Feis Tighe Chonáin

Feis Tighe Chonáin, Feis Tige Chonáin. Irish title for a 14th- or 15th-century prose narrative of the Fenian Cycle usually known in English as The Feast of Conán's House, or The Festivities in the House of Conán. While being entertained by Conán mac Morna, Fionn mac Cumhaill tells stories about himself, some of which have parallels in Norse traditions. In the most significant of the stories Fionn gives three versions of how he acquired supernatural knowledge by drinking a draft from the Otherworld. (a) In the first, one of the daughters of Bec mac Buain, the owner of a wisdom-giving well at Carn Feradaig (Cahernarry, Co. Limerick), accidentally spills the water into the mouth of Fionn and those of two of his companions. (b) In a second, perhaps a variant of the first, also set at Carn Feradaig, Fionn and four companions follow an ugly churl [OIr. aithech] and a young woman into a magical mist. Once the mist clears, the men find themselves inside the churl's Otherworldly palace, near which are two wells. Fionn drinks from both, giving him divine wisdom. The motif of the hero following a churl into the Otherworld has close parallels in the stories of Donn mac Míled in Acallam na Senórach [The Colloquy of the Elders] and Fer Caille in Togail Bruidne na Derga [The Destruction of Da Derga's Hostel]. (c) In the third version, Fionn finds himself turned into a feeble old man after bathing in a lake at Sliab Cuilinn [Slieve Gullion, Co. Armagh]. Fionn's men then lay siege to the neighbouring sídh, until the lord, Cuilenn, offered a magical draft in his golden cup. This not only restores Fionn but gives him supernatural wisdom. Another memorable story allows Fionn to speak of the curious incest of Daolghas. In answer to the question, ‘What man was the son of his own daughter?’, Fionn explains that as Daolghas was dying, his daughter stooped to kiss him; a spark from the fire flew from Daolghas's mouth to her, making her pregnant.

The supernatural wisdom from a magical liquid has suggested parallels with the Norse figures Sigurd and Odin. The standard text in Irish was edited by Maud Joynt, Mediaeval and Modern Irish Series, vol. 7 (Dublin, 1936). The only translation is the inaccessible and now antiquated one by Nicholas O'Kearney in Transactions of the Ossianic Society, 2 (1855). See also Rosemary Power, ‘“An Óige, an Saol agus an Bás”; Feis Tighe Chonáin and “pórr's [Thor's] Visit to Útgarða-Loki”’, Béaloideas, 53 (1985), 217–94; E. O. G. Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North (London and New York, 1964), 41 ff.