#tuatha de

[juniper-divination-and-witchery]

The Mythological Cycle of Irish Mythology: Tuatha Dé Danann and Ireland's Gods

The Mythological Cycle is the part of Irish mythology where the gods are still in charge of Ireland. The Tuatha Dé Danann hold the country, the Fomoire press in from the sea, and the Milesians (the human Irish) haven't arrived yet. Medieval Irish texts most often shorten the longer name to Tuatha Dé, and this overview does the same. Most of what later cycles assume about Irish gods comes from texts in this cycle: how Lugh got to Tara, why the river Boyne is named for Boand.

If you haven't read the four-cycles overview, start there. This article focuses on the cast of the Mythological Cycle and the world they inhabit. The Ulster Cycle overview comes next.

The waves of settlers

The Mythological Cycle's central conflict is the Tuatha Dé's struggle for Ireland against the Fomoire. The cycle assumes readers already know that several other peoples lived on the island before the Tuatha Dé arrived. That backstory comes from Lebor Gabála Érenn (the Book of Invasions), the medieval Irish pseudo-history that frames everything else1.

The waves, as the medieval compilers had them:

Cessair. The first and least canonical. In some versions, she's Noah's granddaughter, who fled to Ireland with fifty women and three men before the Flood. Almost no one survived. Medieval scholars treated her as a late, possibly apocryphal addition to the framework.

Partholón. Came from Greece by way of a long migration. His people cleared four plains, brought farming and brewing, and were wiped out by a plague.

Nemed. Came from Scythia. His people suffered under heavy Fomoire tribute and attacked the Fomoire tower at Tory Island. The survivors split three ways: some became the Fir Bolg, some the Tuatha Dé, some sailed to Britain.

Fir Bolg. Returned to Ireland from Greece. They established the first kingship and divided Ireland into the five provinces that later kingdoms inherited. They lost the First Battle of Moytura to the Tuatha Dé and were given Connacht as their portion.

Tuatha Dé Danann. Came from "the northern islands of the world" carrying four treasures from four cities: the Lia Fáil (the stone that cried out under a rightful king), the Spear of Lugh, the Sword of Nuada, and the Cauldron of the Dagda. They won the First Battle of Moytura against the Fir Bolg and the Second against the Fomoire.

Milesians (the Gaels). Arrived after the Tuatha Dé and defeated them. The Tuatha Dé retreated into the sídhe, the fairy mounds, where most subsequent Irish tradition leaves them. {:.timeline}

The Mythological Cycle stories are set during the Tuatha Dé's reign, before the Milesians arrived. When the old gods reappear in the Ulster Cycle and after, they're already figures of the sídhe.

The cast and the texts

The Tuatha Dé are the gods of Ireland. The full name Tuatha Dé Danann means "the tribe of the goddess Danu." The Fomoire are their adversaries: older, sea-borne, often described as malformed or one-eyed, but also intermarried with the Tuatha Dé in important ways. Lugh's mother is Fomoire. Bres is half-Fomoire. The conflict between the two groups is family business as much as it is cosmic war.

The cycle is held together loosely. There's no master text. Modern editors group these works under the Mythological Cycle:

Cath Maige Tuired (the Second Battle of Moytura), the closest thing to a centerpiece

Tochmarc Étaíne (The Wooing of Étaín)

Aislinge Óenguso (The Dream of Óengus)

Aided Chlainne Lir (The Death of the Children of Lir), a late composition

Aided Chlainne Tuireann (The Death of the Children of Tuireann), also late

The dindshenchas poems and prose for places associated with the Tuatha Dé, especially Boand and the Boyne

Lebor Gabála Érenn itself, as the framework

The cycle is a grouping, not a single book. The texts were written down at different times by different hands. Reading them together is a modern editorial choice.

The Christian and monastic layer, briefly

The series opener covered this argument in detail. The short version: every Irish mythological text we have was written down by Christian monks. Most surviving Mythological Cycle material comes through Lebor na hUidre (the Book of the Dun Cow, c. 1100) and the Yellow Book of Lecan (late 14th century)2.

The point lands hardest in this cycle, because this is where the gods themselves appear as characters. Mark Williams's argument in Ireland's Immortals is that the Tuatha Dé as we have them are partly a medieval Christian construction2. By the time the texts get written, the Tuatha Dé have been euhemerized: presented as ancient kings rather than as gods.

