Page 132 - Demo

132 Stephen Dunford: The Journey of The IrIsh
of them to us spectators, appeared infinitely more distressing and terrifying than they could possibly be to the parties engaged. From sun-rising to the evening did the battle continue with such unremitting slaughter, that the returning tide was stained with their blood.”
When the Norse flight began, some stragglers tried to make good their escape through the great oak wood of Tomar, close to where King Brian’s pavilion was pitched. One of them, Bruadar/Brodir, the ruling chieftain from the Isle of Man, with some of his guard, came upon the old king, who, according to an account written in Germany, fifty years after Clontarf, by the Irish monk, Marianus Scotus, was unguarded and kneeling in prayer at the time.
“It is the king,” whispered one of the Brodir’s attendants, and pausing in his flight, Brodir entered the tent. Old and hoary as he was, Brian still managed to seize his sword, but the more agile Brodir swung his war-axe and cleft the aged King’s head, killing him on the spot. An ancient Norse saga records that when the foul deed was done, Brodir raised his reeking weapon and cried out “Now let man tell man that Brodir felled Brian.” The saga further tells, that two of Brian’s followers, Wolf the Quarrelsome (who some accounts claim to have been a brother of Brians) and the warrior Kerthialfad, rushed to the king, and cap- tured Brodir and the remainder of his men.
According to the telling, “Wolf the Quarrelsome cut open his belly, and led him round and round the trunk of a tree, and so wound all his entrails out of him,” while Brodir’s men were “slain to a man”.
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