WEBVTT - Finn McCool, Part 2: The Thumb of Knowledge 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:05.280 My Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of 0:00:05.360 --> 0:00:14.720 My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:17.799 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:20.400 we're back with part two of our series about the 0:00:20.480 --> 0:00:25.079 legendary Irish hero Finn McCool. If you haven't heard part one, 0:00:25.120 --> 0:00:26.800 you should go back and listen to that one first. 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:28.400 This one will make a lot more sense if you do. 0:00:28.520 --> 0:00:31.640 But at the end of the last episode, we promised 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:35.479 you that this episode would be the one that's all thumb, because, 0:00:35.720 --> 0:00:38.159 of course, one of the great legends about Finn McCool 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:41.560 is the so called thumb of knowledge. We teased it 0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:44.159 a few times in the previous episode. But but now 0:00:44.159 --> 0:00:47.239 we're finally here. We're finally to the thumb factory. That's 0:00:47.240 --> 0:00:50.120 all right. Finn is not merely a warrior and a 0:00:50.200 --> 0:00:52.360 hunter and in a in a defender of his people. 0:00:52.720 --> 0:00:56.960 He also has the gift of divination. His prescience puts 0:00:57.000 --> 0:00:59.760 him in keeping with the likes of Paula Trades, but 0:00:59.800 --> 0:01:04.240 he doesn't take spice or enter a Prana Bindu trance 0:01:04.360 --> 0:01:07.120 in order to see the future, or is it sometimes 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:10.920 described to gain wisdom. Instead, he puts his thumb in 0:01:11.040 --> 0:01:13.720 his mouth is the most heroic thing I can picture. 0:01:14.080 --> 0:01:16.880 I mean, imagine the movie poster. It's like your your 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:20.440 action movie hero. They've got the sword, their hair is 0:01:20.480 --> 0:01:23.560 blowing in the wind, maybe their armor is splattered with 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:27.160 blood and mud. And also he's just got his thumb 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:30.319 in his mouth. Now. In the last part of the series, 0:01:30.360 --> 0:01:34.520 we referenced a few works by a scholar named James McKillop, 0:01:34.520 --> 0:01:38.240 who has written extensively on Finn McCool and on Irish 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:41.440 smith and legend. For example, I cited him when I 0:01:41.480 --> 0:01:45.880 was talking about the version of the Giants Causeways story 0:01:45.959 --> 0:01:49.880 that involves uh, that involves the the Ben and Donner Giant, 0:01:50.000 --> 0:01:53.160 the rival Giant being replaced with one named Kukullen, which 0:01:53.200 --> 0:01:56.080 is totally confusing because that's the name of a different 0:01:56.120 --> 0:01:59.400 Irish folk hero. But this was also the version of 0:01:59.440 --> 0:02:03.240 the story where Finn McCool bites off the rival giant's 0:02:03.360 --> 0:02:06.240 finger when the giant is tricked into putting the finger 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:09.880 into his mouth. But I think you were also reading 0:02:10.040 --> 0:02:13.760 something by James McKillop on the on the origins of 0:02:13.800 --> 0:02:18.240 this thumb story, right, yeah, yeah. According to McKillop. The 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:22.000 The details on how the thumb is utilized very according 0:02:22.040 --> 0:02:25.400 to the you know, the different tellings. Sometimes it's described 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:28.000 as a sucking of the thumb, much like an infant 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:31.040 would would suck on a thumber fingers. Other Times it's 0:02:31.040 --> 0:02:34.800 described as a chewing of the thumb, and sometimes it's 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:39.040 specifically said that the thumb is placed behind the upper teeth, 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:42.160 which I guess is something that is is more or 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:45.880 less happening with any kind of infantile sucking of the 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:49.080 thumb anyway, but that they seem to make us sometimes 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:50.840 the point is made that is like the thumb is 0:02:50.880 --> 0:02:53.640 coming into contact with the palette and pressing. All right. 