Aiste 4 (2014), 11–44

Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn:

History and literature in twelfth-century Ireland

Patrick Wadden

Belmont Abbey College *

ABSTRACT This paper discusses the tale Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn, a sequel to the early Irish epic Táin Bó Cúailgne, in light of the historical context of the period when it was written (the second half of the twelfth century). It argues that its author drew on contemporary historical events and developments as models for episodes in the plot of his story. Specifically, his depiction of Irish kings importing foreign mercenaries from the Hebrides and struggling for influence over the midland province of Mide resonates with distinctly twelfth-century historical phenomena. As a result, although it is set in the heroic past, the images of kingship and of inter-provincial politics depicted in Cath Ruis na Ríg were shaped by the twelfth-century struggle for dominance amongst the various contenders for the high-kingship of Ireland. The paper tentatively suggests that the text might have been written as a commentary on the period of conflict between Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn, king of Cenél Eógain, and Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair, king of Connacht, during the early 1150s.

Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn, ‘The Battle of Rosnaree on the Boyne’,1 tells the story of the Ulaid’s campaign of revenge against the other Irish

* This article was written during the period of my doctoral studies under the supervision of Prof. Thomas Charles-Edwards, for whose guidance and support I am very grateful. I would also like to thank Dr Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Dr Seán Duffy, Prof. Máire Herbert and the anonymous reviewers at Aiste for their comments. Their assistance has saved me from several errors, but for any that remain I alone am responsible. 1 R. I. Best et al. (eds), The Book of Leinster, Formerly Lebar na Núachongabála (Dublin, 1954–83), vol. 4, 761–79, ll. 22627–23283. All references provided will be to this edition by line number. The text has been edited and translated by

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provinces for their part in Táin Bó Cúailgne, ‘The Cattle Raid of Cooley’. The text can be dated relatively accurately on linguistic grounds and because it survives in the Book of Leinster. Similarities between the language and style of Cath Ruis na Ríg and other Book of Leinster texts led first Thurneysen and then Áine de Paor to postulate common authorship for them. They believed that Cath Ruis na Ríg, Mesca Ulad, ‘The intoxication of the Ulaid’, and the Book of Leinster version of Táin Bó Cúailgne were written by the same author during the first third of the twelfth century.2 More recently, Uáitéar Mac Gearailt has carried out a meticulous study of the language of these texts and has convincingly argued against common authorship. Rather, he has suggested that Cath Ruis na Ríg was written at a slightly later date, ‘possibly mid-way through the second half of the twelfth century’.3 The composition occurred, then, very shortly before the text was incorporated into the Book of Leinster, which was written over the course of the second half of the twelfth century.4

Cath Ruis na Ríg has attracted less than its fair share of scholarly interest, perhaps because of what modern readers have perceived as its literary failings; apparent inconsistencies and contradictions that mar the narrative and that can leave the reader bewildered.5 For instance, the opening scene provides all the elements for an epic climax, a showdown in which archrivals would come face to face and old scores would be settled. The action begins in the immediate aftermath of the Táin and the reader is presented with the image of King Conchobar mac Nessa in a deep depression brought on by the events that have befallen him and his kingdom:

Edmund Hogan: Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn with Preface, Translation and Indices. Also a Treatise on Irish Neuter Substantives and a Supplement to the Index Vocabularum of Zeuss’ Garmmatica Celtica, Royal Irish Academy, Todd lecture series, vol. 4 (Dublin, 1892). Translations, though often modified by the current author, are based upon those provided by Hogan. 2 R. Thurneysen, Die irische Helden- und Königsage bis zum siebzehnten Jahrhundert (Halle, 1921), 363–76; A. de Paor, ‘The common authorship of some Book of Leinster texts’, Ériu 9 (1921–23), 118–46. 3 U. Mac Gearailt, ‘Cath Ruis na Ríg and twelfth-century literary and oral tradition’, Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 44 (1991), 129. Cf. idem, ‘The language of some late Middle Irish texts in the Book of Leinster’, Studia Hibernica 26 (1992), 190–99. 4 W. O’Sullivan, ‘Notes on the scripts and make up of the Book of Leinster’, Celtica 7 (1966), 1–31. For a recent study of the manuscript, see D. Schlüter, History or Fable? The Book of Leinster as a Document of Cultural Memory in Twelfth-Century Ireland, Studien und Texte zur Keltologie (Münster, 2010). 5 Mac Gearailt, ‘Cath Ruis na Ríg’, 130–36.

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Dáig damriachtatar cethri ollchóiceda Herend. & tuctha leosum a n-áes cíuil 7 airfiti 7 admolta, combad lériti a

hairgni. 7 combad moti a hurbada. 7 ro-loscit ar ndúnaid 7 ar ndegbaleda connach arddi íat nas a n-airidni 7 a n-

immellaige. & barro ebris dano Ailill 7 Medb cath formsa.

7 rucad láeg mo bó fadéin a purt éicne uaimse. Since the four great provinces of Ireland have come to me, and with them were brought their men of music, and of minstrelsy, and of eulogy, so that the ravages might be more conspicuous, and that the destructions might be greater. And our fortresses and our fine-settlements were burned so that they were not higher than the furnishings and their edges. And Ailill and Medb gained a battle too against me, and the calf of my own cow was taken from me out of a place of danger. 6

In revenge for the part they played in the Táin, Conchobar announces his intention to launch a campaign against his enemies. Having highlighted their role as aggressors and leaders in the Táin, Conchobar identified Ailill and Medb, the king and queen of Connacht, as the primary targets of his anger:

Meni thaeth Ailill is Medb. lemsa man dáilse co derb. atberim rib aidblib tuir. mebais mo chride a Chathbaid.

Unless Ailill should fall and Medb / by me in this encounter assuredly / I say to you — with prodigies of a host — / my heart will break, O Cathbad.7

Despite this careful scene-setting, the anticipated clash between the Ulaid and the men of Connacht never materialises. Conchobar marches his armies southwards into the midlands, not westwards into Connacht and the climax of the story is a battle between the Ulaid, on the one hand, and the army of the king of Tara with support from the king of Leinster, on the other. The reader cannot help but feel unfulfilled, even cheated by a conclusion that fails to live up to the billing.

This apparent deficiency is mirrored in an important episode in the plot that appears similarly incomplete. When Cathbad,

6 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22650–55; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 5. 7 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22711–14; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 9.

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Conchobar’s druid, hears of the king’s plans he advises postponing the expedition. Summer, he says, will bring weather more suitable for military campaigning, and he advises Conchobar to use the intervening period to gather his overseas allies. A substantial portion of the text is then devoted to describing the identities of these absentees and foreigners, the way they were summoned and their arrival in Ireland.8 Once they have landed, though, and despite the author having devoted so much space to them initially, Conchobar’s foreign allies disappear from the story never to be seen again. Instead, Conchobar turns his attention to gathering the army of the Ulaid that proceeds to Rosnaree without foreign reinforcements. A final ambiguity is found in the concluding sentence of the text that claims that as a result of the battle of Rosnaree there came about ‘slúaged catha Findchorad. 7 in tromlonges timchell i Connachtaib. 7 Cath na Maccraide’, (‘the expedition of the Battle of Findchora and the great sea voyage around among the Connachta, and the Battle of the Boytroop’).9 It does not, however, provide any details of these events or how they related to the foregoing story.

These aspects of the text have elicited some discussion. Thurneysen believed that the extant portion of Cath Ruis na Ríg was part of a longer original and suggested that the future battles listed by the Book of Leinster scribe were those in which Ailill and Medb would meet their fate and in which Conchobar’s foreign armies would feature.10 Mac Gearailt thought that the modus operandi of the author might have been another factor contributing to the confusion. He argued that the Book of Leinster text had been written extemporaneously and that this had impacted upon the composer’s ability to maintain narrative coherency.11 Mac Gearailt also drew attention to the existence of a distinct recension of Cath Ruis na Ríg in post-medieval manuscripts and suggested that the Book of Leinster text represents an incompletely copied or incorrectly remembered version of the original story. In her recent study of the contents of the Book of Leinster, Dagmar Schlüter has highlighted the role of the scribes of the Book of Leinster as authors and adaptors of the texts they chose to include in their manuscript.12 Her judgment of the

8 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22740–22870. 9 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23285–86; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 59. 10 Thurneysen, Die irische Helden- und Königsage, 363–76 11 Mac Gearailt, ‘Cath Ruis na Ríg’, 136–37, 147–50. 12 Schlüter, History or Fable?, passim.

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scribes is more positive than Mac Gearailt’s, however, and she stresses their active engagement with their material.

Thurneysen and Mac Gearailt were, perhaps, harsh in their judgments of those responsible for the Book of Leinster text of Cath Ruis na Ríg, whose intentions might have differed from those expected by modern readers.13 Also, while it is true that this version of Cath Ruis na Ríg is no literary masterpiece, it is the only medieval text of the tale we possess. Whatever its relation to the later version or the putative exemplar, the Book of Leinster Cath Ruis na Ríg is deserving of study in its own right. The following discussion will focus on that version of the text alone. In it I shall attempt to shed some light on this fascinating tale by discussing one aspect of its composition, the extent to which the story was shaped by the historical context its author was operating in. Máire Herbert has demonstrated that fully appreciating certain Middle Irish texts ‘entails concern with both the text and context, with the location of the work within the historical and cultural worlds which shaped its creation’.14 Certain episodes and patterns in the story of Cath Ruis na Ríg echo events and phenomena that occurred in Ireland during the twelfth century. By exploring these historical resonances, this discussion will aim to illuminate some of the concerns that motivated the author of this intriguing, though frequently overlooked story.

Nowhere is the text’s historical resonance more apparent than in the depiction of Conchobar hiring fleets of overseas warriors. Cathbad introduces Conchobar’s foreign allies into the narrative when he advises the king to send messengers requesting support to the Ulster hero Conall Cernach, who was

ac tobuch a chisa 7 a chanad i crichaib Leódús, i n-insib Cadd, 7 i n-insib Or[c]. 7 i críchaib Scithia 7 Dacia 7 Gothia 7 Northmannia, ac tastel Mara Ict 7 Mara Torrián, 7 ic slataigecht sliged Saxan.

13 On this point, see D. Ó Corráin, ‘Historical need and literary narrative’, in D. E. Evans, J. G. Griffith and E. M. Jope (eds), Proceedings of the Seventh International Congress of Celtic Studies held at Oxford, from 10th to 15th July, 1983 (Oxford, 1986), 141, and K. McCone, Pagan Past and Christian Present in Early Irish Literature, Maynooth Monographs 3 (Maynooth, 1990), 5–6. 14 M. Herbert, ‘Fled Dúin na nGéd: a reappraisal’, CMCS 18 (1989), 75–87, quoted at 75; eadem, ‘Caithréim Cellaig: Some literary and historical considerations’, ZCP 49–50 (1997), 320–32; eadem, ‘The Death of Muirchertach Mac Erca: A twelfth-century tale’, in F. Josephson (ed.), Celts and Vikings: Proceedings of the Fourth Symposium of Societas Celtologia Nordica (Gothenburg, 1997), 27–39.

