Fionn mac Cumhaill

Oct 7

The one and only

by Isaac Strauss

Alright, listen up, kids, for I will tell the story of Fionn Mac Cumhaill.
Alright. Now, once upon a time, there was a druid who made a deal with an evil spirit, who helped him at his job and helped make him chief druid but he sacrificed all love for his daughter for it.

His daughter, Muirne, hated him and snuck off to the woods to visit her friends Breac and Brianna a lot. One time, she met Cumhaill on her way and challenged him to a contest. 6 days later Cumhaill the warrior was tied with Muirne, 3 to 3, and the last challenge was endurance.

Muirne made the rules, and the rules were simple: the first person to say a number of push-ups that the other person thought they couldn’t do, and then they do it, wins.

Cumhaill went first and said, “601.” Muirne didn’t budge.
Next, it was Muirne’s turn, and she said, “Between eight and nine hundred push-ups.” Cumhaill challenged because he thought it was between 800 and 900 instead of 8 and 900, and then Muirne did nine push-ups and won.

Muirne won a chore a day for a month from Cumhaill, and at the end of the month Muirne said, “Will you keep helping do stuff for me?” and Cumhaill said, “Yes.” And that is how they fell in love.
But since warriors like Cumhall weren’t allowed to marry, they had a plan to escape.

One week later, Muirne was to marry someone her dad chose. The goat for the meat in the meal had escaped (remember that) so they made boar meat instead of goat meat. The first person was a rich man who owned a factory, had divorced three times already, and hated garlic. Muirne put a lot of garlic in their soup, slurped it up, and belched in his face. The next person was a narcissist who loved talking about himself. Muirne hummed whenever he was talking, and when he stopped talking, Muirne stopped humming and just that turned him crazy. The last person was a farmer who only talked about farming prices, and the way Muirne stopped him was by pretending to fall asleep while he was talking.

Muirne’s dad sent her up to her room and locked the door. After a while, the man who had divorced three times already said, “Sure, I’ll marry her,” and went up to her room only to find the goat in there and the window broken. Meanwhile, Muirne and Cumhaill rode off into the forest on Cumhaill’s horse.

They escaped to Cnucha, and after a little while were found, and Cumhaill was killed by Goll mac Morna. Soon after, Fionn was born.

Fionn was raised by Breac and Brianna and learned many hunting skills, but one day Goll mac Morna was so close to finding them that he had to be sent away and he was sent away with three blind smiths.

One day, a group of robbers with a person who had magical genes that made them strong and fast found them, stole all their metals, and killed the smiths. They also kidnapped Fionn, and the way Fionn escaped was while they were feeding him he said to the super-strong person that having magical genes made them dumb, and challenged him to a riddle: “What is harmless but can kill you?”

The strong guy spent all night guessing while Fionn secretly untied his knots. He fell asleep after a little while and woke up when Fionn only had a couple knots left.

The strong guy and Fionn fought after Fionn escaped, and Fionn said the answer was “time” while he was fighting and soon escaped.

To be continued…

Personal Note: I read a book about Fionn while I was in Ireland, and I was fascinated and inspired by it. What I just told you wasn't even close to half of the story of Fionn. Two of my favorite parts are the Salmon of Knowledge and Giant's Causeway, which I will tell you about another time.