The Cattle Raid of Cooley

Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle-Raid of Cooley) is an Irish epic set in a pre-Christian Ireland divided into five provinces. The story centers on the rivalry between Connacht, ruled by Queen Medb and her husband King Ailill, and the province of Ulster, ruled by King Conchobar.

The tale begins with a "pillow-talk" between Ailill and Medb as they lie in bed at Cruachan, the stronghold of Connacht, debating which of them is wealthier. Medb, daughter of the High King of Erin (Ireland), insists she was the noblest of her father's six daughters and claims she paid her own bride-price to Ailill, making him dependent on her. All their possessions are brought forth and compared; in every category, from livestock to jewelry, their wealth is exactly equal, with one exception: a magnificent bull named Finnbennach ("the Whitehorned"), born to one of Medb's cows, has left her herd to join Ailill's, deeming it beneath him to belong to a woman. This single disparity renders Medb's fortune worthless in her eyes.

Medb sends her chief messenger, macRoth, to Ulster to request the loan of the only comparable bull in Ireland: the Brown Bull of Cualnge, owned by Darè son of Fiachna. She offers generous terms, including fifty heifers, land, and her friendship. Darè agrees enthusiastically, but that night Medb's drunken messengers boast that the bull would have been taken by force had it not been given willingly. Darè reverses his decision, and Medb declares the bull will be seized.

Ailill and Medb assemble a vast host from four of Ireland's five provinces. Among their allies is Fergus macRoig, a former king of Ulster living in exile after Conchobar usurped his throne and murdered the sons of Usnech, warriors under Fergus's protection. While the army camps at Cruachan, Medb encounters Fedelm, a prophetess from the fairy mound of Cruachan who learned divination in Alba (Scotland). Asked repeatedly to foretell the raid's outcome, Fedelm gives the same answer: She sees the host bathed in crimson blood and prophesies the coming of Cuchulain, son of Sualtaim, a young hero who will slaughter the army single-handedly.

The combined armies march toward Ulster. Fergus, given the lead because of his knowledge of the land, deliberately leads the host on wide detours and sends secret warnings to the Ulstermen. Most of Ulster's warriors are incapacitated by a supernatural curse known as the "Pains," which periodically renders them as weak as women in labor, leaving the province nearly defenseless. Cuchulain, a seventeen-year-old warrior, keeps watch on the border and sends his father Sualtaim to warn those Ulstermen still able to hide. Before departing, Cuchulain leaves a challenge on a pillar-stone: a ring carved from a single oak branch with one hand, inscribed in ogam, an early Irish script carved into wood or stone, daring any man to replicate the feat.

The army discovers the challenge, and Fergus identifies it as Cuchulain's work. The young warrior begins his guerrilla campaign, killing two scouts and their two charioteers and mounting the four severed heads on a fork driven into a ford. When Ailill asks who could have done this, Fergus identifies his own foster-son and recounts Cuchulain's extraordinary childhood: at five, the boy Setanta traveled alone to Emain Macha, the Ulster capital, and dominated the boy-troop; at six, he killed the watchdog of Culann the Smith and earned his name Cuchulain ("the Hound of Culann"); at seven, he took arms after overhearing a prophecy that whoever armed himself that day would win eternal fame but die young, then killed three formidable enemies of Ulster.

Cuchulain kills warriors nightly with his sling, terrorizing the camp. Through Fergus, the armies learn his demand: single combat at the ford, one champion each day while the host halts, with food and clothing provided to him. Medb accepts, judging it better to lose one warrior daily than a hundred nightly.

A succession of champions falls to Cuchulain. Etarcumul, a brash youth of Medb and Ailill's people who insults him, is cleaved from crown to navel. Nathcrantail, another champion sent against Cuchulain, boasts of routing the hero when Cuchulain refuses to fight an unarmed man but dies the next day when properly armed. Medb repeatedly violates the single-combat agreement, sending groups of warriors, satirists, and druids; Cuchulain destroys them all. During one fight, the Morrigan, a supernatural war goddess, attacks Cuchulain in three animal shapes, but he wounds her each time; she later tricks him into healing her by appearing as an old milking woman. In a pivotal mock combat, Fergus, carrying only a wooden sword because Ailill confiscated his real blade after discovering Fergus's affair with Medb, asks Cuchulain to flee before him in exchange for a promise that Fergus will retreat before Cuchulain at the final battle. Cuchulain agrees.

The boy-troop of Ulster, 150 youths led by Conchobar's son Follomain, marches out to help Cuchulain but is intercepted and slaughtered. Exhausted and gravely wounded, Cuchulain is visited by a mysterious warrior from the fairy world who puts him to sleep for three days while healing his wounds. Upon waking and learning of the boys' deaths, Cuchulain undergoes his most extreme battle-contortion, a supernatural transformation in which his body twists grotesquely, and drives his scythed chariot in great circuits around the enemy camp, leaving the dead in beds of six in a massive slaughter.

The climactic single combat pits Cuchulain against his foster-brother and closest friend, Ferdiad son of Daman. Trained together under the warrior-woman Scathach, they are equals in every skill except that Cuchulain alone possesses the Gae Bulga, a barbed spear that fills the body with thirty barbs, while Ferdiad has impenetrable horn-skin. Ferdiad initially refuses to fight, but Medb threatens him with satirical disgrace and bribes him with land, her daughter Finnabair, and lies that Cuchulain boasted of defeating him easily. The combat lasts four days, each escalating in intensity. On the first two evenings they part as friends, sharing healing herbs and food; by the third night they no longer share a fire. On the fourth day, Cuchulain casts a spear through Ferdiad's heart and launches the Gae Bulga underwater, piercing Ferdiad's armor and filling every joint with barbs. Cuchulain carries Ferdiad's body to the north side of the ford so the victory belongs to Ulster, then collapses in grief, lamenting that every previous combat was mere play compared to this one. After the fight, Cuchulain is left so gravely wounded that his body must be held together with hoops and ropes.

Meanwhile, Sualtaim rides to Emain Macha to rouse the Ulstermen, crying that men are slain, women stolen, and cattle lifted. Protocol silences him until his horse rears and his own shield severs his head, which continues repeating the warning. Conchobar finally rallies the province.

The Ulstermen assemble and march to confront the invaders. Ailill restores Fergus's confiscated sword. In the battle at Garech and Ilgarech, Fergus drives the Ulstermen back three times until Conchobar confronts him shield-to-shield. Cuchulain, still bound on a thorn-mound where he has been recuperating, hears the clash and bursts free from his bindings. He confronts Fergus and demands he honor his promise to retreat. Fergus turns, and all the men of Erin break and flee. Medb sends the Brown Bull ahead to Cruachan.

The Brown Bull bellows upon reaching Connacht, and Finnbennach the Whitehorned charges to meet him. The two bulls fight through the night across much of Ireland. The next morning the Brown Bull appears with the Whitehorned torn to pieces hanging from his horns. He scatters fragments of his rival across the country, each piece naming the place where it falls. The Brown Bull returns to Cualnge, turns on the local people, and kills many before his heart bursts in his breast and he dies.