BAL-or
The Fomorian king whose single deadly eye can destroy an army, killed by his own grandson Lugh at the Second Battle of Moytura.
Balor of the Evil Eye leads the Fomorians as their king, and carries a single great eye that was closed from birth and only opened — by several attendants prying back its lid — on the battlefield, where its gaze alone kills or withers whatever it falls on. A prophecy holds that Balor will be killed by his own grandson, so he imprisons his daughter to prevent her ever bearing a child — a plan that fails when Lugh is conceived regardless and later raised in secret.
At the Second Battle of Moytura, Lugh confronts Balor as his eye is being forced open, and drives a sling-stone through it and out the back of his head, turning the deadly gaze back on the Fomorian ranks behind him and breaking their army. Balor's death by his own grandson's hand is one of the best-known fulfilled prophecies in the whole mythology.
In the version in Cath Maige Tuired, Balor's eye is not dangerous from birth. Instead it is damaged when, as a boy, he looks through a window at his father's druids preparing a potion, and the fumes enter his eye. From then on it is lethal to anyone who looks into it, and it takes four men to lift the lid. This is a different explanation from the better-known folk tale, and the two are worth keeping apart.
In the folk tradition from Tory Island off Donegal, Balor imprisons his daughter Ethniu (or Eithne) in a tower, and the child is conceived by Cian, who has been helped by a woman of the otherworld. In this version Balor is a one-eyed giant rather than a king. The story of the cow Glas Gaibhnenn, which Cian takes from Balor, also belongs to this folklore tradition. In both traditions the end is the same, since Lugh is the grandson who kills him.
| Cycle | Entries here | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| The Mythological Cycle | 21 | The oldest of the four cycles, telling of the Tuatha Dé Danann and the successive invasions of Ireland. |
| The Fenian Cycle | 7 | Tales of Fionn mac Cumhaill and his band of warriors, the Fianna, set generations after the Ulster Cycle in a world of hunting, romance, and roaming adventure. |
| The Ulster Cycle | 12 | The heroic tales of Conchobar mac Nessa's court at Emain Macha, centered on Cú Chulainn and the great cattle raid of the Táin Bó Cúailnge. |
| The Historical Cycle | 1 | Also the Cycle of the Kings — legendary and semi-legendary tales of Ireland's High Kings, treated by medieval scribes as genuine national history. |
Balor is the king of the Fomorians, a race of hostile beings opposed to the Tuatha Dé Danann, famed for a single giant eye whose gaze could kill or devastate whatever it fell upon.
The eye was so destructive that it had to be kept closed and lifted open with a hook through its heavy lid by attendants whenever Balor wished to use it in battle, making it a weapon that had to be deliberately deployed rather than a constant threat.
He was killed by his own grandson Lugh at the Second Battle of Mag Tuired, struck through the fatal eye with a sling-stone in fulfillment of a prophecy that Balor would be slain by his daughter's son.