Revue Celtique 9 (1888) — Irish text, unedited

¹ The text of the following story, now for the first time printed, is taken from a transcript which I made in 1871 from the only known copy, that, namely, in columns 391–395 of H. 2. 16, a manuscript of the fourteenth century preserved in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, and commonly called the Yellow Book of Lecan. The story is one of a class of sagas called Imrama, of which only three other specimens are known to exist, and on which Dr. Schirmer of St Gallen is about to publish a treatise. Like the best known of these sagas, the Imrom Maele Duin, our story is twofold, each part of it being first told in prose and then in verse, which is full, as usual, of chevilles, is often obscure, and is sometimes obviously corrupt. In the present edition the verse is omitted.

² The Voyage of Snedgus and Mac Riagla (or Mac Riaguil) has been analysed by O’Curry in his Lectures, p. 333, and is quoted by him in his Manners and Customs III, 385, as giving two instances of the rare word sianan, some kind of vocal music. Other such words are cuilefaid=culebad (gl. flabellum)1; fant ‘hollow’, borrowed from the Welsh pant; comgaire ‘vicinity’; braga (dat. pl. braigtib) ‘prisoner’; aile ‘fence’; mesrugud “adjudication”; forbas ‘siege’; eisles ’neglect’. The phrase dia bliadna, literally “(that) day of (the following) year”, and the act. redupl. future pl. 3 gébtait may also be noted.

³ Some of the persons named in our tale are historical characters of the seventh century. King Domnall son of Aed, son of S. Colomb cille’s first cousin Ainmire, died A.D. 642 (or 639 according to the Four Masters). His successors, Maelcoba’s sons, Conall Cael and Cellach, reigned jointly till A.D. 659 (or 656). The middle of the seventh century may therefore be fixed roughly as the date of incidents of the tale.

⁴ The Men of Ross, whose vengeful act gives rise to the story, were a tribe whose territory (according to O’Donovan2) “comprised the parishes of Carrickmacross and Clonany, in the county of Monaghan, and parts of the adjoining counties of Meath and Louth.”

⁵ Great was the resentment of the Men of Ross after the destruction of Domnall son of Aed, son of Ainmire, and this was the cause of their resentment. After Mael Coba’s sons had taken Ireland after Domnall, the sons of Domnall were ruling Cenél Conaill and the Men of Ross — Donnchad and Fiacha: Donnchad over the land of Conall, and Fiacha over the Men of Ross.

⁶ Great was their harshness under Fiacha, for none of them was allowed arms or bright clothing, for they had never been ruled by a king like that before, and excessive was the burden of his service.

⁷ Fiacha was one year ruling over them. On the day of the year Fiacha came to Inber Bóinne, and the Men of Ross were summoned to him. He said to them: “Render service still.”

⁸ “We have nothing more,” said they. He said to them: “Pour out all the brine upon my palm.”

⁹ It was poured, and thus was the brine — half of it blood.

¹⁰ Then he said: “There is no due service upon you yet, for the brine is not all. Fill the hills into the hollows that they may be dry land. Plant woods on the plains that they may be forests.”

¹¹ Then a deer rose out of a stone near them. All the king’s household rose in pursuit of the deer. Then the Men of Ross took the king’s own arms, for none of them had arms, and slew him thereafter.

¹² That deed was ill in the eyes of his brother Donnchad, and he came and seized them as prisoners, every one, and put them in a single house to burn them.

¹³ Then he said to himself: “It is not right for me to do this deed without the counsel of my soul-friend, Colum Cille.”

¹⁴ A messenger was sent to Colum Cille. Snedgus and Mac Riagla came from Colum Cille with counsel for him — that sixty couples of them should be put out upon the sea, and that God should pass his judgement upon them.

¹⁵ Little boats were given to them and they were put upon the sea, and they were guarded lest they should come back.

¹⁶ Snedgus and Mac Riagla turned back to go to Iona, to Colum Cille.

¹⁷ As they were in their coracle they said to one another that they would go of their own will into the outer ocean on pilgrimage, as the sixty couples had gone — though it was not of their own will that those had gone.

¹⁸ Then they turned southwards, and the south-west wind bore them into the outer ocean.

¹⁹ After three days a great storm overtook them, so that it was unbearable for them.

