The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends Read Online Free PDF Page B

gates, such as Ludgate.
    More important, to the argument of the river’s site for votive offerings, is Billingsgate on the River Thames. The Saxons, when they arrived, recorded it as Bilesgata, the gate of
Bíle. The Celts originally regarded Bíle as the sacred oak, Danu’s consort, and he, in time, became the god who took the souls on their journey from this world to the
Otherworld.
    Celts often deposited their dead in the sacred river, as do the Hindus in the Ganges, and would escort the dead on their journey to the Otherworld through Bíle’s gate into the
“dark river” at the end of which was their rebirth. Death always came before rebirth, hence darkness before light, in both Celtic and Hindu religions. Hence the Celts counted time by
the night followed by the day, and their new year was at the Samhain (approximating to the night of October 31 and day of November 1). So the new year started with the dark period.
    Among the votive pieces in the Walbrook, there was found a pipe-clay statuette of a female Celtic goddess. Could this have been of Danu, “the divine waters”, herself?
    How did Walbrook receive its name from the Anglo-Saxons, and does it have anything to do with that point of the river as the place where most votive offerings have been found? The original
Celtic inhabitants of London were obviously loath to leave this sacred spot and clung there even after the Anglo-Saxon conquest. They remained long enough for the Anglo-Saxons to designate the
brook as Weala-broc, the brook of the foreigners – i.e. Welisc (Welsh), or foreigners, that being the name the Anglo-Saxons gave to the indigenous Britons.
    Celtic mythology is essentially a heroic one but while the Irish stories belong to a more ancient “Heroic Age”, the Welsh stories have received the gloss of a more medieval courtly
quality. The deities in Celtic myth tend to be the ancestors of the people rather than their creators, a point that Julius Caesar observed and commented on; these deities, as well as the human
heroes and heroines, are no mere physical beauties with empty heads. Their intellectual attributes have to equal their physical capabilities. They are all totally humanand
subject to all the natural virtues and vices. No sin is exempt from practice by the gods or humans.
    In the later folklore, when the deities were being relegated into fairies or evil Otherworld folk, as Christianity grew more dictatorial in its judgment of ancient customs and beliefs, the
heroes and heroines had to pit their wits more often than their brawn against the “evil magic” of such creatures. Often, when trying to escape a prophesied fate, they would simply bring
that fate upon themselves.
    Sometimes, impossible quests were fulfilled in the most impossible ways. The natural and the possible is often discarded for the supernatural and the impossible. The elements of fantasy, cosmic
horror and the supernatural form an indispensable ingredient in the earliest folklore of the Celts. This has ever been a strong tradition, even among more modern generations of Celtic writers, who
seem to have inherited the old ability to present breaks in natural laws as vivid and realistic.
    However, when all the analysis is written and pondered over, when all the background is considered and digested, it is to the stories that we must turn and we should never forget that they were
told for entertainment: that they were meant to be enjoyed as well as learnt from. Above all, we should not forget that a sense of mischievous fun is never far from the surface.

Before the beginning . . .

1 The Ever-Living Ones
    I t was the time of primal chaos: a time when the Earth was new and undefined. Arid deserts and black bubbling volcanoes, covered by swirling clouds
of gases, scarred the grim visage of the newborn world. It was, as yet, the time of the great void.
    Then into that oblivion, from the dull, dark heavens, there came a trickle of water. First one drop, then