For practical reading: take the stories as evidence of how medieval Ireland thought about its old gods, not as transcripts of pre-Christian belief. Some pre-Christian material survives in the texts. Identifying which parts is a scholarly question without tidy answers.

Major figures

These are the gods and figures the reader will keep meeting.

The Dagda. "The Good God." Not "good" in a moral sense, but "good" as in skilled at everything. He carries a club that kills with one end and revives with the other. He owns the cauldron of plenty. He's a comic figure as often as a powerful one.

Lugh. A latecomer who becomes the cycle's most important young god. Skilled at every art, hence his epithet samildánach, "of many talents." Half-Fomoire by his mother, Eithne. He kills his grandfather Balor at the Second Battle of Moytura.

The Morrígan. Goddess of war, fate, and sovereignty. She often appears as a crow or as a washer at a ford. She sleeps with the Dagda before Moytura and shapes the outcome of the battle through prophecy and choice.

Brigid. Daughter of the Dagda. Goddess of poetry, healing, and smithcraft. She mourns her son Ruadán with a keen so terrible it invents the form. The Christian Saint Brigid is a related but separate figure, and the two were deliberately blurred by medieval scribes. For a longer treatment of both Brigids and how they fit together, Courtney Weber's Brigid: History, Mystery, and Magick of the Celtic Goddess is the place to start.

Manannán mac Lir. God of the sea and the Otherworld. He crosses into every other cycle and turns up in voyage tales and royal legends alike.

Nuada and Bres. Two early kings of the Tuatha Dé. Nuada loses his arm in the First Battle of Moytura and loses his kingship with it. Bres takes over and turns out to be a tyrant. Their handover triggers the Second Battle of Moytura.

Boand and Aengus. Boand is a goddess of the Boyne. Aengus (Óengus) is her son by the Dagda. Aengus is the cycle's god of love and youth, and he gives the cycle one of its loveliest stories.

The major stories

Cath Maige Tuired (The Second Battle of Moytura) and the Coming of Lugh

The cycle's central narrative. The Tuatha Dé have lost their king Nuada, who lost his arm in the First Battle of Moytura against the Fir Bolg. The half-Fomoire Bres takes the kingship and rules badly, exacting tribute from the Tuatha Dé and humiliating the Dagda. A young god named Lugh arrives at Tara and proves himself master of every art the gatekeeper can name. He takes command of the Tuatha Dé, and they face the Fomoire at the Second Battle of Moytura, where Lugh kills his grandfather Balor of the One Eye. The story has some of the cycle's most famous set-pieces: the Dagda's grotesque bargain with the Fomoire, the Morrígan's prophecies, Brigid's keen for Ruadán.

Translation: Cath Maige Tuired (Elizabeth Gray, CELT)

Story Archaeology: the Battle of Moytura series (Episodes 1–12) and the later wider-audience series (also 12 parts) are the deepest treatment of any text on this list.

Candlelit Tales: Lugh & Balor of the Evil Eye (Ep 06) on YouTube; Lugh Samildánach (Ep 122) on SoundCloud.

Tochmarc Étaíne (The Wooing of Étaín)

A three-part text. Étaín is wooed by the Tuatha Dé god Midir. His jealous first wife Fuamnach turns Étaín into a fly and blows her on the wind for centuries. Étaín is eventually swallowed by the wife of an Ulster king and reborn as a human. As a human, she becomes the wife of Eochaid Airem, High King of Ireland. Midir tracks her down across lifetimes and wins her back through a fixed game of fidchell, an Irish board game. The story is one of the cycle's richest treatments of the Otherworld and reincarnation.

Translation: Tochmarc Étaíne (Irish Sagas Online)

Story Archaeology: Dindshenchas 09, 10, and 11.

Candlelit Tales: Midir & Étaín (Ep 13), on YouTube and SoundCloud.

Oidheadh Chloinne Lir (The Fate of the Children of Lir)

A late composition (probably 14th–15th century) that became one of the most beloved Irish stories. Lir's four children are turned into swans by their stepmother Aoife, jealous of their father's love for them. They live as swans for nine hundred years, three hundred each on Lough Derravaragh, the Sea of Moyle, and the Atlantic at Erris. They keep their human voices and their memory throughout. When the Christian monk Mochaomhóg finds them and the spell finally breaks, the years catch up to them all at once and they die.

