Dún Scáith- Celtic LocationLocation · Landmark

The Approach to the Fortress

Dún Scáith stood in the Land of Shadows (Tír na Scáth), traditionally located in Alba (Scotland) and associated in later folk tradition with Dunscaith Castle on the Isle of Skye. To reach it, a warrior had to cross the Plain of Ill Luck, where the feet of travelers would stick fast, and the Perilous Glen, filled with monsters and terrors. The final obstacle was the Bridge of the Cliff (Droichet na gCleas, the "Bridge of Feats"), a narrow span that would throw unworthy warriors to their death: when a man stepped on one end, the other end would rise and cast him off. Only those with sufficient skill and courage could cross. In the Tochmarc Emire, Cú Chulainn attempted the bridge three times before, in a feat of supernatural agility, he leapt to its center with the salmon-leap (ích n-erred), reaching the other side in a single bound. The bridge served as the fortress's first and most fearsome trial: those who could not cross were not fit for what lay within.

Scáthach's Training Ground

Within Dún Scáith, the warrior woman Scáthach trained the heroes of Ireland in supernatural feats of arms that could not be learned elsewhere. Cú Chulainn spent a year training under her, mastering the gáe bolga (the barbed spear-thrust), the chariot feat, the thunder-feat, and other combat techniques that would make him invincible. Scáthach's other pupils included Ferdiad, who would later face Cú Chulainn in the most tragic combat of the Táin Bó Cúailnge, and in some versions Conall Cernach. The fortress was also the site of the conflict between Scáthach and her rival Aífe, another warrior queen from the eastern lands. During this war, Cú Chulainn fought on Scáthach's behalf and defeated Aífe in single combat, fathering a son, Connla, upon her. Dún Scáith thus served as the crucible in which Ireland's greatest hero was forged, a place on the boundary between the mortal world and the Otherworld where supernatural martial knowledge could be transmitted from the divine to the human.