Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
The Metrical Dindshenchas (Author: [unknown])
- There is here a limb from the body of a king:
over the streaming currents the sea bore him
towards the noble love, long-limbed, winsome,
of hundred-wounding Cithang's only son.
- 5] From Inis Aine of the heroes
Rot ever-fierce, won his goal,
the chieftain renowned in every land:
he was a gentle border-champion.
- By land and massive sea
10] fared the faultless prince's son;
his left hand to the pure Ictian Sea
his right to the country of enduring Britons.
- And there he heard the sound,
it was a lure of baleful might,
15] the chant of the mermaids of the sea
over the pure-sided waves.
- The loveliness of the sea-maids equalled any wealth
fairer than any human shape were
their bodies above the waves of the tide,
20] with their tresses yellow as gold.
- The hosts of the world would fall asleep
listening to their voice and their clear notes;
Rot would not give up for woman's troth
union with their bodies, with their pleasant bosoms.
- 25] As much of them as was under water
it was a secret with no kindly power
was big as a broad bright hill
of shell-fish and heaps of weed.
- The son of Cithaing gave strong fervent love:
30] no love was got in return;
Rot found, without persistence in beseeching them,
the evil fate that was the custom of the women-folk.
- Choked and killed was Rot
and his noble body overcome,
35] until he would have been thankful, as ye may guess,
to be dead and torn piecemeal.
- There came from the east across the narrow sea,
till it found a level shore of Erin,
a thigh-bone, from the sole upward, as thou mayest guess,
40] so that here rests his noble limb.
- Therefore to be told of in every land
is Port Lairge of the broad shields;
men that are swift in the field if there be strife,
it is likely that they are generous folk.