²⁰ Then Christ had mercy on them, and brought them to a sweet-tasting stream like new milk, and they were sated by it. They gave thanks to God, and said: “Let us leave our voyage to God, and put our oars into the boat.” And thereafter their voyage was left alone, and they put their oars into the boat, and when they had come it was then the poet spoke:

²¹ Snedgus and Mac Riagla

²² of the household of Colum Cille

[…]

²³ After that they were carried to another island, with a silver fence across its middle, and a salmon-weir in it, and the weir was a sheet of silver; and great salmon used to leap against the weir. Each salmon of them was as big as a bull-calf, and they ate their fill of them.

²⁴ Then they rowed to another island, and many young men facing them in that island with cats’ heads on them. One Gaelic-speaking man in it went down to the strand and welcomed them, and said to them: “Of the men of Ireland am I,” said he. “We came here a coracle’s crew, and none of us is left but myself alone. They died a martyr’s death by

²⁵ the foreign inhabitants of this island.” And he gave them food in the coracle, and they left a blessing and took a blessing.

²⁶ Then the wind bore them to an island where there was a great tree with beautiful birds. There was a great bird on top with a head of gold and wings of silver, and it told them tales of the beginning of the world, and told of the birth of Christ from Mary the Virgin, and his baptism and his passion and his resurrection. And it told the tales of the Judgement; and then all the birds beat their sides with their wings until drops of blood ran from their sides for fear of the sign of the Judgement. And that blood was a communion and a sacrament. And the bird gave to the clerics a leaf of the leaves of that tree, and that leaf was the size of a great ox-hide. And it said to the clerics to take that leaf with them upon the altar of Colum Cille — and that is Colum Cille’s flabellum to this day: it is at Kells.

²⁷ Sweet was the music of those birds singing the psalms and canticles in praise of the Lord, for they were the birds of the plain of heaven, and the bodies of the leaves of that tree never wither.

²⁸ Then they blessed the birds, and rowed to a horrible land where there were men with dogs’ heads upon them, with horse-manes upon them. A cleric came out to them from the island, by God’s command, to help them, for they were in peril there without food; and he gave them fish and wine and wheat.

²⁹ Then they rowed until they reached a land where there were people with pigs’ heads upon them, and they […], and great reapers with them cutting the grain in mid-summer.

³⁰ They went from there in their coracle, and sang their psalms and prayed to God, until they reached a land where there were people of the men of Ireland, and

³¹ the women of the island began singing sianan for them at once, and the clerics found it sweet.

³² “Sing still,” said the cleric: “that is the sianan of Ireland.”

³³ “Let us go, O clerics!” said the women, “to the house of the king of the island, for you shall have welcome and entertainment there.”

³⁴ The women and the clerics go to the house, and the king welcomed the clerics and relieved their weariness, and asked them: “From where is your kindred, O clerics?”

³⁵ “Of the men of Ireland are we,” said the clerics, “and of the household of Colum Cille.”

³⁶ “How is Ireland?” said he, “and how many sons of Domnall are alive?” said the king.

³⁷ The cleric answered: “Domnall had three sons; and Fiacha son of Domnall fell by the Men of Ross, and sixty couples of them were put upon the sea for that deed.”

³⁸ “True for you, O clerics, is that tale. It is I who slew the son of the king of Tara, and it is we who were put upon the sea, and well is it for us, for we shall be here till the judgement comes, for we are well without sin, without lust, without fraud on account of it. Good is the island in which I am, for Enoch and Elijah are in it, and noble is the dwelling in which Elijah is.”

³⁹ And he made a great welcome for the clerics and said: “There are two lakes in this land, a lake of water and a lake of fire, which would long ago have reached Ireland were it not for Martin and Patrick praying against them.”

⁴⁰ “We should like to see Enoch,” said the cleric.

⁴¹ “He is in a hidden place — we shall all reach it on the day of the last battle.”

⁴² Then they rowed from that land and were on the billows of the sea

⁴³ for a long while, until great help came to them from God, for they were weary, and they saw a great high island, and wonderful and holy was what was in it.

⁴⁴ Good was the king that was in the island, and holy and righteous, and great was his host, and noble the household of that king, for there were a hundred doors in the house, and an altar at each door, and a cleric at every altar offering the body of Christ.

⁴⁵ Then the clerics went into that house, and each of them blessed the other, and all that great host, both women and men, went then to hear mass.

⁴⁶ Wine was poured for them thereafter, and the king said to the clerics: “Tell the men of Ireland that there is a great vengeance upon you. Foreigners shall come across the sea and shall inhabit the half of the island, and shall lay siege to you; and this is what will bring that vengeance upon them — the greatness of the neglect they put upon God’s commandments and upon his teaching. A month of a year have you been upon the sea, and you shall reach home, and tell all your tidings to the men of Ireland.”

⁴⁷ 16 Sept 1887