Oisín, Oissíne, Oisséne, Oiséne, Usheen [Ir. diminutive of os, deer]. Warrior and poet of the Fianna, principal son of Fionn mac Cumhaill, and sojourner in Tír na nÓg with the beautiful Niam; so much of later Fenian literature revolves around Oisín, especially his dialogues with St Patrick, that those stories are referred to as the Ossianic Cycle. Additionally, much later Fenian material is a recounting of earlier adventures as retold from Oisín's point of view. When the 18th-century charlatan James Macpherson encountered Scottish Gaelic ballads constructed on this rhetorical frame, with Oisín as narrator, he fabricated a series of prose narratives purportedly derived from Ossian [ang., of Oisín], whom he depicts as a historical figure.

Two stories are told of Oisín's birth, both with a deer-mother. In the better-known version Sadb comes to Fionn in the form of a doe, having been enchanted by Fer Doirich the druid. When the hounds Bran and Sceolang chase the doe to the Hill of Allen, Fionn gives her protection, and is delightfully surprised when she turns into a beautiful young woman the next morning. Soon they are married, Fionn abandons the chase and fighting, and Sadb is with child. But when Fionn returns to his old ways, Sadb is again enchanted by Fer Doirich and abandons the newborn Oisín to follow him. Seven years later Fionn finds a naked boy, Oisín, under a rowan tree on Ben Bulben. An alternative version, naming Blaí as the mother, comes in two variants. In one she appears first in deer form, as Sadb does, but in the second she is a beautiful girl married to Fionn and later transformed into a deer by a malicious wizard while her husband is away. In the Blaí stories the mother again abandons her newborn, who is found later by the father, Fionn. Such stories are apparent rationalizations of traditions dating from at least the 9th century, explaining that father and son meet over a roasting pig in a forest and begin to contend with one another before they recognize each other's identity.

In much of older Fenian literature, Oisín is one of the half-dozen most important members of the Fianna, although not necessarily the leader; neither is the the esteemed poet of later tradition. The reputation for valour and bravery of his son Oscar surpasses his own. In Tóraigheacht Dhiarmada agus Ghráinne [The Pursuit of Diarmait and Gráinne], Gráinne expresses a romantic interest in Oisín before she espies Diarmait; later Oisín sides with the fugitive lovers against his vengeful father.

Oisín plays a far larger role in later Fenian literature, in action set after the collapse of the Fianna at Cath Gabhra [The Battle of Gabhair/Gowra], focusing on two prolonged encounters, with St Patrick and with Niam. In the 12th-century text Acallam an Senórach [The Colloquy of the Elders], Oisín and Caílte survive their comrade's destruction and live on to meet St Patrick. This was not the only portrayal of the saint's attempts at posthumous conversion to Christianity of pagan heroes, but it became the most widely known, inspiring an immense body of popular variations upon a theme, composed between the 13th and 18th centuries. While Caílte dominates more of the conversation with the saint in Acallam, the subsequent variations bring Oisín to the fore, apparently because the son inherits his father's mantle of nature wisdom and poetic invention. In these contentious dialogues with the saint, Oisín retells new adventures of the Fianna not found in the older literature, and continually champions the pagan nobility and generosity of Fionn against what he portrays as the cramped and joyless strictures of the new Christian dispensation.