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raising his tax and his tribute in the territories of Lewis, in the Shetlands, and in the Orkneys, and in the territories of Scythia and Dacia and Gothia and Northmannia, voyaging the English channel and the Mediterranean sea, and plundering the roads of the English.15

As discussed by Margaret Dobbs, Conall’s ‘wanderings abroad’ are part of what distinguishes his character in the Ulster tales.16 In Táin Bó Fraích, ‘The Cattle Raid of Fráech’, for instance, Conall accompanies Fráech to Britain and the continent.17 Other texts associate him, through his wife and son, with Pictland18 and Geoffrey Keating, writing in the seventeenth century, ascribed to Conall ‘ionnradh Manann’ (‘the wasting of Man’).19 Of particular interest is the claim in Tochmarc Emire, ‘The Wooing of Emer’, that when Cú Chulainn and his companions fled from Ireland and made for the house of the king of the Isles, they found ‘Conall Cernach 7 Lóegaire Búadach oc tobuch a císa. Ar baí cís a hindsib Gall do Ultaib in tan sin’ (‘Conall Cernach and Lóegaire Búadach raising their tax, because the Ulaid took tax from the Innsi Gall at that time’).20 Tochmarc Emire is older than Cath Ruis na Ríg and was quite possibly available to its author.21 Considering the similarities in imagery and terminology, and the fact that the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg had a noted tendency to borrow from other texts,22 it is possible that Cath Ruis na Ríg’s statement that Conall was taking tribute in various foreign countries is

15 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22739–42; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 11. For the Shetlands as insi Cadd see W. J. Watson, The History of the Celtic Place-names of Scotland (Edinburgh and London, 1926, reprinted Shannon, 1973), 30. 16 M. E. Dobbs, ‘The traditions of Conall Cernach’, JRSAI 6th series 19, no. 2 (1939), 118. 17 Táin Bó Fraích, ed. W. Meid, Medieval and Modern Irish Series 22 (Dublin, 1974), 13–14. For an important discussion of the geography of this text, see D. N. Dumville, ‘Ireland and Britain in Táin Bó Fraích’, Études Celtiques 32 (1996), 175–87. 18 Dobbs, ‘Traditions of Conall Cernach’, 123–24. 19 G. Keating, Foras Feasa ar Éirinn, ed. D. Comyn and P. Dineen, Irish Texts Society vols 4, 8, 9, 15 (London, 1902–14), vol. 2, 208. 20 Tochmarc Emire, ed. A. G. van Hamel, Compert Con Cúlainn and Other Stories, Medieval and Modern Irish series vol. 3 (Dublin, 1978), 60. 21 It is extant in Lebor na hUidre, written c.1100 (R. I. Best and O. Bergin (eds), Lebor na hUidre: the Book of the Dun Cow (Dublin, 1929)), where the relevant passage (ll. 10435–37) reads: ‘Is and bátar i ssudiu for a chind Conall Cernach 7 Loegaire Buadach oc tubach a císa ar baí cís a hInsib Gall do Ultaib in tan sin’. 22 Mac Gearailt, ‘Cath Ruis na Ríg’, 138–40.

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an expanded borrowing from Tochmarc Emire. Mac Gearailt suggested that the author of the text was a member of the Loígsi, who claimed Conall as their ancestor and that he depicted Conall ruling over broad swathes of territory in order to enhance his, and by extension his descendants’ status.23 Schlüter has identified the glorification of Conall Cernach as a common theme in the Ulster tales in the Book of Leinster,24 suggesting, perhaps, that his prominence in Cath Ruis na Ríg was exaggerated in the process of copying the text.

Conall was not Conchobar’s only ally outside Ireland, though, and Cathbad further advised Conchobar to send messages:

cot chairddib écmaisse co iathaib Gallecda, co Galliathaib na nGall. .i. co Amlaíb hua Inscoa rig Lochlainne. Co Findmór macc Rofhir co ríg sechtmad rainni de Lochlainn. Co Báre na Sciggire, co dunud na Piscarcarla. Co Brodor Roth. 7 co Brodor Fiúit. 7 co Siugraid Soga ríg Súdiam. Co Sortadbud Sort co ríg insi Orc. Co secht maccaib Romrach Co hIl co Íle Co Mael co Muile. Co Abram mac Romrach co Cet mac Romrach Co Celg mac Romrach Co Mod mac Herling. Co Conchobor coscarach mac Artuir meic Bruide, meic Dungaill. Co macc ríg Alban. 7 Clothra ingen Conchobuir a mathair.

to your absent friends, to the Gallecda lands, to the Gall-lands of the Gaill, namely, to Amlaíb Úa Inscoa, king of Lochlann, to Findmór son of Rofher, king of the seventh part of Lochlann, to Báre of the Faroe Islands, to the fortress of the Piscarcarla, to Brodor Roth and to Brodor Fiúit, and to Siugraid Soga king of Súdiam, to Sortadbud Sort, king of the Orkneys, to the seven sons of Romra; to Il, to Íle, to Máel, to Muile, to Abram son of Romra, to Cet son of Romra, to Celg son of Romra, to Mod son of Herling,

23 Mac Gearailt believed that Áed mac Crimthainn, the scribe of the Book of Leinster, was responsible for the composition and that he had enhanced Conall’s role because of his attachment to the Loígsi: ‘Cath Ruis na Ríg’, 136–37, 147–50; idem, ‘The language of some late Middle Irish texts in the Book of Leinster’. Donnchadh Ó Corráin accepted the argument in favour of a Loígsi bias in the text, but has dismissed the argument that Áed mac Crimthainn was the author on the basis that Áed did not belong, as Mac Gearailt believed, to the Loígsi. He was actually a member of the Uí Crimthainn who, in Ó Corráin’s words, ‘saw themselves as more than a cut above’ the Loígsi. He therefore suggests that the text ‘is likely to be the work of another’: D. Ó Corráin, ‘Vikings in Scotland and Ireland in the ninth century’, Peritia 12 (1998), 314–16, quoted at 315, note 84. 24 Schlüter, Myth or Fable?, 85–113.

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to Conchobar the victorious, son of Artur, son of Bruide, son of Dungal, to the son of the king of Alba, and Clothra, daughter of Conchobar was his mother. 25

Donnchadh Ó Corráin has perceived in this episode ‘literary reflexes of the battle of Clontarf’, in particular in the names Siugraid Soga, Brodor Roth and Brodor Fiúit which he believes are reflexes of Siugraid, earl of Orkney, and Brodor, slayer of Brian Bóruma, both of whom died at Clontarf.26 These names might, perhaps, have been drawn from knowledge of or sources concerning the battle of Clontarf, but the imagery of an Irish king hiring allies from the Hebrides much more closely reflects a pattern of events that was becoming common in the author’s own time.

Seán Duffy has recently discussed the origins of the tradition of Irish kings importing mercenaries from the Hebrides. These soldiers were known in Irish as gallóglaigh, ‘foreign soldiers’ or perhaps ‘soldiers from the Innse Gall’ (that is the Hebrides), later Anglicised as ‘galloglass’. As Duffy noted, while the term was not coined until the end of the thirteenth century, the practice of importing troops from the Islands of the Gaill into Ireland can be traced back to the middle of the twelfth.27 In 1154, Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn, king of Cenél Eógain, engaged a fleet from Man, the Hebrides, Galloway and Argyll to counter the threat of attack from Connacht.28 In 1170, according to Gerald of Wales, Rúaidrí Úa Conchobair, high-king of Ireland, hired insulanos, men of the Isles, to help dislodge the English from Dublin.29 This expedition was a failure, and when Úa Conchobair attempted another rebuttal of the English advance in 1173 or 1174, he again employed reinforcements from the Isles.30

Conchobar’s foreign allies in Cath Ruis na Ríg came from a range of territories throughout the insular world and beyond. The author’s repeated description of these regions as ‘iathaib Gallecda is Gall-iathaib na nGall’ (‘Gall-ish lands and Gall-lands of the Gaill’), however,

25 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22742–52; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 11–13. 26 Ó Corráin, ‘Vikings in Scotland and Ireland’, 315–17. 27 S. Duffy, ‘The prehistory of the galloglass’, in idem (ed.), The World of the Gallglass (Dublin, 2007), 2–7. 28 J. O’Donovan (ed.), Annála Ríoghachta Eirean: Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland, by the Four Masters (Dublin, 1856), 1154. 29 Giraldus Cambrensis, Expugnatio Hibernica, ed. and trans. A. B. Scott and F. X. Martin (Dublin, 1978), 78–79. 30 The Deeds of the Normans in Ireland, ed. E. Mullally (Dublin, 2002), ll. 3258–59, 3268–69; Duffy, ‘Prehistory of the galloglass’, 7–8.

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laid heavy emphasis on the primary identity of these territories and their inhabitants as Gaill.31 Prior to the English invasion of Ireland, the term Gaill was used to denote foreigners of Scandinavian origin or, as was perhaps more common by the middle of the twelfth century, their partly-Gaelicised descendants who inhabited the insular Viking zone. It was from the lands of these Gaill that Conchobar drew most of his foreign support — from Scandinavia, from the Faroes, from the Orkneys and from the Hebridean islands of Islay and Mull personified in the text as sons of Romra. Allowing for some artistic licence in the compilation of the list of Conchobar’s foreign allies, it seems likely that the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg drew upon the contemporary practice that would later become known as the galloglass tradition for this episode in the narrative. By depicting Conchobar importing overseas reinforcements from the lands of the Gaill, the author was simply having him act in the manner expected of a powerful provincial king in the second half of the twelfth century.

Conchobar’s action in the aftermath of the battle at Rosnaree also has a distinctly twelfth-century ring to it. The battle itself was evidently quite evenly matched and looked at one stage to be going against the Ulaid when Conchobar was forced into a partial retreat. The Ulstermen rallied, however, and Cú Chulainn eventually killed the king of Tara, Cairpre Nia Fer. After the death of their king, the men of Tara abandoned the fight and their Leinster allies beat a hasty retreat chased by Ulaid pursuers. The victorious Ulaid then pitched camp at Tara. A week later, Cairpre’s son Erc came to Tara and requested that Conchobar grant him his late father’s lands. Conchobar agreed to this and, after receiving a submission of obedience from him, installed Erc as king of Tara.32 Erc’s fate, and Conchobar’s role in it, reflects the fate of the kings of Mide who were the author’s contemporaries.

