Questo enorme impero subì la conquista dei Romani, dei Germani, degli Slavi e delle altre popolazioni provenienti dall'est. Alla fine rimasero solo otto regni.
Irlanda, Scozia, Galles, Cornovaglia, Bretagna francese, Isola di Man, Cantabria, Asturie e Galizia.
Le aree dove attualmente si parla ancora una lingua celtica sono una piccola parte delle otto terre di cui sopra.
Tutto ciò trova riscontro nella mitologia celtica.
EIGHTH OF TAURUS = Colptha [calf] ~ Greece ~ SOUTH-EAST
EIGHTH OF PUPPIS = Amergin the Druid ~ Persia ~ Spain ~ Egypt ~ SOUTH
EIGHTH OF HYDRA = Eber Finn [white stream] ~ SOUTH-WEST
EIGHTH OF CENTAURUS = Ír [boar] ~ Mag Trethern of the Seven Pigs ~ WEST
EIGHTH OF SERPENS = Éremón ~ Irúait ~ NORTH-WEST
EIGHTH OF CYGNUS = Érech Febria ~ Finnchaire ~ NORTH
EIGHTH OF CEPHEUS = Árannán [son of Aran] ~ Lochlann ~ Mana ~ Scandinavia ~ NORTH-EAST
EIGHT LANDS were sought by the three sons of Tuirenn and his daughter Dana. Setting out from Temair, the three Sons of Tuirenn visit eight lands and acquire a wondrous object from each. The first land they visit is the Garden in the East of the world and the last is Lochlann where they meet their demise. Their journey follows the chart round in a clockwise manner from east to south and so on. The seven pigs of the Golden Pillars in the West may be identified with the seven piglets of Twrch Trwyth in Culhwch ac Olwen and so the King of Golden Pillars is perhaps the same as the Torc Tríath of the mythic Mag Trethern. Consider here the Hellenistic tradition of the Erymanthean Boar in the Arcadian west of Greece that Hercules sought with the aid of Chiron the Centaur of the Constellation Centaurus. In Ancient Greece, the boar-hunting season began in Virgo on 23rd September. On that day in Rome was the anniversary of the rededication of the Temple of Apollo in the Campus Martius and Apollo’s mother Latona was also honoured.
The eight sons of Golam Míl the Spaniard and of Scota of Egypt seized Ireland, according to the mythology of the Lebor Gabála Érenn. The parents of these eight children have very southern and summery associations by reason of their toponymic epithets. Here again, we find eight partitions of the land. It is tempting to compare Eber Donn with the Donn Cúailgne and Eber Find with the Finnbennach and both pairs with Fea and Femen, the two royal oxen of the Túatha Dé Dánann that were owned by Brigid. That the Lébor Gabála Érenn gives Éremón as the father of Núada Airgétlám, whom it dubs Irial Fáith, is interesting. In other chapters, the father of Núada is called Echtach. In Welsh myth, the father of Nudd is Beli Mawr. One cannot help but wonder whether Éremón, Echtach and Beli Mawr were once all different names for the same personage.
The FOUR-CORNERED MUSIC of the wheel of druidic space and time may be ascertained from the literary imagery in Celtic folklore. Indeed, we see associations between the north and dark forces in the person of the Very Black Witch of the North in Culhwch ac Olwen whose residence in a cave has obvious chthonic evocations. Annwfn is the underworld of the Mabinogion and the hibernal imagery is evident from the venery setting of dogs hunting stags which are only so dubbed when their antlers are fully grown in the darker parts the year after October. Likewise, the chthonic and ancestral associations are embodied in the personalities of the Fomóire who are said to herald from the north and who in the Lebor Gabála Érenn are shown to be the ancestors of the Túatha Dé Danann. In the Tragedy of the Sons of Tuirenn, the northern land of Finnchaire is so much a netherworld that it is located ‘under the waves’ and this can be identified with the so called ‘Land Under Wave’ that features in the Fenian Cycle.
In the Irish language, directionality is indicated by linguistic signifiers that also connote place and time. The words for east (anair, airther) are related to words denoting before and in front. Similarly, the notion of west (aníar, íar) is tied up with what is after and beyond. North is below in Irish (fochal) and in Welsh (gogledd) and south is right (dess) and dexterous.
Red gold is a common motif in Celtic folklore and the link of this peculiarly Celtic coloration with the east is perhaps best seen in the Golden Apples of the Gardens of the East that in the Tragedy of the Sons of Tuirenn regenerate each day in a manner not unlike the rosy-fingered dawn herself. Bendigeitfran’s White Hill of Gwynfryn is located in the South East of Prydain in the same region as the chalk downs that form the white cliffs of Dover and this is the domain of the White Dragon of Lloegr. The South East temporally translates as Belltaine and this is the time of the white mayflowers of the white hawthorn as well as the time when the silvery sheen of King Núada arrives in Ireland in a silvery cloud of mist.
