The giants causeways - Staffa
Photographs, taken from the Giants causeway, in Scotland.
These images offer a sense of grandeur within the scale of the location, which can be seen to possess sculptural qualities. The rocks which present themselves as stepping stones, have a fairy tale essence to them, which evokes a sense of mystery and romance to the location. The boat journey to the island creates connotations of a pilgrimage which adds to the wonder of the area. Due to the location being hard to reach it feel as through you travelling into another world.
This Folk story goes as follows:
Finn MacCool, the handsome giant of Ireland, lived on the wild northern coast, and occasionally he sat at the edge of the sea, sucking on his thumb. That thumb, see, was the source of Finn's knowledge. Whenever he had a question, any puzzle at all, he sucked that thumb and the answer came.
Finn fell in love with a giantess named Oonagh who lived on a rocky isle across the Irish Sea. Trouble was, Finn could not swim, so how would he reach his beloved? He thought a while, and then he tore up some trees, and he built himself a boat, but when he stepped inside, that boat sank under his weight. After all, Finn was a giant.
So Finn sucked on his thumb, and next thing he was gathering columns of rock, six-sided each, flat-topped and weighing 10 tons. He stood on the shore and tossed those columns, one after another, into the sea.
And sure enough, all the way from Finn's home on the Antrim coast to Oonagh's isle lay a path of stones called the Giant's Causeway.
Finn went off to woo Oonagh, and next thing you know, those two married and had a son, a lad named Ossian who grew up and left home to live among the fairies. Oonagh and Finn were sad to see him go, but everyone near and far could still hear them singing late into the night, that's how happy they were together.
Most everyone loved that singing, but there was one who suffered at the sound. His name was Benandonner, and he was a giant, too. Benandonner lived all alone on the isle of Staffa, and a lonelier fellow there never was.
Benandonner was a hairy giant, as hideous as Finn was handsome. No one could love such a creature dressed in clothes of rat and skunk skins, a fellow with three eyes, one big and round and right in the center of his forehead.
So Oonagh and Finn laughed and sang, and Benandonner scowled and grumbled, until one stormy day he sent a message by bird, challenging Finn to fight for Oonagh's love.
Finn and Oonagh laughed at this challenge, but Finn knew he must accept it. He sent a message back to Benandonner, inviting him to visit on the next fine day.
The next sunny summer day Benandonner walked across that Giant Causeway and right up to Finn's door.
Oonagh answered the knock. "Finn's away," she said, for Finn had gone to take a walk. "Come tomorrow," she said, so Benandonner promised he would.
That night, when Finn saw the giant footsteps outside his door, he trembled with fear. "Sure he be a huge monster," said Finn to Oonagh.
"So he is," she said, "but never mind. I know how we'll fix him, we will." And she told Finn exactly what to do.
The next day Oonagh answered the knock at the door, but this time Finn was home, except he was hiding. He was curled up inside the cradle that once belonged to Ossian, bundled up in blankets so that only his eyes were revealed.
"What's this, your baby?" Benandonner asked when he saw the cradle rocking there, and he leaned over and looked into the baby's gleaming eyes.
"Sure he is," Oonagh said, "and Finn will be home soon. Sit you down and eat some of my oat cakes." She gave him a plateful of the cakes she had baked, but into these she slipped pieces of the metal griddle.
Now Benandonner took a bite, and he let out a screech so loud, the whole of Ireland shook. He had broken half his teeth when he chomped on a griddle piece. "What's in these?" he asked, and Oonagh shrugged.
"Baby loves them -- butter and sugar and eggs and flour," she said, and she fed one of the cakes to Finn lying there in the cradle, but this one was soft and fluffy without a bit of griddle inside. Finn swallowed it down.
"That baby must have teeth of iron," Benandonner said. He bent over the cradle, leaned in, and stuck his finger in the baby's mouth.
Crunch! Finn bit down on that finger so hard it came right off.
Benandonner wailed again. "What kind of baby is he? Strong enough to bite off a giant's finger?"
"He's just a wee thing," Oonagh said, "not that strong yet, though his daddy teaches him things."
Benandonner laughed nervously. "What kind of things?" he asked.
Oonagh smiled as she lifted a rock. "To squeeze the juice from rocks," she said, handing over the rock to Finn.
Finn squeezed, and sure enough, liquid began to ooze from that rock because, see, Oonagh played a trick: This rock was but a rock of cheese.
"Let me try that," Benandonner cried, and Oonagh handed him another rock.
Benandonner squeezed and squeezed, and he was strong, sure he was, but nobody can squeeze liquid out of a true rock, and that it was.
Benandonner looked again at the ooze dripping out of the rock in the cradle. And then he thought if this baby be strong like this, what must his father be?
He began to tremble, and then he said, "I'll be going now," and he backed out of that house and ran across the causeway. But halfway across a thought struck him, and he stopped. Then, working feverishly with all his great strength, he carried away the middle section of those rocks, one by one, for he had no wish for a visit from the monstrous Finn.
And that is why, these days, only the beginning and the end remain of the Giant's Causeway, one on Staffa Island, home of Benandonner, and another on the Antrim coast, just near the place where Finn lived.
And that's how people know this tale.
This story is a example of how folklore and myth, was used in explaining a natural phenomenon.
“The Giant’s Causeway is the aftermath of volcanic crashing, burning and cooling,”.... “An epic 60-million-year-old legacy to lava. Over 40,000 basalt columns. Interlocked."
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