The Death Eagle
Searles O'Dubhain
searles@summerlands.com
Tue Feb 22 01:59:47 2000
Because the eagle is able to fly so high, it is considered to be the true bird of the sky gods. The eagles were said to sit on the mountain tops and it was the flapping of their wings that created the winds and the storms. It is the second oldest of all the animals next to the salmon of wisdom which is the oldest of all animals. Poet-Seers who have made the journey to their beginnings  (and back again) relate that they have been in the form of an eagle before becoming this salmon.  In Celtic lore the eagle is the bird of renewal like the Phoenix.  It flies high enough to be burned by the Sun, then plunges into the depths of a lake to be reborn.  This activity is reported in some of the tales known as imrama..  *p*The idea of the eagle being a part of the cycle between death and rebirth (its renewal of itself) is what applies to the tale of Lugh who was killed by Gronw Pebyr. Lleu could not be killed within a house or outside of it, neither on horseback or on foot; nor by any weapon that had taken less than a year and a day of labor to forge by a single man workings only on Sundays while the people were in ritual. He revealed this to Blodeuwedd who joined her lover Gronw in attempting to kill him. Gronw forged a spear (for a year and a day) that he pierced Lleu with as he departed through the doorway of a bathhouse set at the edge of a river and while he had one foot on the back of a goat and the other on the edge of the tub (in which he had bathed). The head of the spear remained in Lleu's side with the shaft sticking out. To avoid his death he transformed himself into an eagle and flew into the top of an oak.  He remained in this tree in a perpetually dying state with his flesh rotting and dropping off of him and being consumed (during the day) by a swine from the pens of his foster father Gwydion. When Gwydion followed the sow upstream to the valley of Nantlleu, she stopped beneath the oak and began feeding on Lleu's rotting flesh. Gwydion sang three chants to bring Lleu (as an eagle) from the tree into his lap.*p*An oak grows between two lakes,*br*Dark sky and glen.*br*If I speak truly*br*This comes from Lleu's feathers.*p*(At this the eagle dropped to the middle of the tree).*p*An oak grows on a high plain:*br*Rain soaks it no more than does putrefaction.*br*It has supported twenty crafts;*br*In its branches is Lleu Skillful Hand.*p*(The eagle then dropped to the lowest tree branch).*p*An oak grows on a slope,*br*The refuge of a handsome prince.*br*If I speak truly*br*Lleu will come to my lap.*p*The eagle came to Gwydion's lap and he touched it with his Druid's wand transforming it back into a healthy and alive Lleu.*p*The oak is the Sacred Bile. The high plain is Magh Mo/r the Otherworldly heaven.  Lleu's existence as and eagle has to do with an in-between-state where he is neither dead nor alive.  It is between death and life that a soul is said to encounter Garuda, the death eagle of Aryan lore. It is the bird upon which Visnu rides (who dreams the samsara of existence).  The eagle guards the two gateways to the Otherworld.  In some traditions, it devours the memories of souls as they journey from one life to another.  In this it is like the Well of Slane or the Cauldron of Regeneration (from the story of Bran and Branwen).  Those who go into it to be reborn are restored to life but cannot speak of their Otherworldly journey.*p*The eagle is a symbol of death and rebirth in Celtic tradition.  Lleu died and was reborn. Poet-Seers must become the eagle to attain to the oldest animal state and to gain the ancient knowledge. Those who die normally and return do not retain this knowledge when they return to existence. Only those who are "twice born" can do so with cognition.  The death and rebirth of Lleu in the story called "Math Son of Mathonwy" is about the death and resurrection of the year.  Lleu is killed at the Equinox, when he has one foot on the edge of the Cauldron of Rebirth and the other foot on the back of the goat of March (Aries).  The year begins anew in the sky with this event from an astrological point of view. While he is dead within the branches of the oak, the Flower Maiden takes a lover until the God of Druids brings him back at perhaps the Summer Solstice.  At that point Lleu has his revenge upon the May King and resumes his reign, banishing the Flower Maiden as the Night Owl or the Cailleach of the Harvest.  She flies away as the owl of the night while he reigns as the eagle of the day. *p*Why this event all came to pass was due to several geasa placed upon Lugh by Arianrhod his mother, but that is another part of the story for another time and place. :-)*p*Searles*p*Information for this message came from Jeffrey Gantz's translation of the Mabinogion, _Celtic Mythology_ by Peter Berresford Ellis, _Dictionary of Symbollic & Mythological Animals_ by J. C. Cooper, and _Beasts of Albion by Miranda Gray. I also used a bit of imbas and some information from traditional tales about Garuda as well as information found within _Gods and Myths of India_ by Alain Danielou. Mike Nichols also has an essay on this topic available on the web (mightpost it into the Public Library if the copyright allows for that).