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The Death of Mac Con

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Myles Dillon*
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin

Extract

The story of the deposition and death of Mac Con is told in The Battle of Mag Mucrama, §§59–77 of Stokes' edition, RC 13, 460–467, and there is an account of his death in the “historical” tract in Laud 610, edited by Meyer, Fianaigecht 28 (RIA Todd Lecture Series xvi, 1910). There is an independent story in YBL, which is here edited for the first time, and may represent one of the sources upon which the author of The Battle of Mag Mucrama has drawn. He did not merely copy it, for his text varies considerably in vocabulary, and by omission and addition. Yet the two texts are closely related, and Stokes' edition, referred to in the notes as L, has been of great value to me in reading and interpreting the text presented here. According to this text Mac Con was king of Ireland for thirty years, and this is also the tradition of the tract in Laud. In L he reigns for seven years (§59), but the alternative tradition is recorded in §77. In the LL text of the Battle of Crinna the period is twenty-seven years, LL fcs. 328 f 16 (O'Grady, Silva Gadelicaii, 491). The Annals of Tigernach say: Ailii aiunt Lugaid Mac Con post hoc bellum regnase [annis xviii] uel xxx ut alii aiunt, RC 17, 11. The source of the words in square brackets in Stokes' edition is not stated. It would be necessary to examine unpublished historical poems, genealogies, and regnal lists in order to trace the origin of these conflicting numbers. Confusion often arises from the use of Roman numerals in manuscripts.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1945

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References

Note 1 in page 340 I owe this reference to Professor Vernam Hull.

Note 2 in page 341 f added above.

Note 3 in page 341 The fcs. is not clear; fogel-arison (?). L omits this phrase.

Note 4 in page 341 Added above.

Note 5 in page 341 domfarraid, MS; dondirraill, L; domháraill, Laud, but the context varies.

5a Added above.

Note 6 in page 341 The fcs. is not clear; the MS. appears to have been re-inked.

Note 7 in page 341 delba, MS.

Note 8 in page 341 indasin, MS.

Note 9 in page 341 o, MS.

Note 10 in page 342 The first quatrain occurs in The Battle of Mac Mucrama, RC 13, 464; the second ibid. 460, and Fianaigecht 32. 20.

Note 11 in page 342 cheis has been corrected to chess and eicis to eices in the MS. The quatrain occurs RC 13,464. y and Fianaigecht 40.2.

Note 12 in page 342 The reading is doubtful since the facsimile is not clear, but ceithre yields good sense. The word would then be an old neuter, and belong to the class discussed by Thurneysen, Handbuch §263.4. A dsg. n. aill is not indeed recorded, but is not impossible, since the neuter appears to be an old n-stem (Hdb. §§480, 482).

Note 13 in page 342 sina: cf. sên.i. lion i ngabur [e]oin ‘a net in which birds are caught,‘ O'Mulc. 1479; sen may be cognate with OE. segne, Gr. σαγνη. Here read séna (?).

13a fidbi: fiacail fidba occurs in the same context in CMM, RC 13, 464.2, and Cóir Anmann, IT iii 306.17, here with the gloss .i. neime as above. The meaning of fidbi is obscure to me.

fi .i. ondi as uirus .i. neim, undefidbae .i.fithnaise ‘fi from uīrus, i.e. ‘poison’ unde fidbae, i.e. fithnaisi, O'Mulc. 534; fithnaisi is also obscure, but seems to mean ‘disease, sickness’ of some kind, s. O'Dav. 946. fidba i.. neim ne[i]ch ro gab credbad ‘the poison of something (someone) that is wasting away,‘ O'Mulc. 598. The glossator is evidently trying to explain this very phrase. He has borrowed the first part of 534 from Corm. 636, but Cormac does not mention fidbi.

