Chapter 3 – Macha of the Tuatha Dé Danann (Part 1) by Morgan Daimler

“It was then that Badb and Macha and the Morrigan went to the Knoll of the Taking of the Hostages, and to the Hill of Summoning of Hosts at Tara, and sent forth magic showers of sorcery and compact clouds of mist and a furious rain of fire, with a downpour of red blood from the air on the warriors’ heads; and they allowed the Fir Bolg neither rest nor stay for three days and nights.”
– The First Battle of Moytura

The Story – the Cét-Cath Maige Tuired and the Cath Maige Tuired

After the Nemedians were driven from Ireland the island was once again abandoned this time for 200 years, until one group of their descendants, the Fir Bolg, returned and settled there. After establishing themselves and ruling for 30 years however the king of the Fir Bolg had a dream that a flock of blackbirds flew to Ireland and overwhelmed the his people and this was interpreted by the king’s druid as a dream foretelling the arrival of the Tuatha De[1], which came to pass.

After spending the intervening years studying magic the Tuatha De Danann returned to Ireland in ships which flew through the air and landed on a mountain, bringing darkness and mist for three days[2]. They engaged with the Fir Bolg peacefully at first, asking for room to settle alongside them in Ireland but the Fir Bolg refused; in response the Tuatha De challenged the Fir Bolg to a battle to see who would get to remain on the island. Macha initially appears along with her two sisters, who go to the seat of kingship in Ireland, Teamhair [Tara], and use their magic to subdue the Fir Bolg for three days. Later the two groups meet at midsummer to fight: the first day the Fir Bolg win and the Tuatha De are soundly pushed back. The second day we are told that the Morrigan, Badb, Macha, and Danann[3] accompany the leaders of the Tuatha De to the battlefield and the day’s fighting results in a draw. The third and final day of fighting the Morrigan, Badb, and Macha along with their three sisters Fotla, Banba, and Eriu and their two foster mothers Be Chuille and Danann go with the warriors to the front lines and raise a series of stone pillars in the field[4] to keep their forces from retreating. Although the king of the Tuatha de Danann loses his arm in the fighting the Tuatha De are victorious, killing most of the Fir Bolg and driving the remaining warriors into Connacht.

Because the king, Nuada, had lost his arm he could no longer continue ruling so in his place the people chose Eochaid Bres, the son of a Tuatha De woman and Fir Bolg father, to be the next king. Although Bres was described as incomparably beautiful he wasn’t a good king, withholding hospitality from his people and allowing his paternal kin to tax them terribly. Because of this, and because Nauda’s arm was healed, after seven years the Tuatha De Danann demanded that Bres step down as king. He initially agreed but asked for a delay before doing so and used this time to go to his father’s people and raise an army to subdue the Tuatha De and take the kingship back by force. The Tuatha De Danann rallied behind Lugh, who like Bres was half Fomorian and half Tuatha De although it was Lugh’s father who was among the Tuatha, in part because Lugh was skilled in all arts and in part because he had been prophesied to kill his grandfather, the Formorian king Balor. After much preparation the two groups finally confronted each other at Samhain[5] and the Tuatha De emerged victorious; according to the story Nuada and Macha fell together at the hands of Balor before Lugh killed him.

This offers a short version of the combined tales of the first and second battles of Moytura, the main pivotal myths of the Tuatha De Danann. Although Macha doesn’t feature prominently she does play an important role in the first story, and the second offers us insight into her death, impermanent as such things are for the Gods. In the first battle we learn that Macha is a sorceress among her people, as she goes with her sisters and works battle magic against their enemies. She also appears accompanying the warriors to the fight on the second and third days of engagement, although it is unclear whether she fights with them or is merely there to offer support; in contrast in the battle against the Fomorians we are told that Macha falls along with Nuada in the fight and while we aren’t explicitly told she was fighting alongside him it is certainly implied.

We also find Macha referenced in other stories of the Tuatha De Danann in ways that give us further insight into who she is in this context, although she is most often mentioned in conjunction with her sisters Badb and the Morrigan. While these pieces of material lack wider context and story they nonetheless provide a deeper view of who Macha of the Tuatha De is. With that in mind I’d like to explore the main ones I have found:

Lebor Gabala Erenn – Macha is listed in this text as a daughter of Ernmas and sister to Ernmas’s other children including Badb, the Morrigan, Fotla, Banba, and Eriu. Along with her two sisters she is said to be a source of ‘bitter fighting’ and ‘a well of craftiness’ (Macalister, 1941).

