“ Shize? I should shee! Macool, Macool, orra whyi deed ye diie? of a trying thirstay mournin?” Finnegan is laid out to be waked, surrounded by the twelve mourners, following his fall from the ladder. I chose the image of the skeleton in a Bronze Age cist grave, as it was the earliest form of burial in Ireland. Before this Neolithic and Mesolithic communities cremated their dead. In the Bronze Age the remains were often buried in a foetal position with funery pots filled with food or drink to sustain them on their journey to the afterlife.
When I first read this page, I imagined Finnegan in his cist grave, with a a bockalips of finisky fore his feet" and "a barrowload of guenesis hoer his head.” In later versions of this illustration the skeleton and his grave goods are partially excavated revealing a barrel of Guinness at his skull and a copper whiskey still at his feet. On page four we were introduced to one of HCE’s bynames, Finn Mccool, the giant whose head is buried in Howth. In this illustration our Finn or Finnegan has the Howth peninsula for his pillow.
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