Champion's portion

Fled Bricrenn

Another Ulster Cycle saga which involves the Curadmír is Fled Bricrenn ("Bricriu's Feast"). The notorious troublemaker Bricriu invites the Ulstermen to a feast. Before it starts he visits three heroes, Cúchulainn, Conall Cernach and Lóegaire Búadach, privately, and advises each of them to claim the Champion's Portion, which at this feast includes not only a roast boar but also a cauldron of wine and a hundred cakes of wheat baked in honey. All three stand up to claim it, and fighting nearly breaks out. To avoid violence the Champion's Portion is shared out among the Ulstermen, and Ailill and Medb, king and queen of Connacht, and then Cú Roí of Munster, are asked to judge the dispute. A series of tests of skill and courage are set, and after each of them Cúchulainn is judged to have won, but Conall and Lóegaire refuse to accept the judgement, and the Champion's Portion goes unawarded. Then, when the three heroes are at Emain Macha, they are visited by a giant churl who challenges them each in turn to behead him, and then allow him to behead them the following day. Lóegaire, Conall and Cúchulainn all behead the churl, who picks up his head and leaves, but Lóegaire and Conall are nowhere to be found when he returns the following day. Only Cúchulainn keeps his side of the bargain. He stretches out his neck for the axe, but the churl spares him in recognition of his courage and honour. He reveals himself as Cú Roí, and announces that the Champion's Portion is indisputably Cúchulainn's.