213 



internal proof of the modern fabrication of these poems. It is a posi- 

 tive fact, that there is not in existence any manuscript of an earUer 

 date than at least the ninth century, in which the word Lochlann is 

 used as the name of the country of the Danes and Norwegians, In 

 the modern copy of the Annals of Inisfallen, in the Library of Trinity 

 College, Dublin, we find the appearance of those pirates first men- 

 tioned under the year 795, in these words : " Lochlonnaigh aig iom- 

 ramhadh ttimchioU na h Eireand da hrath agus argain barca hhfear 

 n Eireann Leo don cead amas" i. e. " The Lochlanns rowing round 

 Ireland to reconnoitre it, and the barks of the men of Ireland were 

 plundered by them at the first onset." Here, within a few years of 

 the ninth century, we find these people called Lochlannaigh, or 

 Lochlanns, but in the original copy, in the Bodleian Library, this 

 occurrence is recorded in these words: ^' Geinte in h Erind." i. e. 

 "The Gentiles (or Pagans) in Ireland;" and in the Annals of Ulster 

 the same name is given to them. The Annals of the Four Masters, 

 which are copied from more ancient records, call these people Alm- 

 huraigh and Fomharaigh, both signifying Firatcs ; and though the 

 Dublin copy of the Inisfallen annals has the name Lochlannaigh, it 

 is certain that the people called Lochlins by Mr. Macpherson, were 

 not known by that name before the tenth century. The name, 

 therefore, of Lochlins, appearing in the poems of Ossian, is a strong 

 internal proof that those poems could not be the production of the 

 period to which they are assigned. 



It is worthy of observation, that in the extract from the annals of 

 Inisfallen, in Trinity College Library, it is said that in the year 795, 

 the Lochlans were " rowing round Ireland." This is a quite different 

 picture of the Danish fleet from that given of it by Ossian and Mr. 

 Macpherson, who would make us believe that six hundred years 



F F 2 



