The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends (17 page)

“Is that Diarmuid Ua Duibhne we see?” asked one of the kings.

“It is myself,” agreed Diarmuid.

“Diarmuid, we are the kings of Inis Tuile and, as you know, there is blood which connects us.”

Indeed, Diarmuid knew that he shared some ancestry in common with the three kings of Inis Tuile.

“For that and our love for you as kin and as hero, we would prefer that you did not stand against us. Will you allow us to cross the ford without opposition?”

Diarmuid smiled softly and shook his head. “I will allow you to cross without opposition on condition that you first let me cross to your island and take off the head of the King of the
World.”

Now Diarmuid knew that they would not allow that.

“Then we must fight our way through you, Diarmuid,” cried the kings.

“You must do what you must do and I must do what I must do,” replied Diarmuid, unperturbed.

The three kings of Inis Tuile started to lead their battalions of warriors against Diarmuid. He fell on them furiously and many great blows were exchanged between them. Hundreds of warriors fell
beneath his sword-blade, while Fatha Conán lay oblivious in sleep.

Then Fatha Conán was at last aroused from his sleep by Diarmuid’s battle-song and he sprang up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Around him was the terrifying combat, the
splintering of shields, the cries and groaning of warriors and clang of metal on metal. He paused only a second and then seized his weapons and rushed forward to Diarmuid’s side.

“A fine friend are you, who let me sleep through a battle,” he said angrily.

“There is no other man on earth that I would suffer such a rebuke from!” snapped Diarmuid. “Not even the wailing of the goddess of death and battles would wake you.”

Then they said no more and both turned to meet the warriors of the three kings of Inis Tuile. The fight went this way and that, and no gain was made on either side. Then slowly the numbers
against them decreased. Eventually,
however, the three kings themselves were left facing Diarmuid and Fatha Conán. Every blow from them was repaid by blows from the
three kings. Finally, it was the three kings who measured their lengths on the ground before Diarmuid and Fatha Conán and the two heroes took the heads of the kings and raised them on rowan
sticks at the ford.

When Diarmuid and Fatha Conán went back to the enchanted house and told Fionn what had happened, Fionn told them to bring the heads of the three kings of Inis Tuile to the house and toss
them through the northern crack to him. They did so without delay. Fionn took the heads and rubbed the blood of the kings on himself and then on his men, except Conán Mhaol, for when they
came to him there was no blood left.

So all of them were freed except Conán Mhaol.

“Is it here that you are planning to leave me?” demanded the disgruntled warrior.

“No, indeed,” Fionn assured him.

They gathered round him and pulled and pulled but could not free him from the enchantment.

Then Diarmuid and Fatha Conán came and they put their hands under Conán Mhaol and, with a tremendous excess of energy, they pulled him from the ground. And the hair of his head,
where he had been lying, and the skin of his buttocks and that on his shoulders were stuck to the ground as they wrenched him away. And it is from this that Conán, son of Morna, was
nicknamed Mhaol or “the Bald”.

It had been a terrible night and Fionn and his men were exhausted.

“The King of the World lies across the ford with his army and we are not fit to give them battle,” muttered Fionn in disgust. “We must rest and recover our strength.”

Diarmuid agreed. “I and Fatha Conán will go back to the ford and make sure that no one crosses until morning.”

“By that time, the Fianna will surely be here,” agreed Fionn.

So Fionn and his men rested while Diarmuid and Fatha Conán returned to the ford to stand guard.

Now Daire Donn and Borb Sinnsior decided it was time
that they rose up and did battle with Fionn. With them came twenty hundreds of their best warriors and they started to
cross the river ford.

At this time, on the peak of Sliabh na mBan, Oisín realized that Fia, Insin, Diarmuid nor Fatha Conán had returned and now the sounds of the
dord-fhiann
were silent.

“I have waited too long for their return,” he rebuked himself. “I will go and find out what is wrong myself.” And he gave command of the Fianna to his son, Oscar.

At the ford, the forces of Daire Donn were beginning to cross, a great multitude of warriors, all well armed. Diarmuid and Fatha Conán stood with weapons ready and a great battle
began.

