Part 12

One of the Belgic States that had an offshoot in Britain was that of the Atrebates close to the Straits of Dover. The town of Arras preserves their name. In Britain, they were settled in the valley of the Thames and their chief place was Calleva, now Silchester in the north of Hampshire. Cæsar took a special interest in the Atrebates, perhaps for the two reasons, that their territory was so near to Britain and that a part of their people were settled in Britain. In the early and insecure stages of his conquest of Gaul, he did not find it practicable to establish at once the Roman form of government. Instead he adopted a device which had already succeeded in the case of the Galatian republic in Asia. The Romans changed Galatia into a monarchy under a Galatian king Deiotaros, believing that they would secure their own authority more effectually by making one of the Galatians, so to speak, their chief policeman. A son and grandson of Deiotaros succeeded him as kings, and after these Augustus abolished this appearance of autonomy and made Galatia a Roman province under Roman governors. Cæsar, having overcome the resistance of the Atrebates on the Continent, appointed one of themselves, Commius, a noble of great influence, to be their king. Commius, he tells us, was a man both courageous and politic, and he considered him loyal. He afterwards used Commius as his intermediary in treating with the Britons, and through him received the submission of Cassivellaunus, whom the Britons had chosen to command their forces. After this service, Cæsar freed Commius from tribute, restored the rights and laws of his people and gave him sovereignty also over the Morini, a neighbouring state on the Belgic seaboard. In the sixth year of Cæsar's command, B.C. 53, a wide revolt of the Gallic states took place, and this time Commius took the side of his fellow-countrymen and was one of the four chiefs to whom they committed the principal charge of the war. In the suppression of the revolt, Commius was one of the last to hold out. He called in the help of the Germans, and when all failed, he took refuge among the Germans. Hirtius, the continuator of Cæsar's narrative, relates how Labienus, one of Cæsar's generals, considered that, in view of the disloyalty of Commius and his entering into conspiracy to revolt, it would be no perfidy to have him done away. Accordingly he sent one Volusenus to him in the guise of an envoy but with private instructions to have Commius murdered. The plot failed, and Commius declared that he would never again consent to speak to any Roman. He continued the war, and had the satisfaction of once meeting and wounding the treacherous envoy Volusenus in single combat. At last he was forced to submit upon terms and to give hostages, but even in his submission he made it a condition that he would not be required to hold direct intercourse with any Roman. He seems to have taken refuge finally in Britain.

Under the rule of Commius over the Atrebates, coins were struck bearing his name in its Celtic spelling Commios, but in Roman lettering, probably about the earliest examples of the use of the Roman alphabet in northern Gaul. Three of his sons appear to have reigned as kings in southern Britain, where, as already said, a colony of their people the Atrebates was settled. Their names, Tincius (or Tincommius), Eppillus, and Verica or Virica, are on numerous coins found in the south-east and middle south of England. One of these coins bears the name of Calleva, chief place of the Atrebates in Britain, now Silchester. The coins are inscribed with Roman letters, the name of Eppillus has already exchanged a Celtic for a Latin ending in the nominative, and the letters R and F, abbreviations for the Latin _rex_ and _filius_, appear on most of the coins. In this way the Latin alphabet found a foothold in Britain about the beginning of the Christian era.

No use of letters nearly so early can be traced in Ireland. When Irish traditions began to be written, the Ogham alphabet was thought to be of remote antiquity, its invention being ascribed to the eponymous god Ogma. This god is apparently identical with the Gaulish Ogmios, a god of eloquence, about whom there is a remarkable passage in the Greek writer Lucian. In the story of Táin Bó Cuailngi, Cú Chulainn cuts a message in Ogham on a branch and sets it up in the middle of a ford for his approaching enemies to read. Nevertheless, I think that the use of Ogham characters cannot be quite as old as the Cú Chulainn period. I see two reasons for thinking so. The first is that the Ogham alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet. The second is that, if the Irish god Ogma mac Eladan ("son of science") is to be identified in any way with the Gaulish Ogmios, god of eloquence,--and it seems impossible to dissociate them--then the name of the god must have come into the Irish language at a very late date before the use of writing. Philologists tell us that, when _g_ was followed by _m_ in the early unrecorded stage of the Irish language, _g_ disappeared, and the preceding vowel, if short, was lengthened "by compensation," as it is called. Accordingly, an ancient name _Ogmios_ would be represented in early MS. Irish by _Óme_ not _Ogme_, and in later Irish by _Uama_ or _Uaime_ not _Oghma_.