The demise of Mide was one of the most notable, and as yet unexplained, developments in Irish history during the eleventh and twelfth centuries.33 After the death of its great king, Máel Sechlainn Mór mac Domnaill, in 1022, Mide entered a period of decline from which it never recovered. By the second half of the twelfth century:

31 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22742–43, 22769–70, 22816–17, 22823–24. 32 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23231–52. 33 F. J. Byrne (‘The trembling sod: Ireland in 1169’, in A. Cosgrove (ed.), New History of Ireland 2: Medieval Ireland, 1169–1534 (Oxford, 1987), 8–10, 19–21) considered the collapse of Mide into a ‘vortex of a whirlpool of competing interests’ to have been the result of the over-abundance of church lands in the kingdom.

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the rich and defenceless kingdom of Meath had long been the bone of contention between the dominant powers. All wanted a slice of the cake. For over a century, the kings of Bréifne had been annexing portions of it. Mac Murrough, in the south, cast greedy eyes upon it, and in the north, Ua Cerbaill, king of Airgialla, was bent on extending his kingdom to the Boyne. Each of the dominant powers appointed its own kings over Meath and that unfortunate kingdom became the theatre of their rivalries and their warfare. 34

The practice of imposing and subjugating kings of Mide began in 1094 when Muirchertach Úa Briain took the ‘unprecedented step of partitioning Mide in two between rival members of the Uí Máel Sechlainn’.35 Further instances of the imposition of kings or the division of the kingship are recorded in the annals in 1125, 1143, 1144, 1150, 1151, 1152, 1153, 1155, 1161, 1162, 1163 and 1169.36 It might even be said that the pattern survived the English invasion; in 1171 Henry II granted the province to Hugh de Lacy to be held as Murchad Úa Máel Sechlainn had previously held it.37 The kingdom of Mide as it existed in the twelfth century included the royal site of Tara, and its king was sometimes still referred to as ‘king of Tara’.38 Given the frequency with which kings of Mide/Tara were installed and replaced by powerful rivals during his own lifetime, it is hardly surprising that the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg should project this practice back into the heroic age of the Ulster cycle. In truth, however, it was a characteristically twelfth-century phenomenon.

34 D. Ó Corráin, Ireland Before the Normans (Dublin, 1972), 164. Cf. 152, 157–59, 161–62. 35 S. Duffy, ‘“The western world’s tower of honour and dignity”: The career of Muirchertach Ua Briain in context’, in D. Bracken and D. Ó Riain-Raedel (eds), Ireland and Europe in the Twelfth Century: Reform and Renewal (Dublin, 2004), 68. See S. Mac Airt (ed.), The Annals of Inisfallen (Dublin, 1977), 1094. 36 W. Stokes (ed.), The Annals of Tigernach (Revue Celtique 16–18 (1895–97); repr. Felinfach, 1993), 1161, 1162, 1163; S. Mac Airt and G. Mac Niocaill (eds), The Annals of Ulster (to a.d. 1131) (Dublin, 1983), 1125; W. M. Hennessy (ed.), Chronicon Scotorum. A Chronicle of Irish Affairs from the Earliest Times to 1135; and Supplement Containing the Events from 1141-1150 (London, 1866), 1143; AFM 1143, 1144, 1150, 1152, 1162, 1163, 1169; M. T. Flanagan, ‘High-kings with opposition’, in. D. Ó Cróinín (ed.), New History of Ireland 1: Prehistoric and Early Ireland (Oxford, 2005), 925. 37 G. H. Orpen, Ireland under the Normans (Oxford, 1911–1920), vol. 1, 285–86. 38 AU 1118, 1123, 1124; ALC 1118, 1123, 1124; AFM 1118, 1141.

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The Battle of Rosnaree only finally came about after a failed attempt by his opponents to appease Conchobar. Offered compensation for the losses he had suffered during the Táin if he would cancel his planned campaign, Conchobar refused. He would not abandon his expedition, he stated, ‘naco raib inad mo phupla cacha cóicid i nHerind’, (‘until every province in Ireland has been a place for my tent’), that is, until he had subjugated all the provinces of Ireland.39 This ambition is redolent of the aspirations powerful twelfth-century would-be high-kings of Ireland, whose attempts to have their authority recognised throughout the island involved great circuitous campaigns through the provincial kingdoms such that undertaken by Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn in 1157.40 In both his ambition and the means by which he set about achieving it — subjugating the kingship of Tara and employing foreign military forces — Conchobar is presented by the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg in the guise of a powerful twelfth-century provincial king and contender for the high-kingship.

The actions ascribed to Conchobar reflected developments in Irish kingship during the twelfth century and betray the influence of his historical context upon the author’s composition. It is hardly a surprise, of course, that the plot and the characters of the story fulfilled the expectations of its twelfth-century audience. However, the specific resonances between the text and historical developments of the 1150s in particular suggest that in Cath Ruis na Ríg we might be confronted with more than unconscious updating of Conchobar’s literary character. One must beware of ‘arbitrarily correlating known historical data with textual content’ to support such a claim, of course,41 but the political situation in Ireland as it unfolded during that decade invited comparison with that of the Ulster cycle and the correspondences between episodes in the plot of Cath Ruis na Ríg and historical events of those years suggest that the author was aware of these similarities and intentionally evoked them for his audience.

The defining feature of the history of Ireland in the early 1150s, like that of the Ulster cycle, was conflict between the king of Connacht and the king of the northern province.42 By the twelfth century, the

39 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22927–28; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 29. 40 AFM 1157. 41 M. Herbert, ‘Reading Recension 1 of the Táin’, in Ruairí Ó hUiginn and Brian Ó Catháin (eds), Ulidia 2, Proceedings of the Second International Conference on the Ulster Cycle of Tales, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, 24-27 June 2005 (Maynooth, 2009), 208–09. 42 Ó Corráin, Ireland before the Normans, 151, 159–62.

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once great kingdom of the Ulaid had been reduced to a fraction of its former extent and was restricted to the area east of the Bann. The real power in the north lay with Cenél Eógain, a branch of the Uí Néill that controlled territory across much of what are now counties Donegal, Derry, Tyrone and Fermanagh. In 1145 Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn had been reinstated as king of Cenél Eógain after a two-year exile with the help of Cenél Conaill, the other northern branch of the Uí Néill based in county Donegal.43 Mac Lochlainn’s exile might have been brought about in part by Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair, king of Connacht and high-king of Ireland. John Kelleher suggested that Mac Lochlainn’s banishing of his rival for the kingship, Domnall Úa Gairmledaig, into Connacht in 1148 was ‘a pretty sure sign’ that the latter ‘had been Ua Conchobair’s man’.44 If so, the enmity this action engendered between Úa Conchobair and Mac Lochlainn was to have significant consequences. Once he was secure in his position, possibly as early as 1147, Mac Lochlainn began to expand his power. He led campaigns against and took submission from the neighbouring kingdoms of the Ulaid, the Airgialla and Cenél Conaill.45 It required repeated campaigns to subdue the Ulaid, but an expedition in 1149 seems to have put an end to their resistance at least temporarily. By the end of that year, the annals depict Muirchertach standing at the head of a political block encompassing all the kingdoms of the North:

Slóighedh ele la mac Néill hUi Lochlainn co ttuaiscert Ereann iume .i. Cenel Conaill, Cenel Eoghain 7 Airghialla,

i nUlltoibh […] Tainic iarttain hUa Duindslébhe i ttaigh hUi Lachlainn co ttuc a mac fein i ngiallna dho, 7 an ro

chuinnigh do ghiallaibhar chena.

Another hosting was led by the son of Niall Úa Lochlainn, with [the people of] the north of Ireland, namely, Cenél Conaill, Cenél Eógain, and the Airgialla, against the Ulaid […] Úa Dúin Sléibhe [king of Ulaid] afterwards came into the house of Úa Lochlainn, and delivered his own son up to him as a hostage, and whatever other hostages he demanded.46

43 AFM 1143, 1145. For Muirchertach’s career, see Ailbhe Mac Shamhráin, ‘Mac Lochlainn, Muirchertach’, in James Mcguire, James Quinn (eds), Dictionary of Irish Biography (Cambridge, 2009). 44 AFM 1148; J. V. Kelleher, ‘The battle of Móin Mhór 1151’, Celtica 20 (1988), 14. 45 AFM 1147, 1148. 46 AFM 1149. Cf. ATig 1149.

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The handing over of hostages to a superior king had long been a sign of political submission in Ireland. Entering into a king’s house, whether literally or metaphorically, was a more recent expression for the formalisation of a similar relationship.47 It is curious to think whether Conchobar’s statement in Cath Ruis na Ríg about finding a place for his tent in every province might have been related to knowledge of this phenomenon. In any case, in the above-cited example, the actions of the king of the Ulaid implied his recognition of Mac Lochlainn’s overlordship. By 1149, then, Mac Lochlainn was the undisputed overlord of the North, a territorial block not quite commensurate with the ancient kingdom of the Ulaid, but certainly comparable in extent. To imagine him as a new Conchobar did not require a great leap of the imagination, despite the fact that the Uí Néill were the traditional enemies of the Ulaid.

In the late Middle Ages, the imagery of the ancient kingdom of the Ulaid was thoroughly appropriated by Mac Lochlainn’s successors in the kingship of Cenél Eógain. One of these built a house on Emain Macha, supposed capital of Conchobar’s kingdom, and several used the title ‘king of Ulster’.48 In recognition of their claims to be Conchobar’s successors, bardic poets often used the imagery of the Ulster cycle in poems addressed to kings of Cenél Eógain. The origin of these practices is generally associated with the collapse of the Anglo-Norman earldom of Ulster in the fourteenth century,49 but perhaps needs to be investigated further. By the twelfth century, the Táin had attained the status of national epic in Ireland, a process that probably began in the previous century when, as Máire Herbert has discussed, Cú Chulainn emerged as a national hero.50 Such was his standing as a model of heroism and bravery that the obit of a king of Connacht, a successor of Ailill and Medb, who died in 1067 described him as ‘Cú Chulainn na nGaedhil’, ‘Cú Chulainn of the Gaels’.51 About a century later, ‘A Mhuircheartaigh mic Néill náir’, better known as ‘The circuit of Ireland by Muirchertach mac Néill’, was written to

47 Marie Therese Flanagan, Irish Society, Anglo-Norman Settlers, Angevin Kingship: Interactions in Ireland in the Late Twelfth Century (Oxford, 1989), 174–99; T. M. Charles-Edwards, ‘The date of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi’, The Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion (1970), pt 2, 296–97. 48 Katharine Simms, ‘Propaganda use of the Táin in the later Middle Ages’, Celtica 15 (1983), 142–49. 49 ibid.; F. J. Byrne, Irish Kings and High-kings (London, 1973), 128–29. 50 Herbert, ‘Reading Recension 1 of the Táin’, 213–17. 51 ATig 1067.

