60 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



of persons but of peoples. The people-names, however, chiefly belong not to 

 the class discussed above, but to a subordinate class, as will be seen. It is 

 therefore unnecessary here to consider the question of the earliest date of the 

 extant Oghams. Between Ptolemy and the oldest probable manuscript 

 records in Ireland there is a gap of at least three centuries. The names 

 Scotti and Ateeotti, known through Latin writings of the fourth century, are 

 probably of a general application, not designative of special groups. Orosius 

 gives one people-name not mentioned by Ptolemy, the Luceni, whom he places 

 on the southern coast over against Spain ; they have not been identified in 

 Irish tradition. (Is Luceni a copyist's error for luerni ?) 



4. In Christian Ireland, from the fourth century onward, the plural formula 

 for people-names exists only as a survival. The Ulidian tales, which are held 

 to embody very ancient traditions, assign indeed a prominent part to peoples 

 with plural names, the Ulaid, the Lagin, the G-aleoin, the Eraiun, but not a 

 more prominent part than to the Connachta, whose name belongs to quite a 

 different order. As the phrase teora Connccchta shows, this name, though plural, 

 is the plural not of a word denoting an individual, but of a collective noun. 

 Already in the pre-Christian period such collective nouns have for the most part 

 displaced the older formula, tending to obliterate it largely from traditional 

 memory, since among the hundreds of collective names on record only a small 

 proportion are known to originate from an earlier group bearing a plural 

 name. 



5. The obsolescence of the earlier order of names is fui'ther exemplified in 

 the complete absence, so far as my observation goes, of any instance of the use 

 of the singular to denote an individual. The only approach to such usage 

 in my knowledge is the occurrence of a few names like Cormae G-aileng, 

 Ailill Erann, Mugdorn Dub, etc., for persons who in the genealogical lore stand 

 as eponymous ancestors to the Galling, the Erainn, the Mugdoirn, etc. 



6. In the Christian period, the surviving plural names (except in genea- 

 logical writings) tend more and more to become dissociated from population- 

 groups, and to attach themselves in ordinary usage to geographical areas, 

 e.g. Laigin, usually meaning the country Leinster, or the people of Leinster, 

 of whom the original Laigin were only one section. 



7. The following names from Irish MS. sources appear to belong to what 

 may be called the first order, i.e. to the Haedui-type' : — 



8. *Arai, dp. Araib. Mid. Ir. Ara Thire, Ara Chhach. 



' Tlie lists of people-names assembled in this paper are of course drawn mainly from Hogan's 

 Onomasticon (joedelicum, which may be consulted wilh regard to the teiritorial location and extent 



