Balor of the Evil Eye

“Then the lid was raised from Balor’s eye. And the army that looked upon it could stand no more against him than against lightning.” — Cath Maige Tuired

Lore: Balor is the king of the Fomorians, the primordial chaos-race that opposed the Tuatha De Danann. His defining feature is his single, enormous evil eye: when its lid is raised (it takes four men to do so), everything in its gaze is destroyed — not merely killed but annihilated, blasted from existence. A prophecy foretold that Balor would be killed by his own grandson. To prevent this, he locked his daughter Ethniu in a crystal tower where no man could reach her. But Cian (a Tuatha warrior, with Manannan’s help) gained access, and Lugh was born. At the Second Battle of Mag Tuired, the young Lugh faced Balor across the battlefield. As Balor’s servants began to lift the lid of the evil eye, Lugh hurled a sling-stone with such force that it struck the eye, drove it through the back of Balor’s skull, and turned its killing gaze on the Fomorian army, routing them.

Parallel: Balor parallels the Cyclops Polyphemus (a single-eyed giant defeated by a clever young hero) and, more precisely, Goliath — an seemingly invincible giant killed by a young champion with a projectile weapon (David’s sling-stone, Lugh’s sling-stone). The prophecy of being killed by one’s own descendant parallels the Greek Cronus (who tried to prevent his overthrow by his children) and Herod (who slaughtered the innocents to prevent the birth of the prophesied king). The evil eye itself connects to a vast Mediterranean and Near Eastern tradition of destructive vision that persists in folk belief today.