Gáirech and Irgairech

Overview

Gáirech and Irgairech is the field where the last battle is fought. Kinsella lists Gáirech as Garhy, and a note in the chapter on the broken pact calls it the final battle of the Táin. The text does not say how far it lies from the other places. The name turns up in verse and dream long before anyone gets there.

It comes up first in the middle of Cúchulainn's long killing. When the Sixfold Slaughter is named, the text says it is one of the three uncountable slaughters on the Táin. The other two are the mutual slaughter at Glenn Domain, and the Great Battle at Gáirech and Irgairech, which is the one where it was horses and dogs as well as men. The text doesn't try to count the dead.

Then it gets mentioned in verse. As Conchobor and Celtchar come back with eight score heads, Celtchar chants that the battle breaks out at Gáirech and Irgairech, with thirty four-horse chariots, a hundred of the host's hard steeds and two hundred druids. Others say it was Conchobor's son Cúscraid the stammerer, chanting in the eastern camp on the night before the battle, just after Laegaire Buadach's chant "Rise kings of Macha". During the same night Dubthach Dael, the blacktongued, dreams of the armies at Gáirech and Irgairech and speaks in his sleep of a fearful morning, hosts in turmoil and kings cast down.

The night before the battle Nét's wives, Nemain and the Badb, call out to the men of Ireland near the field, and a hundred of their warriors die of fright. The text says that was a bad night for them. Kinsella notes that he left out a second telling of the same cry. Ailill chants on the eve of the battle and sends Traigthrén to summon every group of three that is left.

Next morning the men of Ireland, in their groups of three, advance to the ford nearer the army, a rare spectacle as they march to the battle at Gáirech and Irgairech. The nine chariot-fighters from Iruath go with them. Medb holds them back from the fighting, ready to pluck Ailill out if the army is beaten or to kill Conchobor if it wins. Ailill and Medb ask Fergus to join in, and reproach him with all they did for him in exile. Fergus says that if only he had his sword he would send severed heads toppling thicker than hailstones. Ailill has the sword brought and chants to Fergus to take it, lay Ireland low, but spare us at Gáirech.

In the battle that follows Fergus levels the three Bald-topped Hills of Meath, Cúchulainn rises from his sickbed to smash the last company, and Medb has her gush of blood. The battle is over, and the Brown Bull is taken away on the day after.