t only causes the
lampooner's death, but triumphs over the Fomorians.[285] On insufficient
grounds, mainly because he was patron of Diarmaid, beloved of women, and
because his kisses became birds which whispered love thoughts to youths
and maidens, Oengus has been called the Eros of the Gaels. More probably
he was primarily a supreme god of growth, who occasionally suffered
eclipse during the time of death in nature, like Tammuz and Adonis, and
this may explain his absence from Mag-tured. The beautiful story of his
vision of a maiden with whom he fell violently in love contains too many
_Maerchen_ formulae to be of any mythological or religious value. His
mother Boand caused search to be made for her, but without avail. At
last she was discovered to be the daughter of a semi-divine lord of a
_sid_, but only through the help of mortals was the secret of how she
could be taken wrung from him. She was a swan-maiden, and on a certain
day only would Oengus obtain her. Ultimately she became his wife. The
story is interesting because it shows how the gods occasionally required
mortal aid.[286]

Equally influenced by _Maerchen_ formulae is the story of Oengus and
Etain. Etain and Fuamnach were wives of Mider, but Fuamnach was jealous
of Etain, and transformed her into an insect. In this shape Oengus found
her, and placed her in a glass _grianan_ or bower filled with flowers,
the perfume of which sustained her. He carried the _grianan_ with him
wherever he went, but Fuamnach raised a magic wind which blew Etain away
to the roof of Etair, a noble of Ulster. She fell through a smoke-hole
into a golden cup of wine, and was swallowed by Etair's wife, of whom
she was reborn.[287] Professor Rh[^y]s resolves all this into a sun and
dawn myth. Oengus is the sun, Etain the dawn, the _grianan_ the expanse
of the sky.[288] But the dawn does not grow stronger with the sun's
influence, as Etain did under that of Oengus. At the sun's appearance
the dawn begins

"to faint in the light of the sun she loves,
To faint in his light and to die."

The whole story is built up on the well-known _Marchen_ formulae of the
"True Bride" and the "Two Brothers," but accommodated to well-known
mythic personages, and the _grianan_ is the Celtic equivalent of various
objects in stories of the "Cinderella" type, in which the heroine
conceals herself, the object being bought by the hero and kept in his
room.[289] Thus the tale reveals nothing of Etain's