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:56.040 So as amusing as the image of an action hero 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:59.639 sucking his thumb might be, uh, the idea of an 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:03.440 action hero biting his thumb, that's pretty close, but that 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:06.680 seems a little more maybe on the money, especially when 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:10.880 you take into account some historical considerations, because the idea 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:15.639 of biting his thumb immediately made me think of the 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:20.520 classically confusing scene from Shakespeare the Infamous do you bite 0:03:20.520 --> 0:03:24.079 your thumbatus serve the scene from Romeo and Juliet rob 0:03:24.080 --> 0:03:27.040 do you remember coming across this in in school and 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:30.040 having no idea what to make of it. Yes, I 0:03:30.160 --> 0:03:33.320 distinctly remember this, probably when we were watching at an 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:36.160 adaptation of it um and uh, yeah, there's the whole 0:03:36.160 --> 0:03:38.520 scene with I by my thumb at you, and I 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:41.520 remember everyone getting a real kick out of that. Yeah, 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:44.000 it's like it's one of those where you know what 0:03:44.120 --> 0:03:46.440 it means, but you don't know what it means, Like 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:49.000 you get the gist, but you don't understand what they're 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:52.680 talking about. Because so the scene, for anybody who hasn't 0:03:52.680 --> 0:03:55.320 read it, it's in Romeo and Juliet, Act one, Scene one. 0:03:56.320 --> 0:04:00.000 We get servants of the two rival houses, the Montague 0:04:00.040 --> 0:04:02.120 in the Capulets. They run into each other in the 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:05.280 street and they're they're trying to stir things up there. 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:07.839 They're trying to to provoke a fight because they hate 0:04:07.880 --> 0:04:10.320 each other. And so a character from one house says, 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:12.520 do you bite your thumbat us, sir? And the guy 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:14.760 from the other house says, I do bite my thumb, sir. 0:04:15.600 --> 0:04:17.880 Do you bite your thumb at us, sir? And then 0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:21.000 he uh. The guy who's biting his thumb lead leans 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:22.920 aside to his friend and he says is the law 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:25.160 on our side. If I say I and his friend 0:04:25.160 --> 0:04:27.800 says no, it is not. So he says, no, sir, 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:30.200 I do not bite my thumb at you, sir. But 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:32.680 I bite my thumb sir. So it's it's sort of like, 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:35.440 I'm just punching the air. And if you happen to 0:04:35.560 --> 0:04:38.560 walk into the air that I'm punching, you know, so 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:43.240 be it. I think the implication is that if he 0:04:43.279 --> 0:04:46.640 says outright that he is biting his thumb at the 0:04:46.680 --> 0:04:49.440 other guy, then if a fight breaks out, it will 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:52.360 be considered his fault because he provoked it. So he's 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:54.880 just saying no, I'm just biting my thumb in general, 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:57.200 all right, makes sense, makes sense. It's kind of like 0:04:57.279 --> 0:04:59.400 if here is, if there's a difference between flashing the 0:04:59.440 --> 0:05:03.000 middle thing or and making a middle finger and scratching 0:05:03.000 --> 0:05:05.560 your face, you have plausible deniability and saying I know 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:07.680 I wasn't flipping you off. I was. I just on 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:09.599 the side of my face itches and I needed to 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:11.800 relieve it. And my see, my middle finger is my 0:05:11.920 --> 0:05:14.479 longest finger, and therefore it is the ideal finger to 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:18.599 use for scratching. Said notes right, Oh, oh, it's itching again. Oh, 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:23.360 here I go again. Oh now both sides are itching. Yeah. 0:05:23.920 --> 0:05:26.120 Uh so yeah, that that is clearly what's going on 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:28.479 in the scene. But it is interesting to ponder, like, 0:05:28.640 --> 0:05:32.800 what is what is the origin of this thumb biting thing, 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:37.000 because of course this was localized to specific cultures, but 0:05:37.040 --> 0:05:39.839 it's clear what it means in context. It seems to 0:05:39.960 --> 0:05:43.760 bite one's thumb at someone was a gesture of disrespect 0:05:43.880 --> 0:05:46.120 or contempt. It was kind of like giving the finger. 