Texts

verse beg. A Rí richid, réidig dam

  • Middle Irish
  • verse
  • Early Irish poetry
Middle Irish synchronistic poem by Gilla in Chomdid úa Chormaic (fl. 11th c.) referring to events and personages from biblical, classical and native history.
First words (verse)
  • A Rí richid, réidig dam
“O King of heaven, clarify to me”
Author
Ascribed to: Gilla in Choimded ua Cormaic
Gilla in Choimded úa Cormaic
(11th/12th century?)
No short description available

See more
Language
  • Middle Irish
Form
verse (primary)
Length
Number of stanzas: 111
Textual relationships
The poem refers to both native and Greco-Roman traditions.

Classification

Early Irish poetryEarly Irish poetry
...

Early Irish poetryEarly Irish poetry
...

Sources

Primary sources Text editions and/or modern translations – in whole or in part – along with publications containing additions and corrections, if known. Diplomatic editions, facsimiles and digital image reproductions of the manuscripts are not always listed here but may be found in entries for the relevant manuscripts. For historical purposes, early editions, transcriptions and translations are not excluded, even if their reliability does not meet modern standards.

Full poem
[ed.] Best, Richard Irvine, and M. A. OʼBrien, The Book of Leinster, formerly Lebar na Núachongbála, vol. 3, Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1957. xxi + pp. 471-760.
CELT – pp. 471-638 and 663: <link>
574–586 Diplomatic edition.
Edition wanted
No full critical edition of the poem has been published as yet
Translation wanted
The poem has not been translated in its entirety.
The Finn episode (stanzas 73-100)
Meyer, Kuno [ed. and tr.], “The Finn episode from Gilla in Chomded húa Cormaic's poem 'A Rí richid, réidig dam'”, in: Kuno Meyer, Fianaigecht: being a collection of hitherto inedited Irish poems and tales relating to Finn and his Fiana, 16, London: Hodges, Figgis, 1910. 46–51.
CELT – edition: <link> CELT – translation: <link> Internet Archive: <link>
The Finn episode only (f. 144b), stanzas 73-100.
Reflections on genealogical learning (stanzas 45-47)
Ó Corráin, Donnchadh, “Creating the past: the early Irish genealogical tradition [Carroll Lecture 1992]”, Peritia 12 (1998): 177–208.
[ed.] [tr.] Meyer, Kuno, Miscellanea Hibernica, University of Illinois Studies in Language and Literature, 2.4, Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois, 1917.  

Contents: I. Sualtaim; II. Fer Diad the Nibelung; III. Notes on Irish metrics; IV. An Old Irish poem ascribed to St Moling [Rochūala la nech lēgas libru]; V. Ancient Irish poems with sporadic rhyme [incl. verse beg. Admuiniur secht n-ingena, A Amorgein ānmoltaig, Āiliu tech midchūarta, Ind rāith i comair in dairfheda, Dīa Dīa dorrogus re tīas inna gnūis]; VI. Philological notes [21 notes on Old and MIddle Irish]; VII. Notes on Irish texts; VIII. Notes on Thurneysen's Handbuch des Altirischen; Index of words and names.

HathiTrust: <link> Internet Archive – Incomplete: pp. 44-45 missing: <link>
9 Edition and translation
[ed.] [tr.] MacNeill, John, “Early Irish population groups: their nomenclature, classification and chronology”, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 29 C (April 1911, 1911–1912): 59–114.
CELT: <link> Internet Archive: <link>
93 Edition and translation of stanzas 45-47 direct link

Secondary sources (select)

Miles, Brent, Heroic saga and classical epic in medieval Ireland, Studies in Celtic History, 30, Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2011.  
abstract:
The puzzle of Ireland's role in the preservation of classical learning into the middle ages has always excited scholars, but the evidence from the island's vernacular literature - as opposed to that in Latin - for the study of pagan epic has largely escaped notice. In this book the author breaks new ground by examining the Irish texts alongside the Latin evidence for the study of classical epic in medieval Ireland, surveying the corpus of Irish texts based on histories and poetry from antiquity, in particular Togail Troi, the Irish history of the Fall of Troy. He argues that Irish scholars' study of Virgil and Statius in particular left a profound imprint on the native heroic literature, especially the Irish prose epic Táin Bó Cúailnge (“The Cattle-Raid of Cooley”).
48–49
Hillers, Barbara, “In fer fíamach fírglic: Ulysses in medieval Irish literature”, Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium 16–17 (2003): 15–38.
Discusses the references to Ulysses and the siren (murdúchu) motif
Contributors
Dennis Groenewegen, Patrick Brown
Page created
June 2011, last updated: January 2024