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9/6/20264 min read
The tale Cas Ó Cein is a reminder of the importance of the oral tradition in Gaelic literature. Only one manuscript text of the tale survives, and it's little more than a garbled summary, written in County Cavan, Ireland in 1484m and it’s been suggested that it's really just a crib sheet from someone who heard the tale told and wanted to remember the plot. At any rate, another copy was made in 1671, in county Mayo. Then the tale disappears from view, until the 19th century.
The version that's translated here was collected in 1870, from Lachlainn Mac Neill, a shoemaker on the island of Islay in the southwestern Highlands of Scotland. There are other oral versions from both Scotland and Ireland, reminders of a once flourishing tradition that's since disappeared.
Here is a translation of the first little bit.
There was a king in Ireland long ago. He was a just man and a good king, and the people of his kingdom were very fond of him. But for all that, he wasn't happy. None of the children that were born to him ever lived, and it seemed as if he was fated to die without ever having had children.
He asked the nobles of the kingdom for advice, in the hope that they could give him some explanation of why his children were dying. But none of the advice or the explanations that he got made any difference.
There was a wise old man who'd been with the king's father since he was a young man. He went to the king and said: "I'm sorry to see you so unhappy, and I'm sorry about the cause of it, as well. I'm going to give you some advice now. If you have a child again, put him out to nurse far from here, and don't even think of him again. Leave him there until he's nineteen years old, and then send for him. If he's alive, fine and good. If he isn't, well, then you won't feel as much pain, since you won't have seen him in the meantime."
It happened that the queen became pregnant again. When she gave birth, what did she have but a boy?
The king sent for the old man who'd given him the advice, and told him that he was thinking of doing what he'd suggested. They searched for a nurse for the child, far away from the king's court. But because the king's children had always died before, people were afraid to take the young prince, for fear that he would die too.
In the end, they found an old man and woman named O Croileagan, who didn't have a family of their own. The two of them came to fetch the prince, and when they did, they got a lot of gold and silver too, and everything else they might need. They were forbidden to tell anyone else who the child was, or even to suggest to anyone that he wasn't their own child--until he was nineteen years old. If he was still alive then, they were to bring him back to his father's court, and show the signs that would prove he was the king's son.
They took the child. When he wasn't growing in the day, he was growing at night, and it looked as if he'd be a fine lad. His foster-father and mother loved him as much as if he'd been their own, and twenty times more. O Croileagan was only a poor man living in a turf bothy, so the people around him was amazed at the fine education and upbringing he gave the lad, who they thought was his own son. When the boy became old enough, he learned all the skills he'd need for the battlefield. He was a wonderful and able boy, and so it continued until he was almost nineteen. His foster-mother died then, and there was only him and his foster-father left.
On the day he was nineteen, his foster-father said to him; "It's time for me to let you go home to your own place now. I've fulfilled the contract, and you're no longer mine."
The lad just stared at him, with no idea what to say.
"Oh, father, who am I? Who are my people?" he said after a while. "I thought I was yours, and I've never wanted to leave you."
"It'd be better for you to leave me. You're the King of Ireland's son," said O Croileagan.
The young man was so shocked at the sudden news, and at having to leave his foster-father, that he didn't know where he was.
They got ready and set off for the king's court. When they were close, they heard that the king had died.
The king's folk knew that there was a young prince who'd been sent out in fosterage, but they didn't know where he'd been sent, or where they should go looking for him. The king had only two or three people whom he'd trusted, in addition to the old man who'd given him the advice, and they were the only ones who knew where the child had gone to be nursed, and where he'd be found if he lived. (The king hadn't told any others because) he didn't want anyone to know that his son had been nursed in such a poor place, for fear the people wouldn't respect him.
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