ear 1633 and giving, except for
the loss of a leaf, a complete story of the Tain; H. 1. 13 (Trinity
College, Dublin), written in the year 1745 and giving the Tain entire;
Additional 18748 (abbreviated Add.), British Museum, copied in the year
1800 from a 1730 original; Egerton 209 and Egerton 106 (British Museum),
both fragments and dating from the eighteenth century. Fragments of a
modern version are also found in MS. LIX, Advocates' Library, Edinburgh.
To version C belong only fragments: H. 2. 17 (Trinity College, Dublin),
dating from the end of the fourteenth or the beginning of the fifteenth
century; the almost identical Egerton 93 (British Museum), consisting of
only ten leaves and dating from nearly a century later, and H. 2. 12
(Trinity College, Dublin), consisting of only two pages.[8]
The manuscripts belonging to each of these versions, A, B, and C, have
sufficient traits in common to place them in a group by themselves. The
question of the relationship of these manuscripts to one another and of the
character of the suppositional archetype from which they are all descended
is a most intricate one and one which has given rise to considerable
discussion. The question still awaits a definite answer, which may never be
forthcoming, because of the disappearance not only of the first draft of
the Tain, but also of that of some of its later redactions. We must not
overlook the possibility, either, of an otherwise faithful copyist having
inserted in the text before him a passage, or even an entire episode, of
his own fabrication. This, no doubt, happened not infrequently, especially
in the earlier period of the copying of Irish manuscripts, and a single
insertion of this kind, or the omission, intentionally or by oversight, of
a part of the original from the copy might, it will easily be seen, lead
one to conclude that there once existed a form of the story which as a
matter of fact never existed.
The version of the Tain which I have chosen as the basis for my translation
is the one found in the Book of Leinster (_Leabhar Laighneach_), a
voluminous vellum manuscript sometime called the Book of Glendalough and
now kept in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, catalogue number
H. 2. 18. Only a part of the original book remains. It dates from about the
year 1150. This date is established by two entries in the manuscript
itself: "Aed son of Crimthann (Hugh macGriffin) hath written this book and
out of many books ha
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