[Frodo Baggins]

I am writing this because I feel as if I should clear my name. My claim has nothing to do with wicca, half-baked magic, gnosticism or asceticism. Bill Ferny, I took ALL my information from a scholarly work by the title of "Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions" written by James Bonwick. Bonwick was a scholar of ancient religions, he also wrote other books that were similar, such as one on Egyptian mythology and religion. Bonwick said he wrote his book for those who wished to study the subject but had less time than some.

Now Ferny I did not say the Celts were the first to settle Ireland, the Celts came after the Tuaths, who may have had to deal with another race before them. Here is what I have read. Bonwick begins by saying "By far the most interesting of the peoples that formerly inhabited Ireland were the Tuaths, or the Tuatha de Danaans." He says they were men, gods or fairies. He said they came from the east and stopped in at Greece and gained some knowledge from there. Some people associate them to the Tribe of Dan or the Dedanim in the Bible, I personally thing that's pushing it quite a bit. It also says that The Tuaths had to deal with a race known as the Firbolgs when they got to Ireland. After they were out of the way, they settled quite nicely. Some say the Danaan come from the Phoenicians. About 200 years later, the Celts, also known as the Milesians because they were ruled by Milesius, came from Iberia (Spain). Well to make a long story shirt (I could say more) the Milesian Celts and the Tuaths did not get along well. After much fighting, the Tuaths were defeated and fled undergound and to the hills for their lives. That is where legend begins. The Tuaths eventuallly came to be seen as gods and the Irish Sidhe or Shee, fairies or more nearly translated, elves. Legends say that sometimes mortals would become fairy kings and live in the hills with the fairies. This could be that sometimes people were either captured by the Tuaths or willingly lived with, also explaining the poeple that were spirited away by fairies. The mythic fairy caves and fairy hills such as Shee Beg and Shee More were perhaps dwelling places of the hiding Tuaths. It has been said that the fair haired Cletic peoples we see today are descended of the Tuaths, and the dark-haired, fair-skinned Celtic people are descended of the Iberian Milesians.

The Tuatha de Danaan suffer from the same fate as Arthur Dux Bellorum. Arthur Dux Bellorum (lord od battles) was a roamized Britton that was the basis for the mythical King Arthur. But Dux Bellorum never has a wife named Guinevere, never has a wizard named Merlin as a councillor, never had a round table, never had a Lancelot, or a Gawain, nor a Patrice or a Galahad, myth blew it all out of proportion. The de Danaans sufferd the same fate, history became legend, legend became myth and a very human people became god-like magical beings. Even their name Tuatha de Danaan "people of the goddess Danu" suggests mythical qualites.