0:05:46.560 --> 0:05:48.800 It was. It was a way of saying you stink. 0:05:49.800 --> 0:05:52.039 And in trying to find something about the origins of 0:05:52.080 --> 0:05:55.560 this gesture, I found an exerpt from a book called 0:05:55.600 --> 0:05:59.599 How to Behave Badly in Elizabethan, England by a British 0:05:59.600 --> 0:06:04.480 story named Ruth Goodman. And uh she writes as follows quote. 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.200 In modern sicily, you can still see a form of 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:10.560 this gesture and use an upright thumb held so that 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:15.040 the pad points outwards, is tucked behind the top front teeth, 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:18.320 and then flicked forwards out of the mouth towards the 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:22.320 intended insulte. Okay, so are you picturing that It's not 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:24.640 the thumb going straight into the mouth as you might 0:06:24.640 --> 0:06:27.200 think with like when a child is sucking their thumb instead. 0:06:27.279 --> 0:06:29.960 It's like the thumb kind of goes upward into the 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:32.240 mouth behind the top teeth, and then you kind of 0:06:32.279 --> 0:06:36.520 flick the thumb out pad out. But then Goodman also writes, 0:06:36.760 --> 0:06:39.560 I've also seen a version in action on the outskirts 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:41.320 of Venice, although I don't know if it was a 0:06:41.400 --> 0:06:44.400 native Venetian performing it, where the pad of the thumb 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.640 was placed horizontally between the top and bottom teeth in 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:50.680 a bite, and then flicked out, rotating as it went 0:06:50.839 --> 0:06:54.120 so that the bitten pad was thrust forwards. And so 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:58.160 because of the the the Finn McCool biting the thumb thing, 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:00.360 I started to wonder if there were any in tristing 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:04.400 connections between this gesture we see in Shakespeare that appears 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:06.880 to have mostly gone out of style today, though maybe 0:07:06.880 --> 0:07:09.600 you might still see it in isolated cases here or there, 0:07:09.680 --> 0:07:13.000 such as in Sicily or somewhere in Italy. But I'm 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:15.680 gonna have to say that for me, this investigation was 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:18.440 a failure. I couldn't find any evidence of a connection 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:22.720 between these two story elements, though it did raise interesting 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:26.080 questions on its own, like where would this type of 0:07:26.080 --> 0:07:29.640 thumb biting gesture come from and uh from what I 0:07:29.680 --> 0:07:33.600 turned up. Like many obscene gestures, its origins are unknown, 0:07:33.680 --> 0:07:36.320 but I did find a book that had some interesting 0:07:36.360 --> 0:07:41.240 informed guesses, and this was in an academic book called 0:07:41.400 --> 0:07:46.760 Historical Social Psychology by Kenneth Gurgin and Mary Gurgan published 0:07:46.760 --> 0:07:50.440 by Taylor and Francis. And so, first of all, they 0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:53.400 dispense with a few alternatives. They say, well, you know, 0:07:53.600 --> 0:07:57.000 maybe the thumb biting uh insult gesture has something to 0:07:57.000 --> 0:07:59.480 do with thumb sucking, but that doesn't really fit what's 0:07:59.520 --> 0:08:02.560 described in the Shakespearean usage. And they say the same 0:08:02.600 --> 0:08:05.239 goes for the act of biting the knuckle of your thumb, 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:09.000 which is a gesture that sometimes people still used today, 0:08:09.040 --> 0:08:12.160 