Mr. Petrie on the History and Antiquities of Tara Hill. 49 



fourteenth century, If not of an earlier age, may be received as authority for his 

 statement with respect to these schools, the writer of the present memoir has no 

 means of ascertaining, as the book of O'Duvegan, one of the most valuable 

 repertories of ancient Irish literature existing, which formerly belonged to Sir 

 William Betham, is now in the possession of a distinguished MS. collector in 

 England ; and no other copy of the poem is known to exist in Ireland. But 

 the general silence of all the other ancient authorities on the foundation of these 

 establishments, is in itself a presumptive evidence either that O'Flaherty had mis- 

 taken the sense of his author, as in the instance of Mur OUamhan, or that the 

 old j)oet himself had indulged in the common Bardic propensity to exaggeration. 



The reign of Cormac is memorable, as the period in which the celebrated Finn 

 Mac Cumhail, the Fingal of Mac Pherson's Ossian, flourished. His death is re- 

 corded by Tighearnach, at the year 272 ; but the true date, according to O'Flaherty, 

 is 284. This distinguished man was the son-in-law of Cormac, and general of his 

 army, which, as Pinkerton remarks, seems to have been an imitation of the 

 Roman legions. " He seems," says the writer, " to have been a man of great 

 talents for the age, and of celebrity in arms. His formation of a regular stand- 

 ing army, trained to war, in which all the Irish accounts agree, seems to have 

 been a rude imitation of the Roman legions in Britain. The idea, though simple 

 enough, shows prudence, for such a force alone could have coped with the 

 Romans had they invaded Ireland. But this machine, which surprised a rude 

 age, and seems the basis of all Finn's fame, like some other great schemes, only 

 lived in its author, and expired soon after him." — Inquiry into the Hist, of 

 Scotland, vol. ii. p. 77. 



As the successors of Cormac Mac Art, at Tara, to the time of Dermot Mac 

 Ceirbheoil, belong to a period of history now generally received as authentic, 

 and are all in some degree connected with the monuments now or formerly 

 existing there, it will be proper in this place to give a list of them in chronolo- 

 gical succession, with an abstract of such important events of their reigns as bear 

 particularly on the subject of this memoir. In this list the authority of Tighear- 

 nach will, as usual, be preferred to that of the later annalists ; but, as there is a 

 chasm in the former from the year 360 to the year 489, it will be necessary to 

 use the ether annals to supply the requisite links in the historical chain. 



I. EocHAiDH GuNNAT Succeeded Cormac, and reigned one year. The 



VOL. xvni. g 



