Response Mythology

(Kedar)The story about Derdriu and Conchobor is a short and tragic tale of a young woman whose fate was told even before she left her mother’s womb. She was destined to be one of the most beautiful women in Ireland. The would also bring destruction. These two things would tend to go hand in hand given the fact that men would literally fight over a woman with her inherent beauty. Some men heard the prophecy and wanted to kill the child to stop the chance of this prophesized ruin to come true. King Conchobor would not have this and ordered the child under his protection and sent her off to live with the King’s trusted servants. This is where Derdriu grew up and many years passed until she was close to her time to come of age. Knowing that she was to marry the King she felt some despair in her heart because she did not love him. Derdriu so far seems trapped and left with no options other than what fate has written for her.
Instead of people seeing Derdriu as a human they saw her more as a catalyst. Something that would bring ruin to their way of living but at the same time she was so beautiful. Derdriu one day made a wish that she could have a man with these descriptions “hair like a raven’s wing, cheeks flushed with blood and his body white as falling snow”. She found the man that she described that day out hunting by the name of Noisiu. It was love at first sight and at first, he refused her, but he felt something within himself as well that he could not ignore. Seemingly Noisiu ended up falling in love with Derdriu and they were happy together. On one hand, she was treated fairly and equally by her beloved and his brothers. They all fought to protect Derdriu up until the very end. The king would not let anyone but him have his “bride”.
Soon after Noisiu and his brothers were overrun by the King’s men and killed they took Derdriu to be with the king. When she made it to the King, she did not speak to him or even look upon him. She hated him with every fiber of her being for taking the one thing that she loved most in the world. She was taken in a chariot heading to the fair. While feeling despair and drowning in the sorrows of her lost love she chose to take her own life allowing her head to be crushed by a passing standing stone pillar. This is a tragic ending to the story but it is also bittersweet. The antagonist the King did not get to have his “Prize”. Whereas Derdriu took matters into her own hands and made a choice to take her life. While also destroying the thing that made people revere her in the first place. With the lovers’ graves sprouting trees that grew closer and closer together until they intertwined to be together forever is a beautiful sentiment.
Citation:
Exile and Revenge. www.askaboutireland.ie/reading-room/life-society/irish-language-legends/the-exile-of-the-sons-of-/derdriu-and-the-exile-of-. Accessed 23 Sept. 2022.