Clothru

Clothru is presented in medieval Irish sources as a daughter of the High King Eochu Feidlech and sister of Medb and Ethniu/Eithne. In the narrative preserved in texts such as Aided Meidbe (The Violent Death of Medb) and related compilations, when her triplet brothers (the findemna) prepared to fight their father for the high kingship and risked dying without heirs, Clothru seduced the three brothers so that she would conceive an heir. That child is Lugaid Riab nDerg, who is later counted among the High Kings. In later genealogical episodes recorded in the medieval tradition Clothru is said to have lain with Lugaid and thereby to have begotten Crimthann Nia Náir, creating complex kinship roles (mother, aunt, grandmother) within the same lineage. The island Inis Cloithrinn/Inchcleraun is traditionally named for her in the toponymic lore.

Medieval texts and the supplied summaries give no direct physical description of Clothru. The sources portray her as a noblewoman of royal lineage (daughter of a High King, sister to a queen), and her association with the island Inis Cloithrinn preserves her memory in the landscape, but they do not supply clothing, stature, complexion, or other bodily details.

The sources attribute Clothru with decisive sexual agency exercised for political and dynastic ends rather than supernatural powers. Her notable actions are seducing her three triplet brothers to conceive Lugaid Riab nDerg—thereby preserving an heir for the brothers should they die—and later conceiving Crimthann Nia Náir by Lugaid. These deeds function in the narratives as mechanisms to secure and transmit kingship; Lugaid and Crimthann both figure as later High Kings in the legendary sequences. The tradition records a motif that Lugaid is 'red-striped' (riab nDerg) because different parts of his body were said to resemble three different fathers—an explanatory genealogical detail tied to the tripartite paternity recounted in the sources.