Translation: The Fate of the Children of Lir (CELT); also at Irish Sagas Online.

Candlelit Tales: The Children of Lir (Ep 222).

Aided Chlainne Tuireann (The Death of the Children of Tuireann)

Another late composition, often grouped folklorically with the Children of Lir and the Children of Uisneach (in the Ulster Cycle) as the "Three Sorrows of Storytelling," though that grouping is post-medieval. The three sons of Tuireann (Brian, Iuchar, and Iucharba) kill Lugh's father Cian. Lugh demands an éric, a blood-fine, made up of seemingly impossible objects from the corners of the world: three magical apples from a guarded eastern garden, a healing pigskin from the King of Greece, a spear from the King of Persia, two horses and a chariot from Sicily, seven pigs from the King of the Pillars of Gold, a hound whelp from the King of Iruath, a cooking spit from the women of an undersea island, and three shouts from the hill of Miodhchaoin. The brothers complete every task but are mortally wounded earning the last. Lugh refuses to lend them the healing pigskin they themselves fetched. They die, and their father Tuireann dies of grief on their grave.

Translation: Oidheadh Chloinne Tuireann (O'Duffy edition, Internet Archive), bilingual Irish/English.

Story Archaeology: Battle of Moytura 09: The Children of Tuirenn 1, Part 1 and Part 2; Battle of Moytura 10: The Children of Tuirenn 2, Part 1 and Part 2.

Candlelit Tales: The Sons of Tuireann (Ep 12) on SoundCloud.

Aislinge Óenguso (The Dream of Óengus)

The shortest of the major stories and a good entry point. Óengus dreams of a beautiful woman and falls so deeply in love with her that he sickens. His parents, Boand and the Dagda, search Ireland for her. They find her at a lake, where she lives among 150 swans bound together with silver chains. Every other Samhain she shifts between human and swan form. Óengus joins her in swan shape, and they fly together to Brú na Bóinne (Newgrange). The text matters for the Ulster Cycle too, since the woman, Caer Ibormeith, becomes a recurring Otherworld figure in the Táin Bó Cúailnge.

Translation: Aislinge Óenguso (Irish Sagas Online)

Candlelit Tales: The Dream of Aonghus Óg (Ep 08), on YouTube and SoundCloud.

Boand and the making of the Boyne

Not a saga but a place-lore poem from the Metrical Dindshenchas, a body of medieval Irish verse explaining how every important place in Ireland got its name. Boand is married to the Tuatha Dé god Nechtan, who guards a well of inspiration whose waters can be approached only by him and his three cupbearers. Boand approaches the well anyway. The well rises against her, mutilates her, and chases her to the sea, becoming the river Boyne. Read alongside Tochmarc Étaíne and Aislinge Óenguso, the poem sketches the divine geography of the Brú na Bóinne complex.

Translation: Metrical Dindshenchas Vol III (CELT). Boand I and Boand II are the two relevant poems.

Story Archaeology: Brú na Bóinne and Cnogba in the Metrical Dindshenchas.

Candlelit Tales: The Goddess Boann (Ep 31) on YouTube; Boann & The Dagda (Ep 130) on YouTube and SoundCloud pairs the Irish story with a Greek myth from the Embers Collective.

Where to go next

A few things this overview leaves out. The Manannán material in Immram Brain and elsewhere sits between the Mythological Cycle and the immrama (voyage tale) tradition. The dindshenchas material runs far beyond Boand; many other places have origin poems featuring Tuatha Dé figures.

The Ulster Cycle is up next. Several Mythological Cycle figures (Lugh, the Morrígan, Manannán) reappear there, but the world has shifted. Humans are in charge now, and the gods have receded into the sídhe.

