Chapter VII
The Fenian, or Ossianic, Sagas
The second of the two Gaelic heroic cycles presents certain striking contrasts to the first. It depicts a quite different stage of human culture; for, while the Ulster stories deal with chariot-driving chiefs ruling over settled communities from fortified dúns, the Fenian sagas mirror, under a faint disguise, the lives of nomad hunters in primeval woods. The especial possession, not of any one tribal community, but of the folk, it is common to the two Goidelic countries, being as native to Scotland as to Ireland. Moreover, it has the distinction, unique among early literatures, of being still a living tradition. So firmly rooted are the memories of Finn and his heroes in the minds of the Gaelic peasantry that there is a proverb to the effect that if the Fenians found that they had not been spoken of for a day, they would rise from the dead.
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