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Edition

• D. Greene (ed), Fingal Rónáin and Other Stories (Dublin 1975) 51-54.
• K. Meyer (ed & tr), Hibernica Minora (Oxford 1894) 76-81.
  

Manuscripts

• Rawlinson B 502
• Rawlinson B 512
  

Date

• Possibly composed during the Old Irish period (Greene 47)
  

Characters

• Máelodrán mac Dímma Chróin (alias ua Dímma Chróin), a Leinster hero from Dál Messin Corb, said to have lived in the mid-seventh century.
• Aithechda, king of the Uí Máil and father-in-law of Máelodrán
• Dubchrón, Máelodrán's servant
  

Notes

• Máelodrán also appears in Orggun trí mac Díarmata meic Cerbaill.
• This story is likely a rare bit of folklore that grew up among the Dál Messin Corb of south-western Wicklow.  In the Cycles of Kings, stories centering on characters from minor peoples or dynasties are very rare.
  

Máelodrán mac Dímma Chróin is distinguished among his people, the Dál Messin Corb, for his battles against the Osraige and the Uí Máil.  He is married to the daughter of Aithechda, the king of the Uí Máil.  One day while his wife is visiting her ailing mother, Aithechda asks her to betray Máelodrán to him, but the girl says that she does not know in which of his three huts he plans to sleep that night.  However, she says she will scatter phosphorescent wood chips behind her as they go to his hut and thus leave a trail for Aithechda to follow.

The plan succeeds and soon Aithechda and his men surround the house in which Máelodrán and his wife are staying.  Máelodrán asks them if they will let his wife, their sister, go free, but when they agree, Máelodrán dresses in his wife’s clothes and passes out of the house.  Once free, he slaughters his enemies and then makes peace with Aithechda.

One day while bathing in Aithechda’s house, Máelodrán is attacked and killed.  One of Aithechda’s servants throws embers in his eyes, while Aithechda himself runs him through with the Carr Belaig Durgin, Máelodran’s enchanted spear.  When Dubchrón, Máelodrán’s servant returns, Aithechda’s men try to get him to dismount and come in the house, but he suspects a trap and flees once he is shown his master’s severed head.

After the murder, Aithechda takes Máelodrán’s wife as his own (At this time, Máelodrán was not married to Aithechda’s daughter.  Presumably, he left her after the betrayal.).  One year to the day of Máelodrán’s murder, Aithechda is sitting on his couch looking at the Carr.  This spear has a special property: whenever anyone would pass it without leaving it an offering, a demon would make it leap up and kill him.  Admiring it, Aithechda boasts of his murder of Máelodrán.  His wife warns that if anyone could avenge himself from beyond the grave, Máelodrán would.  At that moment, they notice Máelodrán approaching.  He quickly seizes the Carr and kills Aithechda.  As he leaves, he chants a quatrain.  The text says that he is buried at Glendalough.