Lebor Gabála Érenn: The Book of the Taking of Ireland, R.A.S. Macalister edition (Irish Texts Society, 1939). ↩︎

Mark Williams, Ireland's Immortals: A History of the Gods of Irish Myth (Princeton University Press, 2016). ↩︎ ↩︎

[nogetron]

The Dagda, chief of the Tuatha Dé Dannan. Before everything, only two existed, Danu and Donn. The two lovers came together, birthing the first of the Tuatha Dé Dannan. However, the two loved each other so much that they dared not separate their embrace, trapping their children between them. Wishing to free his siblings, the lovers’ son, the Dagda, spoke to his parents to devise a plan. As Danu and Donn could not bear to consciously separate, the Dagda would strike his father allowing enough time for the other gods to escape from their embrace. But when the time came to enact the plan, the Dagda underestimated his own strength and struck his father dead. Danu, overwhelmed with grief, began to sob. Her devastated tears formed a massive wave that washed away the Tuatha Dé Dannan. Donn’s corpse created the land and sky, with Danu’s tears forming the seas. Sprouting from Donn’s corpse arose a mighty tree, with which the god’s used the fruit or bark produced from the tree to fashion the first humans.

Yet, from the sea emerged the demonic Fomorians, who used their powers over the blights of the earth to subjugate both humanity and the Tuatha Dé Dannan. The Dagda was outraged by the horrid actions the Fomorians committed against his kin and humanity. Therefore, the Dagda consulted his wife, the goddess of war and death, the Morrigan. On Samhain the two consummated their love in a river. Afterwards the Morrigan joined the Tuatha Dé Dannan’s rebellion, offering her prophetic abilities and martial tactics. Uniting the Tuatha Dé Dannan and the soldiers of humanity, the Dagda rebelled against the forces of the Fomorians. Later in the war, the united forces could tell that the final battle was near. So in order to stall for time, the Morrigan advised the Dagda to the travel to the Fomorian camp. Once there the Dagda offered them a peace treaty with the Tuatha Dé Dannan, but as expected they refused. Instead the Fomorians forced the Dagda to eat a ridiculous amount of porridge from his magic cauldron, wishing to humiliate him. The Dagda, unashamed and embracing the lunacy, picked up a massive spoon and began to devour the porridge, not leaving a single drop left. With a swollen belly, the Dagda laid down and fell asleep, all the while the Fomorians laughed at him. When awake, he left the camp, encumbered by his full belly. On his way back to the Tuatha Dé Dannan, he was stopped by a beautiful Fomorian woman, announcing herself as the daughter of the Fomorian king Indech. She quickly began to batter him, wishing to make him her personal slave to travel on top of. Encumbered by his full belly, the Dagda couldn’t fight back against her assault. Irritated, the Dagda proceeded to empty his bowels, returning him to his original form. Apparently attracted to this act, Indech’s daughter swiftly fell in love with the Dagda, sleeping with him on the spot. Afterwards the Fomorian promised to aid the Tuatha Dé Dannan in their fight against her kind, the Dagda now gaining both an ally and a lover. In the final battle the Dagda laid waste to his opposition, wielding his magic club that could both bring great destruction yet was also capable of bringing life back to those who were slain. The battle ended as the last blow was struck against the Fomorian leader Balor by the young deity Lugh. After their victory the Dagda gathered Lugh and Ogma to take back his magic harp Uaithne from the retreating Fomorians.

After the war concludes, the Dagda with the rest of the Tuatha Dé Dannan withdraw into the Otherworld through the Sidhe delegated by Manannan. In another myth, the Dagda and the river goddess Boann fall in love. However the goddess was married to the god of the hunt Nuada. When Nuada leaves for an errand, the Dagda sleeps with Boann, impregnating her. To hide this the Dagda uses his powers to make the sun stand still, warping time around Nuada to make the nine months of pregnancy only one day for him. Boann ultimately gives birth to the Dagda’s son Aengus, who once he discovers the truth of his birth, asks the Dagda to help him take over Nuada’s land of Brú na Bóinne. The Dagda has many other children as well, such as Brigit, Aed, Cermait, Bodb Derg, Midir, Ainge, Dian Cécht, and possibly the members of the Morrigna: Badb, Macha, and Nemain.

—————

The Dagda, like the rest of the Celtic gods, was ripped of his divinity by the arrival of Christianity. However, unlike most of the mainland celts, many of the Gaelic myths were preserved in a way in written literature. These writings were euhemeristic in nature, meaning that they adapted these stories to fit into a historical narrative. Not only to fit in with this narrative, but also to adapt the mythology into a Christian framework, the Tuatha Dé Dannan and the rest of the gods were stripped of their divinity. There were differing explanations given to the origins of these figures, some said that they were merely humans with mighty magical powers, others said that they were fallen angels instead, very few though admitted that these figures were in fact worshipped by the ancient celts as gods, such as the Dagda. In this narrative, the Tuatha Dé Dannan were one of a multitude of different “settlers” of ancient Ireland, among which included the Firbolg and the Fomorians. But after the Tuatha Dé Dannan repelled the Fomorians, the final race of settlers, the Milesians, push back the Tuatha Dé Dannan and force them into the Otherworld. Modern scholarship holds the consensus that the Milesians and their victory against the Tuatha Dé Dannan to be a later invention by Christian writers.

