Condaire’s Fatal Raid
Archived: 26 October 2026
Abstract
For Ireland, 962 is a year best approached through a small cluster of annalistic notices rather than a single commanding narrative. Those notices are unusually revealing. They record a failed northern raid, the killing or death of several rulers across the island, and a parallel change in Alba. Together they show a political world made up not of a unitary state but of overlapping kingships, kin-groups, ecclesiastical interests and strategic routes. The clearest event was the death of Flaithbertach son of Conchobar, king of Ailech, after an expedition into Dál nAraide. It was a sharp reminder that even a ruler