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commemorate Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn’s royal circuit of Ireland in 1157 and to compare it with the triumphant activities of his illustrious predecessors. It is a fair assumption that the composer was a partisan of Muirchertach’s, and probably working under the king’s patronage. The poem includes numerous allusions to the Ulster cycle, and although it distinguishes the contemporary Ulaid and their lands, ‘coigead coem Conchobair’ (‘the fair province of Conchobar’) from those under Mac Lochlainn’s direct rule, it also describes Muirchertach as the successor of Cú Chulainn in martial renown and the equal of another great Ulster hero, Fergus mac Róich.52 The expanding applicability of Ulster cycle imagery during the eleventh and twelfth centuries makes it quite conceivable that parallels between the great literary and historical powers in the North were being drawn during the twelfth century, especially in the context of Cenél Eógain lordship over the Ulaid. And this imagery became increasingly suitable when the northern kingdoms were united under Mac Lochlainn in opposition to Connacht.

Once he was secure in the north, Muirchertach began to extend his sphere of activity to the south. In late 1149, he marched into Bréifne on what the Four Masters called a ‘rígthurus’ (‘royal circuit’), to demand the submission of its king, Tigernán Úa Rúairc.53 Although Úa Rúairc was the immediate target of this expedition, the event was more important as a symbolic challenge to the status of Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair, king of Connacht and claimant to the high-kingship of Ireland. Muirchertach’s expedition this year represented the opening strike in an extended period of competition between the two kings for the high-kingship.

Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair had, since the demise of Muirchertach Úa Briain in 1119 and of Domnall Mac Lochlainn in 1121, been the most powerful king in Ireland.54 He had established

52 J. O’Donovan (ed.), ‘The circuit of Ireland by Muirchertach mac Neill, prince of Ailech; a poem written in the year DCCCCXLII by Cormacan eigeas, chief poet of the north of Ireland’, in Tracts Relating to Ireland Printed for the Irish Archaeological Society (Dublin, 1841), vol. 1, 26, 28. D. Ó Corráin, ‘Muirchertach mac Néill and the Circuit of Ireland’, in A. P. Smyth (ed.), Seanchas: Studies in Early and Medieval Irish Archaeology, History and Literature in Honour of Francis J. Byrne (Dublin, 2000), 238–50. 53 AFM 1149. Cf. ATig 1149. 54 For his career see Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, ‘Ua Conchobair, Tairdelbach (O'Conor, Turlough)’, DIB; Ó Corráin, Ireland Before the Normans, 150–62; J. Ryan, Toirdelbach O Conchubair (1088–1156) King of Connacht, King of Ireland co Fresabra, O’Donnell Lecture 10 (Dublin, 1966).

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himself as high-king of Ireland co fresabra (‘with opposition’), through three primary policies: maintaining divisions within Munster, using Bréifne as a buffer between Connacht and the northern kingdoms, and dominating Mide. The early part of his career was largely spent destroying the power of Munster. This involved imposing a division of the province between the Meic Carthaig and Uí Briain,55 taking the submission of Munster kings,56 and continually raiding and campaigning throughout the territory.57 Úa Conchobair used Bréifne as a buffer between Connacht and the northern kingdoms by securing the obedience of its king, Tigernán Úa Rúairc. In 1125 he forced Úa Rúairc to submit to him before making a beneficial alliance that saw them attack Mide in unison.58 Úa Rúairc was not always amenable to Tairdelbach’s plans and sometimes rebelled against him,59 but the general pattern in these circumstances was for Úa Conchobair to try to reestablish a peaceful settlement by taking hostages and making treaties.60 Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Úa Conchobair incessantly harassed Mide. He built bridges on the Shannon to allow his armies to gain easy access to the midlands on their frequent raids.61 He also built castles to defend his borders from counter-attack.62 When the opportunity arose, Úa Conchobair imposed his own political settlement in Mide, as in 1125 when he divided the province between three contenders and in 1140 when he deposed the reigning king.63 In 1143 he installed his son, Conchobar, in the kingship of Mide only for the locals to rebel against him and kill him the following year.64 Undeterred, Tairdelbach affected another settlement and division of the province.65

Mac Lochlainn’s southward expansion brought him into conflict with Úa Conchobair. That the politically aware author of Cath Ruis na

55 AU, ATig, AI, ACL, AFM 1118. 56 1122 (ATig, AI), 1124 (AU, ATig, ACL, AFM) 57 1118 (ATig, ALC, AFM), 1119 (ATig, AFM), 1121 (AU, ATig, AI, ACL, AFM), 1123 (ATig, AFM), 1126 (AU), 1127 (AU, ATig, AI, ACL, AFM), 1131 (AU, ATig, ACL, AFM), 1132 (ATig) 1142 (AFM). 58 ATig, AFM 1125. 59 AFM 1137. 60 AFM 1138, 1144. 61 For bridge-building, see ATig, ALC, AFM 1120. For raiding, see 1120 (ATig, AI, AFM), 1122 (AU, ALC, AFM), 1124, (AFM), 1141 (AFM). 62 AU, ALC, AFM 1129. 63 AU, ALC, AFM 1125; ATig 1140. 64 CS, AFM 1143. 65 AFM 1144.

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Ríg should observe the comparison between events of his own time and the image of conflict between Conchobar mac Nessa and Ailill, king of Connacht, in the Táin, is hardly surprising. That he did observe it and that he intended his text to reflect this struggle is suggested by the fact that the action as it unfolds in Cath Ruis na Ríg follows the pattern of historical developments. For although the real target of Mac Lochlainn’s expansionist policies in the early 1150s was the king of Connacht, the main protagonists generally avoided direct confrontation. Instead, they struggled for influence over the kingdom of Mide.

In 1150, Mac Lochlainn launched the first of several campaigns into Mide, imposed his authority over the province and divided it between Úa Conchobair, Úa Rúairc and Úa Cerbaill. In return for a share of the province and in a sign of subservience, Úa Conchobair gave his rival hostages.66 Two years later Mac Lochlainn campaigned south again:

Sluaighedh la Mag Lachlainn i Mídhe co Raith Cendaigh hi ccomhdhail fer nEreann 7 Toirrdhealbjach Ua Conchobhair do dhol i Mídhe i ccomhdháil Uí Lachlainn 7 Diarmada mec Murchadha rí Laighen. Ro rannsat dna Mídhe ar dhó don chur sin. Tucsat ó Chluain Eraird siar do Mhurchadh Ua Mhaoileachlainn 7 Airther Mídhe dia mhac dó Mhaoileachlainn.

A hosting by Mac Lochlainn into Mide as far as Rath Cennaigh to meet the men of Ireland; and Tairdelbach [Úa Conchobair] proceeded into Mide, to meet Úa Lochlainn and Diarmait Mac Murchada, king of Leinster. They divided Mide into two parts on this occasion; they gave from Clúain Iraird westwards to Murchad Úa Máel Sechlainn, and East Meath to his son, Máel Sechlainn.67

If this account suggests cooperation, it must be read in the context of Úa Conchobair’s long history of unilateral action in Mide. Sharing authority with Mac Lochlainn must have been quite embarrassing for the high-king.

Things got worse for Tairdelbach the following year. As well as his activity in Mide, Úa Conchobair had been struggling constantly with Tairdelbach Úa Briain in Munster. In 1151 things had come to a head and, with the help of Diarmait Mac Murchada, king of Leinster, Úa Conchobair launched a major offensive. This culminated in the

66 AFM 1150. 67 AFM 1152.

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battle of Móin Mór, in which the army of Munster was destroyed and Úa Conchobair’s supremacy over the province confirmed.68 Early in 1153, Úa Conchobar reinforced this settlement by driving Tairdelbach Úa Briain into exile and installing Tadc Úa Briain as his successor. Mac Lochlainn, sensing an opportunity to undermine Úa Conchobair’s position, offered refuge to the exiled Úa Briain king. Later that year, Mac Lochlainn launched a major campaign southwards. This expedition had two purposes, to reinstate Tairdelbach in the kingship of Munster and to settle the succession in Mide to Muirchertach’s liking. Murchad Úa Máel Sechlainn had recently died after a long and much-interrupted reign as king of Mide.69 Muirchertach wanted to impose his candidate as Murchad’s successor before Úa Conchobair had a chance to do the same. Úa Conchobair responded by launching his own expedition and by calling on his allies Diarmait Mac Murchada and Tadc Úa Briain to do likewise. Úa Conchobair soon retreated but Tadc Úa Briain’s army, Mac Murchada’s cavalry and the battalions commanded by Úa Conchobair’s son, Rúaidrí, were each defeated in turn by Mac Lochlainn:

Tainic Ua Lachlainn iarsin cona shlóccaib co Loch Aindind 7 táinic Ua Maoileachlainn ina thigh co bfárccaibh gialla aige 7 do radsomh an Midhe uile dhó ó Sionainn co fairrge, 7 Uí bhFaolain 7 Ui bhFailge. Do rad Uí Briúin 7 Conmaicne do Thighernán Ua Ruairc 7 rug a mbraighde dibhlinibh lais 7 ria siu ro soí diathig ina fritheing 7 ro coinnmhed lá hUa Lochlainn Muimhnigh for feraibh Midhe, for Breifne, for Airghiallaibh for Ultaibh, for Conallchaibh, 7 for Eoganachaibh, uair ro ghabh galar Toirrdhealbhach Ua Briain don turus sin co na eadh sin ros toirmisc gan techt dó isin Mumhain […] Toirrdhealbhach dna, cona mhuintir do dhol isin Mumhain 7 leith ríghe Mumhan do ghabháil do trai neart Muirchertaigh Mheg Lachlainn.

After this Úa Lochlainn proceeded with his forces to Loch Aininn, and [Máel Sechlainn mac Murchada] Úa Máel Sechlainn came into his house, and left him hostages; and he [Úa Lochlainn] gave him all Mide, from the Shannon to the sea, and also Uí Fáeláin and Uí Fáilge. He gave Uí Briuin and Conmaicne to Tigernán Úa

68 AFM, ATig 1151; Kelleher, ‘The battle of Móin Mhór’. 69 For Murchad’s career, see Ailbhe Mac Shamhráin, ‘Ua Máelshechlainn, Murchad’, DIB.

