The Vikings of Strangford Lough and The death of Magnus Barelegs 1103A.D.
By Albert William Kelly Colmer, Consultant Historian
In the folk-lore of Strangford Lough, poetically named as ‘Loch Cuan of the Curraghs’ the story is told in the Metrical Dindshenchas, that the Irish sea god Manannan Mac Lir, in a grief-induced rage over the killing of his son, let forth an outburst of water which formed three Irish sea Lough, Waterford, Dundrum Bayand Strangford Lough.
Again in the Annals of the Four Masters it is also recorded. ‘An inundation of the sea over the land of Brena, in this year (2546 AD), and this is named, Loch Cuan.’ The Irish name of Loch Cuan meaning ‘Loch of the Harbour.’ This name survived as late as the mid – 18th Century, before the now used Viking name ‘Strangford,’ translated the ‘wind inlet,’ became established.
The study of the annals, tell of the Viking dominance over the Strangford Lough area, which stretched over a 200 year period, from the 9th to the 11th Century, and on to the Scandinavian stage, when an incident of near international proportions occurred, when Magnus Barefoot, King of Norway, nicknamed ‘Barelegs’ was killed in battle near Downpatrick in the year 1103 
