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Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Hurling


Hurling is one of the oldest of all games. Ancient Irish tales such as the TáinBóCuailnge testify to its long history.
The story of the Craobh Rua, the Red Branch Knights, is Ireland's oldest and greatest saga, and contains a number of separate tales, one of which, the famous TáinBóCuailnge is concerned with cattle rustling in a period before the arrival of Christianity in this country.
Its princi

pal hero is Cúchulainn, a warrior who began life as Setanta whose wonderful exploits have fired the imagination of Irish people for untold generations.
One such person was The Man from Carron, Michael Cusack, the founder of the GAA. Writing in the United Irishman of March 25, 1889, he states: "When I was a little boy long, long ago, I listened to stories about feats of hurling hundreds of years old and I enjoy them to-day as much as I did in the 1850s."
The stories were undoubtedly those of Setanta, stories which inspired Cusack to ' bring back the hurling' and from that little acorn of ambition, grew the great oak-tree that is the GAA to-day.
The story of Setanta is now due a new airing and he rightly takes his place in the pantheon of Carlow's GAA legends as the new Juvenile Hurling Club in Carlow Town bears the name of hurling's first ever boy wonder.
SUPER-HUMAN BUT RESTLESS ….
From a very early age the boy called Setanta, living with his parents Sualdam and Dechtine on Muirtheimne Plain near Dun Dealgan (Dundalk), showed superhuman qualities of wisdom, warfare, magic and poetry.
When he was five years he was fed up with living at Muirtheimne and, having heard about the boytroops at Eamain Macha, asked his mother Deichtine for her permission to leave.
'You are too young to go,' she told him, 'and there are no Ulster warriors to accompany you.'
'I cannot wait and I do not need nor want the accompaniment of warriors,' said Setanta. 'Show me where Eamain lies and I will leave now'. Dechtine resigned herself to the inevitable. 'To the North then, but the hard crossing of the mountains at Sliab Fuait lies in your way.'
'Those I do not care about, ' said Setanta, and off he went to prepare for the journey from the plains the plain of Muirtheimne to Eamhain Mhaca ...
HURLING SORCERY
"The boy went forth and took his playthings. He took his hurley-stick of bronze ( a chámán créumha) and his silver ball; he took his little javelin for casting and his toy spear with its end sharpened by fire, and he began to shorten the journey (by playing) with them. He would strike his ball with the stick ( camán) and drive it a long way from him. Then with a second stroke he would throw his stick so that he might drive it a distance no less than the first. He would throw his javelin and he would cast his spear and would make a playful rush after them. Then he would catch his hurley-stick and his ball and his javelin, and before the end of his spear had reached the ground he would catch its tip aloft in the air." Leabhair Laighean.
Now that's what you call hurling sorcery! Not to mention the first ever Puck Fada champion!
DRAMATIC DEBUT
Many hurlers down the years have made dream debuts but none as dramatic as Setanta's first competitive outing:
"He went his way to the place of assembly in Eamhain where the youths were. There were thrice fifty youths led by Follomain mac Conchubhair at their games on the green of Eamhain. "The little boy went on to the playing-field into the midst and caught the ball between his two legs when they cast it, nor did he let it go higher than the top of his knee, nor lower than his ankle, and he pressed it and held it close between his two legs and not one of the youths managed to get a grasp or a stroke a prod nor a stroke or a blow or a shot at it. And he carried the ball away from them over the goal.
Then they all gazed at him. They wondered and they marvelled." LL
So not only was Setanta a dab hand at the long puck, he was fairly useful in a match situation too, his flicks and tricks living up to his title of hurling's first legendary figure!
ROWS AND RUCTIONS
Of course, same as it ever was, rows and ructions soon erupted on the playing field:
"Well, boys," said Follamhain mac Conchubhiar, "attack yon fellow, all of you, and let him meet death at my hands, for it is tabu for you that a youth should join in your game without ensuring his protection from you. Attack him all together, for we know that he is the son of a Ulster chieftain, and let them not make it a habit to join your games without putting themselves under your protection and safeguard."
Then they all attacked him together. They cast their thrice fifty camáin at the boys head. He lifted his single play-stick ( a aonlorg áineasa) and warded off the thrice fifty sticks. Then they cast the thrice fifty balls at the little boy. He raised his arms and his wrists and his palms and warded off the thrice fifty balls. They threw at him the thrice fifty toy spears with sharpened butt. The boy lifted up his toy wooden shield and warded off the thrice fifty spears."
TEMPER, TEMPER!
But the bold Setanta could mix it too, though it would appear he had a bit of a temper as the following extract would suggest:
"Then a transformation came over him. You would have thought each rib of his hair had been driven into his head so upright did it stand. You would have thought that a spark of fire was on the top of each bristle. One eye closed until it was no wider than the eye of a needle. The other eye opened until it was as wide as the mouth of a meadgoblet. He bared his jaw-bones to his ear. He opened his lips until his gullet became visible. The hero's flame rose from the crown of his head. Then he set on the youths.
CLUICHE POILL (THE HOLE-GAME)
When things calmed down, Setanta took to playing a different type of hurling game:
"The king put on his light travelling garb and went to bid farewell to the youths. Conchubhar went to the playing field and saw something which astonished him; thrice fifty boys at one end of the field and a single boy at the other end, and the single boy winning victory from the thrice fifty youths.
When they played the hole-game ( cluiche poill) - a game which was played on the green in Eamhain - and when it was their turn to cast the ball and his to defend, he would catch the thrice fifty balls outside the hole and none would go past him into the hole. When it was their turn to keep goal and his to hurl, he would put the thrice fifty balls unerringly into the hole.
SHARPSHOOTER SUPREME
And, of course, Setanta was the original sharpshooter, sure didn't his accuracy prompt his change of name?!
The evening of his big hurling match he was summoned to the court of King Conchobar so that he might attend a feast at the house of the sidhe blacksmith Culann. Setanta promised to come along as soon as he was finished playing cluiche na poll ( the 'hole game')
When the Ulster champions entered the smith's hall, the king gave permission for Culann to let loose his fierce guard hound, forgetting that Setanta had not yet arrived. When Setanta came into Culann's front yard the hound attacked him fiercely, Setanta reacted quickly and the young hurler struck the ball with such power and accuracy that it choked Chulainn's hound.
Culann the chief smith was devastated to find that his guard dog had been killed. "Who is going to guard my house now?" asked the host to which Setanta replied "I'll be your guard dog until you can replace the one I killed. I'll be the "Hound of Chulainn", henceforth the great hurler became known as Cuchulainn.
IT SAID IN THE 'PAPERS'
Virtually all the stories above have been sourced from folk-tales and mythology of ancient Ireland. However, just as in modern times Henry Shefflin and Eoin Kelly have their performances analysed, Setanta's hurling exploits too came under the microscope of two of hurling's greatest students whose deliberations we carry so as to shed light on the fanciful stories above.
LU v LL
No, not a Fitzgibbon Cup hurling match but the books from which we learn of Setanta's hurling skills. Let Art Ó Maolfabhail who in 1973 published Camán, 2000 years of Hurling in Ireland explain:
"Cúchulainn is the hurler par excellence of literature and most Irish people have heard in some form or other of his exploits on the playing field at Eamhain Mhaca, near Armagh, in the days of King Conchubar mac Neasa. Actually these exploits form only an incidental part of the great tale known as the Táin Bo Cuaille ( TheCattle-drivingofCooley).

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