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Rúairc, and carried the hostages of both with him; and before Úa Lochlainn returned back to his house, he billeted the Munstermen upon the men of Mide, Bréifne, the Airgialla, the Ulaid and Cenél Conaill, and Tír Eógain, for Tairdelbach Úa Briain was seized with a disease on that expedition, which prevented him from returning into Munster […] Tairdelbach proceeded into Munster, and he assumed half the kingdom of Munster, through the power of Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn.70

It is eminently plausible that the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg had in mind the pattern of conflict between Mac Lochlainn and Úa Conchobair when he depicted Conchobar mac Nessa, whose primary foes were the king and queen of Connacht, leading his army into battle against the king of Tara. Moreover, there are significant parallels between the description of the battle that was the climax of Cath Ruis na Ríg and the above account of events in 1152. Conchobar’s army, like Mac Lochlainn’s, defeated the Leinster contingent that had come to face it in Mide. Mac Lochlainn had also secured for himself a powerful ally in Tairdelbach Úa Briain. Perhaps the conciliatory attitude displayed toward Conchobar by Eochu mac Luchta, king of Munster, in Cath Ruis na Ríg was intended to reflect this. When he heard of Conchobar’s planned campaign, it was Eochu who suggested that the other provinces should compensate him by making full reparation for everything that was taken or damaged in the Táin.71 Most important and unequivocal, though, is the comparison between Mac Lochlainn’s actions toward the kingship of Mide and Conchobar mac Nessa’s regarding the kingship of Tara. In both cases the son of the recently deceased king made an act of submission to his northern overlord and was granted his father’s kingship in return. ‘Táinic Ua Maoileachlainn ina thigh’, ([Máel Sechlainn mac Murchada] Úa Máel Sechlainn came into [Mac Lochlainn’s] house’), and in return he was allowed to succeed his father as king of Mide, or, as the annals sometimes called him, the king of Tara.72 Likewise, a week after the battle at Rosnaree, Erc mac Cairpri came to Conchobar at Tara and, in a clear act of submission, placed his head on Conchobar’s breast. Erc requested his father’s territory from Conchobar, who granted it to him on condition that Erc was obedient to him: ‘“Maith a meic”, ar Conhobor, “beir mo bennachtainse 7 bí dom réir”.’ (‘“Good, oh son”,

70 AFM 1152. 71 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22879–86. 72 AU 1118, 1123, 1124.

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said Conchobar, “take my blessing and be obedient to me”.’)73 A poem following this description of Erc’s submission to Conchobar makes it clear that it was the kingship, and not just his father’s land, that was granted:

Do gessaib ríg Temrach tair a flaith Cermna can ni clé. airdairc scél scaílter fa chách cocad ruind co brath ce bé.

(It is) the prohibition of the king of Tara in the east / since the reign of Cermna without ill-luck /— famous the tale which is spread through all — / to fight against us until judgment day, howsoever it be.74

Having suffered defeat and humiliation at Mac Lochlainn’s hands in previous years, in 1154 Úa Conchobair launched a naval attack around the northwest coast against the heartland of his adversary’s kingdom. The event is recorded briefly in the Annals of Tigernach,75 but in much greater detail by the Four Masters:

Cobhlach la Toirdhealbhach Ua cConcobhair for muir timchell Ereann fo thuaith .i. loinges Duin Gaillmhe, Chonmaicne mara, fhear nUmhaill, Ua nAmhalgadha, 7 Ua Fiachrach, 7 an Cosnamhaigh Uí Dubhda hi ccinnas forra, 7 ro airccset Tír Chonaill, 7 Inis Eógain. Do chuas ó

Chenél Eóghain, 7 ó Mhuircertach mac Néill dar muir co ruaiclidis .i. go cendcadis longas Gall-Ghaoidhel, Arann, Cinntíre, Manann 7 centair Alban archena, 7 mac Scelling i ccennas forra, 7 iar na ttorracht hi ccomhfhogus Innsi hEóghain ima ccomhráinicc dóibh 7 don loinges oile feachair cath longda do hamnus aighthighe eatorra; ocus bháttar occan iomtuarccain ó prim co nóin, 7 marbhthar sochaidhe mhor do Chonnachtaib imon cCosnamhaigh Ua nDubhda lasna h-allmhurachaibh. Ro mheabhaidh, foran sluagh n-allmhurach 7 ro ládh a n-ár, 7 fhagbhait a longa, 7 ro benadh a fhiacla a mac Scelling.

A fleet was brought by Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair on the sea around Ireland northwards, that is, the fleets of Dún Gaillmhe, of Conmaicne Mara, of the men of Umall, of Uí Amalgada and of Uí

73 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23239; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 55. 74 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23249–53; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 57. 75 ATig, 1154.

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Fiachrach and An Cosnamaigh Úa Dubda in control over them; and they plundered Tír Conaill and Inis Eógain. The Cenél Eógain and Muirchertach mac Néill sent messengers over the sea to hire, that is, they did hire, the fleets of the Gall-Gáedhil, of Arran, of Kintyre, of Man and of the borders of Alba in general, over which MacScelling was in command. And when they arrived near Inis Eógain they fell in with the other fleet and, and a naval battle was fiercely and spiritedly fought between them; and they continued the conflict from the beginning of the day till evening, and a great number of the Connachtmen, together with Cosnamaigh Úa Dubda, were slain by the foreigners. The foreign host was, however, defeated and slaughtered; they left their ships behind, and the teeth of MacScelling were knocked out.76

In his time of need, Mac Lochlainn, was able to send messengers overseas to gather his foreign allies. There was certainly no suggestion that Muirchertach drew upon soldiers from as wide a range of territories as are ascribed to Conchobar’s supporters in Cath Ruis na Ríg. If the Four Masters’ account is to be believed, though, it does appear that he found support throughout the Irish Sea World. In 1154, Man, Arran and Kintyre were probably all part of the kingdom of Man and the Isles, ruled from Man by a dynasty descended from Godred Crovan, alias Gofraid Méranach (d. 1095), that also maintained a claim to the kingship of Dublin.77 The origins of the Gall-Gáedhil, ‘Foreign-Gaels’, are obscure but by the beginning of the thirteenth century the term was primarily associated with the territory to which they have given their name, Galloway.78 In 1154, Fergus, lord, and sometimes king of Galloway ruled over the Gall-Gáedhil.79 MacScelling, the leader of the fleet hired by Mac Lochlainn, cannot be identified with certainty, but his presence might be indicative of the participation of men from Argyll amongst Mac Lochlainn’s allies. In the 1150s

76 AFM, 1154. 77 Duffy, ‘Irishmen and Islesmen’ 93–133. 78 T. O. Clancy, ‘The Gall-Ghàidheil and Galloway’, Journal of Scottish Name Studies 2 (2008), 19–50. The phrasing of this entry in the Annals of the Four Masters is ambiguous as regards the extent of the territories of the Gall-Gáedhil. It could be translated as implying that Mac Lochlainn hired ‘the fleets of the Gall-Gáedhil of Aran, Kintyre, Man and the borders of Alba’, thus suggesting that the territory of the Gall-Gáedhil was more extensive than just Galloway. 79 R. D. Oram, The Lordship of Galloway (Edinburgh, 2000), 51–86; idem, ‘Fergus, Galloway and the Scots’, in R. D. Oram and G. P. Stell (eds), Galloway: Land and Lordship (Edinburgh, 1991), 117–30.

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Somerled, ancestor of many of the later galloglass kindreds, ruled Argyll. According to the seventeenth-century Book of Clanranald, which records the history of some of his descendants, Somerled had a son called Mac Sgilling who may be identified as the leader of the fleet in 1154.80 It would appear, then, that Mac Lochlainn drew upon support from across a number of regions and polities in the northern Irish Sea World.

Previous commentators have doubted the existence of such a broad alliance. They have tended to presume that Muirchertach’s allies were drawn from one or other side of a conflict that was brewing between the king of Man and Somerled of Argyll.81 This conflict need not represent a barrier to the participation of men from both regions in Mac Lochlainn’s fleet. First of all, there is no need to assume that Mac Lochlainn’s emissaries dealt with the political leaders of the areas identified rather than with freelance mercenaries.82 The likelihood is, however, that high politics were relevant to the composition of the fleet and there is evidence to suggest that the early 1150s were years of peace and cooperation between the three major powers of the Irish Sea World. At the centre of this world, both geographically and metaphorically, lay the Isle of Man. The king of Man from c.1112 until 1153 was Olaf son of Godred Crovan. According to the Chronicon regum Manniae et Insularum:

Erat autem vir pacificus, habuitque omnes reges Yberniae et Scotiae ita sibi confoederatos, ut nullus auderet

80 A. Cameron (ed.), ‘The Book of Clanranald’, Reliquiae Celticae (Inverness, 1892–94), vol. 2, 154–56: ‘Do bhí clann mhaith ag Somhairle .i. Dubhgall 7 Raghnall 7 an Gall mac Sgillin’. This character may, like many of the gallóglaigh of later centuries, have taken up residence in Ireland; he is found among the ‘northerners’ and ‘kings of the northern half of Ireland’ brought by Rúaidrí Úa Conchobair to face the Anglo-Norman invaders in the Norman French verse chronicle of the conquest of Ireland (The Deeds of the Normans, ed. Mullally, l. 3252). W. D. H. Sellar, ‘Family origins in Cowal and Knapdale’, Scottish Studies 15 (1971), 29, 36; Duffy, ‘Irishmen and Islemen’, 125; idem, ‘Prehistory of the galloglass’, 7–8. 81 R. A. McDonald, The Kingdom of the Isles (East Linton, 1997), 55–56; Oram, The Lordship of Galloway, 74–77. 82 There is a chance, for instance, that the episode occurred after the death of Olaf, king of Man, in 1153, but before the accession of his son, Godred. I. Beuermann, Masters of the Narrow Sea: Forgotten Challenges to Norwegian Rule in Man and the Isles 1079–1266, Acta Humaniora, series of dissertations submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo, No. 286 (Oslo, 2006), 69–73, contains an in-depth discussion of this issue. I am very grateful to Dr Beuermann for providing me with a copy of his published doctoral thesis.

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perturbare regnum insularum omnibus diebus eius. Accepit autem uxorem Affricam nomine filiam Fergus de Galwedia, de qua genuit Godredum. Habuit et concubinas plures de quibus filios tres scilicet: Reignaldum, Lagmannum et Haraldum et filias multas generavit. Quarum una nupsit Sumerledo regulo Herergaidel.

