Ffanaigecht (later spelling, Fiannaiocht) (Fenian Cycle) refers to the stories centered on the legendary character Finn mac Cumaill, his /fan (warrior band), his son Oisfn, and his grandson Oscar. From the earliest literary attestation in the seventh century among the Laigin, cultivation of this material spread and became associated in the Old Irish period with places as far apart as south Tipperary, west Cork, the Midlands, and east Ulster. Classified by modern scholars as one of the four medieval Irish literary cycles (along with the Ulster cycle, the cycle of Historical Tales [or cycles of the Kings] and the Mythological cycle), it emerged from fragmentarily documented beginnings to become the dominant literary genre of the post-Norman period in Ireland.
The warrior band, an institution with Indo-European roots, was an integral part of medieval Irish society, occupying an important position on its boundaries. Some scholars have argued, however, that the /tan’s existence on the margins of society contributed to the early literary neglect of Ffanaigecht material by Christian redactors and scribes who wished to discourage warrior bands and associated practices. The lack of relevance of this material to a society obsessed with history and genealogy is another reason cited for its initial lack of cultivation. Its rise in popularity in the post-Norman period has been attributed to a lessening of church opposition to the genre and its adaptability to changing literary tastes.
Similar to the figure of Arthur in Britain, the cult of Finn grew from its localized beginnings to spread throughout Ireland and the rest of the Gaelic-speaking world. During this process, particularly under the influence of the synthetic historians in the tenth and eleventh centuries, a position was found for Finn and his /(an in the historical and literary record. They were often portrayed as the standing army of King Cormac mac Airt, defending Ireland in the third century against foreign invasion, often from a base at Cnoc Ailinne (Knockaulin, County Kildare) in Laigin territory.
Fenian lays and ballads began to be composed at least as early as the eleventh century, and these became the dominant literary form of the tradition from the late medieval period onward. The two most important extant ballad collections are those preserved in the sixteenth-century Scottish manuscript, the Book o/the Dean o/Lismore, and the seventeenth-century Duanaire Finn, compiled among the Irish exiles in Ostend, Belgium. The fame of Fenian balladry had spread all over Europe by the nineteenth century, thanks to James Macpherson. He published three works in the 1760s that purported to be translations of epic poems written by Finn’s son, Oisfn (in Macpherson’s spelling Ossian). These "translations" were, in the main, creations of his own imagination, although they were partly based on genuine ballad tradition. From Macpherson’s "Ossian" the term "Ossianic" emerged, a word that is still occasionally used to refer to the cycle as a whole and to the ballad tradition in particular.
Prose material was also extensively cultivated and includes the Middle Irish texts Tochmarc Ailbe and Macgnfmrada Find, the later Feis Tighe Chonain, and the very well known Toraigheacht Dhiarmada agus Ghrainne, a classic example of the love triangle. The central text in Ffanaigecht tradition, however, is Acallam na Senorach (The Colloquy of the Ancients), recently translated by Dooley and Roe. This long tale that focuses, inter alia, on the accommodation reached between the native and Christian traditions, features the encounters between St. Patrick and the last surviving Fenian warriors, most notably Caflte. In this frame-tale, the journey of saint and warrior around fifth-century Ireland is recounted, and the different moral codes of the /(an and the church are compared, contrasted, and ultimately harmonized. It is a veritable treasure trove of Ffanaigecht material, described by Murphy as "a reservoir into which a brilliant late-twelfth-century innovator had diverted several streams of tradition which previously had normally flowed in separate channels." The single largest medieval Irish text, it was written in approximately 1200 in prose interspersed with poetry, the "prosimetrum" form so favored in Irish tradition.
The human and mythic characteristics of Finn mac Cumaill are very fully documented in Ffanaigecht tradition. These range from comparisons with Lug and with the Welsh Gwynn ap Nudd; to Finn’s role of seer in the early literature; to the magical and supernatural environment that surrounds Finn, his /(an, and his family in the later material. His attractiveness to an audience is ensured, however, by his continual presentation as a character with all too human qualities and failings. We see him as an unsympathetic and isolated youth, a successful and a spurned lover, a wise and learned poet, a jealous and embittered old man, and a strong and vigorous hunter/warrior; thus he reflects many aspects of the human condition. This complexity of character, coupled with repeated evocation of the beauties of nature, the clever use of dinnshenchas (place-name lore), and the recurring presence of magic and the supernatural have combined to place Ffanaigecht at the very heart of Irish culture, as is still the case in the modern folk tradition.