The Banshenchus – the Banshenchus is a poetic list of various female characters in Irish myth which includes some small details about them. In this text Macha is listed along with Nemain, Danann, Badb, the Morrigan, Etain, and Be Chuille who are all described as witches of the Tuatha De Danann. It is interesting to note that all of these except Nemain and Etain are the same women who accompany the men to the battle with the Fir Bolg in the Cét-Cath Maige Tuired, indicating that perhaps in that story they were there for magical battle support.

The Glossaries – the Irsan text (MS 1337 Dublin) has this passage about Macha: “Macha that is a crow or the three Morrigans that is Macha and Badb and Morrigan, Macha’s crop that is the heads of people killed in battle…rough the dwellings there where men shear off Macha’s crop where warriors drive a multitude into pens where the raven woman stir up strife.”[6] While short this text is particularly important as it gives us some valuable insight into Macha as a battle and war goddess.

O’Mulconry’s Glossary offers a slightly condensed version of what is found in Irsan, saying: “Macha, that is Badb or one of the three Morrigans, whence Macha’s crop that is people’s heads after the slaughter.”

O’Clery’s Glossary offers this: “Macha, that is a crow or hooded crow, the heap of Macha that is collecting of a crow or a hooded crow.”

This gives us three references to Macha, crows, and battle. The first two refer to severed heads as her nut-crop; the third to what a crow gathers as her “heap” although I believe it’s possible this is a later confusion of the earlier saying, given the similarity of the word used for heap with a related word for head. We know that severed heads were highly symbolic and meaningful in Irish culture and can safely assume that the connection between Macha and these heads is layered and significant, tying her to success in battle. 

The Táin Bó Cúailgne – although Macha of the Tuatha De Danann doesn’t make an appearance, as such, in the TBC she is referenced at least once when the warrior Fergus meic Roich calls his sword a ‘halidom of Macha’; a halidom is a sacred object or something viewed as holy. This ties into Macha as a goddess and again relates her to war and battle.

These sources show us that Macha was strongly associated with her two sisters, Badb and the Morrigan, and reinforces the idea that the three act together as a triad. This pattern is found across Irish myth where groups of three deities, often siblings, are significant together; we might point to the three Brighids as another example of this pattern, or to the three sovereignty goddesses Fotla, Banba, and Eriu.

The material we have to look to also reinforces the idea of Macha as a goddess of war and battle. She stirs up strife and ‘bitter fighting’, the sword is a sacred symbol to her, and the heads of men who die fighting are her ‘crop’. This last ties her directly victory in war as well as to the fighting itself in an inescapable way. This is particularly interesting to consider when we also take into account the Moytura stories which have Macha at the front lines of fighting. Her place as a war goddess then is a ket aspect of Macha of the Tuatha De Danann.

Macha’s connection to magic is well established across sources, with various texts naming her as a witch, sorceress, and druid. Each of these works a slightly different type of magic, something that we see in her stories In Irish myths where we find three distinct main[7] classes of magic workers: tuithecha [witches], corrguinecha [sorcerers], and druad [druids]. In the Cath Maige Tuired all three of these groups are called on to contribute their powers to the fight and each responds by promising a different thing: the druids pledge to bring showers of fire on the Fomorians, the sorcerers say they will drain the vigour from the enemy warriors and bind their urine, and the witches promise to enchant the trees, stones, and grass into an army to fight on the side of the Tuatha De. The powers wielded by each of the three have some overlap – in the Cét-Cath Maige Tuired it’s the sorceresses who rain blood and fire on their enemies, and in a different passage of the Cath Maige Tuired the druids drain the vigour from enemies while the sorcerers enchant the earth – but they are generally treated as distinct groups of magical practitioners within the texts. It is perhaps notable that Macha is associated with all three types of magic and is labelled as part of each group in different places, making her a goddess of magic in general and of witches, sorcerers, and druids specifically.

