The Book of Invasions

The Third Invasion

Nemed and the Nemedians

Inis Fail was then uninhabited for 30 years save Fintán, Tuan and the Formorians, until a third group of people arrived called the Nemedians. They were led by Nemed, who was a descended from Partholon's brother Tait. Tait who was living near the Caspian Sea was the great-grandfather of Nemed. Nemed and followers set out also from the city of Gothia on the Euphrates River and boarded 44 ships in Latakia and set sail. However, after a year and a half of sailing, only a few boats disembarked in Iberia. From there they ventured on several years later, but only one ship reached Ines Fail and that was Nemed's. Onboard Nemed’s ship was his wife Macha, and his four chieftain sons. These four chieftains were called Starn, Iarbonel the Soothsayer, Annind and Fergus Lethderg.

During their time in Ines Fail, the Nemedians, like the Partholonians before them, cleared twelve plains and caused four lakes to burst from the ground. Nemed dug two royal forts in Inis Fail. Raith Chimbaith he dug in Semne, and Raith Chindeich he dug in Ui Niallain. The four sons of Matan, Munremar Boc, Roboc, Ruibne, and Rotan dug Raith Cindeich in a single day.

The Nemedians encounter the Formorians

In the beginning of the time of the Nemedians in Inis Fail the Formorians avoided them because they beheld them to be very many. However, as time passed and the Nemedians encroached more and more on lands the Formorians considered their own, they made plans to attack them. Initially they attacked in small groups. Four or so giants would set upon Nemedians traveling and crush them or they might just appear and crush whole farm houses. However, the Nemedians set a trap for them and caught three of them in a giant pit. One of those who they caught was Sengand son of Gand one of the Fomorian kings. After he soon escaped he and his father came back in force.

Thus the battle of Ros Fraechain commenced. Now the Fomorians were mighty and had grown in numbers by means of their interbreeding with humans and were now many. But they had grown divided and the two kings Gand and Sengand, could only muster just over 3000 warriors. The Nemedians, however, assembled over 40,000 warriors and though the Fomorians caused the plants to rise up and wind around the Nemedians they could not deal with their superior numbers. So they caused fire to erupt from the ground, and though they hurled down huge boulders upon the Nemedian ranks, and peppered them with their blow pipes they could not win. For, the Nemedians harassed them on every side cutting their legs in close with swords and covering them with so many arrows that they looked like giant pin cushions. The two kings of the Fomorians, were slain there and their forces scattered into the forests. Thus Nemed had won the battle of Ros Fraechain.

Tory Island Stronghold of the Formorians

Now on Tory Island the stronghold of the Fomorians there was a tower and when the sons of Nemed, passed near it in their ships, what they saw was a tower of glass in the middle of the sea, and on the tower something that had the appearance of men, and they attacked it with Druid spells. However, the Fomorians worked their own spells against them. When the sons of Nemed attacked the tower, it had vanished. They thought it was destroyed but this was an illusion. Still Nemed won three battles more against the Fomorians when they came in huge ships from the sea for many of them had become sea-rovers. First, Nemed won the battle of Badbgna in Connachta where the huge ships of the Fomorians were burned with arrows of Greek fire. Then the battle of Cnamros was fought in Laigne. Again the numbers were with the Nemedians who prevailed and won the day. Then came the battle of Murbolg in Dal Riada where again the Fomorians lost and were scattered in the sea. Thus the Nemedians were at first successful against the Fomorians, with four decisive victories.

However, the Fomorians learned their lesson and sent a plague to reduce the numbers of the Nemedians. Nemed and many others died of this pestilence in Oilean Arda Nemid in Ui Liathain. This decimated their population, until less than two thousand Nemedians survived leaving the Fomorian’s numbers far greater than their own. The Nemedians were then oppressed by the Fomorian Kings Conand and Morc so that they suffered many years of tyranny. Initially the Formorians demanded that each Samhain they pay two thirds of their milk and this they paid willingly. But a few years later they demanded that they also pay two thirds of their wheat harvest, and this they paid also, but grudgingly. Then the Fomorians demanded that they pay the intolerable tribute of two thirds of their children. The Fomorians decided to ask for young children to make sure they would grow up thinking themselves Fomoians and provide good breeding stock.

However, what they asked was too much. Eventually three Nemedian chieftains rose up and led their people in revolt. By that time the numbers of the Fomorians had grown to just over 40,000 warriors, but the numbers of Nemedian had swelled also. They attacked the Fomorian stronghold of Tory Island. They attacked the Tower of Conand with 60,000 warriors (30,000 on sea and 30,000 on land), and they defeated Conand.

Alas, just then the Fomorians received reinforcement. Morc son of Dela came upon them, with the crews of three-score ships, and they fell in a mutual slaughter and the sea came up over the people of Inis Fail. Bethach died in Inis Fail of plague; though his ten wives survived him for a space of twenty-three years. As Morc attacked, almost all of the Nemedians were either killed in the fighting or swept away by the sea. Not one of them fled from another, so severe was the battling: none escaped save three ships, in which there were about thirty men and women each.

Three Ships Flee Inis Fail

These three ships went forth, parting from Inis Fail, with those on board fleeing from the sickness and taxation. Each of the three ships went its own way, one went into the north of the world, one went to Greece and one went to Alba to become the ancestors of the Scoti (Scots).

Matach and Erglan and Iartach, the three sons of Beoan, went to Dobar and Iardobar in the north of Alba. But Fergus Lethderg disembarked earlier in Lloegr (England) with his son Britain, whose name later became the name of the whole island. In the time of the departure many of the people had started calling themselves the Scotti after the eldest of Nemed’s daughters instead of the Nemedians. They took this name to Alba and called themselves the Scotti there and eventually renamed the country to Scotia.

Semeon son of Erglan son of Beoan son of Starn son of Nemed fled with his crew to Greece. Unfortunately there they were subjugated and became slaves. Their descendants would become known as the Fir Bolgs (the men of the bags) because the Greeks made them remove soil in bags as part of their function as slaves. They would later return to Inis Fail because they realized that even with the demands of the Fomorians they had been better off in Inis Fail.

The third ship of Nemedians migrated to the islands in the north of the world. Iobath son of Beothach son of Iarbanel son of Nemed and his son Baath brought their followers to islands of Foroyar that were in the north of the world. Click here to Continue.

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