The Dagda desired Boann, wife of Elcmar, and made the sun stand still so that nine months passed in a single day. Boann conceived and bore their son Aengus Óg before Elcmar returned.
Danu bore the Dagda and Ogma, the mightiest and the most eloquent of the Irish gods — one the great father who wielded the club and cauldron, the other the champion who bound men with the chains of his speech.
Aed is a son of the Dagda, slain by Corrgenn for seducing Corrgenn's wife, after which the Dagda bore his body across Ireland and buried him at the place that became Ailech Néit.
Bodb Dearg is a son of the Dagda who succeeded him as king of the Tuatha Dé Danann after their retreat into the síd mounds.
The Dagda sired Brigid, who inherited three aspects of his creative fire — poetry, smithcraft, and healing — making her among the most revered of his children.
Cermait Honey-Mouth is a son of the Dagda, one of the lesser-known children of the great god of the Tuatha Dé Danann.
Midir is a son of the Dagda who dwells in the síd of Brí Leith. He features prominently in the Tochmarc Étaíne, where he woos Étaín across multiple lifetimes.
The Dagda and the Morrígan united at the River Unius before the Second Battle of Mag Tuired. In exchange for their union, the Morrígan pledged to use her magic against the Fomorian king Indech, draining the blood and courage from his heart.
At Tara, Lugh assembled the champions of the Tuatha Dé Danann for war against the Fomorians — the Dagda to spy and negotiate, Ogma to lead the warriors, Goibniu to forge weapons that never missed, and Dian Cécht to heal the wounded at the Well of Sláine. Together they broke Fomorian power at the Second Battle of Mag Tuired.
Nuada and the Dagda stood together against the Fir Bolg at the First Battle of Moytura and against the Fomorians at the Second, king and chief druid marshaling the Tuatha Dé Danann through the wars that won and held Ireland.
The Dagda fought the Fomorians at the Second Battle of Mag Tuired. They stole his harp Uaithne, but he pursued them and called it back. The Fomorians also humiliated him by forcing him to eat a vast porridge from a pit.
Cethlenn fatally wounded the Dagda at the Second Battle of Mag Tuired. Though the Dagda survived the battle, he eventually died of the wound years later at Brú na Bóinne.
Brú na Bóinne (Newgrange) was the Dagda's seat of power and dwelling. He held it until his son Aengus Óg tricked him out of it by asking for it 'for a day and a night' — and every day is composed of days and nights.
The Dagda ruled as king of the Tuatha Dé Danann for eighty years after the Second Battle of Mag Tuired, wielding his great club and cauldron as instruments of sovereignty until his death from Cethlenn's old wound.
The Tuatha Dé Danann descended through the sky in a dark cloud upon Ireland, bringing with them the arts of sorcery, druidry, and every craft — a divine race who conquered the Fir Bolg and ruled until the coming of the Milesians.
Aengus Óg tricked the Dagda out of Brú na Bóinne by asking for it 'for a day and a night' — since every day is composed of days and nights, the request encompassed all time. The father lost his dwelling to his son's wordplay.
During Bres's tyrannical reign over the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Dagda was forced to build ramparts and dig trenches as a labourer. Bres's satirist Cridenbél also extorted the three best portions of the Dagda's food each night.
The Dagda wielded the Cauldron of Plenty (Coire Ansic), one of the Four Treasures of the Tuatha Dé Danann brought from the mythical city of Murias. No company ever left it unsatisfied, and it could restore the dead to life.
The Dagda bore the Lorg Mór into the Second Battle of Mag Tuired, wielding a club so vast it was dragged on wheels and carved trenches in the earth behind him. One end struck nine men dead at a blow; the other restored the slain to life.
The Dagda sent Nechtan on errands so he could lie with Boann, then held the sun still to conceal the pregnancy. Later, the Dagda arbitrated when Aengus Óg — the son born of that union — dispossessed Nechtan of Brú na Bóinne.
⚠ Elcmar and Nechtan are sometimes treated as the same figure (husband of Boann), sometimes as distinct; the Tochmarc Étaíne uses Elcmar while other traditions name Nechtan.
Before the Second Battle of Mag Tuired, the Fomorians forced the Dagda to gorge on a vast pit of porridge until his belly dragged the ground, yet he rose and fought with his great club, felling Fomorians by the score.
After the Tuatha Dé Danann's defeat by the Milesians, the Dagda divided the síd mounds among his children and followers, distributing the underground realms that became the dwelling places of the fairy folk.
The Dagda called to his harp Uaithne by name and it flew across the Fomorian feasting hall into his hands, killing nine warriors in its flight. He then played the three strains of Irish music — geantraí to bring laughter, goltraí to bring weeping, and suantraí to cast the whole hall into slumber — and walked out with his companions.
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