An Chraobh Airgid

Being of the sídhe

Aillén mac Midgna

Aillén mac Midgna

The musician of the sídhe who burned Tara every Samhain, until the boy Fionn stayed awake.

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One of the Tuatha Dé Danann, of Síd Fionnachaidh. In the Acallam na Senórach he came down to Tara every Samhain for twenty-three years with a timpán whose music put everyone to sleep, even women in childbirth and warriors lying in their wounds, and then blew fire out of his mouth and burned it. When Conn was king, the ten-year-old Fionn kept himself awake with the point of Fiacha mac Congha’s spear, turned the fire with his cloak, and killed Aillén at the door of his síd.

Kin and bonds

In the tales

  • Fionn and the Burning of Tara For twenty-three years a man of the sídhe has played Tara to sleep at Samhain and burned it. Then a boy of ten, an outlaw, offers to keep it till morning.

See also

Sources

Medieval manuscript. Written down by Irish scholars between the eighth and seventeenth centuries.

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