Note 14 — Chapter III

This would appear to have left six provinces in Ireland, but the distinction between the two Munsters became obsolete in time, though about a century and a half later we find Cormac levying war on Munster and demanding a double tribute from it as it was a double province! So late as the fourteenth century O'Dugan, in his poem on the kings of the line of Eber, refers to the two provinces of Munster.

"Dá thir is áille i n-Éírinn Dá chúige an Chláir léibhinn, Tír fhóid-sheang áird-mhin na ngleann Cóigeadh í d'Áird-righ Eireann"—

i.e., the two most beauteous lands in Ireland, the two provinces of the delightful plain, the slender-sodded, high-smooth land of the valleys, a province is she for the High-king of Ireland.