Cavan of Breifne, Land of Hollows and Hills

Cavan of Breifne, Land of Hollows and Hills
There are fault lines in Ireland that run between north and south but never once had I thought that fault lines could exist between east and west and lands in between.

Liam Lynch from Dublin lives in Australia, and I play on his generosity of spirit and his quick wit and abundance of laughter. “You’re one of us, Liam O’Lynch!” Your people, your old people were from Cavan.” At this suggestion he throws back his head and convulses in laughter.

See there’s a story about all this, about the differences between us and them, the ones in the east, the ones in the west and the ones in between. My friend Liam is an Irishman. He says tree instead of three and his face goes a shade of crimson when he laughs too much at me telling him he’s a Cavan man and that he shouldn’t be ashamed to admit it.

For between east and west there was once a district, I tell him, a district that has spent the last thousand years or more defending itself from the rest of Ireland. The story is as old as time and goes back to the struggles of the Fir Bolg, and even Queen Medb’s armies and the Tuatha De Danann, including the Holy Dagda himself, they all took refuge in the lands of in between.

Then even my lot, the MacCaba arrived in the 13th century from the Isle of Arran as a clann and branch of MacLeods. They were mercenaries hired by the O’Reilly’s and O’Rourke’s. But when the potato famine hit, many left that land of in between for America, and some of my lot went further to Australia. Liam’s lot however made it only as far as the wharf in Dublin, and knew when they saw the sea, that their legs were the legs of the country people, that they had land legs not made for swimming. So there Liam’s lot remained, until in recent times when the Celtic tiger’s teeth began to rot revealing that the tiger was in fact a liger and not as fierce as all had originally thought.

Now the day I tell Liam Lynch that his name is O’Lynch and that his family was formally associated with Cavan he does not sneer but with questionable recognition he throws back his head and turns red in laughter.

Whenever I connect his name to Cavan he looks at me with an eye of the curious, the way that all Irish must view the tourist in the strangers they meet. But before he opens his mouth I tell him that my name is MacCaba or McCabe and that it is the name I wear. This name embodies me I tell him, it wraps around me like an oversized coat. And with the O's and Macs or McC's of Cavan all are kindred, but before I’ve uttered another word he says in terse reply and resignation, “Culchie”.

“Your lot of McCabes from Cavan, they’re Culchies” he says and I am thinking, as one thinks when not versed in such words, that he is talking through his accent about the ones with culture. I feel a sense of pride for being named a descendant of the Culchies for everyone knows that the ones with all the culture and who speak the most Irish live west of Dublin in the Gaeltacht.

And so I am telling him before he calls me another name that I don’t understand, that “Breifne”… Breifne where Cavan and its land of hollows or little hills reside takes its name from an Irish Goddess, and a woman who died fighting defending her land and people from invaders. Within the borders of Breifne lies Art Cabban or, as it is better known, Cavan. These are names within names. Art Cabban, the place of hollows and small hills is a name for a part of Briefne, and within Briefne a great number of ancient names and places abound.”

He stares at me half-smiling. He seems half-believing but is still holding out waiting to be convinced.

“I’m telling you Liam, Breifne was an Irish beauty Queen!”

He just nods his head. He sits back smiling and seems he has heard it all before, just one more voice defending the Culchies of Cavan.

“Breifne” I tell him, was a beauty queen from Cavan and she was widely known for her enchanting good looks. She wore golden plaits in her hair woven with emerald and amber. Her gem encrusted hilt of her sword hung high on her hip. She was the daughter of Beoan mac Bethaig. Her name speaks of great beauty, of a ring and a journey. The name Breifne, I tell him, evokes an invitation for all who originate from her lands and loins to return, no matter how scattered and separated, to return to Cavan and her inland kingdom”.

Now, long ago, I begin to tell him, “long ago the King in Dublin wanted the hand of Breifne but she wouldn’t give it. She wouldn’t give it to just anyone. But that lot, your lot from Dublin made war because of the perceived snub, and since that day to this all from Dublin have been jealous and envious of people from Cavan and it all began with that woman named Breifne who wouldn’t accept the hand of the one from Dublin.”

