Читать книгу 366 Celt: A Year and A Day of Celtic Wisdom and Lore - Carl McColman - Страница 86

Where do the fairies come from? Many stories relate them to tales of angels fallen from heaven. A kind of “Switzerland” of God’s court, the beings who would become the fairies sided neither with God nor with Lucifer when the latter revolted against the Almighty. They didn’t exactly deserve the punishments of hell, but neither were they in a position to remain in heaven—so the Archangel Michael sent them to the earth to live in the twilight state of fairyland.

But a more compelling theory about the origin of the fairies comes from Irish myth. It seems that the Celts, as the first mortals to arrive in Ireland, engaged in battle with the Tuatha Dé Danann (the legendary tribe of gods, goddesses and heroes) when they arrived. The battle left no conclusive winner, so the Celts and the Tuatha Dé Danann struck a deal: the mortals would live above ground, while the magical beings would retreat to a subterranean (subconscious?) world beneath the surface of the land. Hence, they become the Daoine Sídhe, the people of the fairy mounds. So here we see the fairies not as some morally questionable heavenly rejects—but as the ancient ancestors, the shining and divine and immortal beings of the Celtic lands.