It was when the first warriors’ spear points were pressing towards the defenders of the ford that Oisín came to the brow of the hill and saw what was taking place. He drew his sword
and raised his shield and came running down to the ford straight at Borb Mac Sinnsior. His battle-fever was so strong on him that he was able to despatch Borb with one mighty blow and take his
head.

Now Fionn and his companions, having recovered their strength, came running forward to join the battle as well. Those men of Daire Donn’s army who had not fallen to the swords of Diarmuid,
Fatha Conán and Oisín now fell to their swords. Fionn, Goll, Faolán, Glas and even Conán Mhaol, still smarting but fit, rushed forward and despatched the battalions of
the mighty king.

Daire Donn now summoned fresh hosts from the island and they began to storm forward.

Now Oisín raised his war trumpet, which Oscar heard on the slopes of Sliabh na mBan, and the great army of the Fianna, with Fionn’s standard
–
the
Scáil
Gréine
(Shadow of the Sun)
–
began to march forward. None could stand in its way as it swelled remorselessly on towards the enemy in closed armoured ranks.

At the ford the two great armies clashed, with spears, swords and shields locked in combat. Men fell in bloodied forms across the river.

And Fatha Conán met with Daire Donn, the King of the
World, in the very centre of the river and because the great king, though strong, was cumbersome in his
movements, Fatha danced around and around him until the great king was giddy and exhausted. Then Fatha Conán gave him a mighty blow which took off his head. Thus was the Druid prophecy
fulfilled. Fatha Conán raised the head of the king and showed it to the enemies of the Fianna.

The enemy warriors trembled at the sight and fled from the field of battle. The Fianna followed them, hunting them down, leaving but one man to give an account of the battle. This man was of
fleet foot and scrambled through forests and across rocky hills back to his ship. Many a strong champion was left sleeping on that field; many a mother wept for her son, and wife for her husband
and sweetheart for her lover. Many lost their minds after fleeing from that terror. Even the mighty Fianna did not escape unscathed. Many gave their lives, like Fia son of Fionn and Insin,
Fionn’s foster-son, and many others unnamed and unsung were slain or terribly wounded.

Thus was the outcome of the vengeance that Míogach Mac Colgáin, son of the King of Lochlann, had nurtured in his heart for many years. Thus it was that the words of wisdom spoken
by the Druids were found to be true
–
that vengeance, though sweet at first, becomes a bitter cup and proves to be its own executioner. Therefore no vengeance is more estimable than
one which is not taken.

6 The Poet’s Curse

T
o be the subject of a curse from a poet is a terrible thing. In ancient times, the poet had high status at the king’s court and could argue
with the High King himself. Everyone sought the poet’s praise and dreaded his satire. In the
Annals of Ulster
it is recorded that, in the year
AD
1024, the
chief poet of Ireland, Cuán Ua Lothcháin, was unlawfully killed in Theba. As he lay dying, he uttered the poet’s curse, the
firt filed
they called it, and the bodies of
his murderers were said to have rotted within the hours. To challenge a poet or displease him or her
–
for there were
banfíli
, women poets, equal with men in Ireland in
those days
–
would be like playing dice with fate.

The poet’s curse was not something to be chanced lightly. The
Annals of Connacht
record that, in the year
AD
1414, John Stanley, the English viceroy, sent to
rule in Ireland, died from a poet’s curse.

When Tomás Ó Criomththain (1856
–
1937) wrote his best-selling autobiography
An tOileánach
(The Islandman) he wrote that he would abandon his day’s
work to go to listen to the island poet, for fear of being satirised and cursed by him.

The fear of the poet’s curse caused High Kings and kings to promise the poet anything that was demanded of them to avoid the curse. Let me tell you a story . . .

It happened during the years when Mongán Mac Fiachai was a king in Ulster. Mongán “of the head of abundant hair”, for such was the meaning of his name, Mongán,
was prince of
the Dál nAraidhe who ruled from a great
ráth
, or fortress, the Ráth Mór of Magh Linne, which is now called Moylinny in Co.
Antrim. Now Mongán prided himself on his court and one day he decided that, as the Chief Poet of Ireland had never graced his court with a visit, it would appear that he was lacking and this
detracted from his reputation as a learned and hospitable king.

