Cú Roí appears throughout the Ulster Cycle as a fearsome warrior with supernatural powers. He is one of the few who is a match for Cú Chulainn, and in Version 3 of Aided Chon Roí he not only defeats him but humiliates him by driving him into the ground up to his armpits, cutting off his hair, and rubbing dung on his head. In Version 1 of Aided Chon Roí, we are told that he is also essentially invincible because his soul is hidden in a golden apple that is itself hidden in a salmon that only appears every seven years. To kill Cú Roí, the apple must be cut with Cú Roí’s own sword. Cú Roí has even further protection because this knowledge is a secret known only to him – at least until he reveals it to his wife Bláithine.
Cú Roí is not the only nearly invincible warrior in medieval Irish literature. Cú Chulainn himself is normally almost impossible to defeat due to his semi-divine and supernatural nature. When he is finally killed, it is after he is weakened by being tricked into breaking his gessi, and killing him requires a special spear that is made over the course of seven years by working on it only one day each year. In fact, Cú Roí is one of only a few warriors to ever present Cú Chulainn with a real challenge. Among the others are Loch mac Mo Femis, whom the Morrígan herself identifies as the warrior who is Cú Chulainn’s equal in every way, and Cú Chulainn’s own beloved foster-brother Fer Diad. Against these two, Cú Chulainn is forced to resort to his special weapon the gae bolga. Fer Diad and Loch gain their near invulnerability as a result of having a horn-skin, a skin that cannot be penetrated by any weapon. They are not the only warriors to have this particular defense.
In Aided Cheltchair maic Uthechair “The Violent Death of Celtchar son of Uthechar” we meet Conganchnes son of Dedad, whose name is a compound of congna “horn, antler” and cnes “skin.” Conganchnes is identified as Cú Roí’s brother, although based on his name he might also be Cú Roí’s uncle, since Cú Roí is named in this text as Cú Roí son of Daire son of Dedad. Conganchnes is laying waste to Ulster in order to avenge Cú Roí, and we are told that “Spears and swords did not affect him but glanced off him as from horn.” Celtchar is given the task of getting rid of Conganchnes, and he employs his daughter Níab to find out how this can be accomplished. Níab is given to Conganchnes so that she can trick him into revealing how he can be killed. Conganchnes tells her: “Put spits of red-hot iron in my soles and through my shin-bones.” Níab passes this information along to Celtchar and tells him also to put a sleep-spell on Conganchnes and to bring a great host with him. This is done and Conganchnes is killed.
Níab’s role here is essential in defeating Conganchnes, and it is significant that she didn’t just learn his secret, she tricked him into revealing it himself. Bláithine plays the same role in Cú Roí’s story. In a previous post on Cú Roí’s hidden soul, I talked about the Motif-Indexes as useful tools to help find parallels for particular stories, and I pointed out that we have here an example of motif K975 “Secret of Strength Treacherously Discovered.” There are a few other related motifs that could be considered here, including K778 “Capture Through the Wiles of a Woman” and K2213.4.1 “Secret of Vulnerability Disclosed by Hero’s Wife,” but in Cross’ Motif-Index of Medieval Irish Literature there are only references to the stories of Cú Roí and Conganchnes. Although not an Irish story, Cross’ Motif-Index does also contain a reference to a discussion of the story of Lleu Llaw Gyffes in the medieval Welsh Mabinogi.
In Math uab Mathonwy “Math son of Mathonwy,” the Fourth Branch of the Mabinogi,Lleu is cursed by his mother Aranrhod to never receive a name or weapons unless she is the one to give them to him, and finally to “never have a wife from the race that is on this earth at present.” Lleu’s uncle Gwydion tricks his sister into naming and arming her son, but the problem of the wife is slightly more complex. Gwydion and his own uncle Math are both powerful sorcerers, and together they make Blodeuedd out of plants. As a woman not of any race on earth, she can be Lleu’s wife. Lleu is then given land to rule. When Lleu leaves Blodeuedd alone for a time, she encounters Gronw Pebr and falls in love with him. The two conspire to kill Lleu, but first must determine how he can be killed. Blodeuedd pretends that she is concerned that Lleu will be killed, and to reassure her Lleu tells her that he is very difficult to kill indeed. We find here a parallel for the statement in Version 1 of Aided Chon Roí that Cú Roí told Bláithine the secret of his external soul “through his sincerity in order to comfort her distress.” Blodeuedd eventually persuades Lleu to tell her the full details of what would be involved in killing him. Lleu, “gladly,” tells her the following:
“It is not easy to kill me with a blow. You would have to spend a year making the spear that would strike me, working on it only when people were at Mass on Sunday. … I cannot be killed indoors,’” he said, “nor out of doors; I cannot be killed on horseback, nor on foot.” (60)
Blodeuedd is still not satisfied and asks Lleu how exactly he can be killed, given these conditions. Lleu explains how it can be done.
“By making a bath for me on a riverbank, and constructing an arched roof above the tub, and then thatching that well and watertight. And bringing a billy-goat,” he said, “and standing it beside the tub; and I place one foot on the back of the billy-goat and the other on the edge of the tub. Whoever should strike me in that position would bring about my death.” (60)
Blodeuedd, quite rightly, points out that this would be an extremely easy position to avoid, but once the special spear has been prepared, she asks Lleu to demonstrate this position to her, and he agrees. Once the appropriate staging has been set up, Lleu gets himself into this very difficult position and Gronw launches the spear at him. In spite of all this preparation, Lleu manages to escape by transforming himself into an eagle and, with the help of his uncle Gwydion, he is eventually able to take vengeance against Gronw and Blodeuedd.
