What does someone mean when they say

[SpiritWarrior]

I love the Odysseus one too. [img]smile.gif[/img] My favourite myth of all time is Tír na nÓg, but it's Irish in origin, one which I heard time and time again growing up.

[SpiritWarrior]

Actually I just found it hehe, didn't even think I still had this. I hope you don't mind me sharing it with you. Used to hear this when I was a kid and I still like it alot [img]smile.gif[/img] .


The Story of Oísín & Tír na nÓg

There was once in Ireland a band of brave heroes called the Fianna, and it is known that the leader of the Fianna, Fionn MacCumhail, had a son named Oisin who was also a member of the Fianna. The Fianna were fierce in battle and sweet tongued, warrior poets in every sense of the word, and Oisin was no different. He was also very handsome as well, with curly blonde hair, aspired after by women.

One day the men of the Fianna were out hunting by the ocean when Fionn spotted something moving rapidly across the waves. The men of the Fianna thought it was an invader and began to ready themselves for a fight. As the object drew closer, however, the Fianna could only stand by in awe for what they saw was a beautiful woman riding a white horse that was galloping over the waves, tassles of her golden hair blowing in the wind.

The horse leapt ashore with the maiden, and the men knew her to be one of the Sidhe. She introduced herself as Niamh of the Golden Hair, daughter of Manannan Mac Lir, god of the sea. Fionn asked to her if she was married, for he (and the other members of the Fianna) were entranced by her magic beauty.

"No", she said simply, fixing her green eyes on Oisin. She did not have a husband at Tir na nOg. Fionn asked no more, for he saw that his son had already fallen in love with the fairy woman. And so Niamh of the Golden Hair offered her hand to Oisin, who took it willingly and wordlessly, and pulled him up into the saddle behind her.

The Fianna watched as the couple rode over the water, toward the West, toward the land of Tir na NOg. And it was in Tir na nOg that Niamh took Oisin for her husband, and they had three children together, two boys and a girl. And so they spent three years together in a land that knew neither time or fear, pain nor sorrow. Oisin had not aged at all. You see Tir na NOg was a magical place unknown to man, where time worked differently than it did in the mortal lands.

So 3 years passed but gradually Oisin began to grow restless. He missed his father and the other members of the Fianna, and he asked Niamh to send him back for a time, only for a short visit. Niamh knew Oisin's will to be strong, and so she sadly agreed, and called to her the selfsame white horse that had carried them away from the world of men.

When Oisin was seated she looked into his eyes and told him he mst be very careful, and no matter what happened he was never to set foot on the earth, the soil of Ireland. Oisin promised her he would not, and assured her that he would be at her side again soon, before galloping off towards the east. As Niamh watched him go, she wept bitterly, fearing she would never see her beloved husband again.

When Oisin reached Ireland, he went directly to Dun Aileann where the Fianna camped when they weren't fighting or hunting. But the path he knew was grown over with weeds, and when he reached the Dun itself the roof had fallen in and the walls were crumbling.

Puzzled, Oisin turned his horse toward Glenasmole, a favored hunting ground of the Fianna. On his way there, he met three men trying to move a large rock. They were small and frail looking to Oisin, not giant men such as the Fianna.

Oisin pulled his horse alongside the men and asked them had they heard any news of his father Fionn, and the Fianna? The men exchanged glances,looking at the massive stranger on the beautiful horse, and finally one of the men stepped forward. He remembered hearing children's stories about a band of monsters called the Fianna who stole children away from their beds at night.

These stories were just that - stories - told to frighten children. Everyone knew that there was never a man alive called Fionn, never a group called the Fianna. Oisin was shocked, and reproached the men for speaking such lies. He was Oisin, son of Finn, leader of the Fianna - who were men, not monsters! - and as for the rock any one of the Fianna, himself included, could heft it with one hand and throw it into the next glen from where they stood, for such was the might of his kind.

The men laughed mockingly at Oisin, and told him to try his luck and show them if he really was one of the Fianna. Oisin, very angry at this point, leaned down from the saddle and lifted the rock up high to throw it, but as he did so, the saddle broke and he fell to the ground. The moment his flesh touched the earth he transformed and became an ancient, blind old man.

Though he had spent only three years at Tir na nOg, for every year that passed there, one hundred had passed in the world of men. Oisin was rapidly showing his full age, and the white horse that had carried him turned away, almost sadly, knowing that Oisin could never again set foot in the land of eternal youth, and galloped of into the west.

Oisin lived out the rest of his days in this house of St. Patrick, tending herds and caring for the fields, but he missed the Fianna and his wife Niamh sorely.

Often he thought he could see Tir na nOg in the distance, just over the horizen, green and lush just like the day he had left it and once he thought he saw an image on the ocean, a vision of a woman with golden hair riding a great white horse. But for Oisin, Tir na nOg would always be just over the horizen. Finally Oisin died, and went to join the rest of the Fianna, gone so long before him.

[ 06-26-2003, 05:32 PM: Message edited by: SpiritWarrior ]