So he sent to the Chief Poet inviting him to spend a week at his court as a guest. The Chief Poet was called Dallán Forgaill, who was, of course, not of the Dál nAraidhe but of the
sept of the Masraighe from Maighin, which is now Moynehall in South Cavan. Dallán Forgaill was, therefore, a stranger to the prince’s land, and Mongán had no personal knowledge
of him but, as he was the Chief Poet and could go wheresoever he chose and be accorded high honours among the kings of Éireann, his status was his reputation. So he came to Magh Linne and
was wined and feasted and entertained at Mongán’s court.

Dallán Forgaill, if the truth be not shameful, was a man of quick temper, an irascible man, proud, vain and as quick to take offence as to accept flattery. He was a repulsive-looking old
man, partially blind, and most people who knew the quickness of his temper feared him.

One night, when the hearth fires were blazing high, and the feasting was over, and the warriors of Magh Linne were gathered round; when Mongán sat in his carved oak chair of office with
his queen, Breothighearn
–
the highly noble one
–
at his side, her spun-gold hair reflecting the light of the flickering torches, dancing as if on fire, Dallán
Forgaill was asked if he would recite some stories.

And he was nothing loath to do so.

He choose a story of the Fianna, the élite band of warriors who were bodyguards to the High King, whose leader was Fionn Mac Cumhaill. The story he chose was of the great battle in which
the prince Fothad Airgtheach was killed in battle.

Most knew of the story, for there were three Fothad brothers
–
Fothad Airgtheach, Fothad Canainne and Fothad Cairptheach
–
and they found themselves as three joint
rulers
of the kingdoms of Éireann. But Fothad Canainne fell in love with the wife of Ailill Flann Beag, the leader of the Niadh Nask, the élite warrior corps who
guarded the king of Munster. She eloped with him. But her husband caught up with Fothad Canainne and his warriors at a place called Féic, which is near Millstreet in Co. Cork, and there was
a great battle. Fothad Canainne was defeated. He was captured and beheaded by the angry husband. But even after death, his head recited a poem to the woman he loved, describing his love and his
death in battle.

Of the remaining Fothad brothers, a quarrel broke out between them and Fothad Airgtheach, in anger, slew his brother Fothad Cairptheach. Now as Fothad Cairptheach had been a just king among the
brothers, who had ruled for a year and a day, and had also been a commander of the Fianna, it was the Fianna who now came against Fothad Airgtheach, seeking vengeance for Fothad Cairptheach’s
death, and fought a great battle in which he was slain.

“And this,” explained Dallán Forgaill, at the end of his story, “was at Dubhthair Laighean.”

Now the place he named is now called Duffrey in Co. Wexford.

At once Mongán, who prided himself on his knowledge, frowned and bent forward towards the poet. “Where, then, do you say is the burial place of Fothad Airgtheach, Dallán
Forgaill?” he asked, clearly puzzled.

The Chief Poet of Ireland sniffed airily. “Why, where else but in Dubhthair Laighean? For he was buried near the spot where he fell.”

“But that cannot be so, O Poet,” averred Mongán, at which many drew their breath sharply, for it was not wise to contradict a poet, let alone the Chief Poet of Ireland.

Dallán Forgaill’s countenance grew stony. “Not so?” he said sharply. “What do you mean, it is not so? Have not I said it is so?”

“Because it is a false enlightenment that you have given. Fothad Airgtheach, as everyone in this hall knows, fought his last battle here among the Ulaidh, indeed among the Dál
nAraidhe, here in Magh Linne. When dawn rises and lights
the big green hill outside this fortress, you will see that was the very spot where he fell and so that hill is a
fitting place for the bones of a prince of Éireann to rest in.”

Dallán Forgaill erupted in rage and fury. “You dare, little princeling, to contradict the Chief Poet of Ireland?” he cried. His brows drew together and the blood gushed in his
face; his tongue was tipped with ready venom.

Mongán was taken aback by the thunderous voice of the poet.

The court was suddenly quiet.

“I may challenge you when you are wrong,” Mongán replied stubbornly.

“So you deny me knowledge, kinglet? You deny me, who am versed in all the history of the dead and the living of Ireland? You dare? Very well, then I shall satirize you, and your father and
your mother, and your grandfather, since it is not becoming that your word, the word of a petty king, should be taken before mine, the word of the Chief Poet of All Ireland.
Fuighleacht
mallacht
ort
!”