can only be an incredible elemental battle (á la Avatar: Last Airbender, probably) Timi is slain. Gbonka then asks to be burned alive, and is reduced to ashes. However, three days after his death, he is resurrected (alert: be aware of diffusion and popular mythological facets being borrowed and reused between cultures!). His resurrection shames Sango, who then leaves town and takes his own life, supposedly. It was the hope and belief of the Yoruba, however, that he did not truly kill himself, but instead left to watch over the people from on high. The followers of Sango would kill any who claimed that the god had taken his own life with the lightning they had been allowed to wield by their now-gone lord.
In Haitian Vodou, Sango is seen as a more powerful god of thunder and lightning, but the Yoruba stories venerate him as a legendary, mostly-human founder of their line, and attribute fewer omniscient qualities to him, instead seeing him as a holy ancestor. As we’ve seen before, it’s only natural for a degree of deification to filter its way into veneration in polytheistic and/or natural religions. Hey, when I think about my great-great-grandfather, you’d better believe he’s shooting fire from his fingers and riding a manta ray through the sky.
Enoch and the Watchers: Part Two
Even though the Watchers, with their angelic know-how, taught their human charges a great deal–-they showed them how to make weapons, cosmetics, mirrors, and to use sorcery—God couldn’t abide the existence of the Nephilim, fruit of those who’d betrayed his trust and fled from his service. Semyaza, the leader of the Watchers, earned a great deal of God’s wrath by being the principal tutor of humanity in ways that were beyond them at the time, and by inciting the Watchers to rebel in the first place.
God decided that the Watchers and the Nephilim had to be taken care of. With his buddy, Enoch, acting as chief administrator, he organized a worldwide flood, that would end all life on Earth, thus washing clean the perceived stain of the Nephilim with the rest of humanity. This was put into effect in the time of Noah, the great-grandson of Enoch, and from there the familiar deluge story of Genesis would kick in.
It’s a sad story, in a lot of ways. The great crime of the Watchers was caring too deeply for the humans, those they were charged to care for. The book sets the familiar tone of raising the idea of humanity, with all its faults, as the greatest gift that heaven could bestow; even the immortal, ancient, powerful angels envied the lives of humans, and for that envy, their children were washed away, and the Watchers themselves were bound in the valleys of the earth, to wait there until Judgment Day.
Enoch and the Watchers: Part One
Christian/Jewish scripture rarely maintains a consensus, and when it comes to angels, everything’s up in the air. When we talk about the Watchers, we’re delving deep into Christian and Jewish apocrypha— specifically, the Book of Enoch. The writings attributed to Enoch were seen as real scripture by many Christian authorities writing in the first and second centuries CE, and may have been similarly important to Jewish groups about this time. However, the Book of Enoch was removed from canon in the years to come, except for in the Ethiopian Christian Church, where it remained a fundamental part of scripture.
Now, Enoch was the great-grandfather of Noah, and was elected by God as his all-around favourite guy, and was essentially named “greatest dude on the planet.” He was plucked from the mortal world, and raised to the level of Metatron: in some canon, he is seen as the voice of god, and was “promoted” to angelhood. He was also seen as the inventor of reading and writing, and was in charge of doing all of the big guy’s dirty work on Earth— like dealing with those pesky rebel Watchers.
The Watchers, y’see, were a group of angels who had been charged with watching over humanity. They just watched a little too closely, if you catch my meaning; they became deeply enamoured with the lives of men, and with the lovely wiggle ‘n shake of human women. They gave up their duties, descended down to Earth, and began to procreate with undoubtedly surprised people. The result of this interesting and as yet unseen union were the Nephilim— in the book of Genesis, they were described as “warriors of renown,” which you’d expect from Angelic stock. In the Book of Enoch, however, they were giants that would bring ruin on the world, and were the cause of everything bad.
About By the Gods!