At first sight, it may appear too much to say that the Ogham alphabet was founded on the Latin alphabet. Why, let us ask, might it not have been a quite independent invention? A little reflection will convince us that it could not have been an independent invention. There is no limit, practically, to the possible varieties of alphabet, _i.e._, of graved or written symbols used to represent words. There are pictorial systems, and derived from these the so-called hieroglyphics, systems in which every word has a distinct syllable, systems in which each character stands for a symbol, systems in which no vowels are written, and systems which have distinct symbols for vowels and consonants. To the last class belong the Greek and Latin alphabets. There are systems in which the long and short vowels are distinguished, for example, in Pitman's shorthand alphabet; and this is partly the case in the Greek alphabet. The Ogham alphabet belongs to the class in which there are distinct symbols for vowels and consonants. All its consonants but one are found in the Latin alphabet. Except for this one, representing the sound of _ng_ in _song_ or _sing_, it is content with the Latin consonants, though each of them has to express two very distinct sounds in Irish, the mute or stop sound and the spirant or "aspirate" as it is popularly called. Lastly, it has the five Latin vowels, without distinction of long or short. Hence its Latin origin is hardly open to question. Until Cæsar's time, the Greek, not the Latin, alphabet was in use among the Gauls, the nearest people to Ireland by whom writing was then used. The Ogham alphabet and the Latin alphabet differ, generally speaking, in the same respects from the Greek alphabet. The latter therefore cannot have furnished the Irish model. The conclusion is that the Ogham alphabet, based on the Latin, was devised at some time later than the introduction of the Latin alphabet into neighbouring countries, that is to say, about the beginning of the Christian era or some what later. It was suitable only to the purposes for which it is known or related to have been used, _i.e._, for brief inscriptions or brief messages or statements. It was not suitable for the ordinary expression of written thought, for literature in the wide sense.

The range of the use of Ogham in inscriptions outside of Ireland corresponds to the range of Irish settlements and of Irish influence, at the time of the collapse of the Western Empire. In general the range is that of the Irish language at the time, but a number of Ogham inscriptions are also found in parts of Scotland which at that time were inhabited and ruled by the Picts. Apart from the Pictish instances, the farthest outlying Ogham that has been discovered is curiously enough found at Silchester, the ancient Calleva, the capital of the Atrebates in Britain, and the place in which the coins of the sons of Commius were struck, the coins that exhibit the earliest known use of the Roman alphabet or of any alphabet in Britain.

The dating of the extant Ogham inscriptions is a matter of very great difficulty, and the more closely I have attempted to examine them, the greater the difficulty has become. I shall only say that the latest forms of Irish names that they contain appear to be about identical in their stage of phonetic change with the earliest forms found in Irish writers, for example in the Life of St. Columba by Adamnanus who quotes from older documents--probably forms of the latter part of the sixth century. The weight of evidence, in my opinion, goes to show that the cult of the Ogham inscriptions was mainly associated with Paganism.

The manuscript literature of Irish does not come in a line of continuity from the Ogham writing. The system of spelling in the oldest specimens of MS. Irish has its basis in a British pronunciation of Latin--that is, in Latin modified and changed as a spoken language among the Britons during the centuries of the Roman occupation. One of the tasks incidental to the work of St. Patrick and his helpers in missionary work in Ireland was to give lessons in Latin to those who were to be the future clergy of the country. Thus we read again and again that St. Patrick wrote an alphabet for this and that convert--alphabet in this case meaning a primer or possibly a book of psalms--at all events a set of lessons in Latin. It is easy to show that a similar pronunciation of Latin prevailed in the early Christian schools of Ireland and in Britain at the same time; that this pronunciation differed systematically from the Italian pronunciation; that the differences represent changes which had taken place also in the British language, though not in Irish; and that the orthography of Old and Middle Welsh and also of Old and Middle Irish was moulded by this modified British pronunciation of Latin. The peculiarities of spelling produced in this way do not appear at all in the Ogham inscriptions; and on the other hand, there are peculiarities in the orthographic system of the Ogham inscriptions which leave no trace in Irish MS. writing. The oldest Irish grammarians speak of the Ogham method of writing as the Irish method and of the MS. method as the Latin method; and they report current sayings which show that among the early Irish Christians the use of the Irish method was regarded as profane and even tainted with impiety--meaning, beyond doubt, that it was closely associated in their minds with heathenism. On the other hand the earliest specimens of written Irish are distinctively Christian. The oldest known piece of Irish MS. writing is, or was until recently, preserved in Cambrai and is ascribed to the seventh century--but pieces as old or older exist in various transcripts.

