Talk:Gonnagle

When considering the issue of musical instruments being used as weapons of war, one has to contemplate what would happen if the Gonnagles of the Nac Mac Feegle or the Pictsies ever had cause to come up against a Llamedosian male voice battle choir, supported by specially reinforced war-harps... would the result be a terrible battle of attrition, or would both sides tacitly and unspokenly agree to differ? Of course, Llamedosian (Welsh) folklore preserves memories of a terrible tylwth teg living in mounds and barrows who periodically leave to raid human settlements, terrorise humanity, and leave changelings. The term "little people" appears to rule out Elves, or it could be a euphemism along the lines of Lords and Ladies or "The Gentry". It is clear from context that "little people" does not carry associations of gentle flower-folk nor entrancing bewinged entities presenting the appearance of pre-pubescent girls.

Perhaps such an entity as a Llamedosian version of the Feegle exists, and if so, it has its own equivalent of the Gonnagle, possibly a "macsboes" who renders the enemy insensible by waving a giant leek and telling terrible jokes punctuated with the war-cry "Oggy Oggy Oggy!" ...--AgProv 14:36, 2 May 2007 (CEST)

First he played the notes of pain...

Irish mythology preserves the story of the god Angus Og, whose preferred weapon in war was the harp.

On the one occasion his harp was captured by the foul enemy race of Fhoi Moir, Angus and his comrades crept into the enemy camp by night and located the instrument. Upon his battle-harp, the god played the Three Noble Strains of Ireland that were inherent in the music. The first of these, the goltrai (strain of weeping) caused every one of the Formorians to mourn and lament their defeat. He followed this with the geantrai (the strain of merriment) so the Formorians, who had so recently been mourning fell to laughter like puppets on a string. The Dagda ended his medley with the suantrai (sleep-strain) whereupon the Formorian warriors fell into a deep, deep sleep. At that point it was child's play for the Dagda, Aengus Og, and Uaithne to take the harp and leave the enemy camp.

Elsewhere in Irish mythology, the goltrai strain in music has explicitly been called "the notes of pain" and it is evidently this in which Pictsie gonnagles are trained.

There is a theory underlying the modern Irish wake - a celebration of the dead lasting at least three days - that remembering the dead should consist of a day of sorrowing and weeping for one who is no longer here; a day of rejoicing for one who has passed to Heaven and whose sorrows are over (to celebrate their life); and a day of sleep to repair the wounds and hurt of those left behind. Amen to that! --AgProv 09:41, 30 March 2010 (UTC)