One Man's God: Celtic Myths, Part 2

Lá Fhéile Pádraig sona daoibh!

Been a LONG time coming for this part 2.  I wanted to read some more myths of Ireland and Wales in particular before moving on.  One book, in particular, I wanted to make sure I read was Irish Witchcraft & Demonology by St. John D. Seymour. It is such a fun book that I could not pass up owning a copy, especially when I could buy it from the personal collection of Wednesday Mourning!

One of the things we must keep in mind when reading any Celtic myth or story is that the ones we have now were handed down to us from oral traditions and then recorded by Irish Christian monks.  While I am sure they did their best to preserve what they could they undoubtedly recorded them from the point of view of a Christian.  Even the later King Cycle of Irish myths included Christian themes. 

What does that mean to us, or more to the point, me and One Man's God?  Often it is not easy to tell if a "demon" from a Celtic Myth is a demon in their own world view OR a demon from the Christian world view.  Don't claim they all have to be Christian, we don't know and the experts are also split. But that honestly should not matter to us.  I don't care if they are a "Celtic demon" or "Christian demon,"  are they a "Monster Manual Demon?"

Thankfully we have some candidates. But first let's go back to our primary source, the AD&D Deities & Demigods. 

I mentioned in my Part 1 that there are not a lot of great candidates for demons in the text of the D&DG. I even disagree with the idea that Arawn is Lawful Evil. After rereading the First Branch of the Mabinogi I see the Lawful, but not the Evil.  Lawful Neutral is a better fit really. His abode, Annwn, is described as beautiful, unchanging, and without pain or suffering.  Hardly the MO of an evil god.

There are creatures though that could be described as demons.

Air Demon

I did a write-up a bit ago about the Swan Maidens and the Children of Lir.  In the tale Aoifé, step-mother of the Children of Lir, turned the children into swans. As punishment, she was changed into a Demon of the Air.  We know from the tale that demons of the air are immortal.  

Air Demon
FREQUENCY:  Very Rare
NO.  APPEARING:  1-4
ARMOR CLASS: 2
MOVE:  0" Fly 24"
HIT DICE:  4+4 (22 hp)
%  IN  LAIR:  0%
TREASURE  TYPE:  Nil
NO.  OF  ATTACKS:  1
DAMAGE/ATTACK:  Wind Blast 1d6 (60')
SPECIAL  ATTACKS:  Chill (2d4) x3, Invisible
SPECIAL  DEFENSES:  +1  or  better weapon to hit
MAGIC  RESISTANCE:  25%
INTELLIGENCE:  Average
ALIGNMENT:  Chaotic  Evil
SIZE:  M  (5')
PSIONIC ABILITY:  Nil

Wind Demons are among the weakest of demons.  They lack physical bodies and are functionally invisible.  Detect magic, detect evil, or detect invisible will reveal the location of the demon, which will appear as a faint outline of a humanoid creature.  The creature's evil intent is dampened only by their inability to interact with physical items including people. 

They try to cause havoc as much as they can in their own limited way.  They can attack with blasts of wind that whip up items to cause damage.  Additionally, three times per day the Air Demon can cause a blast of chill wind for 2d4 hp of damage to anyone within 15' of the location of the demon.

Air Demons are pitied more often than feared.  Their blasts of wind are ineffective from a distance and their howls of rage are sounds of a gale. They are immortal but lacking substance they can never interact with anything.  Even other air demons are as mist to them.

Demon Boar

The importance of the wild boar and the boar hunt in Celtic myth and even life can't be understated. The Welsh prince Twrch Trwyth was transformed into a boar.  Diarmuid the Irish warrior and member of the Fianna goes on a boar hunt but is killed by the Great Boar of Ben Bulben who had been his transformed half-brother. There are plenty of other examples of boars as monsters in Irish my including one with Cú Chulainn about a giant boar with tusks of gold and a hide as thick as armor. 

Demon Boar
FREQUENCY:  Very Rare
NO.  APPEARING:  1
ARMOR CLASS: -1
MOVE:  18"
HIT DICE:  9+9 (50 hp)
%  IN  LAIR:  25%
TREASURE  TYPE:  Nil
NO.  OF  ATTACKS:  1 gore (slashing)
DAMAGE/ATTACK:  2d8+4
SPECIAL  ATTACKS: Cause Fear
SPECIAL  DEFENSES:  Magic weapon to hit
MAGIC  RESISTANCE:  25%
INTELLIGENCE:  Low
ALIGNMENT:  Chaotic  Evil
SIZE:  L  (8')
PSIONIC ABILITY:  Nil

The demon boar is a demonic spirit that inhabits the body of a boar and creates a true monster. 

The boar grows large and fierce. Its tusks become gold and razor-sharp.  Its hooves become iron and cause flames to erupt as it runs.   Its natural hide is thick as armor. It is immune to all but magical weapons.

The Demon Boar is intelligent enough to plan and scheme.  Some can even speak.  Its normal tactic is to encounter a group of hunters and use its Cause Fear to scatter them into smaller groups.   It then will pick off the hunters one by one.  It relishes in the death and fear it causes.    It lives only to kill great heroes.

Only great weapons such as the Gáe Bulg of Cú Chulainn or the Claíomh Solais of Nuada Airgeadlámh have any chance of bringing this fiend down.

Irish Ways and Irish Laws

I love Celtic myth and history. It is all just so fantastic and fascinates me a in way that Greek and Norse myths never did, though the Norse myths come close.

Since I mentioned the book Irish Witchcraft & Demonology I should link out to the write-up I did on Ireland's most notorious witch, Alice Kyteler.

One of my favorite bits of Irish and Celtic mythology for a game is Brian Young's Castles & Crusades Codex Celtarum.  Brian has a Ph.D. in Bythronic languages and has been a gamer even longer.  He is exactly the sort of person I'd want to write a book like this.  Sure, you don't need a Ph.D. to write game materials, but it sure helps! 

And finally here is one I just found today, but it has been up for a bit.  FilmRise has the entire 1987, 6-part BBC Studios documentary, The Celts, on YouTube.  This fantastic documentary educated many on the history and archeology of the Celts as well as introducing the world to the music of Enya.

Go n-éirí an bóthar leat!