Classical Legend Research Articles

The Lughnasa Musician in Ireland and Scotland

scraps have survived in widely scattered areas and in very brief form, but I believe that they give both a clue to the original form of the celebration and a means of tracing in some cases its survival outside of Ireland. I believe that it can be amply demonstrated, on the basis of internal evidence alone, that these stories are genuine survivals of ancient Celtic myth. Like classical legends, modern Irish and Scottish fairy tales are full of stories of people who obtained their musical skill from the good people. One such story, which seems to have a vague, accidental connection with the Lughnasa legends because it takes place in part of Croagh Patrick, is called Piper and the Pzca; it appears in a collection by Douglas Hyde.2 This story is typical of modern stories of musicians and fairies: it tells of a half-fool who is taken by an otherworld creature, in this case a puca, to a fairy dwelling to play for a feast and who acquires unsurpassed musical talent as a result, although he was originally an indifferent or even laughable performer.3 The stories of musicians in enchanted caves associated with the Lughnasa myths are different from the standard stories connecting musicians with the fairies, however, and seem to come from an older stratum of belief about the powers of music. In general, these stories tell of a harper, piper, or fiddler who enters a cave, not a fairy mound, in search of treasure and is assumed to be dead when those outside can no longer hear his music-and, indeed, he never returns. What happens to him is not explained in any of the Irish stories, but the musician's fate is considered terrible enough to explain why no one enters the cave. These tales seem to be more concerned with the caves themselves and the loss of the musician than with any connection between the musician and the otherworld. The tales and songs connected with this tradition in Scotland, as in Ireland, come in two types: the piper who gets his power from the fairies, and the piper who is destroyed by beasts in a cave.

A Revaluation of Horestes (1567)

JJISTORIANS of English drama are generally agreed as to the 171 importance of John Pikeryng's Horestes in the development of Elizabethan tragedy. Tucker Brooke, for example, believes that this I567 adaptation of the Orestes legend stands the highest point attained by the transitional interlude in the development of dramatic unity and tragic purpose. Yet the historians have failed to agree on solutions to some of the basic problems that the play presents. They confess themselves frankly baffled as to the identity of the author named on the title page of the work. And they differ on such fundamental questions as whether the interlude was designed for a courtly audience or the popular theater, and whether it was intended to be simply a dramatization of the classical legend, or an allegory of events in the life of Mary Queen of Scots. A re-examination of the play in the light of contemporary English and Scottish political attitudes affords reasons for believing that Horestes was indeed designed to reflect at least those aspects of Mary's affairs in Scotland that were of particular concern to a learned English audience, and that the author was probably John Puckering, subsequently Speaker of the House and Lord Keeper in Elizabeth's government, and an ardent foe of Mary Stuart.

The Traditional Background of Partonopeus de Blois

The romance of Partonopeus de Blois, though widely read and much admired in the Middle Ages, has not aroused a comparable interest among modern scholars. No edition of the French text has been published since 1834, and no exhaustive investigation of its literary sources has yet appeared. The story is usually explained as a medievalized version of the legend of Cupid and Psyche, with the roles of hero and heroine reversed under the influence of Breton lais of the fairy mistress type. Since critical discussions have tended to emphasize—perhaps overemphasize—the indebtedness of Partonopeus to the classical legend and its folk tale analogues, the connections with the Breton lais and the matière de Bretagne have been explored only in a general and rather tentative way. A more specific study of these connections based on the available French edition may help us to reach a clearer understanding of the materials which compose this charming romance, although a comprehensive analysis must await a critical edition of the text.

Aspects of Classical Legend and History in Shakespeare

Aspects of Classical Legend and History in Shakespeare Aspects of Classical Legend and History in Shakespeare. By F. S. Boas. Annual Shakespeare Lecture of the British Academy 1943. Oxford University Press. 3s. George Cookson George Cookson Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar English: Journal of the English Association, Volume 5, Issue 26, Summer 1944, Pages 55–56, https://doi.org/10.1093/english/5.26.55 Published: 01 July 1944

Aspects of classical legend and history in Shakespeare

Aspects of classical legend and history in Shakespeare

The Corbridge Lanx

The Corbridge lanx, a silver dish of excellent workmanship, unusually well preserved, is one of the most interesting relics of Roman antiquity as yet discovered on English soil (pl. viii). Its admirers, however, after more than two centuries, are faced with the problem, still unsolved, of satisfactorily understanding and explaining its puzzling decoration. Of the two lines of research hitherto adopted the first is mystical or allegorical, and is attracted particularly by the mysterious objects close to the undoubted figure of Apollo, though it exaggerates their mysterious character in every respect; and the explanation of them as illustrating a systematic cosmological antithesis between heaven and earth, in the style of Neo-platonism or of the Emperor Julian, has not so far proved likely to lead anywhere. The simpler and more definite interpretation of the second group is based on classical legend, an interpretation well justified by the undoubted presence of at least three Olympian deities. Yet the attempt to deduce a Judgment of Paris from no more than the joint presence of Artemis, Apollo, and Athena was from the first a difficult line to pursue; for of the normal characters in the scene only Athena is shown, while the presence of Apollo and Artemis is a positive drawback. Cogent proof is absent here also. Despite the light meanwhile thrown on numerous details, there is nothing to change in the statement made by Roger Gale in 1735, that a gathering of deities is represented, while their relation to any given legend, if such exists, is certainly still to seek.