‘The Raid on Fraoch’s Cattle’ is an eighth-century tale in which Findabair, daughter of Medb,* falls in love with Fraoch, the son of Idath, King of the Connachta, and Bé Find from the Otherworld. From this it would seem that he has one foot in early history and the other in mythology. Fraoch asks Findabair’s father, Ailill, for her hand and Ailill accepts as long as he gets the bride-price.
Afterwards they go with Medb* to the Dublind Fraoich or ‘Fraoch’s black pool’ on the River Suck [39] to swim. While Fraoch is in the water, Ailill steals a thumb ring (ordnasc) that Findabair gave Fraoch as a token of their love. Ailill throws the ring into the pool and it enters the mouth of a salmon. He then takes the ring from the salmon and hides it in the bank of the river. Ailill then asks Fraoch to break a branch of a rowan tree growing out of the bank and bring it to him. He breaks off a branch and brings it across the water, holding it over his back. There follows a description of Fraoch by Findabair:
Ba hed íarum athesc Findabair, nach álaind atchíd, ba háildiu lee Fraoch do acsin tar dublind, in corp do rogili agus in folt do roáilli, ind aiged do chumtachtai, int shúil do roglassi, is hé móethóclach cen locht cen ainm, co n-agaid fhocháel forlethain, is é díriuch dianim, in chráeb cosna cáeraib dergaib eter in mhbrágit agus in n-agid nhgil. Iss ed atbered Findabair, nocon fhacca ní rosáissed leth nó trían do chruth.
This is what Findabair used to say afterwards when she saw any beautiful thing: that it was more beautiful for her to see Fraoch coming across the [river] Dublind, the body for shining whiteness and the hair for loveliness, the face for shapeliness, the eye so blue-grey, and he a gentle youth without fault or blemish, face broad above, narrow below, and he straight and perfect, the branch with the red berries between the throat and the white face. This is what Findabair used to say: that she had never seen anything half or a third as beautiful as he.
[Translated by James Carney]
I include the above in its original Gaelic as, apart from its content, its use of alliteration shows it as an example of a ‘run’ of words which was used to give vibrancy to the storyteller.
According to the story, Ailill wants more berries, so Fraoch returns to the pool and meets a monster (béist) in the water, which he eventually kills by cutting off its head, thanks to Findabair derobing and plunging into the water with Fraoch’s sword. This gives the name the Dublind Fráech i mBréib, considered by the Dindshenchas* and Hogan to be the River Suck.
The story continues with a number of motifs that show much European influence, and then the cattle spoil begins. Fraoch occasionally returns to the síd or fairy mound at Cruachain, so we see how deeply he is a lightning rod for the early stories along Magh Aí or the plain of Connacht. With elements from the European Romantic Age, Fraoch is the romantic hero from Connacht, as Naoise is from Ulster and Diarmuid* Uí Duibhne from Munster. But without Findabair, Deirdre and Gráinne,* they would be merely heroes.
The allusions to the River Suck above is consistent with O’Rahilly’s mention of Fraoch mac Fidaig being of the Gamanrad tribe, and that these people were of the Domnann and associated with the Suck and present-day Irrus domnann or Bangor Erris [23] in Co. Mayo. In Tochmarc Treblainne or ‘The Wooing of Treblan Fraoch’, Fraoch is said to be of the Domannann, a dominant tribe in Connacht. He may also have been from the Ól nÉcmacht, an older name for Connacht or the Connachtaí, who were dominant in Connacht but lost power and were moved further west. In pre-Gaelic times their territory extended from Limerick to Assaroe in Sligo, and from Uisneach in Westmeath to Inis Bó in Mayo.
About ten miles north-west of Cruachain is the River Boyle [33] and it is near here at Knockadoobrusna Cnoc-a’ dumha brusna, or ‘the hill of the burial mound of the wood for firing’, that Cesair, the first woman to enter Ireland, is said to be buried. Cambrensis in his Topographica Hibernia wrote that ‘the mound of earth in which she was buried is called the tomb of Ceasara to this day’, which shows that the name and tumulus existed down to the beginning of the thirteenth century. The tomb can be seen from the town of Boyle as you approach the railway station, where, looking south, a mound can be seen on a hilltop about a mile away.
