Eigse Paged 2004 - National University of Ireland

ENCOUNTER AT THE FORD 17
learns that he has struck a fairy woman, who was seeking to take him
as her mate. 20
In his article on Cú Chulainn and the Cronn, Nagy also discussed
the implications of another scene in the Táin in which martial activity,
water, and female sexuality all come together. As he seeks to protect
his province from invasion, Cú Chulainn is approached and
solicited by a beautiful young woman, eventually identified as the
war goddess known as the Morrígain. At first he tries to excuse himself
on account of the danger of the situation, and the physical strain
which he is undergoing: Ní haurussa dam-sa dano comrac fri banscáil
céin no mbeó isind níth so ‘It is not easy for me to come
together with a woman while I am in this struggle.’ 21 When she offers
to help him, Cú Chulainn becomes abusive: Ní ar thóin mná dano
gabus-sa inso ‘It is not for the sake of a woman’s backside that I
undertook this.’ 22 The Morrígain then turns against him, threatening
to attack him in the shapes of various animals when he is next fighting
in the waters of the ford. When she does in fact attack him in this
way he puts out one of her eyes, and breaks one of her ribs and one
20
There are one hundred and fifty versions of the story in the archives of the
Department of Irish Folklore, University College Dublin / National University of
Ireland, Dublin. For a recent discussion, see Miceal Ross, ‘The knife against the
wave: a uniquely Irish legend of the supernatural?’ Folklore 105 (1994) 83-8; a
notable instance is discussed by Tomás Ó Con Cheanainn, ‘Seanchas ar Mhuintir
Laidhe’ Éigse 33 (2002) 179-225 (at pp 208-9).
21
There is a play on words here, as comrac can designate combat as well as a sexual
encounter; for comparable exploitation of the word’s ambiguities in conjunction
with níth (and its rhyming antonym síth) see John Carey, ‘The rhetoric of Echtrae
Chonlai’ CMCS 30 (Winter 1995) 41-65 (at pp 53-4). Jacqueline Borsje suggests to
me that it may be significant in this connection that Níth is one of the names of the
hag Cailb in Togail Bruidne Da Derga, a figure who shares other names with the
Morrígain (LU l. 6980). The next in the list of Cailb’s names is Némain: cf. the river
Níth Némannach (e.g. LL l. 2407), now the Dee in Co. Louth.
22
The phrase tón mná recurs in other passages which express the idea that sexual
desire can induce a man to disregard or transgress political boundaries. An early
account of the cattle-raid of Cuailnge states that Fergus ‘turned against the Ulaid for
the sake of a woman, i.e. for the sake of Medb of Cruachu; for he waged war against
his own people for the sake of a woman’s backside’ (fecca[i]s... for Ulta di āg mnā
.i. di āg Medba Crūachan, ar imgeogain ar imtoin mnā fria chenēl fadessin, Kuno
Meyer, ‘The Laud genealogies’ 305). In the Táin itself Conall Cernach berates
Fergus for fighting against his own folk ‘for the sake of the backside of a wanton
woman’ (ar thóin mná drúithi, TBC I l. 4069); and the law tract Do Thuaslucad
rudrad speaks of the diminished status of the man in-etet toin a mna tar crich ‘who
follows his wife’s backside across a border’ (CIH 427 ll 3-4).