Stories of Oisín's visit to the Otherworld with a beautiful woman are widespread in the oral traditions of Ireland and Gaelic Scotland, but Micheál Coimín's [Michael Comyn's] literary version, Laoi Oisín i dTír na nÓg [Lay of Oisín in the Land of Youth], effectively displaces all others. Evidently drawing on abundant oral tradition, Coimín composed Laoi Oisín in Irish about 1750, a text circulating in manuscript for 100 years before it was edited and translated. In this version, Oisín is hunting one day with the Fianna when he is visited by a beautiful fairy-like woman named Niamh Chinn Óir [of the Golden Head/Hair] on a white horse who tells him she loves him and wants him to accompany her to Tír na nÓg [the Land of Youth] or Tír Tairngire [the Land of Promise]. In earlier versions (see NIAM (3)) she is merely a mortal woman who elopes with him. Travelling due west, Oisín slays a giant so that when he arrives in Tír na nÓg he is awarded Niamh as a consort. They begin 300 years of love-making, which produces two sons, one confusingly named Oscar (2), and a daughter. When Oisín then decides to return to Ireland, Niamh warns him not to dismount from his horse or he will find himself old, withered, and blind. What was once familiar to him now seems strange; he passes the Hill of Allen [Almu] and finds it abandoned and overgrown. At Glenasmole, Co. Wicklow, he answers the call of men trying to lift a stone into a wagon. As he stoops, his reins break; Oisín falls to the ground and is immediately transformed into the very aged man that Niamh had predicted. His white steed returns to the Otherworld. Whatever Coimín's reliance on oral tradition or the degree of his invention, his text of Oisín's story offers examples of two tale types, 470 and 766, and the folk motifs C521; C984; D1338.7; F302.1; F378.1. See also HERLA, KING.

Texts: Laoi Oisín ar Thír na n-Óg, ed. and trans. Tomás Ó Flannghaile (Dublin, 1907); ‘The Lay of Oisín in the Land of Youth’, trans. Bryan O'Looney, Transactions of the Ossianic Society, 4 (1861), 227–80; ‘Ossian in Tir na n-Og’, in Blanaid and Other Irish Historical and Legendary Poems, trans. T. D. Sullivan (Dublin, 1891), 115–42. Recent commentary: Máirtín Ó Briain, ‘Some Material on Oisín in the Land of Youth’, in Donnchadh Ó Corráin (ed.), Sages, Saints and Storytellers (Maynooth, 1989), 181–99. The most celebrated English-language adaptation of the story is William Butler Yeats's poem ‘The Wanderings of Oisin’ (1889). Others include T. W. Higginson, ‘Usheen in the Island of Youth’, in Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic (1898), 25–31; James Stephens, ‘Oisín and Niamh’, Sinn Féin, 26 (26 Feb. 1910), 2; John Varian, Oisín the Hero (1910).

Oisin

In Celtic* mythology, Oisin (or Ossian) was a great warrior poet and the son of Finn, leader of a warrior band known as the Fianna. Legend says that an enchanter had changed Finn's lover, the goddess Sadb, into a deer. One day while looking for Sadb, Finn came upon Oisin. He realized the boy was his son after Oisin told him that his mother was a gentle deer. Finn raised Oisin and trained him to be a warrior, but Oisin also inherited his mother's gift of eloquent speech. He became a great poet as well as one of the fiercest warriors of the Fianna.

As a man, Oisin met Niamh, daughter of the sea god Manannan Mac Lir. She invited him to visit her father's kingdom of Tir Na Nog, the Land of Ever Young. Oisin stayed there for 300 years, although it seemed like only a few weeks. Lonely for home, he asked if he might visit Ireland. Niamh agreed and sent him back on horseback, warning him not to touch the ground or he would never return to Tir Na Nog. However, Oisin slipped and fell to the ground, instantly becoming a blind old man who never saw his beloved Niamh again. In 1761, a writer named James Macpherson published what was claimed to be a translation of Ossian's poems. Their authenticity was disproved by Samuel Johnson 14 years later.

See also Celtic Mythology; Finn.

Oisín ♂ (Irish) Pronounced ‘oh-sheen’, from a diminutive of os ‘stag’, borne in Irish mythology by the son of the hero Finn mac Cumhaill (Finn MacCool), who was carried off by Niamh to Tír na nÓg, the land of perpetual youth. The name was resuscitated in the 18th century and has enjoyed considerable popularity in recent times, both inside Ireland and beyond. See also Osian.

Also: Os(s)ian, Osheen (Anglicized forms).

Oisin, a legendary Gaelic warrior and bard, known also as Ossian (see Macpherson and Fingal). In The Wanderings of Oisin (1889), a narrative poem by Yeats, the bard tells Saint Patrick the story of his love for Niamh, the daughter of the sea-god Manannán.

Oisin see Ossian .