But this is only the prologue of the drama; the details would fill a volume.

It must suffice to say, that the bulls had a battle of their own.

Finnbheannach and Donn Chuailgne (the Leinster bull) engaged in deadly combat, which is described with the wildest flights of poetic diction.[86] The poor "white horn" was killed, and Donn Chuailgne, who had lashed himself to madness, dashed out his brains.[87] [Illustration: FLINT SPEAR-HEAD, FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE R.I.A.] Meav lived to the venerable age of a hundred.

According to Tighernach, she died A.D.70, but the chronology of the Four Masters places her demise a hundred years earlier.

This difference of calculation also makes it questionable what monarch reigned in Ireland at the birth of Christ.