with the Kirwans of Castle Hackett, who claim descent from a beautiful fairy, whose loveliness is sometimes renewed in the family. Finvarra helps himself freely to wine, but he cannot be called an extravagant guest as he keeps the cask full to the brim. The story is alluded to (1839) in the Ordnance Survey Letters, and I found a variant on Galway Bay.[1]
In one version it is the fairies of Cnoc Meadha near Burrishoole, Co. Mayo, that are friends with the Kirwans, not Finvarra of the southern Cnoc Meadha or Knockmaa near Tuam.
Puca. The Púca, or Phuca, is generally suspected, from his name and his absence from our ancient literature, to be a parvenu in Ireland, for his origin and provenance have never been established. The name Pook of goatish shape and the mischievous Puck immortalized by Shakespeare, appear in English sources.[2] Elsewhere than in our district he is a shaggy goat or black horse, who bewilders and carries off belated persons. Here (and it supports the suspicion of his late introduction) he is of human shape, some even confuse him with the Banshee.[3] James Hardiman publishes an old poem Abhann an phuca, by a bard MacSweeny, of Doon Castle, the foundations of a peel tower on a high rock on the mainland opposite to Omey Island. In a note, the editor says that it is believed that the Púca survived the deluge and is a mischievous, hairy spirit, who exerts his power on November Eve (Samain) whence many avoid going out that night after sunset.
Lochaunaphuca on Cliara[4] is haunted (I heard) by "a sort of spirit"; Professor Eoin MacNeill heard that "the Púca was seen there and might be seen yet." On Achill, "Puca" was one of four human tyrants who broke a stone cross on
- ↑ Ancient Cures, etc., p. 148; Ancient Legends, etc., i. pp. 145, 149; ii. pp. 102, 217, cf. p. 214.
- ↑ "The Pouke nor other evil sprite" in Spenser; "that same Pooke hath goatish body" in Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphosis, 1587, p. 126; Croker's Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland, p. 153.
- ↑ As on Clare Island, Mayo. "Pook" is not uncommon in place names, but in at least some is a "buck goat."
- ↑ Misprinted "Sochaunaphuca" supra, xxix. p. 307; the other names are Owennaphuca near Omey Island, Galway, and Foheraphuca in Achill.
