80 Proceedings of the Royal I fish Academy. 



of Ireland, upwards of seven, hundred years before Solon* legislated for 

 Greece ; and on the highest peak of a range of hills, rendered the more 

 conspicuous and remarkable because they are the highest in the corn- 



chains of gold d (to be worn) on the necks of kings and chieftains in Ireland." 

 " The Age of the World, 3873. The first year of Faildeargdoid." 

 "The Age of the World, 3882. After Faildeargdoid had been ten years in the 

 sovereignty, he fell by Ollamh Fodhla, son of Fiacha Finscothach, in the battle of 

 Teamhair. It was by the King Faildeargdoid 15 that gold rings were first worn 

 upon the hands of chieftains in Ireland." 



" The Age of the World, 3883. The first year of the reign of Ollanih Fodhla, 

 son of Fiacha Finscothach." 



" The Age of the World, 3922. Ollamh Fodhla, after having been forty year3 

 in the sovereignty of Ireland, died at his own mur (house), at Teamhair. f He was 

 the first king by whom the Feis-Teamhrachs was established ; and it was by him 

 Mur-Ollanihan was erected at Teamhair. It was he also that appointed a chieftain 

 over every cantred, h and a Brughaidh over every townland, who were all to 

 serve the king of Ireland.' Eochaidh was the first name of Ollamh Fodhla ; and he 

 was called Ollamh (Fodhla) because he had been first a learned Ollamh, and after- 

 wards king of (Fodhla, i. e. of) Ireland." 



" The Age of the World, 3923. This was the first year of the reign of 

 Finnachta, son of Ollamh Fodhla, over Ireland." 



"The Age of the World, 3942. This was the twentieth year of the reign of 

 Finnachta over Ireland. He afterwards died of the plague in Magh-inis, in UladhJ 

 It was in the reign of Finnachta that snow fell with the taste of wine, which 

 blackened the grass. From this the cognomen Finnachta, k adhered to him. 

 Elirn was his name at first." 



4 Chains of Gold. Keating has the same, and in Mageoghegan's Annals of Clonmacnois it is 

 expressed as follows : — "Mownemon was the first King that devised gould to be wrought in 

 chains fit to be wore about men's necks, and rings to be put on their fingers, which was" 

 (were) " then in great use." 



• Faildeargdoid. He is called Alldeargoid by Keating, and Aldergoid in the Annals of 

 Clonmacnois. This name is derived from pail, a ring ; t>eap5, red ; and t)Olt», the hand. 

 " In his time gold rings were much used on men and women's fingers in this Realm." Annals 

 of Clonmacnois. 



t Sis own mur at Teamhair : i. e., Mur-Ollamhan, i. e. Ollamh Fodhla's house at Tara. In 

 Mageoghegan's translation of the Annals of Clonmacnois it is stated " that he builded a fair 

 palace at Taragh only for the learned sort of this realm, to dwell in at his own charges." But 

 this is probably one of Mageoghegan's interpolations. A similar explanation of Mur-Ollamhan 

 is given by O'Flaherty in his Ogygia, p. 214 ; but Keating, who quotes an ancient poem as 

 authority for the triennial feast or meeting at Tara, has not a word about the palace built for 

 the Ollamhs. See Petrie's Antiquities of Tara Hill, p. 6. 



e Feis-Teamhrach. This term is translated " Temorensia Comitia," by Dr. Lynch, in 

 Cambrensis Fversus, pp. 59, 60, 301, and by O'Flaherty, in Ogygia, part III., c. 29 ; but it is 

 called"Cena" (Coena) " Teamra," in the Annals of Tighernach, at the year 461 , and translated 

 Feast of Taragh by Mageoghegan, in his version of the Annals of Clonmacnois, in which the 

 following notice of it occurs : — " OUow Fodla, of the house of Ulster, was King of Ireland, and 

 of him Ulster took the name. He was the first King of this land that ever kept the great 

 Feast at Taragh, which feast was kept once a year, whereunto all the King's friends and dutiful 

 subjects came yearly ; and such as came not were taken for the King's enemies, and to be pro- 

 secuted by the law and sword, as undutiful to the State." 



h Cantred : cpioOd cet) : i. e. a hundred or barony containing one hundred and twenty 

 quarters of land. It is translated " cantaredus or centivillaria regio" by Colgan. Trias Thaum., 

 p. 19, n. 51. 



! A brughaidh over every townland. Dr. Lynch renders this pasage " singulis agrorum 

 trioenariis Dynastam, singulis Burgis praefectum constituit." A brughaidh, among the ancient 

 Irish, meant a fanner ; and his bdlle or townland comprised four quarters, or four hundred 

 and eighty large Irish acres of land. 



j Magh-inis in Uladh. Now the barony of Lecale, in the county of Down. 



* Finnachta. Keating gives a similar interpretation ; but it is evidently legendary, because 

 Finnachta, or Finnshneachta, was very common as the name of a man among the ancient Irish, 

 denoting Niveus, or snow-white. The name is still preserved in the surname O'Finneachta, 

 anglici Finaghty. 