but it seems to to mean something different. Biting the 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:16.160 knuckle of your thumb seems to denote someone desperately trying 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:20.080 to contain rage, and that also it also just doesn't 0:08:20.120 --> 0:08:24.000 fit what's described in these sources. So instead they argued 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:26.640 that the thumb biting described by Shakespeare is something that 0:08:26.680 --> 0:08:29.520 has generally fallen out of fashion today, it's mostly not 0:08:29.680 --> 0:08:32.720 used anymore, and that in order to understand it we 0:08:32.720 --> 0:08:36.200 would need to look to the historical context. So what's 0:08:36.240 --> 0:08:38.880 the context. Well, I thought their answer was pretty interesting. 0:08:39.320 --> 0:08:41.920 They write quote. The clue, it seems, is to be 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:43.960 found in the fact that during the latter half of 0:08:43.960 --> 0:08:47.439 the sixteenth century, men were in the habit of wearing gloves, 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:51.160 and these were usually removed prior to any confrontation, not 0:08:51.360 --> 0:08:54.199 unlike the present day Irish habit of taking off one's 0:08:54.320 --> 0:08:58.120 jacket to show that one means business. In fact, the 0:08:58.120 --> 0:09:02.160 practice of removing and throwing down glove had become ritualized 0:09:02.200 --> 0:09:05.439 as a challenge long before Shakespeare's time, and it is 0:09:05.480 --> 0:09:08.920 common knowledge that medieval knights use this device to invite 0:09:08.960 --> 0:09:12.280 each other into the lists. It seems likely that the 0:09:12.320 --> 0:09:15.280 medieval convention, or some version of it, was still around 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:19.040 in a stylized form during Shakespeare's time, but it had 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:22.720 become abbreviated to the point where an intention movement of 0:09:22.800 --> 0:09:27.160 removing one's gloves would suffice. So how does an early 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:30.720 modern hater remove a glove? Well, one way would be 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:33.160 to remove it with the opposite hand, but another way 0:09:33.240 --> 0:09:35.520 would be to bite at one of the fingers of 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:38.040 the glove with your teeth and then pull the hand 0:09:38.040 --> 0:09:40.719 away from inside. You've probably seen people take gloves off 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:43.960 this way. The latter method, they claim, is well attested, 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:46.320 and it was not unusual to remove a glove this 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:48.680 way by by biting the thumb and pulling the hand out. 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:51.960 Though when I was trying to imagine doing this myself, 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:56.040 to just sort of give it a quick thought experiment check, 0:09:56.400 --> 0:09:58.240 I think you probably can do it. Though it seems 0:09:58.240 --> 0:10:00.679 to me be easier to get get your hand out 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:02.760 of the glove by biting one of the long fingers 0:10:02.800 --> 0:10:05.880 than by biting the thumb. But I'm no no glove expert. 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:08.679 Well this makes sense. Yeah, the gloves are off. This 0:10:08.760 --> 0:10:11.880 is the classic challenge, and I had to We had 0:10:11.880 --> 0:10:16.200 to check this with seth Um, whose Simpsons knowledge knows 0:10:16.200 --> 0:10:18.960 no bounds. But on on the Simpsons we had the 0:10:18.960 --> 0:10:22.240 episode where we had the glove slap where Homer is 0:10:22.320 --> 0:10:25.320 challenging everyone to a duel in town by slapping them 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:28.080 with his glove, which he has removed. Right, So in 0:10:28.120 --> 0:10:32.199 this case, the authors suggest their hypothesis is that over time, 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:36.280 this familiar, highly salient activity of taking off a glove 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:40.040 to demand a duel could be abbreviated to a simple 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:44.560 gesture of just biting your thumb to show scorn or 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:47.880 disrespect whether or not you're actually wearing a glove. They 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:51.319 do say they could find no direct evidence supporting this