The most famous story of this type is certainly the Biblical story of Samson and Delilah. Samson has extraordinary strength and is in love with Delilah. His enemies, the Philistines, pay Delilah to discover the source of his strength so that he can be weakened, subdued, and captured. She asks him to tell her the secret to his strength three times. First, he tells her that he should be tied up with fresh bowstrings that have not dried, then he says that he should be tied up with new, unused ropes, and finally he tells her that his hair should be braided into a loom. Each of these things is done, but when he is attacked, he is clearly unweakened and he is able to defeat his attackers and escape any harm. Delilah confronts him each time, calling him a liar. After the third time, she accuses him of lying about loving her and continues to demand the truth. Finally, he tells her that if his head is shaved, then he will lose his strength. This is done and Samson is weakened and captured. Delilah receives her payment, and no further mention is made of her. Samson’s hair begins to grow back while he is imprisoned and, having regained some of his strength, he is able to pull down a temple, killing himself along with everyone else inside it. Unlike Cú Roí, Conganchnes, and Lleu, Samson clearly knew that Delilah was revealing his secrets to his enemies and can hardly have been surprised when she did it for the fourth time when he had finally told her the truth about the source of his strength.
These stories are often framed as the betrayal of a secret, but is there really any betrayal involved? Delilah was paid to learn Samson’s secret and he gave it to her freely, knowing the consequence. Níab was sent by her father to learn the weakness of a man who was slaughtering her people. She certainly owed no loyalty to Conganchnes. Blodeuedd, as Lleu’s wife, can certainly be said to have owed him her loyalty, but I can only feel sorry for her. Created for the sole purpose of being Lleu’s wife, she had no experience at all of the world or of other people or even of herself as a living person before being given to him. She was likely only minutes old! It is not hard to imagine her learning of human experiences by watching the other people in Lleu’s court, witnessing the lives and loves of the servants and others around her, wondering what her own life might have been like had she been born a human woman instead of created out of plants only to belong to Lleu, who may have seemed more like her jailer than her husband. And then one day, while Lleu is gone, Gronw Pebr arrives and for the first time she experiences all the excitement of first love and sees a chance to live for herself, if only for a time. Unable to put herself back in her prison once she has had a taste of freedom, she makes the terrible decision to kill her husband. Clearly, she should have just run off with Gronw and not plotted her husband’s murder, but this is a story about Lleu, not Blodeuedd, and so the focus must remain fully on him. For a medieval audience, Blodeuedd’s betrayal is probably quite clear and unforgivable, but for modern readers I suspect it is far less so.
What of Bláithine? What loyalty did she owe to Cú Roí? It is only in this account of Cú Roí’s death that Bláithine learns and reveals the hidden secret of his invincibility, but in every version of the story, Bláithine, elsewhere called Bláthnait, helps Cú Chulainn and the Ulstermen to kill Cú Roí. In the longest version of Aided Chon Roí (Version 3), Bláthnait, along with the cows, three birds, and the cauldron, is taken by Cú Roí after the siege of the Men of Fálga because he did not receive his fair share of the prizes taken during that raid. In this text, Cú Chulainn is said to have loved Bláthnait even before she was taken during the siege. It is not clear whether Bláthnait returned Cú Chulainn’s affections, but once he contacted her at Cú Roí’s fort, she willingly conspired with him. In Brinna Ferchertne “Ferchertne’s Dream-Vision,” however, Cú Roí is said to have taken Bláthnait from Cú Chulainn, who then spent a year in silence searching for her until he finally discovered her whereabouts and realized that it was Cú Roí who had taken her. In this version of the story, it seems fair to say that Bláthnait’s loyalty was to Cú Chulainn, from whom she was taken against her will. In all the other accounts of Cú Roí’s death, Bláthnait participates in her own rescue by binding Cú Roí to a bed with his own hair and then pouring milk into the river so that it runs white as a signal to Cú Chulainn that it is safe to attack. She also steals Cú Roí’s sword and throws it out the window to Cú Chulainn so that it can be used against him.
Version 1 of the story offers a different view of these relationships, however, and a different motivation for Bláithine to act against Cú Roí. In Version 1 of the story, Bláithine is taken by Echde Echbél but declares that she loves Cú Roí. Cú Roí retrieves her from Echde, but when the Ulstermen refuse to give her to him as promised, he is forced to take her for himself. There is no suggestion of a love triangle with Cú Chulainn here, and Bláithine’s loyalty should be with her husband, whom she seems to have chosen for herself. What persuades her to act against him is Cú Chulainn telling her about “his doings for the sake of the Ulstermen and her father, in order that she would betray the man.” Cú Roí frequently opposes the Ulstermen, and Cú Chulainn appeals to Bláithine’s loyalty to her father and to her people, persuading her to work against their enemy, although he is also her husband. Bláithine’s conflicting loyalties and the tension between her love for her husband and her duty to her father give her story far more depth than motifs about treachery, unfaithful wives, and the wiles of women might suggest.
My next post will be the last in this series about Aided Chon Roí. Since, as far as I can tell, no translation of Version 2 of Aided Chon Roí has ever been published, I will provide one with minimal commentary.
