30 Mr. Petrie on the History and Antiquities of Tara Hill. 



this cognomen did really exist ; and the ancient lives of St. Patrick, as well as 

 the authentic annals, sufficiently prove that triennial assemblies at Tara, what- 

 ever may have been the exact time of their institution, had certainly existed 

 from a very remote period preceding the introduction of Christianity. 



It must be confessed also, that the doubts created by the great antiquity 

 assigned to Ollamh and his institutions have been considerably increased by the 

 pompous amplifications given by the most learned modern Irish antiquaries of the 

 simple records of the original annalists. It is not easy to read without incredu- 

 lity the following passage from O'Flaherty, which may serve as an example of 

 this amplification : 



" Ipse Uteris apprime excultus OUamh-Fodla, .i. per Hiberniam quae Fodla lingua nostra dicitur, 

 praecipuus literarum professor (cui Achaio prius nomen datum) ob insignem literaturae peritiam 

 meruit appellari. Qui ad promovendum etiam literarum studium Mur-OUamhan, i. Doctorum 

 murum Temoria; erexit. Gymnasium, Canopum, Prytaneum, Academiam, vel Lyceum dicas ; de 

 quibus ultimis accipe hos Ciceronis versus : 



" Inque Academia umbrifera, nitidoque Lyceo 

 Fuderunt claras faecundi pectoris artes." — Ogygia, p. 214. 



By a reference to the passage previously quoted from the Four Masters, on which 

 this evidently rests, it will be seen that the only foundation for a belief in the ex- 

 istence of this college or Lyceum, is an etymological inference from the name of 

 the house or mur, in which Ollamh Fodhla died, a name which, when translated 

 grammatically, can have no other meaning than the House of Ollamh himself, as 

 the genitive singular form of Ollamh is Ollamhan ; and it is thus understood 

 by Keating, who has not a word about the college of the Ollamhs, or Professors, 

 but simply states that Ollamh Fodhla died in his own house (ma C15 pein). 



In like manner, the late Irish lexicographer, Edward O'Reilly, in his Essay 

 on the Brehon Laws, translates the following passage in the Leabhar Gabhala, 

 or Book of Invasions : 



Qp 6 ceona pij lap a noeapnao pep He was the first king by whom was held the Feis 



Ceaiiipach a muip Olluriiain 1 cCeampai^, of Tara in the College of Professors. — Transac- 

 &c. tions of Royal Irish Academy, vol. xiv. p. 147. 



The same writer elsewhere {Irish Writers, p. xv.) states, that the laws pro- 

 mulgated by this monarch, Ollamh Fodhla, are quoted in Cormac's Glossary, a 

 work of the ninth century ; but on a careful examination of that work, it has 

 been found that this assertion is not true. 



