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The Insular Celts held deer as supernatural
animals: "fairy cattle" that were herded and milked by a localised and benevolent fairy giantess in each district, who could shift shape to that of a deer.
In the West Highlands, she selected the individual deer that would be slain in the next day's hunt.
In Ireland, An Chailleach Bhéarach, "The Old Woman of Beare",
patroness of an island off the coast of County Cork, takes the form of a deer to avoid capture; to Beare come characters from the Land of the Dead to visit
Ireland. Other Celtic mythological figures were given connections to
deer, but especially Sadbh.
Sadbh was the Sidhe mother of Oisin by Fionn mac Cumhail.She was enchanted into the form of a white deer on refusing the love of Fear Doirche, but she found he had no power over her while she was within the dun of the Fianna. Bran and Sceolan, Fionn's hounds, did not attempt to kill her when the Fianna found her out hunting. She was brought home, but later she was lured out from the protection of the house and she was enchanted once more, by the Druid Fear Doirche. After seven years, the hounds found a little boy, Oisin, Sadbh's son, who remembered his deer-mother. She was made to follow Fear Doirche and leave her son to the elements.
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Saint Giles, a Catholic saint especially revered in the south of France, is reported to have lived for many years as a hermit in the forest near Nîmes, where in the greatest solitude he spent many years, his sole companion being a deer, or hind, who in some stories sustained him on her milk.
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