The Wise King of Tara
Cormac mac Airt was the High King of Ireland during the Fianna’s golden age — the king whose court at Tara was the setting for the Fenian Cycle’s greatest stories, and whose reign the tradition held up as the standard of what a just king should be.
He showed what he was as a child. A queen’s sheep had eaten a woman’s woad plants. The king at Tara awarded the woman’s sheep to the queen as compensation. The boy Cormac said the judgment was wrong: the wool of the sheep should pay for the woad, since both would grow back. The wool was renewable, the sheep were not. The king heard him and knew a wiser mind was in the hall. Cormac was recognised as the rightful king.
His reign had three celebrated symbols. A golden cup that shattered if three lies were spoken over it and repaired itself at three truths — the emblem of a court where justice mattered. A silver branch with golden apples whose music eased all grief. And his reign’s abundance: rivers full of fish, plains full of cattle, no unjust death.
He betrothed his daughter Gráinne to Fionn mac Cumhaill. When Gráinne eloped with Diarmuid on the night of the feast, Cormac told Fionn it had been done against his will and he could not be held responsible for his daughter’s choice. He was not wrong.
He visited the Otherworld and was shown the Well of Wisdom — five salmon eating the hazel nuts of knowledge — by Manannán mac Lir himself.
He converted to Christianity before his death. The tradition made him both the last just pagan king and the first Irish king to accept the new faith.
His son Cairbre Lifechair declared war on the Fianna after his death. The golden reign ended with Cormac. What followed was Gabhra.
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