225 



of the day, and Is further worth notice as having been edited by Gro- 

 tius, when he was only fourteen years of age. 



Historical composition must have had many votaries at a period, 

 when both the domestic and foreign relations of Ireland were so well 

 worth recording. Innes coldly admits the fact. " In these ages 

 when that country was more famous for learning and learned men 

 than most other nations, by consequence it is natural to expect that 

 they should have had as good monuments of history, civil and eccle- 

 siastical as any country, though by the Danish invasions and other 

 accidents many valuable pieces of that kind may have perished."* 

 The revision and castigation of the Irish chronicles by Saint Patrick, 

 has been already alluded to, "I" and is a conclusive testimony that such 

 histories must have existed in abundance, while even Cambrensis.]: 

 mentions the " antiquissimas Hibernensium historias." 



Poetry, it has already been shewn, was of the highest antiquity 

 amongst the Irish,§ in truth there was a period when the bards appear 

 to have been the sole movers and conductors of their public affairs. 

 At the close of the sixth century, according to the native annals, 

 their number had so increased, and their extortions and licentious- 

 ness become so insupportable, that their total suppression was only 

 prevented by the interference of Columba, when wholesome regula- 

 tions were established for their observance.il It has been before men- 

 tioned from the lives of Saint Patrick, how Dubthach, the chief bard 



* Critical Essay, vol. 2> p. 404. 



t ^nte, p. 178. J Top. Hib. Dist. 3. c. 1. 



§ See O'Conor, Rer. Hib. Script. Nunc. Epist. ccxliv. 



II Lanigan's Eccl. Hist. vol. 2. p. 237, &c., and Walker's Irish Bards, p. 53, &c. In 

 about a century after, the Welsh formed the same institutions for their bards under Cadwal- 

 lader, as did Gurniund, King of Denmark, for the Northern Scalds, in 880. — See Anthol. 

 Hib. voa. 3, p. 2.43, 

 ■ bcsl do tntiiUt^. ini-rbX toflae la la/fpiqaoO .Iffhsvaosxioo .hflj'jsfab siq ( 



.&! .3 ,0 J?.ia .(JiH .qoT— ''.lojatftisl • » * » is-xl>om aca l': 