He was a peace-loving man who entered into such a close confederacy with the kings of Ireland and Scotland that no man dared disturb the peace in the kingdom of the Isles in his lifetime. He married the daughter of Fergus of Galloway called Affrica, who bore him a son called Godred. He had many concubines as well, by whom he had three sons, namely, Reginald, Lagman and Harald, and many daughters, of whom one was married to Somerled of Argyll.83

This final marriage, as the chronicle put it, ‘fuit causa ruinae totius regni insularum’ (‘proved to be the ruin of the entire Kingdom of the Isles’).84 In 1156, Somerled attempted to install his son by this marriage as the king of Man resulting in the fragmentation of the kingdom of the Isles.85 According to the Manx Chronicle’s admittedly often-confused chronology, this conflict between Somerled and Godred son of Olaf did not occur until 1156, two years after warriors from both regions fought alongside each other in the service of Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn.

There seems to be no reason to doubt the Manx Chronicle’s depiction of Olaf Godredsson’s ability to hold the various rulers of the Irish Sea World in alliance. The marriages it records suggest the existence of a network linking Argyll, Galloway and Man that was only dismantled by Somerled’s actions in 1156. Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn was well situated to take advantage of these networks of alliance during the early 1150s. In 1176 Cardinal Vivian, the Papal Legate, visited Man. According to the Manx Chronicle, while there he officiated at a marriage ceremony involving Godred, king of Man and the granddaughter of Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn. The Chronicon claims that the couple’s son, Olaf, was already three years old at the time so the marriage had clearly been in existence for some time prior to 1176. It is impossible to tell how long before then, but it is not unfeasible that it reflected an alliance that had been in place since the

83 Chronica Regum Mannie et Insularum, ed. and trans. G. Broderick (2nd ed., Douglas, 1995, repr. 1999, 1st ed. 1979), f. 35v. 84 ibid. 85 ibid., f. 37v.

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1150s. The description of the bride as ‘filia MacLoclen filii Murkartac regis Yberniae’ (‘daughter of Mac Lochlainn, son of Muirchertach king of Ireland’) suggests that her status was envisaged as a link with her illustrious grandfather rather than her father.86 Muirchertach’s name was still considered important on Man over a decade after his death.

There may have been another marriage alliance between Mac Lochlainn and the royal dynasty of Man. One of the earliest extant examples of dán díreach bardic poetry is a poem in praise of Raghnall son of Gofraid, king of Man (d. 1229).87 According to that poem, Raghnall’s mother’s name was Sadhbh.88 She was presumably not, therefore, the wife of Gofraid mentioned in the Manx Chronicle in 1176, whose name is given as Finnguala (‘Phingola’). Yet Raghnall is also called ‘ua Lachluinn na laigheng’ (‘descendant of Lochlann of the ships’), and said to be descended from Conn and Cormac, important figures from the genealogy of the Uí Néill.89 It is possible, then, that there had been another, earlier marriage alliance between Muirchertach and his Manx allies.

Mac Lochlainn’s contact with Somerled of Argyll was not restricted to events in 1154 either.90 In the aftermath of the defeat of his hired fleet that year, Mac Lochlainn travelled to Dublin where he accepted the submission of the inhabitants and granted them a

86 Chron. Man. f. 40r. It is worth noting the route taken by Vivian on this journey. According to Roger of Hoveden (Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, ed. W. Stubbs, Rolls Series (2 vols, London, 1867), vol. 1, 136–38), Vivian departed from Whithorn in Galloway and stopped off in Man on his way to Ulster, where he arrived in the middle of John de Courcy’s conquest. One wonders what his point of entry to Ulster was; the Murlough on Dundrum Bay, county Down would have been quite convenient. This was possibly the Carraic Murbuilg where some of Conchobar’s foreign allies are said to have landed in Cath Ruis na Ríg. See below. 87 B. Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall, king of Man’, Éigse 8 (1957), 283–301. For another translation, see Thomas Owen Clancy (ed.), The Triumph Tree: Scotland’s Earliest Poetry, 550–1350 (Edinburgh, 1998), 236–41. 88 Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall’, 289; Clancy, Triumph Tree, 236–41. 89 Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall’, 284–85, 293, 296; Clancy, Triumph Tree, 236–41. 90 Seán Duffy (‘Ireland and Scotland, 1014–1169: contacts and caveats’, in A. P. Smyth (ed.), Seanchas: Studies in Early and Medieval Irish Archaeology, History and Literature in Honour of Francis J. Byrne (Dublin, 2000), 354–56) has argued that Cenél Eógain may have had connections in these regions earlier in the twelfth centuries. As early as the last decade of the eleventh century, he suggests there was a settlement of Hebridean exiles in Inishowen that may have paved the way for later contact.

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tuarastal, or wages, of 1200 cows.91 This was a sign of Mac Lochlainn’s overlordship and he was probably still the ultimate ruler of the city in 1164, when Dublin warriors fought with Somerled at the Battle of Renfrew, in which the lord of Argyll was killed rebelling against the king of Scotland.92 Earlier in the same year, officials had come from Iona to Derry to invite Flaithbertach Úa Brolcháin, abbot of Derry and ‘comarba’ (‘heir’) of Colum Cille, to assume the abbacy of Iona ‘a comairli Somarlidh 7 fer Airir Gaidhel 7 Innsi Gall’ (‘in accordance with the wishes of Somerled and the men of Argyl and of the Insi Gall’).93 Úa Brolcháin was prevented from doing so by the combined authority of Mac Lochlainn, the archbishop of Armagh and the nobles of Cenél Eógain. Some scholars have perceived in Mac Lochlainn’s actions signs of animosity towards Somerled.94 Others, however, have interpreted these events largely in light of ecclesiastical developments and suggest that Mac Lochlainn was motivated by his reluctance to see the prestigious office of comarba Coluim Cille pass out of his territory when Derry was at the height of its power.95 There is no reason to see enmity between Somerled and Mac Lochlainn in the events of 1164. In fact, it seems quite plausible that Somerled’s ability to communicate with Úa Brolcháin reflects an existing relationship with territory under Mac Lochlainn’s control.

Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn’s international connections allowed him to call upon allies from the territories of the Gaill in times of need, as he did in 1154. So too Conchobar mac Nessa, whose links with his foreign friends in ‘the Gall-lands of the Gaill’ reflected Mac Lochlainn’s position at that date, even down to the detail of having a marriage alliance with an overseas king. Moreover, Conchobar’s overseas reinforcements arrived at landing sites closely associated with Muirchertach’s allies. In Cath Ruis na Ríg, once word reached them that the requested assistance was forthcoming from Conchobar’s foreign friends, the Ulaid set about preparing for their arrival:

‘Dogensa fled’, ar Cú Chulaind, ‘i n-accill 7 i n-airchill Conchobuir ac Dún drechsholus Delgga.’ ‘Dogensa fled mórchaín móradbul aile’, bar Celtchair mac Uthechair, ‘i

91 AFM 1154. 92 AU, ATig 1164; Duffy, ‘Irishmen and Islesmen’, 126–29. 93 AU 1164; M. Herbert, Iona, Kells and Derry: The History and Hagiography of the Monastic Familia of Columba (Oxford, 1988), 120. 94 Oram, Lordhsip of Galloway, 74–77. 95 Herbert, Iona, Kells and Derry, 120–21; J. Bannerman, ‘Comarba Coluim Chille and the relics of Columba’, The Innes Review 44.1 (1993), 38–42.

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n-accill 7 i n-airichill Conaill Chernaig meic Amairgin ac Carraic Murbuilg.’ ‘Dogensa no fled morchain móradbul,’ for Loegaire, ‘ac Inbuir Sheimne thuaid.’

‘I will make a banquet,’ said Cú Chulainn, ‘in wait and in preparation for Conchobar at bright-faced Dun Delgga.’ ‘I will make another splendid vast banquet,’ said Celtchair mac Uthechair, ‘in wait and in preparation for Conall Chernach mac Amairgin at Carraic Murbuilg.’ ‘I too will make a splendid vast banquet,’ said Loegaire, ‘at Inber Seimne in the north’.96

Two of these sites can be positively identified. Dún Delgga is modern Dundalk in county Louth and Inber Seimne is modern Larne, county Antrim. Carraic Murbuilg is less easily pinned down. Hogan identified it with Murlough Bay on the north Antrim coast, citing the Four Masters’ reference to Dunseverick being in ‘Murbolg Dalriada’.97 There is some doubt over this, however, because there is also a Murlough on Dundrum Bay in county Down. The description of Inber Seimne as being in the north may suggest that the other two landing-sites were further south, in which case Murlough Bay, county Down, would be the preferred choice. On the other hand, Conall was depicted as coming from Lewis, so a site further north might be expected. Conall’s association with Dunseverick in other texts might corroborate the identification with an area nearby.98

Cú Chulainn, Lóegaire and Celtchair displayed considerable powers of foresight and prophecy in choosing the sites to prepare their feasts. Coming around the Mull of Kintyre, Conchobar’s allies fell victim to bad weather and their fleet was divided into three separate sections. One third of the force, under the command of Conall Cernach, landed at Carraic Murbuilg. Another third, under the sons of Romra, landed at Larne. The final section landed at ‘Tráig mBaile meic Búain’ (‘the Strand of Baile mac Búain’), at ‘Inber Linni Luachainne’

96 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22776–81; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 15. 97 E. Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn, p. 15. Cf. idem (ed.), Onomasticon Goedelicum Locorum et Tribuum Hiberniae et Scotiae (Dublin, 1910), s.v.. Carraic Murbuilg is not, unfortunately, listed in fascicle 3 (C-Ceall Fhursa) of the Historical Dictionary of Gaelic Placenames / Foclóir Stairiúil Áitainmneacha na Gaeilge, Irish Texts Society (London, 2008). 98 Tochmarc Treblainne (ed. J. Pokorny, ZCP 13 (1921), 173) and Oided mac nUisnig (ed. W. Stokes, in W. Stokes and E. Windisch (eds) Irische Texte mit Übersetzungen und Wörterbuch, 2 ii (Leipzig, 1887), 141) both make this connection. See Dobbs, ‘The traditions of Conall Cernach’, 118.

