285 
IRELAND. 
tnitive inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland," adduced 
a great variety of proofs that the original inhabitants of 
this country were the Cuthi, or old Perfians of facred 
Scripture, and the Aire-Cotii of Dionylius Periegetes, 
whom he found on the river Indus, and who, according 
to Irifh hiftory, mixed with the Bolg or Bolouges, feated 
on the fame river, then with the people of Oman, on the 
Perfian Gulf, and afterwards with the Tuatha Dedan, or 
the learned fcientific Dedanites of Chaldea, forming one 
body of people, known to the Greek hiftorians by the name 
of Indo-Scythae, who, for the fake of commerce, fettled 
on the Pontus and Cafpian fea, and thence migrated to 
Spain and to the Britifh ides. According to the fame in¬ 
genious writer, Erin, the molt ancient appellation of this 
ifland, is the fame with Iran, the proper name of Perfia; 
and its firft colonilts, the Indo-Scythae, the fame people 
with the Phcenices of Tyre, who are faid to have traded 
from Spain with the Britifn illands. He brings forward 
authorities to demonftrate that they introduced the art 
of navigation, and a knowledge of the liars to guide 
them ; the art of filling and working metals; of making 
glafs, arithmetical figures and Pelafgian letters, together 
with an ogham, or myfterious character; of all which he 
fays, monuments remain, and are almoft daily found as 
the bogs are cleared away; that, like their Afiatic bre¬ 
thren, they erected no Itone buildings, the fire-tower ex¬ 
cepted, which was copied from the moll ancient pagodas 
of India ; that, before Chrillianity was introduced, two 
idolatrous religions prevailed, that of the ancient Perfians 
and that of the Chaldeans; the latter introduced by the 
Dedanite colony; but both worfhipped the fun, moon, 
planets, and fire, and at length coalefced into one. In 
fupport of this hypothefis of the eallern origin of the early 
inhabitants of this illand, general Vallancey has pointed 
out the flrong refemblance which fubfilts between the an¬ 
cient Irifh language and the Zend and Pehlvi; and fhown 
that they made ufe of oriental terms in grammar, aftro- 
nomy, and legiflation ; in the dalles and ranks of men ; 
in manufactures, arts, fciences, and topography; terms 
perfectly unknown to the Celts, or any other northern na¬ 
tion or wellern people. The very mythology of the 
Brahmins is, according to this learned and ingenious 
writer, minutely detailed in the hiftory of Ireland, and 
the names of their deities often occur in ancient Irifh ma- 
nufcripts. The fimilarity of the religion of the inhabi¬ 
tants of this remote wellern ifland with that of the Per¬ 
fians of antiquity, is confirmed by the exillence of the 
fire-towers and the incloll-d circles, with an altar or fire¬ 
place in the centre, where the Magi performed their reli¬ 
gious ceremonies. Monuments, refembling both in na¬ 
ture and in name the Englilh Stonehenge, or Coir-Gaur, 
the Temple of the Sun, but on a fmaller fcale, yet remain 
in Ireland.. On the fummit of a hill between Lilburn and 
Belfall, is an entrenched temple of this kind, in a perfeft 
Hate, except that the altar has been thrown down. Its 
old name was Beal-agk, the fire or altar of Belus, or the 
lun ; but it is now denominated the Giant’s Ring. 
_ But, whether we are to receive as truth the accounts 
given by Mr. Whitaker, general Vallancey, the Irifh an- 
nalifts, or any other, it is certain, that, till little more than 
a century ago, Ireland was a fcene of confufion and 
llaughter. The Irifh hiftorians acknowledge this, as we 
have already feen. Very few of their monarchs efcaped a 
violent death. The hiftories of their kings indeed amount 
to little more than this, that they began to reign in fuch a 
year, reigned a certain number of years, and were {lain in 
battle by the valiant prince whoffucceeded to the throne. 
