Deoca (or The Woman of the South)
A princess of Munster, mentioned in Irish medieval legend.
It is said that she was betrothed to Lairgnen and asked of him
as a marriage gift the children of Lir, who had been magically
changed by their stepmother into four wonderful singing
swans. The hermit who looked after them refused to give them
to Lairgnen, who then seized them. When brought into the
presence of Deoca they were transformed into their human
formwithered, white-haired, miserable beings. The hermit
baptized them before they died, and sorrowed for them so
much that he himself was laid in their grave.