The phrase cannot be separated from fidba chnáma, ‘jawbone’ which is attested in two places: srengais in n-6l don fidba chnáma ‘he drew back the cheek from the jawbone,’ LU 6547 (=TBC 2606). atnaig Dia sruth usci gloin somblasta triasin fidba chndma do .i. lecca chamaill boi ina laim ‘God sent him a stream of pure sweet water through the jawbone, i.e., the jaw of a camel which he had in his hand,’ LB 127b7 (cf. Judges xv. 19). Thus fíacal fidbai probably means ‘jaw-tooth.’ It was well known that Ailill's tooth was poisonous, for this was one of the three blemishes for which he was famous. The legend concerning them is recorded in Côir Anmann, loc. cit. The attempt to explain fidbi as ‘poisonous’ is, I suspect, a mere guess of the glossators. But the exact meaning of the word is not clear. It is however perhaps possible to explain how some glossator was led to make this guess. In the Laud text the prose has merely: Do sadis Ailill a fiacail hi ngruad Meic Con di thecosc condid erbalad ria nde nomaide ‘Ailill thrust his tooth into Mac Con's cheek for warning that he would die within three days,’ Fianaigecht 36.11. Then follows the quatrain in which the tooth is called fiacail fidbui (sup. p. 4), and the glossator, to whom fidbui was unfamiliar supposed that it meant ‘poisonous,’ and found in Cormac's Glossary a partial confirmation of his guess. In my translation ‘poisonous’ has been allowed to stand, since it renders the meaning of the gloss, and represents the sense understood by the scribe.

If this explanation is correct it is of some importance, for it suggests that the Laud text, which is not in saga-form, but rather a ‘historical’ tract, is a primary source from which the sagas derive. Windisch gives ‘Knochenbogen’ as a literal rendering of fidba chnáma, TBC 370, note 5, and so in the Vocab. fidba ‘Bogen’; but I have found no confirmation of this.

Note 14 in page 344 sûainead: cf. ro gab siabrad do delbad, Fianaigecht 36.17. I have no other example of the word.

Note 15 in page 344 According to one tradition Mac Con was a son of Sadb the wife of Ailill, and he was therefore a half-brother as well as a foster-brother of Eogan.

Note 16 in page 344 Cf. the story of Oisin told in the Dindshenchas of Tipra Sengarmna, Metr. Dinds. iii 89–100; Rennes Dinds., RC 15, 446.

Note 17 in page 344 This is told in the Laud text, Fianaigecht 38.14.

Note 18 in page 344 andfocal, andocul annacol o, n. (a) ‘habitual saying;’ (b) ‘habitual lament.’ (a) annfocal .i. gnáthfoccal, O'Cl. conid annfocul. i. Cú. 7 Cethen, LL 30b7. iss ed didiu and focol ro boi i mbélaib int slúaig ‘this was the saying that was on the lips of the host,’ LU 10819 = Ériu 12,178. 20 (cf. LU 10879 = Ériu 12, 182.12). ba he a hannocol onn mir sin na Becfolad ‘from that time forth the habitual saying of Becfola was,’ YBL 118b44 (PRIA Ir. MSS. Ser. i i 180.16, where the editor misread the ms.). (b) ba é a hannacul ‘this was his lament,’ RC 13, 460.9 (cf. ibid. 15, 20). be hé didiu a hannocol ‘this was her lament,’ LL 274b30 (PRIA XXX C 263.21 [1912]). The rendering ‘lament’ is suggested by the context in the examples under (b), but in every case ‘what he (she) used to say’ would be a sufficient translation. The passage in Cath Maige Mucrama corresponding to this text reads: is do sein asbered Sodb, RC 13, 464. 19. In Laud 610: is din cath sin asbert Sadb ingen Chuind in rann, Fianaigecht 34.19. The word is well attested, but it has often been mishandled by scribes and editors. I suppose that it is a compound of focul (*ande- oq -tlo-) which Bergin has explained as a native word, Ériu 12, 135. Meyer lists the word in the form annacol ‘a dirge,‘ Contrib.; cf. Hessen, s.vv. annacol, annfoccal. It seems to have become obsolete early.

Note 19 in page 344 don: sg. dat. of ‘earth, ground, place,‘ s. Meyer, Univ. of Illinois Studies in Lang. and Lit. ii, no. 4, 28. I owe this reference to Professor Vernam Hull.

Note 20 in page 344 The quatrain seems to echo the vocabulary of a quatrain in Bruiden Da Chocae which begins: Maircc dibeir tóeb a deo de, RC 21, 318.8 Stokes neglects the verse in this text, as was his practice, and the quatrain is incomplete in his edition. I have supposed above that di[u] is dsg. of a word déo which may be attested in this passage. L and Laud vary: inna etc, L: 7 da heu, Laud.

Note 21 in page 345 ro bí: pret. sg. 3 active impers. ‘it slew.‘ This impersonal construction is not uncommon, s. Pedersen, VKG ii 310. If be emended to bíth, the construction is passive. L and Laud vary: docer, L; conid a path, Laud.