In a paper on the Annals of Tigernach, I have shown that a chronicle of the world, written in continuation of the Chronicle of Eusebius, Jerome, and Prosper, and embodying a skeleton of Irish history, was brought to conclusion in Ireland in the year 609. From certain indications this chronicle would appear to have been commenced in the closing years of the sixth century--say between 590 and 600. Part of this chronicle is embodied in the Annals of Tigernach and in the Annals of Ulster, and extracts from it in the Annals of Innisfallen. What survives of it with relation to Ireland is the oldest known history of Ireland. From its manner of dealing with Irish affairs, I think we must conclude that even before its time, a certain body of Irish heroic literature existed in MS. and consequently that the writing of this literature had already begun in the course of the sixth century. There are other evidences that during the sixth century a blending of the old heathen lore and learned tradition with the new Christian learning was taking place--the native schools of poets, originally druids, becoming Christian and adopting the apparatus of Christian learning. St. Columba, we are told, had a poet named Gemmán for tutor, and we may be quite certain that the friendship which Columba is said to have shown to the poets as a body in the Assembly of Druim Ceata in 575 was not extended to a class which he associated with heathenism.

Nevertheless, a good deal of specifically heathen practice and teaching was preserved, more or less covertly, among the secular poets of Ireland for centuries after St. Columba's time.

In the seventh century, writing in Irish appears to become very common, but Adamnanus, about the beginning of the eighth century, writing from the standpoint of Latin and Christian learning, still speaks of his native tongue in depreciation. This sentiment did not extend to the Irish secular school of _literati_. An old grammar of Irish, dating in part from the seventh century, speaks of Irish as a "choice language," and proclaims its superiority over other languages. In the seventh century, too, new metrical forms in Irish poetry, based on Latin hymns, make their appearance, and afterwards develop into a varied and elaborate system of metric.

Let us now return to the political side of Irish history. I have endeavoured to trace the stages by which the Pentarchy of the old heroic tales became broken up and transformed into a quite different state of things when the early Christian period is reached. The chief agencies in this transformation were the extension of the power of the Connacht dynasty and its branches over northern Ireland, and the rise of the Eoghanacht dynasty in southern Ireland, with its seat at Cashel. The growth in power of the two ascendant dynasties, those of Tara and Cashel, is marked by a sort of colonising process. Offshoots from each dynasty are planted in authority over petty kingdoms, displacing or rather depressing the rulers previously in possession.

Something similar took place in later times under the Feudal system. In virtue of the supposed Donation of Constantine, now long recognised to have been fabulous, but accepted as genuine in the Middle Ages, the Popes claimed temporal dominion over all the islands of the ocean. In exercise of this temporal claim, Adrian IV conferred the lordship of Ireland on Henry of Anjou. But in virtue of the same supposed right, Adrian had already an immediate feudatory for Ireland in the person of the king of Ireland--Ruaidhri. Henry thus took the place of a "mean lord" or intermediate feudatory between the existing lord and the overlord. Henry himself repeated this process. He granted the lordship of Ireland to his son John, and this grant was confirmed by the Pope then reigning, Alexander III. Sir John Gilbert has pointed out that, had the issue of John's elder brothers survived, John would not have become king, and the lordship of Ireland would have been separate from and independent of the Crown of England, and subject only to the feudal overlordship of the Pope while it lasted. The result of granting the lordship of Ireland to Henry II was that the existing possessor was depressed in rank, not dispossessed--this apart from the cession of rights which Ruaidhri made to Henry by the short-lived Treaty of Windsor.

An almost identical process was a staple part of the policy of Irish kings from the beginning of the fourth century until the middle of the sixteenth. Such lordships can be shown to have been created either by Shane O'Neill or his father Conn, acting as king of Ulster. During the whole intervening period, we can trace the same process, the creation of mean lords, in every part of Ireland under Irish kings. In most cases the new lord was a member of the king's family, a brother, a son, or other near relative. A number of very clear and noteworthy instances of this exercise of royal dominion by Irish kings took place in consequence of the Norman conquest.

Events of this kind are not recorded in the Irish annals, except in a few instances when the exercise of power was somewhat abnormal. Since we have now reached a point at which the annals begin to figure as chief witnesses, some notice of the general character of the annals will be in place. At first sight, the pages of our native chronicles appear as a sort of trackless morass to the inquirer after Irish history. The reason is this--the chroniclers hardly ever tell us anything that an Irish reader of their times could be expected to know as a matter of course. They say almost nothing about institutions or about anything that is normal. Just as they record earthquakes, comets, eclipses, excessive frosts or floods or droughts, but say nothing about the normal course of the stars or the seasons, so, in regard of human affairs, they are silent about all that is regular or institutional, about matters of common knowledge in their time, and they are silent also, as a rule, about the institutional aspect, so to speak, of events which they relate. We are told, for example, that a certain king puts a prince of his own house to death--and that is all. From some subsidiary document we may learn that the act was a judicial act, done after trial and sentence. Or we are told that a certain king leads his forces against another king and how the battle went--but we have to consult some other source to find that the action was taken in consequence of the refusal to pay tribute according to ancient claim and precedent.

