By Patrick O’Sullivan

Padraig Pearse once wrote that his vision of an Irish school was one where the teaching of Irish was taken for granted.

We had two Irish books in fifth and sixth class in Callinafercy National School many moons ago. The textbook was called Geatai an Eolais, the Gates of Knowledge; the black and white sketches that served as illustrations a far cry from the full colour photographs in textbooks today, and yet very atmospheric in their own way.

One of the pieces, ‘How Lugh was chosen’, was based on Celtic mythology. Nuadu of the Silver Arms was hosting a great feast at Tara when Lugh arrived, the doorkeeper announcing him as, ‘samildanach’, one skilled in each and every art. Lugh was immediately challenged to a game of fidchell, a game like chess, by the King, Nuadu, but Lugh won time and time again.

Then, Ogma, the champion, challenged Lugh to cast back to the centre of the palace the huge stone which he, Ogma, had hurled outdoors and which lay on the green beyond. Ogma cautioned that it would take four score oxen to move it but Lugh lifted it high above his shoulders and flung it back to its original resting place.

Soon Abhcan, the harper, gave Lugh a musical challenge. Abhcan played first, ‘and the company at Tara had never heard finer or sweeter in their lives’. Then Lugh took hold of the harp and began to play, the tunes he played so soft and sweet that his hearers began to drowse and sleep.

After that, his music was so sad that people fell to lamenting but almost in an instant he was playing the liveliest, merriest tunes imaginable, everyone rising to their feet and dancing with delight.

Continue reading in this week’s Ireland’s Own