I continue for I am spinning wax lyrical now,

“Briefne died for her inland kingdom, keeping evil from her door. And it is her blood that lies soaked into that earthen floor”

And he grins, and says without hesitation, “What in Cavan!??”

“Yes,” I tell him, “in Cavan!!”


Wearing the Green of Cavan on a Green Bus
Now conversations about the greatness and wonders of Cavan happen in all sorts of places with all sorts of people.

Where I live in Perth, West Australia the seats of our buses are embroided with scenes of the sea shore, scallop shells and sea fish, star fish sewn into the seat and back rest. It’s an attempt to make the passenger distracted, to soothe their journey, and the rush of their mind. For most, if not careful, will imagine themselves aboard a boat and, for some, the motion of imagined swells will rock them to sleep.

One day I am minding my own business on a bus when an old man comes stumbling down the aisle. He wears his shirt like a billboard. In Australia no one wears their identity on their sleeve except for the Irish, or the-would-be-Irish, or those whose ancestors blame their uncomfortable sense of selves on the potato of 1847. But on this bus an expat Irishman jumps aboard and upon his black shirt the words “J.B. O'Reilly and Guinness” are proudly proclaimed. Sure, now there’s no harm in that excepting of course the conflict and civil war of words when these two words are pronounced together. For wearing that word Guinness identifies the wearer with a place and not just any place but a preference and attitude for a certain locality. There’s always the attitude.

T-shirts and the emblems of the Irish are a pet favourite of mine.

Once in a giant supermarket in the Czech Republic I spied one wearing a shirt that read, “Never Surrender UDF… And this man was looking for oil to cook his chips, and I was looking for a conversation in a language other than Czech. And, sensing something of a Scottish accent or was it Irish in this man I open up on him: “Ciamar a tha thu!? Conas atá tú??” I blend two languages of the Celtic tongue into one sentence. His eyes look me up and down and he says in a dark monotone with a dialect that rocks the space between us, “I don’t speak that language” and nearing him I see his T-shirt and read the words printed in black thereon.

Now, back to this man on the bus with the accent that seemed Irish, for before I have picked him to be a Jackeen (a bearer of the Union Jack) from Dublin I am hesitant remembering that man from Derry, but when I see the words “Guinness” and “O’Reillys” I know it is safe to proceed, for while there is no shamrock, no words other than “O’Reilly” and “Guinness” these words alone spell out the man’s social, cultural and economic hearth and home. But I can tell for this Irishman, aboard this bus, these words are every bit his flag of “never surrender,” that bears an uncanny similarity to another's shirt I had seen in the wilds of the Czech.

The Irish when in lands that are not their own wear their hearts on their sleeve and their emblems over their heart. But you’d think he would have known, that the bait of names upon his shirt would be taken, and devoured by the nearest fish! And being a descendant from Cavan it was easy to sense his Dublin exuberance and self-confidence.

"Guinness" I announce, "Guinness that is brewed from the waters of the Liffey?” I ask him.
“We send you our Australian Vegemite in a jar and you mix it with the water from your sacred rivers and streams and export it back to us as beer."
He half sniggers, only half, and the bait is left dangling on the hook.

"And J.B. O'Reilly was born in Drogeda, I tell him. “But,…” and I am working him to the grand fanali, “His family's origins, his roots…” I tell him, “His roots are from Cavan."
"CAVAN!!" he chokes.
"CAVAN!! He says as if the mere word has pierced his shirt and heart with a rust-jagged knife. “They're the bloody Jews of Ireland!!"
Now, indeed having had several Jewish forebears who sold snuff in Grafton Street, his suggestion that they – my forebears - might have been selfish gives me courage to continue.

“Ah” I hear myself saying and I smile, he has taken the bait, and no matter how much he shakes his head there is no getting him off the hook.

"But don't you think…," I add, "Don't you think it’s strange that a Dublin man such as yourself should be wearing one of Cavan's royal names over his heart?"