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(‘the mouth of the Water of Lúachann’), that is, the strand at Dundalk.99

Another late twelfth-century text, the bardic poem addressed to Ragnall, king of Man, associates Tráig Baile with the Manx kings. The poem depicts Ragnall in a manner befitting ‘the greatest warrior in the western lands’, as the Orkneyinga Saga calls him.100 The Irish poet described him as a king who ‘roindfi ár do Manaind maidréidh’ (‘will deal death from smooth-plained Man’), and associated him with raids and conquests in Ireland and the Hebrides.101 The poem closes with an address to Raghnall in which the poet lauded his patron’s wealth and prowess: ‘táin cu tráchtaib do thighi biri ó Thráigh mbárcghlain mBaile’ (‘to your hall’s shores you take spoils from bright-barqued Tráig Baile’).102

In the latter part of his career Raghnall turned his attention increasingly toward the Anglo-Norman world. Combined with the poet’s depiction of him as a young ambitious warrior prince, this suggested to its editor that the Irish poem might have been composed in the earlier part of Raghnall’s career.103 Nonetheless, there is further evidence of an association between Man and an area close to Tráig Baile dating from later in Raghnall’s life. On 16 May 1212, King John of England made a grant ‘to Reginald, king of Man, of one knight’s fee in Ireland, on the sea, near Carlingford’.104 Carlingford is on the other side of the Cooley peninsula from Tráig Baile, but the grant does suggest a continuing connection between the Manx kings and that area of what is now county Louth. This grant may well have corresponded to an area previously held by Raghnall or his ancestors used for correspondence with Ireland. The choice of Tráig Baile as a landing site for Conchobar’s foreign allies in Cath Ruis na Ríg was probably intended to invoke the image of Manx involvement in Ireland. It is therefore worth noting that the leader of the forces that landed at

99 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22782–95; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 16–17. 100 Orkneyinga Saga: The Literary History of the Earls of Orkney, trans. H. Pálsson and P. Edwards London 1978), 221. 101 Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall’, 291; Clancy, Triumph Tree, 238. 102 Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall’, 297; Clancy, Triumph Tree, 241. 103 Ó Cuív, ‘A poem in praise of Raghnall’, 283. R. A. McDonald (Manx Kingship in its Irish Sea Setting 1187–1229: King Rognvaldr and the Crovan Dynasty (Dublin, 2007), 115–20) bases his analysis of the poem on this dating. 104 H. S. Sweetman (ed.), Calendar of Documents Relating to Ireland Preserved in Her Majesty’s Public Record Office, London, 1171–1307 (London, 1875–86), vol. 1, no. 428.

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Tráig Baile in Cath Ruis na Ríg was Amlaíb (Olaf) ‘rí Lochlainne’.105 Although his name is a stereotypical Norse one, it was also that of the king of Man who died in 1153 after a forty-year reign, Olaf Godredsson, or Amlaíb mac Gofraid as he was known to the Irish.106

The association between Tráig Baile and Man is mirrored by that between Larne and Galloway, although the evidence of the latter connection is less clear. In 1177, John de Courcy conquered the kingdom of the Ulaid. Twenty years later, John’s Irish enemies killed his brother in battle. In response, John called upon the assistance of Duncan fitz Gilbert, otherwise Donnchad mac Gille Bhríde, lord and later earl of Carrick.107 Duncan’s lordship had been carved out of the lordship of Galloway in the aftermath of warfare between the descendants of Fergus of Galloway in order to placate one branch of the family.108 He was nonetheless a Gall-Gáedel. Roger of Howden, our source for Duncan’s involvement in Ulster, recorded the expedition as having occurred in 1197. Given the incessant struggle between de Courcy and his neighbours, it is almost impossible to identify a specific expedition in the record of the Irish annals.109 One possibility is that Duncan’s involvement underlies an event recorded in the Annals of Loch Cé and the Annals of the Four Masters in 1198 and in the Annals of Ulster in 1199. The record shows that de Courcy was engaged in a campaign against Áed Úa Néill, king of Cenél Eógain. Rather than face his attacker in open battle, Áed outflanked de Courcy’s army and attacked Larne. There he inflicted a defeat on the

105 Cath Ruis na Ríg ll. 22791–95. 106 McDonald, Manx Kingship, 65–67, discusses his career. Ó Corráin (‘Vikings in Scotland and Ireland’, 316) suggested that this character was ‘a literary reflex of Amlaíb Cuarán’, the tenth-century king of Dublin. 107 Roger of Hoveden, Chronica, ed. W. Stubbs, Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene, Rolls Series 51 (London, 1868–71), vol. 4, 25: ‘Eodem anno Jordanus de Curci, frater Johannis de Curci princeps regni de Ulvestir in Hibernia, a quodam Hibernense familiari suo interfectus est. In cujus vindictam praedictus Johannes frater ejus commisit praelium eum Hibernensibus regulis; ex quibus partem fugavit, partem stravit, et terras eorum sibi jugavit; quarum partem magnam dedit Dunecano filio Gilberti filii Fergus, qui eo tempore, quo praedictus Johannes praeliaturus erat cum Hibernensibus venit ad eam in Hibernia cum gente non modica auxiliaturus.’ 108 Oram, The Lordship of Galloway, 87–112. 109 AU 1197 (ALC 1196) records the defeat of John’s forces at the hands of the Cenél Eógain and a great campaign in retaliation by John that included attacks on Derry and the harrying of Inishowen. Further defeats at the hands of Gaelic Irish armies are recorded in AU 1199, 1200 and 1201.

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Gaill who ‘dechadur ina longaibh’ (‘retreated in their ships’).110 In the aftermath of the English invasion of Ireland, the term Gaill quickly came to be applied to the Anglo-Norman invaders and settlers. Áed’s victims might, then, have been recent settlers from England, but they might also have been Duncan’s Gallovidian followers.111 Downpatrick, rather than Larne, was de Courcy’s capital, so Áed’s decision to attack the port town perhaps reflected knowledge that that was the source through which de Courcy was acquiring his Gallovidian support.

Roger of Howden also claimed that de Courcy granted Duncan lands in Ulster in return for his assistance. Unfortunately, Roger does not identify the land in question but evidence of Duncan’s later possessions in Ulster suggests that it might have included Larne and the surrounding area. In the aftermath of his 1210 campaign to Ireland, King John of England issued a grant of land to Duncan. The territory involved was a large tract roughly coterminous with the modern barony of Upper Glenarm, county Antrim. It included the towns of Glenarm and Larne and several carucates of coastal land in between.112 This territory was surrounded by those King John had given to Duncan’s kinsman, Alan of Galloway, as part of an extensive grant including most of the northeast coast of Ireland.113 The reason John reserved these particular lands for Duncan from amongst all those belonging to Alan might have been that the lord of Carrick had a prior claim to them since the time of John de Courcy.

Although the evidence for a link between Larne and Galloway can only be traced back with certainty to 1210, and tentatively to the 1190s, it is possible that the Ulster town acted as the primary port for

110 AU 1199. Cf. AFM and ALC 1198. 111 AU 1200 records the death of Duncan’s cousin Roland (alias Lachlann) son of Uhtred, who was described as ‘rí Gall-Gaidhel’ (‘king of the Gall-Gaedil’). Apparently, the Irish author of this annal recognised the distinct identity of Galloway, which had not yet been fully incorporated into the kingdom of Scotland. Roland’s son, Thomas, earl of Athol, attacked Coleraine in 1214. According to the Irish annals, he was accompanied by the Gaill of Ulster. These might likewise have been either English settlers or his own Gallovidian followers as he had received a grant of land in Ulster from King John in 1213. AFM, ALC 1213, AU 1214; CDI 468, 474. 112 CDI 1, 907; Orpen, Ireland under the Normans ii, 267. S. Duffy, ‘The lords of Galloway, earls of Carrick, and the Bissets of the Glens: Scottish settlement in thirteenth-century Ulster’, in D. Edwards (ed.), Regions and Rulers in Ireland, 1100–1650 (Dublin, 2004), 37–50, explores the later history of these lands in the context of links between north-eastern Ireland and Galloway. 113 CDI 1, 427.

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communication between Ireland and Galloway at an earlier date, as it still does today. By naming Larne as one a landing site for Conchobar’s allies, the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg might have intended to evoke the image of the involvement of Gall-Gáedil, for whom that was a primary port in Ireland, in Irish affairs. And like the Manx, the Gall-Gáedil of Galloway were amongst Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn’s allies in 1154.

It is possible that the mention of the presence of Conchobar mac Artuir meic Bruide meic Dungaill, son of the king of Alba, amongst Conchobar’s allies was also inspired by events in 1154. The battle at Renfrew in 1164 was not the first occasion when Somerled of Argyll attempted to overthrow the Scottish kings. Soon after the death of David I in 1153 Somerled had rebelled in support of his nephews, the sons of Malcolm Mac Heth.114 The Mac Heths are an enigmatic family, not very well known in the sources, but they were almost certainly claimants to the kingship of Scotland and the campaign of 1153 was probably intended to place one of them on the throne.115 After that campaign failed, it is certainly not impossible that one of these claimants to the kingship of Alba became involved in Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn’s fleet through their association with Somerled.116 Irish sources are much more sympathetic to the rivals of the Canmore dynasty — the Cenél Loairn claimants to the kingship in the eleventh century, for example — than those records emanating from the heartland of the Scottish kingdom or farther south.117 It is possible, therefore, that an Irish author might have been willing to accord the title ‘son of the king of Alba’ to persons otherwise not accorded royal status. It is conceivable that the participation of a Mac Heth in Mac Lochlainn’s 1154 alliance underlies the reference to a king of Alba in

114 Anderson ed. and trans, Early Sources for Scottish History, vol. 2, 223–34. 115 R. A. McDonald, ‘Rebels without a cause? The relations of Fergus of Galloway and Somerled of Argyll with the Scottish kings, 1153–1164’, in E. J. Cowan and R. A. McDonald (eds), Alba: Scotland in the Medieval Era (East Linton, 2000), 167; idem, Outlaws of Medieval Scotland: Challenges to the Canmore Kings, 1057–1266 (East Linton, 2003), 28, 75–81, 85–88. In 1975, A. A. M. Duncan wrote that the identity of Malcolm MacHeth was ‘one of the important unsolved problems of early Scottish history’ (Scotland: The Making of the Kingdom (Edinburgh, 1975), 166). 116 Having been marginalised for quite some time, the history of the MacHeth’s and other groups antagonistic to the Canmore kings of Scotland have become the focus of much recent discussion. R. A. McDonald, Outlaws of Medieval Scotland; A. Ross, ‘Moray, Ulster and the MacWilliams’, in Duffy (ed.), World of the Galloglass, 24–44, surveys much of the literature. 117 Seán Duffy has discussed this evidence: ‘Ireland and Scotland’, 349–50.

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Cath Ruis na Ríg. There is an interesting coincidence between the name of the ‘king of Alba’ in the text and an otherwise unknown figure called Arthur who was killed in single combat in Scotland in February 1154. It is not clear whether this figure was connected with the MacHeth-Somerled rebellion of the previous year, but the timing of the incident and the Holyrood chronicler’s claim that the reason for the man’s death was that ‘he intended to betray King Malcolm’, suggests such an association.118

It appears, then, that Conchobar’s importation of foreign allies into Ireland might have been modelled on Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn’s actions in 1154, just as his campaigning in the midlands reflected Mac Lochlainn’s activities in the preceding years. The foregoing discussion has, hopefully, illustrated some of the intrigue that awaits those who delve into Cath Ruis na Ríg by highlighting the importance of the historical context within which it was written for understanding aspects of it. The author of Cath Ruis na Ríg was evidently very politically aware and drew upon his knowledge of political events in the early 1150s to shape his narrative. It might even have been the case that his recognition of the similarities between the political situation during these years and that which provided the background for the Táin inspired him to compose a new Ulster tale when many parts of the Ulster cycle were already of great antiquity.

