This statement receives strong
confirmation from a Scandinavian record, the _Landnama-bok_, which
says[22] that, in or about the year 870, a well-known Norse chief named
Leif
"went on warfare in the west. He made war in Ireland, and there
found a large underground house; he went down into it, and it was
dark until light shone from a sword in the hand of a man. Leif
killed the man, and took the sword and much property.... He made
war widely in Ireland, and got much property. He took ten thralls."
Although the Scandinavian record does not speak of the owner of the
earth-house as either a "Fian" or a "Fairy," it is quite evident that
this is an example of the plundering referred to in the Irish chronicle,
and that the Gaels of Ireland seven or eight centuries ago, if not a
thousand years ago, regarded the underground people as indifferently
Fians and Fairies.[23]
Many other associations of Fians with Fairies are to be seen. In one of
the old traditional ballads regarding the Fians, they are described as
feasting with Fairies in one of their "hollow" mounds.[24] A
Sutherlandshire story relates the adventures of the son of a Fairy
woman, who took service with Ossian, the king of the Fians.
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