translated by Kuno Meyer Electronic edition compiled by Beatrix Färber Proof corrections by Beatrix Färber
Funded by the HEA via PRTLI 4
1. First draft, revised and corrected.
Extent of text: 2500 words
Distributed by CELT online at University College, Cork, Ireland.
Text ID Number: T303011
Availability [RESTRICTED]
Available with prior consent of the CELT project for purposes of academic research and teaching.
CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts
The electronic text covers pages 22, 23 and odd pages 25–27. The Irish original is available in a separate file, G303011.
Text has been proof-read twice.
The electronic text represents the edited text. The editor's annotations are integrated into the markup and numbered sequentially. Corrections by Meyer made in ZCP 8, 599 are integrated using corr sic="" resp="KM".
There is no direct speech tagged; within the poem speech has been marked by sp and speaker.
When a hyphenated word (hard or soft) crosses a page-break, the page-break is marked after the completion of the hyphenated word (and punctuation).
div0=the tale; page-breaks are marked pb n=""/.
Names are not tagged.
Created: The translation is by Kuno Meyer. For details about the Irish text, see file G303011. (c.1910)
Beatrix Färber (ed.)
Beatrix Färber (ed.)
Beatrix Färber (data capture)
The story of the combat between father and son has touched almost every nation which has produced an epic, or ballads of an epic character, or as in the case of the Irish, epic tales. That particular version of the story, which in Old-Irish literature is embodied in the tale of the fight between Cúchulinn and his son Conla1 is ultimately derived, both in its main features and in all important details, from the Persian story of Rustem and Sohrab. This occurs in an episode in the Shah Nameh of Firdausi, a poet of the tenth century, who worked up older legends. Long before his time, however, it had found its way from Persia westward. It must have reached the Goths in their migrations, from whom it passed into the literature of several older Germanic tribes. For the Old-High-German poem of the combat between Hildebrand and Hadubrand has a Low-German origin; we meet the same motive in the Norse Thidrek-saga, and find traces of it in Anglo-Saxon literature. It seems most likely that it was the Anglo-Saxons who handed it on to the Irish some time during the seventh or early eighth century.
In Old-Irish literature the legend was naturally incorporated in the chief cycle of story-telling at that time, attaching itself to the hero whose adventures most resembled those of Hildebrand. Like Rustem and Hildebrand, Cúchulinn had spent his youth in foreign lands. There he begot the son who was to fall by his hand.
The discovery of another Irish setting belonging to the Ossianic cycle will cause little surprise to those who know that this later cycle modelled many of its stories on those of the older heroic cycle. It is true, the legend of Finn and Oisín did not lend itself well to the introduction of the new motive. For in all the stories of the cycle Finn and his son are throughout on amicable terms and closely associated in their exploits and adventures. We shall see how the narrator gets out of the difficulty by inventing a quarrel between Finn and Oisín, during which the latter absents himself for a whole year. Again, the tragic issue was not adaptable to the Ossianic
The poem has come down to us, so far as I know, in three manuscripts only: H i.e. Harleian 5280, fo. 35b1; N i.e. 23 N 10, p. 53; and M i.e. Ewen McLachlan's transcript which he called Leabhar Caol, preserved in the Advocates' Library Collection of Gaelic MSS., vol. 83, p. 251. The vellum manuscript itself from which M'Lachlan made his transcript has for some time been missing from the Library. It was called Leabhar Cille Brighde, and bore the number 32. An account of its chief contents will be found in the Report of the Comittee of the Highland Society of Scotland, Edinburgh 1805.3 As appears from a colophon at the end of our piece, the scribe who wrote it was called Fithel mac Flaithrig mic Aedha.4 I am indebted to the kindness of Professor Donald Mackinnon for a most careful copy of M'Lachlan's transcript.
Though none of these three MSS. is earlier than the sixteenth century, the language both of the prose and poetry contained in the piece is pure Old Irish. Indeed, we have here another instance of an Ossianic text which may be confidently assigned to the ninth century. Short as both prose and poetry are—the latter only sixteen stanzas—there are enough old forms, particularly in the verb, that make it impossible to assign a later date. In syntax the position of the attribute before the noun on which it depends may be noted, as in fóibur frossae, aiss lomma. Unfortunately, the verses are badly handed down in all the MSS., being defective and corrupt in several places. My translation can therefore only be tentative and imperfect.
Finn ua Báiscne was seeking his son Oisin throughout Ireland. Oisin had been a year without anyone knowing his whereabouts. He was angry with his father. Then Finn found him in a great wilderness. Oisin was cooking a pig. Finn turns upon him and deals him a blow. Oisin seized his weapons and his accoutrements. He did not at once recognize him. Then Finn said it was foolish for a young warrior to fight against a grey-headed man. Thereupon they sing a lampoon.
Oisin dixit:
- 'Tis plain to me,
though the grey-head attacks (?) me,
the points of his spear are no sharper,
his shield is no broader.Finn:
- Though the points of his spear be no sharper,
though his shield be no broader,
at the hour of wielding (them) in combat
the grey-head will prevail.Oisin:
- 'Tis clear, though his wrist is stronger
and though the rim of his shield is broader,
he cannot ...
...Finn:
- I am not like
the ... stirk;
the grey-head knows how to deal wounds and to receive them,5
... so that he is riddled.Oisin:
- When he has been wounded three times
in battle where far-reaching strokes are dealt,
his scream of doom sounds ill
as he faces young warriors.Finn:
- I am well acquainted with young men
who carry ...6
when they are ...
streams of blood run upon ...Oisin:
- That is not what they do
when they are7 in the heat of the fight8
the youth (sings?) a paean,
the old warrior is struck to the ground.
Finn:
- The man who ... with his spear
to encounter the young man,—
I know what will come of it:
the young man's nose will be split.Oisin:
- When palsy has consumed every bone,
the spear from his hand is not bitter.
The young man is in the heyday of his strength,9
the old man's spring-time is past.10Finn:
- When they are together
upon the stone-dyke of fierce slaughter,
he does not love to meet sword-edges,11
sips of milk ...Oisin:
- It is one of the habits of the grey-head
to talk from under the cover of his shield;
showers of sword-edges ...
his old legs cannot stir.Finn:
- I have not ... from a royal host
a maniac upon trees in a wilderness;
in the battle ...
young men are wont to be upon the point of a branch.Oisin:
- The maniac who is running here westward
is not a young man, it is a grey-head;
the ... which is upon such a one,
'tis that which is upon the old man.Finn:
- Verily, my son,12
what you utter is not good;
though you deceive me it does not hurt;
'tis time that we should be more trustful.Oisin:
- Oh ancient hero,
you are not wont to be among youths;
I had no desire to harm you
if you had not been boastful against warriors.Finn:
Then their own people came to Finn and Oisin.