Silver Branch
Part of a series on |
Celtic mythologies |
---|
The Silver Branch or Silver Bough (Irish: An Craobh Airgid) is a symbol found in Irish mythology and literature.
Featured in the Irish poem The Voyage of Bran and the narrative Cormac's Adventure in the Land of Promise, it represents entry into the Celtic Otherworld or Tír na nÓg.
Literary examples
Voyage of Bran
In
The land of the branch turned out to be some sort of "Otherworld", for even though Bran and his crew believed they tarried at the Land of Women for a year, it turned out to be many years, even centuries, so that when they approached Ireland, they learned that they had become ancient history, and a member who tried to set foot on land turned into ashes.[8][9]
Eleanor Hull wrote a paper drawing parallel between this silver branch and the golden bough of Roman legend which was required for entry into the Underworld (Pluto).[10] In like manner, the branch (silver or otherwise) is an object given to a human invited by a denizen of the Otherworld to visit his/her realm, offering "a clue binding the desired one to enter".[11] One of the paralleling examples was the branch seen by Bran.[12]
Though not a genuine
Cormac's adventure
A magical silver branch with three
In a variant text under the title "How Cormac mac Airt Got his Branch",
Here, the branch possessed the additional ability make people forget their woes.
Dialogue of the Two Sages
Also, in
In popular culture
- The Silver Bough is a work on Celtic folklore by Florence Marian McNeill, a Scottish folklorist.
- The Silver Branch is the title of the second book in Rosemary Sutcliff's children's book series The Roman Britain Trilogy.[26]
- The Silver Bough is also the title of a 1948 novel by Scottish novelist Neil M. Gunn. He references frequently the Silver Bough song sung by the protagonist's landlady and the protagonist has a musical silver bough with gold apples crafted for the landlady's granddaughter
- The Silver Branch documentary (Katrina Costello) is a celebration of the people and place of the mythical landscape of the Burren. The protagonist (Patrick McCormack) references the Silver Branch myth, in his search for unity, in being part of nature and letting nature work on us to find our place in the world.
Explanatory notes
- ^ Kuno Meyer who edited the text merely footnoted the gloss in the manuscript ".i. nomen regionis", which imparts no further information beyond this being a place name,[4] and noting that the variant Emne in the text is the nominative form.[5]
- ^ Emain Ablach is one of the names of Manannán's dominion in Altram Tige Dá Medar: "Manannan’s house at Emain Ablach"Emain Ablach".[7]
- ^ This tale exists in several manuscripts of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; i. e. Book of Ballymote, and Yellow Book of Lecan, as edited and translated by Stokes, in Irische Texts, III. i. 183–229; cf. Voy. of Bran, i. 190 ff.; cf. Le Cycle Myth. Irl., pp. 326–33.
- ^ Irish: Fághail Chraoibhe Cormai, cross-referenced to (equated with) Echtra Cormaic.[15]
- ^ The manuscript source is unclear for this variant edited and translated by O'Grady's and published by the Ossianic Society.
- ^ Jacob's version is a condensation of the O'Grady translation.[17] Lady Gregory describes Manannán's gift as a "shining branch having nine apples of red gold."[18]
- ^ Among the early ecclesiastical manuscripts of the so-called Prophecies.
References
- ^ Meyer, Kuno, ed. (1895), Voyage of Bran, vol. 1, London: D. Nutt,¶2-31 (3–30 are quatrain strophes). pp. 1–17
- ^ Meyer (1895) ed., "Voyage of Bran" ¶62. pp. 30–31
- ^ Cook, Arthur Bernard (1906), "The European Sky-God V. The Celts (continued)", Folk-lore, 28, London: 144–145
- ^ Meyer (1895) ed., "Voyage of Bran" ¶2–3, 10 and notes. 4–7.
- ^ Meyer (1895) ed., "Voyage of Bran" ¶19 and notes. pp. 10–11
- ^ "Emain Ablach", Mackillop (1998) ed., Oxford Dictionary of Celtic Mythology.
- S2CID 202046305; re-edited/re-titled as "The Fosterage of the House of the Two Pails" via CTC.
- ^ Meyer (1895) ed., "Voyage of Bran" ¶62–65, pp. 30–33
- ^ Nutt, Alfred "Summary of Bran's Presentment of the Happy Otherworld", "The Happy Otherworld in the Mythico-Romantic Literature of the Irish." Voyage of Bran 1 1421–43
- ^ Hull (1901), p. 431.
- ^ Hull (1901), p. 435.
- ^ Hull (1901), p. 436.
- ^ Gregory, Augusta, Lady (1911). "The Silver Branch and the Golden Bough". The Fairy-faith in Celtic countries. London, New York: H. Frowde. pp. 336–337.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Stokes, Whitley, ed. (1891), "Echtra Cormaic i Tir Tairngiri ocus Ceart Claidib Cormaic"[The Tale of the Ordeals, Cormac’s Adventure in the Land of Promise, and the Decision as to Cormac’s Sword], Irische Texte, vol. 3, S. Hirzel, pp. 185–202 (text); 203–221 (translation); 222–229 (notes)
- JSTOR 20521320
- ^ a b O'Grady, Standish Hayes, ed. (1857), "Faghail Craoibhe Chormaic mhic Airt" [How Cormac mac Airt Got his Branch], Toruigheacht Dhiarmuda Agus Ghrainne, Or The Pursuit After Diarmuid O'Duibhne and Grainne, the Daughter of Cormac Mac Airt, King of Ireland in the Third Century, Transactions of the Ossianic Society 3, pp. 212–229
- ^ Jacobs, Joseph, ed. (1894). How Cormac Mac Art went to Faery. Illustrated by John D. Batten. London: David Nutt. pp. 204–209, notes p. 233.
{{cite book}}
:|work=
ignored (help) - ^ Gregory, Augusta, Lady (1905). "Chapter XI. His Three Calls to Cormac". Gods and Fighting Men. Illustrated by John D. Batten. London: John Murray. pp. 115–121.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ O'Curry, Eugene (1873). "Lecture XXXIV The Musical Branch". On the Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish. Vol. 3. Williams and Norgate. pp. 316–317.
- ^ The branch also has the property that "no sorrow or depression could rest upon the person who heard it" in the Book of Fermoy version of "The Finding of Cormac's Branch".[19]
- ^ Schoepperel, Gertrude (1913). Tristan and Isolt : A Study of the Sources of the Romance. Frankfurt am Main: J. Baer. pp. 324–325.
- ^ O'Curry (1873) "XXXIV The Musical Branch mentioned in the tale of the 'Dialogue of the Two Sages'". p. 316.
- ^ Hull (1901), p. 440.
- ^ Cf. Hull (1901), pp. 439–40.
- ^ The Colloquy of the Two Sages. ed. and trans. by Whitley Stokes. Paris: Librairie Emile Bouillon, 1905. – http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/colloquy.html#4
- ^ The Silver Branch (The Roman Britain Trilogy) - https://www.amazon.com/dp/0312644310
- Bibliography
- JSTOR 1253964
- MacKillop, James (1998) Dictionary of Celtic Mythology, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 21 "apple", 205 "Fand", 270 "Imram Brain", 322–3 "Manannán mac Lir", 346 "Niam (3)", 359–60 "Otherworld". ISBN 0-19-280120-1.