FINLAY

finlay, george (1799-1875), british historian, was born of scottish parents at faversham, kent, on the 21st of december 1799. he studied for the law in glasgow, and about 1821 went to gottingen. he had already begun to feel a deep interest in the greek struggle for independence, and in 1823 he resolved to visit the country. in november he arrived in cephalonia, where he was kindly received by lord byron. shortly afterwards he landed at pyrgos, and during the next fourteen months he improved his knowledge of the language, history and antiquities of the country. though he formed an unfavourable opinion of the greek leaders, both civil and military, he by no means lost his enthusiasm for their cause. a severe attack of fever, however, combined with other circumstances, induced him to spend the winter of 1824-1825 and the spring of 1825 in rome, naples and sicily. he then returned to scotland, and, after spending a summer at castle toward, argyllshire, went to edinburgh, where he passed his examination in civil law at the university, with a view to being called to the scottish bar. his enthusiasm, however, carried him back to greece, where he resided almost uninterruptedly till his death. he took part in the unsuccessful operations of lord cochrane and sir richard church for the relief of athens in 1827. when independence had been secured in 1829 he bought a landed estate in attica, but all his efforts for the introduction of a better system of agriculture ended in failure, and he devoted himself to the literary work which occupied the rest of his life. his first publications were _the hellenic kingdom and the greek nation_ (1836); _essai sur les principes de banque appliques a l'etat actuel de la grece_ (athens, 1836); and _remarks on the topography of oropia and diacria, with a map_ (athens, 1838). the first instalment of his great historical work appeared in 1844 (2nd ed., 1857) under the title _greece under the romans; a historical view of the condition of the greek nation from the time of its conquest by the romans until the extinction of the roman empire in the east_. meanwhile he had been qualifying himself still further by travel as well as by reading; he undertook several tours to various quarters of the levant; and as the result of one of them he published a volume _on the site of the holy sepulchre; with a plan of jerusalem_ (1847). _the history of the byzantine and greek empires from 716-1453_ was completed in 1854. it was speedily followed by the _history of greece under the ottoman and venetian domination_ (1856), and by the _history of the greek revolution_ (1861). in weak health, and conscious of failing energy, he spent his last years in revising his history. from 1864 to 1870 he was also correspondent of _the times_ newspaper, his letters to which attracted considerable attention, and, appearing in the greek newspapers, exercised a distinct influence on greek politics. he was a member of several learned societies; and in 1854 he received from the university of edinburgh the honorary degree of ll.d. he died at athens on the 26th of january 1875. a new edition of his _history_, edited by the rev. h.f. tozer, was issued by the oxford clarendon press in 1877. it includes a brief but extremely interesting fragment of an autobiography of the author, almost the only authority for his life. as an historian, finlay had the merit of entering upon a field of research that had been neglected by english writers, gibbon alone being a partial exception. as a student, he was laborious; as a scholar he was accurate; as a thinker, he was both acute and profound; and in all that he wrote he was unswerving in his loyalty to the principles of constitutional government and to the cause of liberty and justice. finn mac cool (in irish find mac cumaill), the central figure of the later heroic cycle of ireland, commonly called ossianic or fenian. in scotland find usually goes by the name of fingal. this appears to be due to a misunderstanding of the title assumed by the lord of the isles, ri fionnghall, i.e. king of the norse. find's father, cumall mac trenmoir, was uncle to conn cetchathach, high king of ireland, who died in a.d. 157. cumall carried off murna munchaem, the daughter of a druid named tadg mac nuadat, and this led to the battle of cnucha, in which cumall was slain by goll mac morna (a.d. 174). find was born after his father's death and was at first called demni. he is leader of the _fiann_ or _feinne_ (english "fenians"), a kind of militia or standing army which was drawn from all quarters of ireland. his father had held the same office before him, but after his death it passed to his enemy goll mac morna, who retained it until find came to man's estate. find usually resided at almu (allen) in co. kildare, where he was surrounded by some of the contingents of the fiann, the rest being scattered throughout ireland to ward off enemies, particularly those coming from over the sea. in times of invasion find collected his forces, overcame the foe, and pursued him to scotland or lochlann (scandinavia) as the case might be. when not engaged in war the fiann gave themselves up to the chase or love-adventures. we are informed in great detail as to the conditions of admission to this privileged band, which were at once singular and exacting. the foremost heroes in find's train were his son ossian, his grandson oscar, cailte mac ronain, and diarmait o'duibne, whose elopement with find's destined bride grainne, daughter of the high-king cormac mac airt (a.d. 227-266), forms the subject of a celebrated story. these, like find, were all of the ua baisgne branch, with which was allied the ua morna, with whom they were generally at variance. the latter hailed from connaught, chief among them being goll and conan. by the annalists find is represented as having met with death by treachery either in 252 or 283. under coirpre lifeochair, successor to cormac mac airt, the power of the fiann became intolerable. the monarch accordingly took up arms against them and utterly crushed them at the battle of gabra (a.d. 283). very few survived the defeat, but the story makes ossian and cailte live on until after the arrival of st patrick in 432. it is incredible that such a band as the fiann should have existed in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. a number of sagas older in date than the ossianic stories have been preserved, which deal with events happening in the reigns of art son of conn (166-196), lugaid mac con (196-227), and cormac mac airt (227-266), but none of these in their oldest shape contain any allusion whatsoever to find and his warriors. in the history of the boroma, contained in the book of leinster, find is merely a leinster chieftain who assists bressal the king of leinster against coirpre lifeochair. it can be shown that find was originally a figure in leinster-munster tradition previous to the viking age, but we have no documentary evidence concerning him at this time. he seems primarily to have been regarded as a poet and magician. later he appears to have been transformed into a petty chief, and zimmer even tried to show that his personality was developed in leinster and munster local tradition out of stories clustering round the figure of the viking leader ketill hviti (caittil find), who was slain in 857. by the year 1000 find was certainly connected in the minds of the people with the reign of cormac mac airt, but the process is obscure. recently john macneill has pointed out that in the oldest genealogies find is always connected with the ui tairrsigh of failge (offaley, a district comprising the present county of kildare and parts of king's and queen's counties). the ui tairrsigh were undoubtedly of firbolg origin, and macneill would account in this manner for the slow acceptance of the stories by the conquering milesians. whilst the ulster epic was fashionable at court, the subject races clung to the fenian cycle. for the last 800 years find has been the national hero of the gaelic-speaking populations of ireland, the scottish highlands and the isle of man. see also celt (subsection _irish literature_). authorities.--a. nutt, _ossian and the ossianic literature_ (london, 1899); h. zimmer, "keltische beitrage iii.," _zeitschrift fur deutsches altertum_ (1891), vol. xxxv. pp. 1-172; l.c. stern, "die ossianischen heldenlieder," _zeitschrift fur vergleichende litteraturgeschichte_ (1895; trans, by j.l. robertson in _transactions of the gaelic society of inverness_, 1897-1898, vol. xxii. pp. 257-325); j. macneill, _duanaire finn_ (london, 1908). (e. c. q.)