"OH SHITE!!" he says.

And at that he can take no more. With great haste he jumps back down from his seat to the floor and dances and runs his way along the aisle of that bus. And all I see, the last I see of him is his black shirt with that Cavan name O'Reilly waving back at me, and embroided proudly next to it is Ireland’s river Goddess inspired drink Guinness sitting alongside it.


Cavan land of Sparkling Lakes
And now it happens one day that my friend Liam O’Lynch of Dublin smiles with his Cheshire Dublin grin and another conversation about Cavan unfolds.

And he reminds me, is quick to tell me, “Cavan”, where they peel their wallpaper from their walls to stick to the walls whenever and wherever they move” he adds.

“Cavan, yes, Breiffne I tell him, “The land of lakes that feed your sacred rivers and streams.” And the sparkle, I tell him, “Do you see the sparkle in my eyes?” I ask him. And he searches.

“It is the glint that my ancestors have passed on to me from their eyes looking at all the sunshine on all those lakes of Cavan, and all that beauty…”

“Yes” he says.

“Yes, Cavan people might have the glint of sunshine in their eyes but they surely don’t want to share it with anyone else.” He adds. “They walk around all day with dark sunglasses.”

And in his polite Dublin way I can tell he is mocking me only because he is struggling to come free from the hook that is embedded in his mouth.

“Well,” I continue. “You would know about Asterix the Gaul,” I tell him, “…that cartoon figure and his village of Gaulish warriors that held out against the Romans?”

“Yes” he says.

“Well” I tell him, “They got their story from Cavan in much the same way that the English turned Ireland’s story of Finn MacCool into King Arthur and that Lady of the Lake.”

“The English,” I tell him. “They not only took the story of Finn MacCool but renamed Finn, Arthur, after the man who first invented Guinness, Arthur Guinness. And the French, who love all things Irish, stole from the English what they had stolen from the Irish. Arthur’s magical waters of the Liffey enhanced the brew of Guinness, and the French appropriated that story for Asterix of Gaul and that magical druid made potion which gave to them supernatural strength…”

Liam doesn’t know what to make of the story I am spinning him, but I keep on and mention how the Gauls had beaten the Romans, at least in that book…
And that hook is firmly embedded in our man from Dublin’s mouth and the further I spin the yarn the deeper that hook is sliding. Mention the English to most Irish and they’re stuck, mention the English, the French and the Romans in one sentence and they’re spellbound and lost in a cavern or hollow of thought.

“And that story of King Arthur and that Lady of the Lake came from the lakes of Cavan”, I tell him.
“And the story of appropriation and theft from Cavan does not end there,” I say to him earnestly.
“For in that story of Asterix the Gaul there was a Bard named Cacofonix who could not sing. In fact his singing drove people mad and his countrymen would use him as their secret weapon against the Romans.

I see in Liam’s eyes some recognition of this story…

“And in Cavan,” I tell him, “…In Cavan we had a similar Bard named O’Carolan.”
“Yes” he says as my bait and hook slides several centimeters further down his gullet. “But O’Carolan was not a man of fiction, and yet he too was Ireland’s secret weapon against the English…”
“Yes,” he agrees.

“And no more beautiful music could you hear from all of Ireland,” I say.
And he is half-nodding whilst attempting to rattle off a few other ancient bards to steer me off my track.
“And…” I tell him, “And all this beautiful music which came from the man O’Carolan, came from Cavan, all of it learnt from time he spent living by those sparkling lakes. Music developed and mastered from Cavan’s Lakes that feed your sacred rivers and streams, rivers and streams that you bottle with Australian Vegemite, Vegemite and Liffey River water that you use in the magical ingredients of Guinness, and Guinness that they sell at J.B. O’Reilly’s Hotel in Perth, West Australia and all connected with the O’Reilly’s from the hills and hollows of Cavan.

Liam looks at me and says nothing. His eyes seem to sparkle and in his sparkling eyes he leaves few doubts about his O’Lynch Cavan origins. In fact his Cavan cultural heritage is evident for all to see.