Fingal

Fingal [cf. ScG fionn gall, fair foreigner]. Title character of James Macpherson's six-part prose ‘epic’ Fingal (1762), now considered a part of The Poems of Ossian. Clearly based on Fionn mac Cumhaill, despite Macpherson's denials, Fingal embodies many of the author's somewhat fey heroic ideals. He is the son of the giant Comhal, and king of Morven, the land of the north-west Caledonians. His wives are Roscrana, mother of Ossian, and Clatho, mother of Reyno, Fillean, and Bosmin, his only daughter. In Fingal, he travels to Ireland to aid Cuchulain against Swaran, the vicious Scandinavian king of Lochlin, who is invading Ireland. After much struggle, Fingal succeeds in subduing and capturing Swaran. This narrative is continued in Macpherson's Temora (1763), also included in The Poems of Ossian. Elsewhere in the Poems, Fingal is a righter of wrongs and a defender of the oppressed. He dies in a battle near the River Boyne.

Much as the name Fingal is associated with Macpherson, its use pre-dates the publication of Ossian by many centuries. A king named Fingal ruled the Isle of Man, 1070–7; ‘Fingal’ was used in Scottish contexts for the character now known as Fionn mac Cumhaill as early as the 14th century. After Macpherson, Scottish commentators commonly substituted ‘Fingal’ for ‘Fionn’. Distinguish from Finngoll, cited in some of Fionn's pedigrees.

Bibliography

See Derick S. Thomson , The Gaelic Sources of Macpherson's Ossian (Edinburgh, 1952);
James MacKillop , Fionn mac Cumhaill (Syracuse, NY, 1986)

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