THE SILVER ARM (1981) is volume Two of the CONQUESTS trilogy and continues the story of Nuada, telling how the Gods forged his Arm of Silver. THE SILVER ARM also contains the account of the Second Battle of Moy Tura, a saga unique in Early Irish Literature for in it appears almost the entire Irish pantheon.

This volume describes the great battle in which the Tuatha Dé Danann led by Nuada of the Silver Arm and their greatest champion Lugh, the Il-Dána, king, Balor of the Evil Eye. This theme of the old hierarchy of Gods and Heroes being displaced by a powerful new order is one common to other ancient literature: Greek Myths describe the defeat of Cronos and the Titans by Zeus and the Olympian Gods, the same motif is found in Scandinavian accounts of the Aesir-Vanir Wars and in stories within the early Indo-European tradition.

Like THE BOOK OF CONQUESTS, the paintings for THE SILVER ARM suffered from poor reproduction but despite this a flavour of the great epic remains. I designed the layout of THE SILVER ARM with the stylised geometry of ancient Irish Manuscripts in mind but, during publication and printing, some of the decorative borders were inexplicably dropped from the book leaving dreadfully bare pages at the end of each chapter!

However, despite these flaws, THE SILVER ARM contains some of my best work. In my paintings for it I dare to believe I have captured majesty that has prevented the ancient race of the Tuatha Dé Danann from being submerged beneath the dim tides of history.