The name Ól nÉcmacht has been translated in several ways. In the late Middle Irish treatise on personal names known as Cóir Anmann (‘fitness of names’), a tale purports to explain its meaning as follows: a banquet was held for the Ól nEcmacht by the druid Domma, and the Ól nEcmacht failed to share the food and drink – ‘whereupon the host Domma said: “Uncomradelike (écumachta) is this drinking (ól) ye do”’, so from that time the term Ól nÉcmacht clung to the province of Connacht. However, another possible meaning could be ‘great horsepeople’, with macht meaning either from ‘across the sea’ or ‘death’ or ‘wonderful’. The Echach were at the heart of the Dál nAraide,* and the Cruithin* and were the horse people who came from east Co. Down and gave their name to Lough Neagh – ‘the lake of the horse’. Eochaid Echbel (horse-mouth) was a noted leader of the Echach. The word Echtrai or ‘horse-travelling’ is the Irish word used for tales which come under the title of ‘adventures’.
The Battle of Airtech was fought between the Ulaid and the Fir Ól nEchmacht close to Cruachain. It would seem that this battle marked the end of the Ól nEcmacht as a power in Ulster and in Connacht. A manuscript translated by R.I. Best alludes to this battle as follows:
Nir leicsit dono fir Ól nEgmacht Ailill no Medb léo insin cath. Digniet ierom catha commorae comardae dib cechtor dilina occus ro indsaigh cach i cheile dibh i rrói cath occus imbualtae; ro comraicsit iarom ocus ro gab cách dib for truastrad i ceili ocus for trencuma. Ba hacgarb ba haithaihge ro ferad in gleo eter firu Ol nEgmacht ocus Ulta. Bai tnuth ocus miscais ocus midduthracht oc cach dia cheile dibh. Bui muirnn occus seselbi isin cath chechtordae .i. buirfedach na fer, iachtad na miled, cnetu ocus osnadhach na trenfer, beimnech occus blesbarnach na cloidem, síanu ocus scretu na sleg ocus na soicchet, occus becedach ocus golbemnech na carruc n-adbalmor n-anbforustai oc beim fri sciathaib ocus luirechaib occus cathbarraib na n-arcon occus na n-arsed:
The Fir Ól nEcmacht did not let Ailill or Medb go with them into battle. They form battalions then on each side, one as great and lofty as the other, and they make towards one another on the field of battles and of conflicts. Then they encountered, and every man took to smiting his fellow and to hard hacking. Rude and sharp was the fight between the Fir Ól nEcmacht and the Ulaid. Envy and hatred and ill-will there was on every side. There was uproar and tumult on both sides of the host, namely the bawling of the men, the outcry of the soldiers, the groans and lamentations of the strongmen, and clashing and clatter of the swords, the whiz and whirr of the spears and arrows, and the roaring and wailing of the huge tottering rocks as they crashed upon the shields and breastplates and helms of the wardogs and veterans.
As to the meaning of airtech and its location, one is left in the land of supposition. The word may be related to airtherach, meaning ‘eastern’; the ind Airthir were the ‘eastern districts’, and the Airthir were a tribe whose territory included the present county of Armagh and the capital of Ulster, Emain Macha.
Síd ar Cruachain, also known as Oweynagat (Uaimh na gcat, ‘the cave of the cat’), is perhaps the most interesting site in Cruachain, as it has an entrance to the Otherworld. From here at Oíche Shamhna or Hallowe’en emerged the Ellén Trechenn or triple-headed deity who laid waste to Ireland. It is also said that from here emerged a flock of birds that ‘withered up whatsoever their breaths impinged on’. For many years Simon O’Dwyer and his wife Maria, along with their Bronze Age horn and bodhrán, joined me and many others in acknowledging the start of Samain from within this underground cave.
FIGURE 9. An entrance to the Otherworld – Oweynagat at Cruachain.
There are many caves in this area, and according to local tradition they go back as
