show notes s02 e05
Irish Mythology Podcast

Aibreán  14, 2021

Episode 15

The Wooing of Étaín (Part 3): The Wooing of Ulster by Aengus

Thank you for listening to this episode!

Here you’ll find our notes, links to research and some personal highlights from your hosts. 

Welcome | fáilte 

In this episode we hear about how Aengus and Midir are doing a year on from the events of the last part of this story. Midir sustains an injury while visiting Aengus and to make up for it, the latter goes to County Down to ask for the hand of Étaín in marriage for Midir. 

We ask:

• Was Aengus a love god?
• Was he a god of poetry?
• What was Aengus’s primary role in Irish Mythology?
• How did the Gaeilic Cultural Revival of the 19th century  influence how we see Aengus today?
• Why did WB Yeats become obsessed with Aengus?
• How were tribal groupings in ancient Ireland similar to networks of mutual aid?

Midir loses an eye while trying to break up a fight; Dian Cecht works some healing magic; Aengus goes up to Down to woo Étaín for Midir; The Dagda fights an Octopus; WB Yeats is CANCELLED!

A cautionary tale on why you should only agree to things you know you can do, unless yer Da is the Dagda.

Resources

• The Wooing of Étain 
• Ireland’s Immortals, A History of the Gods of Irish Myth – Mark Williams
• MAG MUIRTHEMNE, The Metrical Dindshenchas, Poem 99
• Ptolemy’s Map of Ireland (2nd Century) 
• Why WB Yeats, Maud Gonne and Iseult Gonne?  Orna Ross
• Yeats Meets the Digital Age, Full of Passionate Intensity – New York Times
• No Second Troy – WB Yeats
• Easter, 1916 – WB Yeats
• The Song of Wandering Aengus – WB Yeats
• La Belle Dame sans Merci – John Keats

 

Ptolemy’s map* 2nd Century  – I have added the rough locations of the three main locations in today’s story.  

credits

Written, presented and produced  by Marcas Ó hUiscín and Stephanie Ní Thiarnaigh. 

Music – Celtic Warrior by Damiano Baldoni (licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 public licence 

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

All sounds cc licence from freesound.org 

Featured Image Étaín and Midir, illustration by Stephen Reid in T. W. Rolleston’s The High Deeds of Finn (1910).