192 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



XXX. — On an Ogham- inscribed Stone prom Mount Music, Co. Cork. 

 A letter addressed to the Secretary of the Academy by Samuel 

 Ferguson, LL. D., Q. C, Vice-President. 



[Read 23rd February, 1874.] 



20, North Great George's-street, 



Dublin, 2nd Feb. 1874. 



Dear Sir, — My friend Mr. Brash has sent me the enclosed paper 

 on an Ogham-inscribed stone from Knockauran, now in the possession 

 of Mrs. Windele at Cork, which I wish you to be kind enough to pro- 

 cure Council's permission to read at the next meeting of the Academy. 

 It is possible I may not be able myself to attend the meeting, and, 

 as the inscription is one on which I am able to add something that 

 seems to me to be of interest, to what Mr. Erash communicates, I will 

 so far trespass on your goodness as to ask you, after reading Mr. Brash's 

 remarks, to read also the following from me : — 



I agree that the principal name is Annaccanni, although to some 

 eyes it might appear as Annaccasni, the difference being due to the 

 obscurity of one digit in the antepenultimate group. Supposing it to 

 be the representative of the Aenagan and JEigneghan of the manuscripts 

 it will be for philologists to say whether the Oghamic form, according 

 to their conceptions, betokens an earlier or a later date. On this sub- 

 ject I may observe that, within the range of my own observation, I 

 have nowhere met a distinct example of the letter h in any lapidary 

 Ogham text ; and that if the vocalic change of ae or ei into a should be 

 held to tell a tale of modern innovation, the absence of the h would 

 seem to point the other way. I invite the consideration of philolo- 

 gists to this topic, because in the Ogham text last submitted by Mr. 

 Brash to the Academy [ante, p. 1 88], the form Declenn drew attention, 

 from its apparently evidencing a change posterior to the use of the name 

 as found in manuscripts, that is in the form Deglan ; and I would wish 

 to ask is it true that a in the one case or c in the other can be shown, 

 on any settled phonetic principles, to be more modern respectively 

 than ce, ei, and g ? for, if so, we ought, in these characteristics, to have 

 a pretty certain guide to the dates of the objects. 



More difficulty attends the group of characters which Mr. Brash 

 takes to be the patronymic. I conceive that what is taken for the two 

 distinct groups u and a (three notches and one notch separably) is the 

 single vowel of five consecutive notches, i, and think I discern all the 

 members of the group on the paper cast to which I refer. This would 

 yield so far the combination Aillitt — and it seems not improbable to me 

 that what remains is the termination of some form of Ailiter— seemingly 

 spelled Aillittar, "a pilgrim." Certainly, I would find excessive dim- 



