Oil paint on canvas
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/jack-butler-yeats-2178" aria-label="More by Jack Butler Yeats" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Jack Butler Yeats</a>
Death Diarmuid Last Handful Water
Purchased 1948
actions: postures and motions
adults
birth to death
colour
compassion
death
diseases and conditions
emotions and human qualities
emotions, concepts and ideas
Fenian saga, ‘The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne’
formal qualities
gestural
group
groups
hands clasped
heroism
literature and fiction
man
natural phenomena
people
reclining
society
standing
tales, legends and traditional
water
wounded
painting oil paint canvas
22 September 2006 – 31 October 2011
2011-10-31
22 September 2006 – 31 October 2011
2011-10-31
2006-09-22
National Gallery of Ireland (Dublin, Ireland)
http://www.nationalgallery.ie
2006-09-22
Long loan to National Gallery of Ireland
Loan-out
The Death of Diarmuid, the Last Handful of Water
support: 610 × 914 mm
Purchased 1948
<p><b>N05836</b> THE DEATH OF DIARMUID, THE LAST HANDFUL OF WATER 1945</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Inscr. ‘Jack B. Yeats JAC.’ b.l.
<br/>Canvas, 24×36 (61×91).
<br/>Purchased from the artist through the Waddington Galleries, Dublin (Knapping Fund) 1948.
<br/><i>Exh:</i> R.H.A., Dublin, 1946 (181); Galerie Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1954 (7), as ‘Diarmuid et Grainne et la derniére “poignée” d'eau’.
<br/><i>Lit:</i> Douglas Hyde, <i>A Literary History of Ireland from Earliest Times to the Present Day</i>, 1899, p.385.</p>
<p>The subject is taken from a story in the Fenian Saga, <i>The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne</i>. ‘Diarmuid of the Love-spot unwittingly causes Gráinne, daughter of Cormac mac Art, the High-King, to fall in love with him, just on the eve of her marriage with his captain, Finn mac Cool. He is driven to elope with her, and is pursued round Ireland by the vengeful Finn, who succeeds after many years in compassing the death of the generous and handsome Diarmuid by a wild boar, and then winning back to himself the love of the fickle Gráinne.’ Yeats has chosen the moment when Diarmuid lies dying, his only remaining hope being to receive a drink of water from Finn, who has magic powers of healing. Reluctantly Finn goes to fetch water in his cupped hands, but as he returns he thinks of Gráinne and allows the water to trickle through his fingers. The same happens a second time. The third time Finn succeeds in bringing back the water, but by then Diarmuid is dead.</p>
<p>Finn was a Celtic hero of the third century A.D., whose exploits were first recorded in written form between the seventh and eighth centuries and survive today in the Book of Leinster (<i>c</i>. 1150). Gráinne is pronounced ‘Graanya’. The story has been edited and translated in the third volume of the Ossianic Society by Standish Hayes O'Grady.</p>
<p>Another <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>painting</span></a>, ‘The Path of Diarmuid and Gráinne’, now belongs to the Dowager Lady Aberconway and is inspired by the same story.</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture</i>, London 1964, II
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-08T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: postures and motions adults birth to death colour compassion death diseases and conditions emotions and human qualities emotions, concepts and ideas Fenian saga, ‘The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne’ formal qualities gestural group groups hands clasped heroism literature and fiction man natural phenomena people reclining society standing tales, legends and traditional water wounded