In conclusion, I would like to make a tentative suggestion that the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg used his composition in order to comment on contemporary politics. In discussing Recension 1 of the Táin, Máire Herbert, who has read contemporary political concerns in Middle Irish texts such as Fled Dún na nGéd and Caithréim Cellaig, stated that she does not believe ‘that Irish heroic tales were to be read as allegorised narrative’.119 However, to the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg who, I hope to have shown, based episodes in his narrative on contemporary historical events, his depiction of their literary surrogates offered an opportunity to express his attitude towards players on the contemporary political scene.

The author depicted Ailill and Medb of Connacht in very negative terms, particularly in his account of Medb’s decision to abandon her allies prior to battle. When news of Conchobar’s impending campaign reached his enemies and their offer of compensation for his earlier

118 Anderson ed. and trans., Early Sources for Scottish History, vol. 2, 224. Cf. McDonald, Outlaws of Medieval Scotland, 28–29. 119 Herbert, ‘Reading Recension 1 of the Táin’, 208–09. For Herbert’s discussion of Fled Dún na nGéd and Caithréim Cellaig, see note 17 above.

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losses was refused, the alliance between them broke down. Cairpre Nia Fer demonstrated his loyalty to his allies by declaring that he would go to their aid if Conchobar should march against them:

Mad cucainni dobera Conchobor 7 Ulaid a n-agid ticed Ailill 7 Medb nar furtactni 7 nar forithin. Mad sechoind digset i coiced cendfind Connacht ragmaitni na furtachtsom 7 na forithin.

If it is towards us that Conchobar and the Ulaid will turn face, let Ailill and Medb come to our aid and to our help. If it is past us that they will go into the fair-headed province of Connacht, we will go to their aid and to their help.120

His expectation that this loyalty would be reciprocated was misplaced, though, as Medb decided to abandon Cairpre to face the Ulaid without her support. ‘Biatsa sund i mbalib’ (‘I will be here in my homesteads’) she said when given the news that Conchobar was marching against Cairpre.121 This anti-Connacht bias might be read as reflecting the author’s attitude toward Tairdelbach Úa Conchobair. It may have been intended to echo Tairdelbach’s actions in 1153 when he initially marched into Mide to confront Mac Lochlainn, but soon retreated across the Shannon to safety, leaving Mac Lochlainn free to assert his power. Tairdelbach might have garnered a reputation for such duplicity because of actions earlier in his career. In 1114 the young king of Connacht took the opportunity provided by Muirchertach Úa Briain’s ill-health to attack Munster in alliance with Úa Briain’s great rival Domnall Mac Lochlainn, king of Cenél Eógain. After the attack, however, Tairdelbach abandoned his new ally and made peace with Úa Briain.122 In 1118 he repeated the trick, but this time at the expense of Uí Briain. While on a hosting with Muirchertach into Desmond he turned against his ally and made ‘síth ri macc Meicc Carthaig’ (‘peace with the son of Mac Carthaig’).123

If his characterisation of Medb can be understood as reflecting the author’s prejudice against Úa Conchobair, the question arises whether the composition might have been intended as propaganda on behalf of Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn. Mac Lochlainn was certainly not averse to producing historicising texts for his own benefit. As Donnchadh Ó Corráin has illustrated, Muirchertach, or rather scholars

120 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 22934–39; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 29. 121 Cath Ruis na Ríg, l. 22960; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 81. 122 ATig 1114. 123 AI 1118.

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working for his cause, utilised history and historical figures to magnify the Cenél Eógain king in ‘The Circuit of Ireland by Muirchertach mac Néill’.124 Cath Ruis na Ríg’s attitude towards Mac Lochlainn must be bound up with its depiction of Conchobar mac Nessa, and Conchobar’s stated desire to bring all of Ireland under his authority certainly correlates well with what we know about Mac Lochlainn’s ambitions during the early 1150s. As is often the case in Ulster tales, however, the depiction of Conchobar’s character was not particularly positive. In the face of battle Conchobar is said to have taken three steps in retreat before entreating the heroes of the Ulaid to hold the field.125 Retreating in the face of the enemy was a very un-kingly action. Indeed, the eighth-century legal text Críth Gablach, ‘Branched Purchase’, would have us believe that cowardice in battle reduced a king’s honour-price.126 This image is hardly compatible with the text being a Mac Lochlainn product.

In fact, the hero of the story has been identified as Conall Cernach. Not only is he depicted as raiding across great swathes of Europe, but in the aftermath of the battle of Rosnaree Conchobar states that ‘menbad Chonall is forainne bad róen’ (‘if it had not been for Conall, it is we [the Ulaid] that would have been defeated’).127 Conall’s prominence in the text, it has been argued, is evidence of its Loígsi bias, for the Loígsi claimed descent from him. Such bias might have come about because the author of the text was a member of the Loigsí, as Mac Gearailt has argued, or, as Dagmar Schlüter has argued, because the Book of Leinster was a document of cultural memory that originated in a monastery of within Loígsi territory in which the scribes enhanced Conall’s role beyond what it had been in their exemplar.128

The character who comes across most positively in the story apart from Conall is Conchobar’s opponent in battle, Cairpre Nia Fer, king of Tara. Despite ultimately being defeated and losing his life, Cairpre is depicted in glowing terms throughout the text. Twice implicit contrasts are drawn between him and the rulers of the other provinces, and on both occasions he comes out on top. Whereas Medb abandoned Cairpre to face the Ulaid without her support, Cairpre displayed laudable loyalty towards his Connacht allies when he heard news of Conchobar’s impending expedition. After being thus abandoned,

124 Ó Corráin, ‘Muirchertach mac Néill and the Circuit of Ireland’, 238–50. 125 Cath Ruis na Ríg, l. 23112. 126 Críth Gablach, ed. D. A. Binchy (Dublin, 1941), ll. 538–41. 127 Cath Ruis na Ríg: ll. 23257–58; Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 57. 128 See notes 23 and 24 above.

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Cairpre fought bravely at the head of his army, in stark contrast to Conchobar. Unable to endure the sound of Conall Cernach cutting down his men, Cairpre confronted the Ulster hero himself.129 Having been removed from the fray by his men, Cairpre again heard the sound of Conall cutting down his army so ‘tanic reime co lármedón in chatha co torchatar ocht cét laech lánchalma leis’ (‘he advanced to the middle of the battle and eight hundred full-brave heroes fell by him, before he encountered Conchobar’).130 Such was the ferocity of Cairpre’s attack that Conchobar’s shield cried out, calling reinforcements to his aid.131 Cairpre was again dragged away by his own men, but was pursued by Cú Chulainn. Uncharacteristically, Cairpre initially got the better of his superhuman opponent, only to be defeated when Cú Chulainn’s charioteer, Láeg, arrived with Cú Chulainn’s magical weapons.132 This constitutes as laudable a death as one could imagine given the circumstances.

Perhaps, then, it is in the camp of the contemporary kings of Tara, the Uí Máel Sechlainn kings of Mide, that we ought to seek the allegiance of the author of Cath Ruis na Ríg. The message of the text to such an audience might have been that loyalty to the untrustworthy kings of Connacht would result in disaster at the hands of the powerful northern king who, apart from his own army, could call upon the assistance of his allies amongst the Gaill. As Conchobar did not, in the end, make use of his foreign forces in the battle of Rosnaree, so Mac Lochlainn did not, at least according to the surviving sources, utilise his foreign allies in his campaigns into Mide. The events of 1154, like the long description of Conchobar amassing his overseas support, were a reminder of the threat that lay near at hand. Alliance with Mac Lochlainn, on the other hand, could have more beneficial results. Contrast, for instance, Medb’s behaviour towards the men of Tara in Cath Ruis na Ríg and Mac Lochlainn’s action in 1155, when on campaign in Mide he returned to the locals cattle taken from them on previous occasions:

Sluaighed lá Muirchertach mac Néill Uí Lochlainn co hath Dúini Calman for Indeóin 7 ro ghabh braighde Teathbha 7 tug ógaisecc cruidh fer Midhe do neoch ro airccset roime. Do rad dna, righe Mídhe ó Shionainn co fairge do

129 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23173–75. 130 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23192–96: Hogan, Cath Ruis na Ríg, 51. 131 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23196–203. 132 Cath Ruis na Ríg, ll. 23210–22.

Patrick Wadden

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Dhonnchadh mac Domhnaill Uí Mhaoilsechlainn 7 ro shóidh dia thigh iar sin.

An army was led by Muirchertach, son of Níall Úa Lochlainn, to Ath Dúine Calman on the Inneoin; and he took the hostages of Teathba, and he gave a full restitution of the cattle of the men of Mide to those he had before plundered. He also gave the kingdom of Mide, from the Shannon to the sea, to Donnchadh, son of Domnall Úa Máel Sechlainn, after which he returned to his house.133

Moreover, although there is no evidence of a marriage alliance between the kings of Mide and Mac Lochlainn, as there was between Conchobar mac Nessa and Erc mac Cairpri, the Uí Máel Sechlainn and the Meic Lochlainn did share a common Uí Néill ancestry. It may just be the case that Cath Ruis na Ríg, with its resonances of the conflict between Mac Lochlainn and Úa Conchobair in the 1150s, was actually composed for the Uí Máel Sechlainn kings of Mide who were so often during these years caught between the proverbial rock and hard place.

If this was the case, then despite the fact that it was poorly constructed as a narrative, perhaps the Book of Leinster text of Cath Ruis na Ríg was not as incomplete as Thurneysen and Mac Gearailt believed. In the aftermath of Mac Lochlainn’s campaign into Mide in 1155, Úa Conchobair retaliated by building a bridge over the Shannon, but Donnchad Úa Máel Sechlainn, recently installed in the kingship of Mide by Mac Lochlainn, was able to destroy it.134 Úa Conchobair wasn’t quite a spent force, and early in 1156 he attempted to exert his influence again in Munster and in Bréifne, but as far as Mide was concerned, the die was already cast. By 1155 then, and certainly by the time of Úa Conchobair’s death in 1156,135 the competition between Mac Lochlainn and Úa Conchobair that informed Cath Ruis na Ríg had come to and end without the two kings having come face-to-face in a battle. Even in its apparently anti-climactic conclusion, then, Cath Ruis na Ríg echoes history.

133 AFM 1155. 134 AFM, ATig, 1155. 135 AU, ATig, AFM.