hypothesis, 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:53.600 though it does fit well with the observation that the 0:10:53.720 --> 0:10:59.079 gesture mostly fell into disuse when dueling disappeared as a 0:10:59.160 --> 0:11:02.960 legitimate way settling beef. So anyway, I think interesting question 0:11:03.040 --> 0:11:05.200 on its own, but I couldn't really find that this 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:09.080 much informs Finn McCool right right. I think that's one 0:11:09.080 --> 0:11:11.520 of the things that makes the Thumb of Knowledge here 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:15.520 so fascinating is that it does, to a certain extent, 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:18.280 feel like kind of an island in mythology, Like it's 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:21.720 something that it's not like there's something universal about heroes 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:24.720 um biting or sucking their thumb or placing their thumb 0:11:24.760 --> 0:11:27.200 in their mouth. But but we'll get into some of 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:30.440 the connections that that are in place in a bit here. 0:11:36.720 --> 0:11:39.360 The next question is, of course, well, why, what's the story. 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:41.400 There's gotta be a story. There's always a story behind 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:45.199 why something is the way it is in mythology, and 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:49.199 the main origin story for the miraculous thumb of Finn 0:11:49.280 --> 0:11:53.880 McCool is the salmon of knowledge. Salmon is in the 0:11:53.880 --> 0:11:58.000 the fish, the delicious fish where we're familiar with and uh. 0:11:58.280 --> 0:12:02.200 McKillop points out that, okay um. In addition to this, 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:06.079 the salmon has plenty of mystical connotations, uh, in part 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:08.880 due to uh it's observed leaping out of the water. 0:12:09.320 --> 0:12:11.640 So it wasn't a stretch to think there might be 0:12:11.720 --> 0:12:15.160 something magical about a salmon. Uh. It's not like an 0:12:15.200 --> 0:12:20.000 inherently secular animal or mundane animal. It is one that 0:12:20.000 --> 0:12:24.160 that that already has all these various mystical connotations and uh, 0:12:24.240 --> 0:12:26.360 and so it makes sense that it might play into 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:28.800 such a story. Rob can I reveal though, when I 0:12:28.840 --> 0:12:30.840 was trying to say, okay, are there are other magical 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:33.720 salmon out there? So I google the phrase magical salmon 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:37.719 and the first result is, of course, Chef Paul Prudom's 0:12:37.760 --> 0:12:43.440 salmon Magic Seasoning Blend. There you go. I'm sure it 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:47.480 was a magical um recipe that that he he earned 0:12:47.640 --> 0:12:51.240 by catching a magical fish. Um. Because that's that's that's 0:12:51.280 --> 0:12:54.679 basically what we have going on here. So the stories goes, 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:57.800 do you have a druid by the name of Finnegus 0:12:58.160 --> 0:13:00.400 who lives on the banks of a river and he 0:13:00.440 --> 0:13:04.080 has long waited for and and and intends to catch 0:13:04.400 --> 0:13:07.360 the salmon of knowledge. There are other versions of the 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:10.439 story that say that he's he's camping out at a waterfall, 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:12.280 or that there's some sort of a you know, some 0:13:12.360 --> 0:13:17.319 sort of an underground UH reservoir sort of situation going on. 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:20.679 But the idea is that at some point this uh, 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:23.640 this marvelous salmon is going to present itself and if 0:13:23.679 --> 0:13:26.080 the druid can catch it, he can eat it and 0:13:26.120 --> 0:13:29.160 he can gain all of that wonderful wisdom for himself. 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:32.480 Now is it ever explained how he knows that the salmon, 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:34.840 the salmon of knowledge, will give him all this wisdom? 0:13:34.960 --> 0:13:37.959 Or is that just he is just something he knows? Well, 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:40.240 there are a few different um there's at least one 0:13:40.280 --> 0:13:44.240 really good UH story beyond behind this, and this is account. 