Archæological research shows that Ireland was inhabited from very early times though it is impossible to fix the exact chronological limit of the earliest colonization. Passing over the beginnings of civilization which are exemplified by the crude implements and other remains of the Stone Age, we note that in the Bronze Age when the art of working metals had been discovered the existing specimens of the work of these ancient craftsmen point to a relatively advanced stage of civilization. Indeed, an examination of the discoveries of this period amply justifies the statement that “in point of wealth, artistic feeling and workmanship, the Irish craftsmen of the Bronze Age surpassed those of Britain.”[1] The doyen of prehistoric chronology, Dr. Oscar Montelius of Stockholm, having studied the antiquities of the British Isles, gave the result of his labours in a memoir published in 1918.[2] This work is now the standard authority on this subject. Dr. Montelius divides the Bronze Age into five periods. In the first period he includes the Transitional Period where copper was in use (Copper period) which he places between the middle of the third and the beginning of the second millenium, B.C. One of the greatest living Irish archæologists, Mr. George Coffey, while agreeing with the Scandinavian as to the division into five periods, would not place the first period so early as has been suggested by Dr. Montelius, but agrees that the first period ended between 2000 B.C. and 1800 B.C. Both writers would place the end of the fifth period, that is, the end of the Bronze Age about 350 B.C. Thus we may consider the Irish Bronze Age as extending approximately from 2000 B.C. to 350 B.C. Mr. Coffey in one of his valuable works gives numerous illustrations representative of each period.[3] The originals are nearly all in the National Museum, Dublin, where Mr. Coffey is the official Keeper of Irish Antiquities. A notable feature of the finds of this period is the abundance and variety of the gold ornaments. The collection of gold ornaments of Irish workmanship is the largest in the British Isles being twelve or thirteen times more than that in the British Museum.[4] Possibly, this is but a small fraction of the entire output of the Irish artists of pagan times; for many Irish gold ornaments have been discovered in Scandinavia and in Western Europe not to speak of many finds which never enter a museum.[5]
From such material remains it would appear to be a legitimate deduction that even at this early age the Irish were skilled craftsmen and acquired by some means at least an elementary and industrial and technical education and that they were already cultivating the æsthetic. Art was developing on distinctly national lines, yet the country was not isolated. There must have been direct communication with the Continent; for Mr. Coffey has traced Aegean and Scandinavian influence in the incised ornament of the New Grange group[6] and Iberian influence on some of the later type of bronze ornaments.[7]
THE BREHON LAWS:
The laws of a country dealing as they do with man in his relations to his fellow-man and society in general are always an important indication of the state of civilization attained by the race which has evolved them. In this connection a valuable source of information on the social condition and state of culture attained by the pagan Irish is the native code of laws, generally styled the Brehon Laws, but more correctly termed the Féineachas. According to a generally accepted tradition these laws were revised and codified in 438 A.D. by a committee of nine appointed by King Laoghaire at the suggestion of St. Patrick. The committee consisted of three kings (Laoghaire, High King of Ireland; Corc, King of Munster; and Daire, King of Cairnach); three saints (St. Patrick, himself, St. Benin and St. Cairnech); and three learned men (Ross, Dubhthach and Feargus).[8] These laws grew up with the people from the very beginning of society and took cognisance of them from every point of view. They professed to regulate domestic and social relations of every kind, as well as professions, trades, industries, occupations and wages.[9] As laws they are too minute; but this defect renders them valuable to the student who is interested in the social conditions of the period during which they were evolved. As a recent commentator[10] has remarked: “The rigorously authentic character of these laws relating to, and dealing with the actual realities of life and with institutions and a state of society nowhere else revealed to the same extent; the extreme antiquity both of the provisions and the language in which they were written, and the meagreness of Continental material illustrative of the same things endow them with exceptional archaic, archæological and philological interest.” The development of such a comprehensive and detailed code of laws must have been the work of many generations of lawmakers and suggest a relatively high degree of native culture. In this connection one is inclined to quote the emphatic declaration of Dr. George Sigerson who has won honours both as a litterateur and as a scientist. He says: “I assert that, biologically speaking, such laws could not emanate from any race whose brains had not been subject to the quickening influence of education for many generations.”[11] In other words, such a code of laws can be accounted for only on the assumption of a high degree of culture as a racial heritage of the nation which evolved them.
EVIDENCE FROM EARLY IRISH LITERATURE:
There are many passages in the oldest Irish literature, both secular and religious, which state that the Irish had books before the introduction of Christianity. In a memoir[12] of St. Patrick written in the seventh century Muirchu Maccu Machteni relates how during the contest of the saint with the druids—the learned men of the time—the High King Laoghaire proposed that one of St. Patrick’s books and one belonging to the druids should be cast into the water to see which would come out uninjured—a kind of ordeal. Here it will be noticed that Muirchu’s statement embodies a tradition which was old in the seventh century. The same story is told in the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick.[13] Both the Irish bardic tales and the oldest existing lives of St. Patrick agree in stating that he found in the country both literary and professional men—all pagans—druids, poets and antiquarians or historians,[14] as well as an elaborate code of laws.[15]
Although no Irish document has been preserved which dates earlier than the seventh century, there is ample intrinsic evidence that the earliest existing documents were copied from manuscripts which go back a century or two earlier and these again may have recorded the traditions of a still earlier period. Authorities are agreed that after the establishment of Christianity in the fifth century the Irish scholars committed to writing not only the laws, bardic historical poems, &c. of their own time, but those which had been preserved from earlier times whether traditionally or otherwise.[16] In a subsequent chapter reference will be made to a common practice of the Irish monks, namely that of making marginal and interlinear glosses on the classical writings they were studying, copying, or teaching. For the present it is sufficient to note that even in the case of the earliest of the seventh century glosses the written language was fully developed and cultivated, with a polished phraseology and an elaborate and systematic grammar having well established forms for its words and for all its rich inflections. To the linguistic student it is inconceivable how much a complete and regular system of writing could have developed in the period which had elapsed from the introduction of Christianity in the fifth century until the general spread of Christian learning in the seventh. Such a period would be much too short, especially when it is recollected that early Irish literature had its roots not in Christianity but in the native learning which was the main, and almost the sole, influence in developing it. This consideration points clearly to the conclusion that native learning was carefully and systematically cultivated before the introduction of Christianity.
Again, Irish poetry owes its development solely to the Lay Schools.[17] It had complicated prosody—with numerous technical terms[18] all derived from the Irish language. These vernacular terms used in Irish grammar contrast strikingly with the terms used to designate the offices and ceremonies of Christianity which were almost all derived from Latin.[19] All this would go to prove that Irish prosodial rules and technical terms, and of course Irish poetry itself, were fully developed before the introduction of Christianity.