The god-folk of the successive invasions are "euhemerised", i.e., described as having dwelt terrestrially and ruling over Ireland in kingship before the age of mortal men (the Milesians, or their descendants). Afterwards, the Tuatha Dé Danann are said to have retreated into the sídhe (fairy mounds), cloaking their presence by raising the féth fiada (fairy mist). Having disappeared but not died, the deities oftentimes make "guest appearances" in narratives categorised under other cycles. Orally transmitted folk-tales may also be, in a broad sense, considered mythological cycle material, notably, the folk-tales that describe Cian's tryst with Balor's daughter while attempting to recover the bountiful cow Glas Gaibhnenn. Near-modern histories such as the Annals of the Four Masters and Geoffrey Keating's History of Ireland (=Seathrún Céitinn, Foras Feasa ar Éirinn) are also sometimes considered viable sources, since they may offer additional insights with their annotated and interpolated reworkings of LGE accounts. Some of the romances are of later composition and found only in paper manuscripts dating to near-modern times ( Cath Maige Tuired and The Fate of the Children of Tuireann).
The disguises are thinly veiled nonetheless, and these writings contain discernible vestiges of early Irish polytheistic cosmology.Įxamples of works from the cycle include numerous prose tales, verse texts, as well as pseudo-historical chronicles (primarily the Lebor Gabála Érenn (LGE), commonly called The Book of Invasions) found in medieval vellum manuscripts or later copies. This is because the Christian scribes who composed the writings were generally (though not always) careful not to refer to the Tuatha Dé Danann and other beings explicitly as deities. Commentators exercising caution, however, qualify them as representing only "godlike" beings, and not gods. The characters appearing in the cycle are essentially gods from the pre-Christian pagan past in Ireland.
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