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:47.920 This is an account mentioned by Patricia Monaghan in uh 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:52.520 Celtic Mythology and Folklore. According to this author, the fish 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:56.920 is sometimes identified is Fenton, a bard who lived many 0:13:57.000 --> 0:14:01.200 lifetimes and many incarnations. Us he has all of this 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:04.720 accumulated knowledge and in this incarnation he just happens to 0:14:04.720 --> 0:14:07.880 be a salmon. And so I guess you know, through 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:11.520 the druid I arts. This particular druid knows hey, I 0:14:11.559 --> 0:14:13.600 can catch him this time, and if I eat him, 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:16.880 and I'll gain all of that knowledge. So it's it's 0:14:17.000 --> 0:14:19.800 literally that I'm gonna eat your brains and gain your knowledge, 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:23.320 right well, you know, but not maybe not the brains, 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:26.600 maybe just all that delicious. Uh maybe I don't know. 0:14:26.920 --> 0:14:28.440 I don't I'm not sure if you have to eat 0:14:28.520 --> 0:14:30.680 like absolutely all of the fish, or you have to 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:33.120 eat the brain, but you're already cooking a salmon, so 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:34.520 you might as well make a meal out of it. 0:14:34.840 --> 0:14:38.120 I don't know. Well, I actually I guess as as 0:14:38.160 --> 0:14:41.240 well as we're about to learn it's not just the brains, 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:42.800 and in fact that it may be a little more 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:46.360 subtle than that, because what what apparently happens is, uh 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:49.320 the druid finally succeeded in catching it after waiting for 0:14:49.400 --> 0:14:53.280 it for seven years, which incidentally, it's been seven years 0:14:53.280 --> 0:14:56.120 since Finn McCool was born. And seven year old Finn 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.520 McCool is hanging out there at the druid camp with him, 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:02.120 and you know he's shadowing him, uh you know, as 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:06.040 you do. And so Finnegus he's caught the salmon. He's overjoyed, 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:08.280 so he starts cooking the salm, puts it on a spit. 0:15:08.840 --> 0:15:12.040 It's roasting there, and Finns trying to help out, and 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:15.800 he accidentally burns his thumb on the cooking fish. And 0:15:15.880 --> 0:15:17.120 what does he do? What do you do in your 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:20.600 your thumb is is burnt while you immediately seek to 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:23.720 soothe that pain by thrusting your thumb into your mouth. 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:27.080 And Finn does just this, and when he does, he 0:15:27.160 --> 0:15:30.440 inherits the power of the salmon before the old druid 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:33.160 even gets a shot at it. So it's the oil 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:36.760 from the salmon that contains the knowledge you. It's not 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:38.560 eat your brains and gain your knowledge. It's eat your 0:15:38.600 --> 0:15:42.920 omega threes and gain your knowledge right right now. In 0:15:43.000 --> 0:15:46.160 some variations, however, he gains he said to gain the 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:50.040 power of divination by eating magical hazel nuts, or he 0:15:50.120 --> 0:15:53.320 gains it from the salmon because the salmon ate magical 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:56.520 hazel nuts. Uh. There's also one version in which he 0:15:56.680 --> 0:16:00.320 enters a fairy mound. Uh. Fairy mounds are these sircular 0:16:00.400 --> 0:16:04.840 ancient dwellings uh you know from from from ancient Ireland 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:08.240 that were later associated with supernatural tales and you know, 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:11.480 stuff like the to authora done and uh So. Anyway, 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:15.120 he enters a fairy ground, he gains the magical ability 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:18.120 from three fairy women he encounters