Tuaithe is defined as witchcraft and related to the word tuath, meaning “northward, turning northward, perverse, wicked“. Tuaithe is a complex word that is associated with both the Good Folk (tuath-geinte) as well as witches (tuaithech or bantuaithech), and to make things more complex although the word tuath has strong negative associations bantuaithech is also defined as ‘wise woman’ and tuaithech by itself only means “a person with magic powers“. We might tentatively conclude then that this particular type of witchcraft is associated with the Otherworld and can be sinister in nature or benevolent, rather like the sidhe themselves.

Corrguinecht is often translated as sorcery but literally means ‘crane-wounding’ likely a reference to the crane-pose where the sorcerer would stand on one leg, with one arm behind his back and one eye closed and chant a spell against his enemy, usually a form of satire. This kind of magic is seen in the Cath Maige Tuired when Lugh uses the crane pose and chant to curse the Fomorians before the battle, and at the start of the Cét-Cath Maige Tuired Macha is referred to as a sorceress when she and her two sisters call rains of fire and blood down on the Fir Bolg. Corrguinecht seems particularly suited to use in battle.

Druidecht is the magic of druids; although the term is sometimes translated as wizardry it literally means druid-prowess. Druids in pagan and early Christian Ireland were considered a class of people, skilled in various magic, who acted as advisers to kings. Although most stories of druids feature male characters female druids aren’t unheard of. In various translations and versions of the Táin Bó Cúailgne Fedelm is called a druidess, seer, or fairy. The Morrigan and Macha are called druidesses at different points and the Tuatha De Danann appeared to have both male and female Druids. In the story of Fionn Mac Cumhaill it is said that he was fostered by two women, one of whom is described as a druidess. A 15th century Irish manuscript relates how Fingin Mac Luchta was visited by a druidess each Samhain eve who would foretell events in the year to come. In all of these cases the word used to describe the woman varied between druidess, seer, and fairy and most were strongly connected to the Otherworld, for example in the story of Fingin the Druidess was said to come from  a fairy hill. It is possible that this reflects the slow Christianization of older stories into more fantastical forms, or the liminal place that druids occupied where they were always seen as being more than one thing, as it were. Female druids were often described as both seers and druids, indicating that perhaps druidesses were often both or were particularly associated with prophecy.

By putting all of these pieces together we can build a more complete picture of who Macha of the Tuatha De Danann was and deepen our understanding of her.

For more details: https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/moon-books/authors/morgan-daimler

References
Dobbs, M., (1930) The Ban-Shenchus; Revue Celtique, vol 47
Fraser, J., (1916) The First Battle of Moytura. Retrieved from https://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/1maghtured.html
Grey, E., (1983) Cath Maige Tuired
Gwynn, E., (1906). Metrical Dindshenchas
Macalister, RAS (1941) The Lebor Gabala Erenn vol 4
Russell, P., Moran, P., Arbuthnot, S., (2023) Early Irish Glossaries Database, version 3.3 Retrieved from www.asnc.cam.ac.uk/irishglossaries/

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[1] Tuatha Dé [people of the Gods] is the older term. Tuatha Dé Danann [people of the goddess Danu or people of eth gods of skill] is a later version used by Christian scribes to differentiate from the biblical use of Tuatha Dé as ‘people of God’ used for the Israelites in the old Testament. I will be using both forms here.
[2] The Christian scribes recording this story in the Lebor Gabala Erenn explain away the mystical elements by following this passage with an insertion which claims the Tuatha De arrived in wooden ships at the shore then burnt their ships creating smoke which covered the land.
[3] It is unclear who exactly this figure is; it is possible this is Danu but it may also be a misspelling of Dinann, a daughter of Flidais. This second theory is somewhat supported by a later passage in which Danann and Be Chuille – a daughter of Flidais – are named as the foster mothers of the three Morrigans.
[4] Hence the name of the story: ‘maig tuired’ means plain of pillars
[5] 1 November
[6] This translation is my own; other translators may handle some of this passage differently, particularly ‘that is a crow’ which may also be read as ‘that is Badb’ and the final line about raven women stirring up strife, as the phrase mna trogain is used idiomatically elsewhere for childbirth but I am giving it literally here.
[7] Along with a range of sub-groups