Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
The Metrical Dindshenchas (Author: [unknown])

poem 69

Mag Mucrime

  1. Mag Mucrime, that all extol,
    the plain where we shall go as familiar visitors,
    the plain full of homes and householders,
    the kin of fair-haired Eochaid possessed it.
  2. 5] A land for tillage, smooth and rough alike,
    long, wide, and shining;
    a flat country where girded swords are seen,
    full of oak woods laden with oak fruit.
  3. "A secret," saith every fortunate host,
    10] "is the legend of Mag Mucrime:
    needful is the help of sage or bard,"
    saith each of them," to illuminate it."
  4. From the cave of Cruachu, where they were used to dwell,
    came a black herd of magical nature,
    15] and a demon urged the lean stock
    towards Medb and Ailill.
  5. It was a wondrous property of the herd of swine —
    a hundred men busy counting them on the same hill,
    though they stayed till doomsday counting them,
    20] no two would find them alike in number.
  6. They ravaged fruit and sheen
    in the tuneful province of Connacht,
    so that nought was left but ruin and blight
    in every district that they visited.

    7. p.385

  7. 25] Ailill and Medb came
    to hunt them and number them aright:
    and they were found upon the bright sands
    in their lairs in Mag Fraich.
  8. The hunters set to chase them one by one,
    30] and to count them right heedfully;
    to Medb at Belach na Fert
    they were brought all together at a marsh.
  9. One pig, nimble as a deer, made a spring,
    and Medb caught hold of his strong leg,
    35] and with the haste of danger he left
    his skin in one of her hands.
  10. From the day that the wild swine were counted
    east and west in Mag Fraich,
    (it severs not from truthful tales)
    40] the plain is called Mag Mucc-rima.

    11. p.387