AIDEDA
AIDEDA
In medieval Irish literary terminology, the word aided
refers to a tale in prose or prosimetrum that relates
the violent demise of a hero, king, or poet. Like the
Comperta,Echtrai, and Immrama, it belongs to a
system of nineteen tale-types or general topics, which
medieval Irish scholars used as a means of classifying
much of their narrative literature. Judging from the
number of tales that survive, the aidedmust have
been a popular tale-type. In fact, some thirty-five
death-tales that contain the word in their title are
extant, most of which are written in Old or Middle
Irish (c.650–1200). Almost half of these are histor-
ical tales, while much of the remainder belong to the
Ulster Cycle. Yet the aidedis not the only tale-type
in which the violent deaths of kings and heroes can
be narrated. Such stories often form integral episodes
in other tale-types, especially the catha (battles),
togla(destructions), and oircne(slaughters). Indeed,
some of the most famous death-tales in the Irish
language—stories like To gail Bruidne Da Derga(The
Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel) and Orgain Denna
Ríg(The Destruction of Dinn Ríg)—are not classified
asaidedaat all, but belong to these other tale-types.
Regardless of the titles under which they survive,
death-tales formed an important part of the Irish lit-
erary tradition.
Origins and Development
Comparative evidence from other Indo-European
cultures, Greek and Indic in particular, suggests that
theaided, as a tale-type, is ancient, and some Irish
examples do preserve elements of demonstrable
antiquity. However, since the 1950s, scholars have
begun to change the way they view early Irish liter-
ature, the death-tales included. These stories are no
longer regarded as the products of an age-old oral
tradition, but as the products of the ecclesiastical
scriptoria in which they were written. Studies, espe-
cially since the 1980s, have shown that the creators
of these texts drew on a wide range of materials,
both foreign and domestic. As a result, they were
able to fashion narratives that at one time hearkened
back to the pre-Christian past but at the same time
addressed contemporary political and social con-
cerns. The aidedathemselves proved particularly
adaptable in this respect, so much so that they con-
tinued to be composed and reworked from their tex-
tual beginnings in the eighth century right up until the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when death-tales
like Oidheadh Chloinne Lir, Oidheadh Chloinne
Tuireann, and Oidheadh Chloinne Uisnighenjoyed
widespread popularity.
The Mythology of Death
The heroes of Irish myth and legend do not wither
away from disease or old age, but like their counter-
parts in other traditions, they die dramatic deaths that
mark the culmination of their heroic biographies.
Their deaths, like their births, take place in a well-
ordered universe in which every event has its time and
place, and in the aideda, the time and place of death
are usually liminal. Heroes tend to die at transitional
points in the seasonal calendar (like Samain) and at
transitional points in the physical landscape (like
fords). One of the more common liminal spaces in the
Irish death-tales is the quasi-otherworld banquet hall,
orbruiden. In this setting, the doomed hero partakes
of the so-called fatal feast, often in the company of a
strange woman thought to be a figure of death. Many
a king in Irish literature from Conaire Mór to Diarmait
mac Cerbaill meets his end in a bruiden. The hero can
suddenly find himself in one of these liminal spaces
through what appears to be happenstance, through his
own actions (often this involves the violation of his
geissi, or taboos), or through the complex interaction
of human and supernatural agents bent on the hero’s
destruction. But however it comes about, once the
hero enters this liminal space at the proper time, his
demise is assured.The Threefold Death
No aspect of the early Irish aidedahas received more
attention than the motif of the threefold death, in
which the victim is killed by three different means in
rapid succession, often wounding, drowning, and
burning. Examples of this motif can be found in the
literature and folklore of many countries, including
Wales, France, and Estonia. Although its origins and
development are obscure, some scholars believe that
the motif may have its beginnings in a putative Indo-
European tri-functional sacrifice, in which human vic-
tims were offered to a trio of divinities. Potential
support for this theory comes from the archaeological
record. Over the years, a number of prehistoric bodies
have been unearthed from the bogs of northern and
western Europe, some of which, like the Lindow Man
from Cheshire, England, show signs of ritualistic
threefold death.
But whatever its supposed origins, the motif of the
threefold death in early Irish literature has little to do
with paganism, much less human sacrifice. Two of the
best examples of this motif are found in Aided Diar-
mata meic Cerbaill(The Death of Diarmait mac Cer-
baill) and Aided Muirchertaig meic Erca(The Death
of Muirchertach mac Erca). Just as in these stories, all
the other instances of this motif in Irish sources are