Kingship

Stories with the Kingship theme:

• The Birth and Taboos of Conaire Mór Aug 14, 2025

  

  In the ancient annals of Ireland, few kings were as blessed at birth and as cursed by fate as Conaire Mór, whose story reveals the terrible burden that comes with divine kingship and the tragic consequences of breaking sacred taboos. His tale is one of supernatural birth, mystical kingship, and the inexorable working of destiny that even the greatest of kings cannot escape.

  The Divine Conception

  The story begins not with Conaire himself, but with his mother, Mess Búachalla, whose own birth was marked by wonder and mystery. She was the daughter of Étain and Cormac, king of Ulster, but her conception came about through the intervention of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the divine race that ruled Ireland before mortal men.

• Knocknarea and Queen Medb’s Cairn Aug 13, 2025

  

  Before the grey Atlantic throws itself on the strand at Sligo, a short green mountain rises—Knocknarea, a table set for the sky. On its crown is a cairn of stones, and in every house from Strandhill to the Garavogue someone can tell you whose it is.

  “Medb,” they say, and if they are old they say it as if it tasted of apples and iron.

• The Lia Fáil, the Stone of Destiny Aug 12, 2025

  

  Among the four great treasures that the Tuatha Dé Danann brought with them when they came to Ireland, none was more important to the governance of the land than the Lia Fáil, the Stone of Destiny. This was no ordinary stone, but a sacred pillar that held within it the very essence of rightful kingship and the power to recognize truth from falsehood.

  The Lia Fáil stood upon the Hill of Tara, the most sacred place in all of Ireland, where the High Kings held their court and made the laws that governed the entire island. It was a tall pillar of pale stone, smooth as silk but harder than iron, and carved with spirals and symbols so ancient that even the druids could not read them all.