The first to claim our attention relates to Cúchulainn's relations with Labraid of the Swift Hand on the Sword, king of an Irish Hades or Elysium.[1] His wife's name is given as Liban, and she had a sister Fand, who had been deserted by her husband Manannán mac Lir. Fand fell in love with Cúchulainn on account of his fame, and she and her sister the queen tried to induce Cúchulainn to visit them in Labraid's Isle; but it was all in vain, until Labraid appealed to him to come on a certain day to his aid against his enemies, the chief of whom are called Senach the Demoniac, Echaid of Eol, and Eogan of Inber: at last Cúchulainn was induced to drive forth in his scythed chariot to the assistance of Labraid. Cúchulainn, when he arrived in Labraid's kingdom, would have made short work of the enemy, if Labraid himself had not intervened to put a stop to the slaughter, but for no more evident reason than that it was forbidden Pwyỻ to inflict more than one blow on Havgan. Just as Arawn promised Pwyỻ the handsomest woman he had ever seen as his consort, so the reward held out to Cúchulainn for descending to assist Labraid was the hand[2] of his sister-in-law Fand, who in consequence came away with Cúchulainn to Erinn. The next story to be mentioned relates also to Cúchulainn visiting Hades, but it differs from the foregoing in several important respects, besides introducing us to another set of names. It is to the effect[3] that
- ↑ The story is printed in Windisch's Irische Texte, pp. 205—227, from the Bk. of the Dun, pp. 43—50: for O'Curry's translation, see the Atlantis for 1858.
- ↑ Windisch, Ir. Texte, p. 209.
- ↑ It will be found, accompanied with a translation into German, in Stokes & Windisch's Irische Texte (Leipsic, 1884), pp. 173—209.