there, but then as 0:16:18.160 --> 0:16:21.400 he's leaving, he accidentally smashes his thumb in the door 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:25.280 of the fairy mound. But it seems like the fish 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:27.760 version of the story, the Salmon of Knowledge is the 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:32.560 primary tale. It's the most popular now. It's It's often 0:16:32.600 --> 0:16:36.120 stated that it's not just putting the thumb in his 0:16:36.240 --> 0:16:40.160 mouth that sets off the divination trance, but that Finn 0:16:40.200 --> 0:16:44.840 also has to recite a kind of poetic chanting incantation 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:48.480 um called the I think probably pronouncing this wrong, but 0:16:48.520 --> 0:16:53.800 the teenem latia laeda uh and uh. This also may 0:16:53.800 --> 0:16:57.000 have some connection to hazel nuts, according to McKellop in 0:16:57.080 --> 0:17:00.920 the Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. McKellop adds that the thumb 0:17:01.000 --> 0:17:03.680 allowed him to enter quote and I love this an 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:07.480 altered visionary state in which he could see past, present, 0:17:07.560 --> 0:17:11.040 and future, in which he could see present. Wow, I 0:17:11.040 --> 0:17:13.760 mean that that is a real Well maybe maybe it 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:15.880 means he could see all of the present, like things 0:17:15.960 --> 0:17:19.399 that are not present with him at the present or 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:22.480 to see the present clearly. I don't know. There's another 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:26.440 interesting wrinkle here. Uh. The Celtic Languages and Literature professor 0:17:26.880 --> 0:17:30.720 Patrick k Ford suggests that one connection here may be 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:34.920 that the old Irish word for thumb was order, which 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:39.480 may also signify a morsel, particularly a morsel of meat 0:17:39.640 --> 0:17:42.880 that you would you know, consume, And McKillop points out 0:17:42.960 --> 0:17:46.560 that that the consumption of a morsel of magical flesh 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:49.679 is a common folkloric more motif. So if I'm to 0:17:49.760 --> 0:17:53.800 understand this correctly, uh, the interpretation would mean that fins 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:59.080 morsel slash thumb becomes the sacred flesh by coming into 0:17:59.160 --> 0:18:03.080 burning contact with the cooking sacred fish of the salmon 0:18:03.119 --> 0:18:06.640 of wisdom. But is it also suggesting that there may 0:18:06.760 --> 0:18:09.840 possibly have been the kind of semantic contagion in the 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:13.880 evolution of this story where originally the story was about 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:16.719 eating a magical morsel of meat, but because you can 0:18:16.840 --> 0:18:20.159 use the same word for morsel of meat and thumb, 0:18:20.240 --> 0:18:23.960 that it came to represent a thumb in later tellings. Yeah, 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:26.600 that's absolutely the sense I'm getting from this. Yeah, so 0:18:26.640 --> 0:18:30.760 we have, you know, sanantics and linguistic shift going on 0:18:30.880 --> 0:18:33.520 here in addition to just you know, a cool story 0:18:33.560 --> 0:18:36.320 of of magic fish consumption. Oh, this is great because 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:40.159 I'm imagining other variations of of that kind of evolution 0:18:40.200 --> 0:18:44.560 of a story like the the the thumb slash morsel 0:18:44.680 --> 0:18:46.720 makes sense because like a little morsel of meat that 0:18:46.800 --> 0:18:49.240 might be about the size of your thumb. But there 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:52.080 are other ways that we use body parts to measure 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:55.800 quantities in reality. Like I'm thinking of people who would say, hey, 0:18:55.840 --> 0:18:58.639 I want two fingers of whiskey in the glass. So 0:18:58.680 --> 0:19:01.000 you could have a story about somebody who drinks a 0:19:01.040 --> 0:19:03.959 magical draft of something. They get two fingers of it, 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:07.480 but then in later tellings it gets confused and it's like, well, yeah, 0:19:07.480 --> 0:19:11.440 they drank their own fingers and then they gained this power. Yeah, 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:14.080 you could have like a sort of a Popeye esque 0:19:14.160 --> 0:19:16.800 