Before the influence of Christianity, the Dagda was one of the most important gods in the Gaelic pantheon. The Dagda was most likely considered to be the chief god of the Tuatha Dé Dannan. He was a god of many things, such as fertility, fatherhood, manliness, life, death, the seasons, time and possibly the sky. He represented greatness in its many forms. His title of the Dagda accentuates this, as it translates to “the good god” or “the great god”, playing upon his greatness in all things. The Dagda has many more names he has gone by as well, such as Eochaid Ollathair “great father”, Dáire “the fertile/violent one”, Eochu “horseman”, Aed “the fiery one”, Ruad Rofhessa “lord of great knowledge”, Fer Benn “man of the peak”, Eogabal, Cerrce and many more.

Due to their tumultuous history, there is no surviving Gaelic creation myth, as such the one I gave above is my own interpretation of the reconstructions given by Iain MacAnTsaoir and Peter Berresford Ellis. These reconstructions are based on both post-christianization sources as well as Proto-Indo-European archetypes. Every attempt at reconstructing the creation myth given above cannot be relied upon (especially mine), as there simply is no evidence of what the creation myth could’ve been. I do not consider my rendition to be any more accurate than the others, since like them mine is similarly based upon debatable and absent evidence.

In post-christianization literature, the Dagda’s father is named Elatha, strangely making the Dagda the half brother of the god Lugh. Yet despite this, Nuada who is described as the Dagda’s brother in multiple sources, isn’t considered a son of Elatha. This confusion is compounded by the fact that Nuada is described as the brother to the Dagda’s son Dian Cécht. These contradictory genealogies could imply that they were a later addition made by writers to further push the euhemeristic narrative. In some Irish literature, the Dagda was said to have died in the final battle with the Fomorians, succumbing to his wounds after the battle. Nevertheless this is contradicted by other writings that depict the Dagda as surviving the conflict, as seen in him recovering his harp, and in other writings where he is credited with an 80 year reign over the Tuatha Dé Dannan after the war, meaning that his death was likely another addition made by later Christian authors.

The Dagda’s brothers, Nuada and Ogma, form a popular trinity in Gaelic myth, possibly representing a triplicate deity in which they were aspects or manifestations of the Dagda, similar to the Morrigna who form the triplicate of the Morrigan.

The god of death Donn mentioned in the reconstructed creation myth has theological ties to the Dagda, with some researchers believing that they were one and the same as not only was the Dagda associated with death, but he was also occasionally referred to as Dagda Donn. The Romans referred to a “Celtic Dis Pater” a death god who the celts claimed ancestry. Donn is the most common god to be claimed as the “Celtic Dis Pater” but if he was a form of the Dagda then that would mean the Dagda would be connected to the Roman god as well. Another Roman god possibly connected to the Dagda is Jupiter, as in the same text mentioning the “Celtic Dis Pater” the author also mentions a “Celtic Jupiter” which many scholars have likened to the Dagda. The Dagda also holds connections with the Germanic mythos as well, as he has been likened to the god Odin, sharing many of his traits. The Dagda has been likened to other Celtic gods as well, such as the Gaulish Sucellus and the Irish Crom Dubh and Crom Cruach who fought against the Christian Saint Patrick.

In a story revolving around the culture hero Cu Chulainn having one of his young cows being taken by the Morrigan, when the arrogant hero confronts the Morrigan she’s seen herding her livestock with someone described as a “giant red man” though never given a name, it’s generally believed that this man is the Dagda.

[labradoriteceffyldwr]

My favorite thing about being The Fairy Boy is when people find out and they're all, "Oh fairies?"

And I get the pure joy of being like, "No. Fairies."

[bean-na-farraige-agus-foraoise]

Because it apparently needs to be said again.

Danu isn’t real.

She doesn’t appear in the lore.