A recent hiftorian (Gordon), who did not fuller national 
vanity to get the better of his good fenfe, candidly ac¬ 
knowledges, that, in the ages anterior to the birth of Chrift, 
the afFairs of Ireland are utterly unknown and infcruta- 
ble; that fcarcely a few glimmering rays of light appear be¬ 
tween the incarnation and the introduflion of Chrillianity 
into the country; that, after this event, very little authen¬ 
tic matter can be collected beyond the affairs of the church, 
■V- -Vol.XI. No. 753. 
and fome tranfaclions of religious and literary men, till 
the invafion of the Englifh under Henry II. when com¬ 
mences a more authentic, regular, and connected, chain 
of hiftory. Thus the periods of time in refpeft to Irifh 
tranfaCtioris may not improperly be divided into the un¬ 
known, ending about the commencement of the Chriftian 
era ; the fabulous, ending near the middle of the fifth 
century; the legendary, terminating in 1170; and the hif- 
torical, extending from the Englilh invafion to the pre- 
fent time. 
That the Phoenicians, a nation fo renowned for the ex¬ 
tent of their commerce, were not unacquainted with Ire¬ 
land, would appear likely, without the authority of 
ancient writers. The Greeks had received, probably 
through the Phoenicians, fome obfcure account of this 
ifland, four or five centuries before Chrift, as we learn 
from the Argonautics of Orpheus, who is fuppofed to 
have been contemporary with Pififtratus. In Ariftotle’s 
Treatife of the World, cotupofed three centuries before 
the Chriftian era, it is denominated Ierne. In early pe¬ 
riods of the Roman empire, it is noticed by feveral writers; 
as, Strabo, Pomponius Mela, and Solinus; but more par¬ 
ticularly by Ptolemy, a geographer of the fecond century, 
who recorded the names and fituations of the tribes in¬ 
habiting Ireland, from the belt information that he could 
procure. With the (late of the inhabitants, excepting 
their barbarif'm, thefe writers however feem to have been 
wholly unacquainted. 
It can fcarcely be doubted that Ireland was firft colo¬ 
nized by Celtic tribes, the primitive poffeffors of the Eu¬ 
ropean continent. By the refearches of the mod: intelli¬ 
gent antiquaries it feems to be eftabliflied, that two Celtic 
tribes, diltinguilhed by the names of Gael and Cumraig, 
fucceftlvely inhabited the fouth of Britain long before 
the birth of Chrift. The former, fuppofed to be the fame 
with the Gallic Celts of Casfar, and to have come imme¬ 
diately from Gaul into Britain, were probably driven 
weftward into Wales and Cornwall, and at laft into Ireland, 
by the latter, who are conjectured with equal reafon to 
have come from Germany. Such is the mod rational ac¬ 
count of the primitive colonization of Ireland. 
Thefe people, fuppofed to have arrived nine or ten cen¬ 
turies before the Chriftian era, remained the undifturbed 
poffeffors of Ireland till they were invaded about fix or 
feven hundred years later by Gothic or Scythian tribes. 
Thefe were probably Belgians, the Firbolgs of ancient 
Irifh tradition; who appear to have eftablrlhed themfelves 
principally in the louth-eaftern parts, where Ptolemy found 
people diftinguifhed by appellations belonging to Belgic 
tribes on the continent. 
There is good reafon to believe that Scandinavian Goths 
were the next colonifts who fettled in this country. Thefe 
were undoubtedly the Tuatha de Danans of Irilh tradir 
tion, or, as they are alfo called, Damnonians. In the 
fourth century we find Ireland in the poffeflion of the 
Scots, an appellation deemed fynonymous with Scyths, or 
Goths, whence the name of Scotia,was given to the whole 
ifland. 
As this country was never vifited by the Romans, it 
partook not of the civilization which thofe conquerors 
diffufed through every region fubdued by their arms. 
Tacitus informs us that, about the eightieth year of the 
Chriftian era, an Irilh chieftain, expelled by domeftic fac¬ 
tion, fted to Agricola, the Roman governor of Britain, 
who, however, was too much occupied in the fubjugation 
of the inhabitants of that illand, to {pare a fufficient force 
for farther conquefts. Orofius, a writer of the fifth cen¬ 
tury, relates that a body of Scythians driven from Gallicia 
in Spain by the emperor Conllantine fought an afylum in 
Ireland, where they were received by the Scots, a-kindred 
people. Thefe new-comers were in all probability the 
Gadelians orMilefians, corruptions of Gallicians, who, as 
we have feen, were likewife called Scots or Scyths. 
The romantic hiftorians of Ireland have given a lift of 
one hundred and eighteen fuccelfi.*e monarchs, from He- 
4. D remon, 