character if he has if he's six two fingers in 0:19:16.880 --> 0:19:19.160 his in his mouth, then he gets all riled up 0:19:19.320 --> 0:19:22.399 and is ready to fight, puts him into a drunken 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:26.119 brawling spade. So as we'll discuss, the thumb pops up 0:19:26.119 --> 0:19:28.880 in a few other places. Um, but it's largely thought 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:32.520 to be quite emblematic of Finn McCool. His only real 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:36.480 defining feature in iconography. I think sometimes there are hounds 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:41.480 or dogs that are associated with Finn McCool. Uh. But 0:19:41.480 --> 0:19:45.400 but the thumb especially is something where you know, historians 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:49.399 and art historians are looking at at various images. If 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:53.160 they see the thumb being, you know, poked towards the mouth, 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:55.400 they can they can generally say, with some certain data, 0:19:55.480 --> 0:19:59.040 this must be Finn McCool. And I haven't found an 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:01.920 example of this online or in the books I was 0:20:01.960 --> 0:20:06.680 looking at, But apparently many Celtic crosses have various figures 0:20:06.680 --> 0:20:10.719 in the design and sometimes you'll see uh this, uh, 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:15.280 this thumb brandishing Finn McCool. Characters pop up, or it's 0:20:15.280 --> 0:20:19.359 assumed that it's Finn mcool because who else would it be. Um. So, 0:20:19.440 --> 0:20:21.159 if if you, if you've never if you can't imagine 0:20:21.160 --> 0:20:23.080 what a Celtic cross tends will look like. They tend 0:20:23.080 --> 0:20:25.199 to be to be a cruciform shape. But then with 0:20:25.240 --> 0:20:29.240 all these kind of compartments for further illustrations and symbols, Now, 0:20:29.280 --> 0:20:32.560 how is it the thumb is usually emphasized in the psychography. 0:20:32.680 --> 0:20:35.240 Is it like glowing or something? Or is he sucking it? 0:20:35.280 --> 0:20:38.200 Is it in his mouth? Um? Like I said, I 0:20:38.240 --> 0:20:41.000 couldn't find a direct example of this that stood out 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:43.920 to me, But I I just they're they're they're gonna 0:20:43.920 --> 0:20:46.240 be smaller figures and they're I don't think they're gonna 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:48.960 it's gonna be necessarily obvious that like the thumb is 0:20:48.960 --> 0:20:51.920 glowing or anything. But just by by virtue of having 0:20:51.960 --> 0:20:54.160 some sort of emphasis on the thumb and a visible 0:20:54.200 --> 0:20:56.840 thumb or even a thumb in the mouth, it's gonna 0:20:56.840 --> 0:21:00.480 be pretty obvious that it's Finn McCool. Now this is 0:21:00.520 --> 0:21:02.800 not related to the thumb, but just as a quick 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:05.640 side note on you mentioned that some stories of Finn 0:21:05.680 --> 0:21:08.720 McCool emphasizes dogs. I was reading a few of those. 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:12.520 They are actually some really great dog buddy uh legends 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:15.960 of Finn, And one of them is about how he 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:20.640 how he gains a wife who is a person who 0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:24.760 or I think she's like a fairy, but in any case, 0:21:24.840 --> 0:21:29.480 she's transformed into a fawn by an evil wizard and uh, 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:32.400 and he finds her by by virtue of the fact 0:21:32.440 --> 0:21:34.840 that he's out with his hunting dogs and when he 0:21:34.880 --> 0:21:37.919 comes across this fawn, his dogs don't go after the 0:21:37.920 --> 0:21:40.679 fond and like attack it, but instead settle down and 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:43.920 cuddle with it. And so then he brings the fawn 0:21:44.040 --> 0:21:47.040 back with him to his to his castle. And once 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:50.080 they arrived there, the fawn turns into this woman who 0:21:50.080 --> 0:21:53.639 becomes his wife. But then unfortunately she is she is 0:21:53.920 --> 0:21:59.560 tricked and stolen away by the evil wizard. Again interesting interesting. Uh. Now, 0:21:59.640 --> 0:22:03.960 in terms of other accounts of thumbs in uh in 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:08.360 in in Celtic mythology, I did run across another interesting example, 0:22:08.400 --> 0:22:11.800