Charles-Edwards (T. M.)
- s. xx–xxi
- (agents)
Bretha Comaithcheso, “Judgements on Neighbourhood”, is a tract forming part of the great law-book, Senchas Már, dating from c. 700. It expounds the law governing relations between neighbouring farmers, especially those who formed by contract a co-operative group. Already in the pre-Viking period it was attracting layers of comment, both glosses and a dossier of more extended texts that amplify or update or even contradict the main text. The result is a collection of material outstandingly rich among European texts on farming of a similar date.
Liam Breatnach’s Quiggin Lecture, The Early Irish law text Senchas Már and the question of its date, proposed that the Senchas Már was written in a single effort mounted by the church of Armagh within the date range c. 660 × c. 680. This revised and expanded version of a lecture given in 2017 accepts that there was a link between Armagh and the Senchas Már, sets the latter in the context of the written laws of Western Europe, 400–800, and investigates how the Senchas Már might have fitted into the sequence of seventh-century texts pertaining to Patrick. It also tackles two related issues: the relationship between evolving ideas of Irish nationality, the Patrician legend and the Senchas Már, and how one might bridge the gap between the Patrick of the saint’s own writings and conceptions of Patrick current in the seventh century.
Almost all the fundamental facts about the Amrae, the most intriguing and the most difficult of early Irish texts on Columba of Iona, are disputed: its date, its authorship, whether it is a poem or prose, for what audience or readership it was intended, and even the meaning of the title. Hitherto, discussion has been hampered by the absence of a reliable critical edition, one that takes into account all the surviving copies and situates them in the manuscript tradition of the text. This task has been admirably performed by Bisagni. His edition includes a book-length introduction which advocates an early ninth-century date for the main text of the Amrae, locates its composition at the Columban monastery of Durrow, and interprets it as a response by the Columban familia to the threat posed to its interests by the church of Armagh in a period when Áed Oirdnide of Cenél nÉogain reigned as king of Tara. Bisagni’s arguments are considered in the light of the text he has provided.
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