TIMELINE OF IRISH LITERATURE

from 600 BCE to 1850 CE

  EARLY MEDIEVAL PERIOD — c. 600 CE - c. 1200 CE

Context

This period saw significant societal changes, including Viking raids and settlements, and the reform of the Irish church. Literature continued to thrive, with scribes copying, editing, and reinterpreting older material, creating new works and compiling major manuscripts.

Language

Middle Irish represents a transition between Old Irish and Modern Irish. There's more variation in spelling and grammar.

Key Developments & Genres

Continuation and Expansion of Saga Cycles

Ulster Cycle
Older tales were retold, sometimes expanded, and new tales added. Táin Bó Cúailnge was famously redacted in manuscripts like Lebor na hUidre and the Book of Leinster.

Fenian Cycle (Fiannaígecht) / Ossianic Cycle
Rose to prominence during this period, focusing on the hero Fionn mac Cumhaill and his band of warriors, the Fianna. Key texts include early forms of tales that would later be part of Acallam na Senórach.

Kings' Cycles (Historical Sagas)
Tales about historical or legendary Irish kings, often blending myth and history. Examples include stories about Brian Boru or Niall of the Nine Hostages.

Voyage Tales (Immrama) and Adventure Tales (Echtrai)

Stories of marvellous sea voyages to otherworldly islands (e.g., Immram Brain - The Voyage of Bran) or adventures into supernatural realms.

Dinnsenchas (Lore of Places)

A significant genre comprising poems and prose tales explaining the origins of place names, linking them to mythological or historical events and figures.

Genealogies and Synthetic History

Continued importance, with major compilations like Lebor Gabála Érenn (The Book of Invasions), which attempted to create a comprehensive legendary history of Ireland, integrating native traditions with biblical and classical accounts.

Religious and Didactic Literature

Saints' lives and homilies continued to be popular, and this period also saw the rise of a new genre, Vision Literature. These tales recounted personal revelations or visions of the afterlife, and were filled with the same type of fantastic imagery that voyage texts contained. But these tales were far more grand, as befitting their eschataological nature. While this was a pan-European genre, the Irish works in this vein focused more and more on a liminal state of the soul after death, a place where the soul would undergo trials, and, through those trials, become worthy of residing in eternal bliss. Later Christians would recognize such a state as Purgatory. The 10^th-century Fís Adamnáin (The Vision of Adamnán) is one of the best of these; it's Dante's Commedia Divina, only three hundred years earlier.

When we look at the history of the concept of Purgatory, we see the distinctiveness, or hiddenness, or insularity, of Christianity in Ireland. It's not until the late 13^th century that the Roman/Universal church catches up with Ireland. The Council of Lyons (1274) officially recognized purgatory and affirmed that souls in purgatory are helped by the prayers of the faithful. The Council of Florence (1439) reaffirmed the teaching and clarified that the souls in purgatory benefit from masses, prayers, and almsgiving. And the Council of Trent (1545–1563), responding to the Protestant Reformation, reaffirmed its existence and doctrinal basis. It condemned both the denial of purgatory and abuses related to indulgences but upheld the practice of praying for the dead.

Poetry

Both religious and secular poetry flourished. Bardic schools were becoming more formalized.

Key Manuscripts (major compilations)

Lebor na hUidre (The Book of the Dun Cow)

This is an Irish vellum manuscript, compiled around 1100 CE from older manuscripts and oral traditions. It's a collection of factual material and legends that date mainly from the 8th and 9th centuries. It is the oldest extant manuscript in Irish, but it's badly damaged; only 67 leaves remain and many of the texts are incomplete. It was written in Irish at Clonmacnoise by two principal scribes (Mael Muire Mac Célechair and an unnamed scribe (A)), then later revised by an interpolator (H) using different sources. It is named as it is because it was supposedly created from the hide of a dun cow by St. Ciarán of Clonmacnoise or was made from the hide of a dun cow owned by St. Ciarán. But St. Ciarán lived 500 years before this ms was compiled, so that's either one old cow or one old monk. In any case, this ms contains the oldest version of the Táin Bó Cuailgne, the Voyage of Bran, the Feast of Bricriú, and other religious, mythical, and historical material. It's held in the Royal Irish Academy.

The Book of Leinster

Compiled in the middle of the 12^th century, but contains much Old Irish material. What remains of this huge volume (410 folio pages) contains about as much written material as a 3000-page novel, and the original collection was even longer. It collects nearly 1000 pieces of both prose and poetry (historical sketches, romantic tales, topographical tracts, genealogies, etc.)—a vast collection of ancient Irish lore. It's been called the Encyclopedia of Medieval Ireland.

This ms was presented to Trinity College Dublin in 1786. Exposure to sunlight, poor attempts to restore it over the ensuing centuries, and the breakdown of the vellum left it in a crumbling state. A multi-year restoration project (funded by the Bank of America) was completed in 2025, and in May of that year the ms went on public display for the first time ever. TCD is also home to what is perhaps the most famous illuminated manuscript in the world, The Book of Kells. The Book of Leinster was included in their "Book of Kells Experience" exhibition for three months.

Some of its highlights:

Rawlinson B 502

Officially, this ms is called Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawlinson B 502. Some scholars have also called it The Book of Glendalough, (Lebar Glinne Dá Locha), after several allusions in medieval and early modern sources to a manuscript of that name. However, there is currently no agreement as to whether this ms, or, more precisely, its second part, is actually the manuscript referred to by that title.

Two separate codices were compiled around 1125-1130, but they were bound together into a single ms sometime in the early 17^th century. It was described by Brian Ó Cuív as one of the "most important and most beautiful ... undoubtedly the most magnificent" of the surviving medieval Irish manuscripts. Pádraig Ó Riain states " . . . a rich, as yet largely unworked, source of information on the concerns of the community at Glendalough in or about the year 1131, and a magnificent witness, as yet barely interrogated, to the high standard of scholarship attained by this monastic centre."

Yellow Book of Lecan (compiled later, but contains much Middle Irish material)

This 344-page ms was copied out in Co. Sligo before 1401 CE. It contains 152 distinct works, a mixture of the ecclesial and secular. It has nearly the whole of the Ulster Cycle, with a partial version of the Táin Bó Cúailnge. There are catechisms, commentaries, homilies, stories of the saints, dinnsenchas, a description of the banqueting hall at Tara, religious lyrics, and other, poems, tales, and immrama. Besides a number of ornamented capitals, there are no illuminations in this ms; it's important not for its art, but for the density of material it contains. It is currently held in Trinity College Dublin.

* These guides use five special symbols, taken from Mark Williams' Ireland’s Immortals: A History of the Gods of Irish Myth, Princeton UP, 2016.