The name is based on shitty hypothetical linguistics and the attributes associated with her are taken from deities from other cultures to fill a role that does not exist within our lore.

Danann means “skills” or “craft”- and there’s loric evidence for this meaning.

[house-of-crows]

Look.

Don't be fucking stupid, okay? You can pull the dumb shit on your own time in your own space just keep it the fuck away from me alright? Okay~ Don't thank the Good Neighbors that help you keep your home clean, don't sweep your porches, keep certain plants growing at the gate and for the love of all holy do not cross Boundaries, do not move Their marking stones, and do not cross Their portals.

What happens to humans who get lost in the Wilds is never a good time. Whatever you THINK you're going to get; a new name, a partner who will never leave you, rid of your old identity, a child, whatever the fuck; WHAT YOU WILL RECEIVE is probably a century or three of hell and then literally eaten. Probably before you're actually dead, and potentially you'll be awake to see it happening.

FFS don't be stupid and assume that the Spicy Romance Novels are telling you the truth. It's not a funny "escape from capitalism" meme anymore. At BEST you'll be lost in the woods, probably get dehydrated, and sprain an ankle or catch something from improperly filtered water. At WORST?

Do your own research on "worst." And remember what the Good Neighbors share the land with: All the cultures that came before our immigrant ancestors walked these woods and hollows.

Tch'yeah. It ain't just the Good Folk you've got to keep an eye for. It's Indigenous critters and spirits. It's things that you should never speak the name of, if you know them. It's knowing never to whistle at night or look out your windows after dark because you will NEVER like what you see.

Do the research. Know whose lands you're squatting on. Be respectful.

Keep your eyes open and your mouth shut. Keep your eyes on the trail in front of your feet if you find yourself going in circles, don't listen to whatever is calling in the deep wood, turn your shirt inside out, and pray. Whatever gods' you've got might listen. Hope that the Folk in the wild places don't hear you first.

[irelandseyeonmythology]

Could you explain more about how the “people of the goddess Danu” theory was disproven? For the life of me I can’t find anyone who doesn’t accept that interpretation, but I don’t want to be inaccurate!

The question of whether anything is ever really DISPROVEN in the field of Celtic Studies is a worthy one in and of itself -- since we just have the texts, that means that, unless and until more material is edited/translated, we all have the same amount of evidence, we all have roughly the same level of linguistic training, so it's really all in how the material is read. There are some who'd say, for example, that the idea of a mythological cycle, or Irish Mythology in general, is disproven -- obviously, I'd disagree strongly. I have one colleague who firmly believes that the idea of Cú Chulainn being Lugh reborn is the result of a scribal error based off of what one scholar has put, I've pointed out what another scholar's argued about the significance of it. This isn't a field where things get solidly disproven often, we just put forth a lot of arguments and see what sticks.

And we argue. And argue. And ARGUE...

But! To the root of the question! Tuatha Dé!

The main acceptance for the idea of "Tuatha Dé Danann" as being an artificial name comes from an article that John Carey wrote in 1980, "The Name Tuatha Dé Danann" where he argues, essentially, that the name doesn't appear before Lebor Gabála Érenn in the 11th century and came about as a way of trying to disambiguate from the Israelites, with the figure of "Danu" being created to solve a problem that never existed in the first place.

In sources that are generally dated to before it, all we get is "Tuath(a) Dé or áes síde.

Now, is this the FINAL word? Probably not because, again, Celticists love to argue, but over the last forty years or so, it's achieved a near ubiquitous level of acceptance.

[ifallfox]

Check out full versions of this seidhe Venatrix and other art on my behance.net/fallfox

deviantart.com/fallfox

artstation.com/FallFox

Hope you enjoy! thanks for watching! 😊

[alynna-menagerie]

So I see that otherlycreatures blog is back, exploiting the fae for publicity and profit. So sad. I thought we had run her off of tumblr for good...

I WILL have her know that I am descended directly from the Tuatha de, we are out there, faekin are a real thing. We are out there and we are fae and I am pretty sure "Atri" would know that. But our existence makes her little fae rag less special, so it is a threat to her.

Besides, if she actually knew where the Tuatha de come from, and what we really are, she'd piss her pants...

We are not from Greece. Not even close. We were always just Tuatha de. Also for the curious, it's pronounced "Twa-tha-de". Don't say it with four syllables, that hurts my ears.