Okpen — TMn Gallon and the 'Dunum^ of Ptolemy. 43 



Labraid Loingsech [Labraid ' the Exile'], to Erin, and they sacked Dind Big, 

 &c. From them the Galio\i\n are named, as if Gall-lion [' G-aulish multi- 

 tude '] and then posterity continued for a long time in the land, witness 

 Diin nGalion among the Ddl Mesi Gorb." ' 



It may be inferred from this passage that at the time when the tract was 

 first written there was in existence in the territory then known as Dal Messi 

 Corb an ancient fortress called Dun Galion, and traditionally associated with 

 a foreign people, usually called Galidin (more properly Galidin) or, as we may 

 call them, Galians. 3 "Was this the fortress now known as Eathgall ? 



We must first then inquire where the territory known as Dal Messi Corb 

 lay. From the notes in the Lebor Brecc to the Martyrology of Oengus it 

 seems probable that Inis Baithin, now Ennisboyne in the parish of Dungans- 

 town, County Wicklow, was in it, 3 and also Inber Doeli, now Ennereilly near 

 Arklow. 4 O'Donovan, referring to the former passage, says that the Dal 

 Messi Corb were " seated in the barony of Arklow and some of the adjoining 

 districts in the present county of "Wicklow." 5 This statement is, no doubt, 

 correct, as far as it goes ; but can we not gain some idea as to the extent of 

 these " adjoining districts " ? 



1 LL. 311a (20). There is a later and fuller version, ibid., 377 a. I render the words 

 jianlag do gidlaib, a band of ' Gauls,' as such seems the original meaning of the word 

 Gaill, i.e., Galli. The more familiar use as denoting the Northmen, and afterwards the 

 English, or, indeed, any kind of foreigners, was a post- Viking extension of the original 

 meaning. See the remarks of Prof. Kuno Meyer ; Revue Celtique, vol. xi, p. 438. 



■ The name appears in various forms pointing to nom. pi. Galidin, Galioin, Galiuin, 

 Galeoin, Gailediu, &c. This last form gave rise to a false etymology from gai, 'a spear,' 

 adopted by Keating (I. T. S., vol. i, p. 194), and implied by the equivalent viri armorwm 

 of the Irish Nennius. This meaning was probably suggested by the old etymology of 

 Laigin (Leinster) from laigne, 'spears,' but the duplication of this idea, as Sir John Rhys 

 remarks (Celtic Heathendom, p. 600), is "a little too much to nass. 7 ' M. D'Arbois de 

 Jubainville says that the older gen. pi. was Galian, assonating with giall, grian. The 

 nom. pi. would then be Galidin, representing Galiani, This he regards as a derivative 

 of Galli-a. But Galidin never has 11, while, as Sir John Rhys has pointed out to me, there 

 are several related names with the single I, e.g. TaXctTai, (.Galatians), Galam or Golam, 

 the Celtic name of Mil (Lat. Miles), and Galedin for Galat-in-i, a Welsh name, to be 

 referred to by-and-by, for the Belgae of the south coast of Britain. Moreover, Windisch 

 treats Galiain as inflected likefirian, pi. fireoin, gen. firian, reduced to fire n (Tain B. C. , 

 p. 50 ; and see Worterbuch, Irische Texte) ; and Stokes gives the original form of this as 

 verianos, (Urkeltischer Sprachschatz, p. 272). Moreover, Thurneysen says that firidn is 

 borrowed from Kymric (Brythonic) gimrion (Handbuch des Alt-Irischen, p. 519), or 

 rather, we should say, from the antecedent to that, namely, Wirianos. From this 

 comparison and analysis the important conclusion seems to follow that we must regard 

 Galidin, borrowed from a Brythonic Galiani, as the name by which a Brythonic people 

 called themselves, that is to say, the name could not have been originated by the Goidels. 

 Perhaps Login, the ' spear-men,' was the Goidelic name applied to an immigrant people 

 who called themselves, or were called by their congeners, Galidin. 



3 Martyrology of Oengus (Henry Bradshaw Soc), p. 134. 



4 Ibid., p. 206 ; and see ,; Inber daele," Onom. Goed. 5 Four Masters, 952. 



