Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions

Ancient Irish Litcj^attcre, 309
291 words, 16 are Latin, and 30 are obsolete. The antiquarian
authority, J.
T. Gilbert, has doubts of any fifth
century Latin Vulgate in Ireland. The Lives of St. Patrick
are mostly of mediaeval age.
The Martyrology of Donegal wd^s by O'Clery, one of the
" Four Masters," and gives an account of the Irish Saints.
The Saltair Chaisil was seen by Sir W. Ware, though
since lost. There are two copies of the Book of Hymns,
eleventh century. 7 he Martyrology of Maolinuire O'Gorinain
dates from 1167 ;
the Metrical Calendar is put at the
ninth century. St. Patrick's Hymn to the Trinity \?> declared
of the sixth century. Among Foray or cattle-stealing poems
may be cited the Tain-Bo- Cuailgne, written by St. Kiaran
on the skin of his pet dun cow.
in
imitation of the Welsh ones.
Irish Triads were perhaps
O'Curry had declared the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick
to be of the seventh century. Arthur Clive finds it " was
certainly written after the eleventh century. Such are the
allusions to the kings and chieftains ;
while the MS. called
the Book of Armagh must have been written after the
Norman Conquest, for it alludes to the Saxons as in occupation
of the Island, and gives expression to a prophecy
foretelling their final expulsion."
Gilbert, the Irish Archivist, in Calendar of Ancioit
Records in Dublin, tells us that " the early documents are
in mediaeval Latin, antique French, and Old or Middle
English, written in obscure and contracted styles, replete
with obsolete terms and archaic, undated." He finds the
charters and grants are written in abbreviated Latin. The
Irish was ever a puzzle. There were men to be found in
Rome, it was said, who could speak every language but
Irish. Lilly called it the Angels' language. Our James I.
hated it, and declared his conviction that the Devil himself
could not speak it. It might, therefore, on that account,