Мифология пространства древней Ирландии

The monograph is devoted to a phenomenon of five major roads and five sacred trees of Ireland which almost never attracted scholars» attention before. The five major roads of Ireland (Slige Midlúachra, Slige Cualann, Slige Assail, Slige Dala and Slige Mór) just like its five sacred trees (Eó Mugna, Eó Rossa, Bile Tortan, Bile Dathi, Bile Uisnig), five hostels or five provinces, belong to the mythological tradition, having its roots in pre-Christian times, the tradition whose integral element was the fivefold division of the island. It is important to warn in advance that the major part of all events, protagonists and realities mentioned in the book are related to mythological space and time, considered by medieval redactors in Ireland as a distant synthetic past of the island. Basically all scholars touching the subject of the five roads of Ireland often pointed out their role in history (or pseudohistory) as routes connecting Tara, the royal residence, with the rest of Ireland, underlying the increasing significance of Tara’s high-kingship since the time of Uí Neill. The five major roads of Ireland did not appear in the later Irish folklore, they belonged to the classical repertoire of Irish filid and with the collapse of independent rulers and traditional poetic schools the memory of these features of landscape was lost.

One can argue that all these phenomena constitute pieces of the distinct cosmology reflected sometimes in early Irish texts. Filid – poets and keepers of tradition – acted as intermediaries between ancient oral tradition and texts written in monasteries. That is why the stories of the five roads and trees were fixed in several specimens of early Irish literature. The most interesting problem for us here lies in the function of the five roads and trees in the general picture of the fivefold division of Ireland. We shall try to examine the story of the roads» manifestation, their role in the cosmogonic myth of Conn Cétchathach’s birth. Just like the five trees of Ireland, the five roads appear in Ireland on the night of Conn’s birth, and just like the trees they are in some instances associated with the poets (

filid), poetry (rámut roscadach in the alliterative poem, which we shall discuss later) and knowledge. Their unique position in the tradition, their, as it were, «primordial» status (as in prímróit

) makes the five roads different from other roads of the country mentioned in Irish literature. The five roads and trees of Ireland can be seen as one of those «gravitation centres» around which in the dinnshenchas and in early Irish tales the mythological situation unfolds itself. The restoration of the mythological situation, roles played by space, time and knowledge in it, on the basis of these «gravitation centres», might be one of the perspective fields in Celtic studies. I shall try to examine mainly the mythological situation connected with the manifestation of roads and trees as it is described in Airne Fíngein («Fíngen’s Night-Watch») and in the

dinnshenchas, one alliterative poem from which, «Búaid Cuinn, rígróid rogaide…», has not been edited before.

We examined the story of the manifestation of the roads and the trees, which might be seen as a variant of a cosmogonic myth. It is important that the texts do not mention the creation of the roads, the trees and other wonders on the night of Conn’s birth; all of them are found or manifest themselves out of pre-existence in the Otherworld. The five roads and trees of Ireland belong to the same fivefold structure of space in Irish mythology as five provinces and other phenomena. When the roads as well as the five trees manifest themselves from the Otherworld on earth they act as representatives of the divine order on earth. In case of the five sacred trees of Ireland, they were considered by the medieval redactors as the witnesses of the Paradise on earth (just like Eó Mugna in AF

is said to be «the son of the tree of Paradise»). As far as one can argue on the basis of our sources, the domestication of space in the discussed mythological texts consists of the process of forming the earthly order following the divine pattern.

As M. Eliade wrote, no human being never chooses any particular place, he just finds it, in other words the sacred space is manifested to a hero. This manifestation does not necessary come from a direct hierophany; sometimes it is performed with the help of a certain traditional technique based on the cosmological system[613]. Our heroes perform this very technique while opening the roads.