Books and other items printed in Gaelic from 1801 to 1840 > Poems of Ossian in the original Gaelic > Volume 1

XXVI DISSERTATION ON THE AUTHENTICITY
" one Finnanus the son of Coelus, (in our language,
" called Fynmacoul) a man of a huge size, and
" sprung as it were, from the race of the ancient
" giants, at that time, (namely, in the reign of
" Eugenius II.) lived amongst us."*
The following quotation from Bishop Douglas,
in his " Palice of Honour,'' may also be adduced,
as not inconsistent with the idea that Fingal and ^
his heroes were of Scotish extraction:
" Greit Gow Macmorne^ and Fyn Mac Cowl and how
" They suld be Goddis in Ireland as they say."
These heroes might certainly be born in Scotland,
though they might be accounted Gods in Ireland ;
and the general tenure of the quotation, seems to
justify that explanation. That this was the bishop's
meaning, is the more probable, because in a poem
written about the same period, namely, in the
reign of James IV. called, " the Interlude of the
" Broichis," Fyn Mac Cowl is given to the High¬
lands :
" My fore grandsyr, hecht Fyn Mac Cowl
" That dang the devil and gart him yowll
" The skvis rained when he wald scowll,
" And trublit all the air :
* " Multorum opinio est, Finanum quondam Coeli filium,
" nostra lingua Finmakcoul dictum, ingentis magnitudinis
" virum, ea tempestate apud nostros vixisse, et tanquam ex
" velerum gigantum slirpe exortum."