Origins of the Otherworld Belief
Three sources for the belief in another world so close to our own might be suggested.
      The first comes from the memories of the Celts themselves. Originally, they were a nomadic people, living as hunter-gatherers and travelling long distances across various terrains. Their tradition was primarily an oral one and they wrote very little about themselves. Consequently, much of the accounts of their travels was passed down between generations through song and story. While we know that the bards possessed phenomenal, and largely accurate, memories (see: Druidic Tradition) we are not so sure about the common warrior or farmer. Probably their memories tended to run recollections together in a muddled and haphazard way. As often happens, accounts of the places that they remembered might have altered across the years; embellishments may have been added, locations changed to fit the particular story. Gradually and almost unconsciously, real locations and sites might have assumed a legendary and mythical quality. Thus, a temporary campsite in a peaceful, sunny valley became, several centuries later, a sun-drenched, fertile land where the heroes of Celtic legend found rest and repose; a minor skirmish on a muddy plain became an unending battlefield where the warriors of old continually tested their mettle. The battles in the Otherworld, it was said, greatly outdid those in the mortal sphere in their ferocity, skill and strategy.
      A second source for the belief may come from the environment itself. Celts regarded the lands that they came to and in which they settled with a mixture of awe and wonder. They viewed the great stones and tumbled features left by the Ice Age as the work of primal gods and/or giants (see Giants, Monsters and Fairies) neither of whom had really gone away. The Celts steadfastly believed that the world of spirits was incredibly close. Natural phenomena, as for example majestic cloud formations, would require explanations. Spectacular cloud formations might resemble ships, mountains or the ramparts of mighty castles and to the Celtic mind, this may have been exactly what they were. They hinted at a strange land in the sky, beyond mortal comprehension and beyond reach. Such a place could have stirred the imagination to envisage trees, fields and houses among the towering cloudbanks, all suggestive of another, unknown country.
      Not only cloud formations but changes in the quality of light play tricks on the eyes. The landscape that the Celts inhabited was littered with scattered rocks left in the wake of great glaciers and studded with the earthen fortifications of earlier, aboriginal peoples. In the evening, as the light began to fail, this terrain would change aspect. Shadows misled the senses, creating features that were not there at all. In the evening gloom, the tumbled stones took on the shape of a castle or fortress, a narrow valley seemed to suggest a river. When the light changed again, such things were revealed for what they were and the suggestions would be gone. To the Celtic mind, the halfglimpsed Otherworld had simply melted away. This is why most visions of the Otherworld, or the fairy world, were seen at twilight, between the lights.
      With climatic changes at the end of the great Ice Age, might have come phenomena that are no longer common. For example, mirages may have been more common in the west than they are today. Such optical illusions may well have been part of the Celtic experience – distantly-glimpsed lakes may have vanished; illusionary towns and cities may have come and gone in the wink of an eye – once again creating the myth of another country.
      Evidence from relatively modern times supported this theory. On 7 July, 1878, the inhabitants of the Irish seaside town of Ballycotton, County Cork, were greatly excited by the sudden appearance out in the ocean of an island where none had existed before. Observers were able to see the new island quite plainly, its rugged coastline, deep woodlands and seemingly fertile valleys. Fishermen sailed out to investigate but, as they approached, the island suddenly winked out of existence, leaving them wondering.
      Similar islands have been seen off the coast of Kerry at Ballyheigue Strand, in Galway in Ballinaleame Bay and Carrigaholt in Clare. There have been reports of mysterious landmasses off Achill Island in Mayo and off the coast of Sligo at Inniscrone. (See also: The Island of Vanishing Men). These and other well-documented mirages might have formed the concept of a fairy country that came and went as it saw fit and created its own folklore.
      A third explanation for the Otherworld belief may also have its roots in our own reality. We must remember that, during the time of the Celts, large tracts of the country and the seas round about lay mostly unexplored. Although the Celts were neither seamen nor explorers at least some of them made voyages of discovery, particularly during their early Christianised period. Irish and Scottish monks in particular are reputed to have sailed in flimsy craft to many parts of the world. One Irish saint – Brendan the Navigator – allegedly set foot in America, long before either the Vikings or Christopher Columbus. Accounts of these often dangerous voyages, coupled with greatly exaggerated travellers' tales from all over the ancient world, served to create a new and fantastic landscape which coalesced into a generalised Otherworld, a place containing many exotic and diverse elements.
      As the ancient world became more accurately mapped and its mysteries rationalised, these stories passed into legend and myth, but still they exerted a powerful influence on the development of the folktale within Celtic society. And, somewhere in the deepest recesses of the Celtic mind, the possibility of a distant, but utterly real, Otherworld continued to survive.

This Chapter extract continues with The Celtic Otherworld - Part 2>>>.

From Complete Guide to Celtic Mythology by Bob Curran