The Lia Fáil (Irish for "big stone of Fál", pronounced Irish pronunciation: [ˌlʲiːə ˈfɔːlʲ]), also known as the Coronation Stone of Tara, is a stone at the Inauguration Mound (Irish: an Forrad) on the Hill of Tara in County Meath in Ireland, which served as the coronation stone for the High Kings of Ireland.[1] In legend, all of the kings of Ireland were crowned on the stone up to Muirchertach mac Ercae c. AD 500.
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In Celtic mythology, the Lia Fáil is said to have been brought to Ireland in antiquity by the semi-divine race known as the Tuatha Dé Danann. The Tuatha Dé Danann had travelled to the "Northern Isles" where they learned many skills and magic in its four cities Fálias, Gorias, Murias and Findias. From there they traveled to Ireland bringing with them a treasure from each city - the four legendary treasures of Ireland. From Fáilias came the Lia Fáil "the Stone of Fál"; also called the Stone of Destiny (Latin: Saxum fatale). The other three treasures are the Claíomh Solais or Sword of Victory, the Sleá Bua or Spear of Lugh and the Coire Dagdae or The Dagda’s Cauldron.
Some historians such as John of Fordun and Hector Boece from the thirteenth century, treat the Lia Fáil the same as the Stone of Scone in Scotland.[1] The stone on the Hill of Tara (pictured here) is wrongly named the Lia Fáil. 'Lia Fáil' does not translate as 'big stone'. It is the Gaelic for 'Stone of Destiny'. The Lia Fáil left Tara in AD 500 when the High King of Ireland Murtagh MacErc loaned it to his brother Fergus (later known as Fergus the Great) for the latter's coronation in Scotland. Fergus's sub-kingdom, Dalriada, had by this time expanded to include the north-east part of Ulster and parts of western Scotland. Not long after Fergus's coronation in Scotland, he and his inner circle were caught in a freak storm off the County Antrim coast in which all perished. The stone remained in Scotland which is why Murtagh MacErc is recorded in history as the last Irish King to be crowned on it.
The Lia Fáil was thought to be magical: when the rightful High King of Ireland put his feet on it, the stone was said to roar in joy.[1] The stone is also credited with the power to rejuvenate the king and also to endow him with a long reign. Cúchulainn split it with his sword when it failed to cry out under his protégé, Lugaid Riab nDerg, and from then on it never roared again, except under Conn of the Hundred Battles and Brian Boru.
It is from this stone that the Tuatha Dé Danann metonymically named Ireland Inis Fáil (inis meaning island), and from this 'Fál' became an ancient name for Ireland.[1] Fál in Irish Gaelic means hedge or enclosure. In this respect, therefore, Lia Fáil came to mean 'Stone of Ireland'. Inisfail appears as a synonym for Erin in some Irish romantic and nationalist poetry in English in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; Aubrey Thomas de Vere's 1863 poem Inisfail is an example.
The term Fianna Fáil ("the Fianna, warriors, or army of Ireland"; sometimes rendered "the soldiers of destiny") has been used as a sobriquet for the Irish Volunteers; on the cap badge of the Irish Army; in the opening line of the Irish-language version of the Irish national anthem; and as the name of the Fianna Fáil political party, one of the main parties in the Republic of Ireland.[2]