Oisin and the Rock of Cashel

 

Is there an effigy of the great mythological figure Oisin somewhere at the Rock of Cashel?

Or perhaps an imprint where the bull in this story ran into?

I wonder does it have anything to do with the Sheela na Gig on the walls of the Rock? (See comments for a picture).

"When St. Patrick was building the great church on the Rock of Cashel, the workmen used to be terribly annoyed, for whatever they put up by day was always found knocked down next morning. So one man watched and another man watched, but about one o'clock in the night every watcher fell asleep as sure as the hearth-money. At last St. Patrick himself sat up, and just as the clock struck one, what did he see but a terrible bull, with fire flashing from his nostrils, charging full drive up the hill, and pucking down every stone, stick, and bit of mortar that was put together the day before. "Oh, ho ! " says the Saint, "Til soon find one that will settle you, my brave bull"

Now, who was this but Usheen (Oisin) that St. Patrick was striving to make a good Christian. Usheen was a very crooked disciple. When he was listening to pious reading or talk, his thoughts would be among the hunters and warriors of his youth, but he loved the good Saint for his charity to himself. The day after St. Patrick saw the bull, he up and told Usheen all about what was going on. "Put me on a rock or in a tree," says Usheen, " just by the way the bull ran, and we'll see what we can do." So in the evening he was settled comfortably in the bough of a tree on the hill side, and when the bull was firing away up the steep like a thunderbolt, and was nearly under him, he dropped down on his back, took a horn in each hand, tore him asunder, and dashed one of the sides so hard against the face of the wall, that it may be seen there this day, hardened into stone. There was no further stoppage of the work; and in gratitude they cut out the effigy of Usheen riding on his pony, and it may be seen inside the old ruins this very day."

"A person pretending to have been on the rock, says there is a rude mark, as of the side of an ox, on the outside of one of the walls, and a knight mounted on a diminutive quadruped in bas-relief within."

From The Fireside Stories of Ireland (1870), 153-4 - Patrick Kennedy.