Among the subsidiary material which helps to explain the annals, and to give their events a place in historical sequence, the genealogies have the highest importance. In particular, they throw a great deal of light on the process above-mentioned, the extension of the power of dynastic families by the creation of lordships over the head of existing feudatories--to use a borrowed term.

An early instance of the process in question is found in an account quoted by O'Donovan from a MS. life of St. Greallán. Maine, he tells us, from whom the sept of Ui Maine took its name and descent, was settled in the territory of Ui Maine by a king of Connacht in the fifth century, dispossessing the "Firbolg" king of that district. (This instance, by the way, further exemplifies the unity still subsisting at that time between the different branches of the Connacht dynasty. Maine, to whom a kingdom in Connacht was thus granted by the king of Connacht, belonged to the Oriel branch of the royal house, a branch which had settled in Ulster early in the preceding century.) When O'Donovan, or the narrative which he quotes, says that the dispossessed king was of the Fir Bolg stock, he uses the term Fir Bolg in its late and wide application. The older possessors of the territory were Picts. Moreover, they were depressed rather than dispossessed, for the descendants of the ancient rulers continued to dwell as subordinate chiefs in their old territory. The family of Ó Mainnín, called Manning in English, is one of those descended from the ancient Pictish rulers of this district, which comprised the southern part of County Roscommon and the south-eastern part of County Galway. Still earlier appropriations of this kind can be traced to the time of Niall of the Nine Hostages, his brothers and sons. The old territory of the Fir Domhnann in northern Connacht became Tír Fiachrach, "Fiachra's Land," being appropriated to Fiachra, brother of Niall, and his descendants. Another branch of Fiachra's sept become possessors of the kingdom of Aidhne, lying between Galway Bay and the old Pictish territory before-mentioned. From Brión or Brian, another brother of Niall, is named Tír Briúin or Brión's Land, extending over parts of the counties Roscommon, Leitrim and Cavan. Brion's sept, the Ui Briúin also obtained a territory in the district of Tuam and another territory called Umhall, around Clew Bay. From a third brother of Niall named Ailill is named Tír Ailello, "Ailill's Land," represented by the barony of Tirerrill in Co. Sligo. In like manner, various territories were appropriated to sons of Niall of the Nine Hostages. The western part of Ulster, which was not brought under conquest by the settlement of the Airghialla, and which is now represented by Donegal county, was partitioned among three sons of Niall, Conall, Énda, and Eoghan, and bore afterwards their names Tír Conaill, "Conall's Land"; Tír Énda, "Enda's Land"; and Tír Eoghain, "Eoghan's Land." It should be noted that the original Tír Eoghain was the peninsula now called Inis Eoghain. The country now called Tyrone was then a part of Oriel. This settlement of the sons of Niall in western Ulster was, however, rather by way of conquest than of grant. No element of conquest enters into the settlements of the other sons of Niall or of the septs descended from them.

Cairbre, or his sept, for we have no record by which the grant can be dated, obtained that territory in the north-eastern corner of Connacht, bordering on Ulster, which still retains his name in that of the barony of Carbury in Co. Sligo. A second territory appropriated to Cairbre or his sept was around Granard in Co. Longford. A third was on the Leinster border, and it still preserves the name in that of the barony of Carbury in the north of Co. Kildare.

Loeguire, son of Niall, who became king of Ireland, obtained, or his near descendants obtained, a territory on the Connacht side of Loch Erne, another in Westmeath, another in East Meath or Bregia. Maine, son of Niall, obtained a territory on the east side of the Shannon; Fiachu, son of Niall, a territory in Westmeath; Ardgal, a grandson of Niall, a territory in East Meath.

It seems quite clear that no appropriations of this kind took place before the time of Niall, the close of the fourth century. Had there been earlier appropriations in Connacht or Meath, then there must have been royal septs, offshoots of the Connacht-Meath dynasty, in possession of the appropriated territories and claiming descent from earlier kings of Connacht or Meath. Nor was this claim of descent likely to be forgotten, for, as the Book of Rights shows, in each of the principal group-kingdoms, the kings whose kinship to the principal dynasty was acknowledged, were free of tribute to the principal king. The Book of Rights shows that, except the descendants of Niall and of his brothers, all the petty kingdoms of Connacht and Meath were tributary to the over-kings; and the genealogies show that the ruling families of the tributary kingdoms were as a rule of quite distinct lineage from that of the over-kings. The natural inference from these facts is that this process of superimposing new lords of the dominant dynastic blood over old rulers of a different lineage begins in the time of Niall of the Nine Hostages, about A.D. 400.