Tamun
the Stump
The camp fool, dressed up as Ailill to trick Cúchulainn, who knows him by his speech and kills him.
Overview
Ailill has the camp fool made up to look like him, with a king's crown on his head, and sends him with Finnabair to betroth her to Cúchulainn. Cúchulainn goes to meet them, knows by the man's speech that he is the camp fool, and shoots a sling-stone that pierces his head and knocks out his brains. He cuts off the girl's two long tresses, thrusts a pillar-stone under her cloak and another up through the fool's middle, and leaves them like that. Kinsella's note says the original does not name the fool and that the name Tamun comes from a later version.
Connections
Related characters
- Ailill (Ordered him made up to look like himself)
- Cúchulainn (Killed him and left him with a pillar-stone through his middle)
- Finnabair (Sent out with him to be betrothed to Cúchulainn)
- Lugaid mac Nois (Carried the offer of Finnabair to Cúchulainn)
Places
- Finnabair's Pillar-Stone (The two standing-stones, Finnabair's and the Fool's, are there still)