Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib
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Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib (English: The War of the Irish with the Foreigners) is a two-part medieval Irish chronicle that claims to record the depredations of the Vikings in Ireland and the Irish king Brian Boru's great war against them. That war culminated in the Battle of Clontarf (1014), in which Brian was slain but his forces were victorious. However, the chronicle, which extravagantly compares King Brian to Augustus and Alexander the Great, was written in the early twelfth century, at least a hundred years after the events that the anonymous composer claims to record had unfolded.
Modern scholars consider Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib to be a piece of "brilliant propaganda" written in a "bombastic style and full of patriotic hyperbole." Although the chronicle remains a valuable source of information about the Viking Age in Ireland, its accuracy is uncertain.[1]
Comparable works include the earlier Fragmentary Annals of Ireland and the later Caithréim Chellacháin Chaisil.
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[edit] Date
Based on internal evidence and on the nature of the text's allusions to Brian’s great-grandson Muirchertach Ua Briain (d. 1119), it has been suggested that the work was composed sometime between 1103 and 1111.[2]
[edit] Political purpose
The main purpose of the chronicle seems to be to eulogize Brian Boru and thereby to show that the record of achievements of Brian's Dál Cais dynasty proved that they deserved Ireland's high kingship. This was an issue because the Ua Briain sept of the Dál Cais was struggling to remain High Kings of Ireland at the time of the chronicle's writing.
Another reason for the chronicle's composition may have been to counter the Brjánssaga ("Brian's Saga"), written before 1118 by a Dubliner in an attempt to distance Dublin from the killing of the national hero, Brian. The chronicler of Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib depicts the Vikings as vicious barbarians and suggests that the Dubliners are like their ancestors. In short, it may have been partly an attempt to "put the Dubliners in their place."[3]
[edit] Notes
[edit] Edition
- Todd, J. H., ed. (1867), Cogadh Gaedhel Re Gallaibh: The War of the Gaedhil with The Gaill, Rolls Series, London: Longmans, http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=TgMGAAAAQAAJ
[edit] References and further reading
- Holm, Poul. "Between apathy and antipathy: the Vikings in Irish and Scandinavian history." Peritia 8 (1994): 151-69.
- Ní Mhaonaigh, Máire. "Some Middle Irish declensional patterns in Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib." Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 49 (1997): 615-28.
- Ní Mhaonaigh, Máire. "Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib and the Annals: a comparison." Ériu 47 (1996): 101-26.
- Ní Mhaonaigh, Máire. "The date of Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib." Peritia 9 (1995): 354-77.
- Ni Mhaonaigh, Maire. "Bréifne bias in Cogad Gáedel Re Gallaib." Ériu 43 (1992): 135-58.
- Nic Ghiollamhaith, Aoife. "Dynastic warfare and historical writing in North Munster, 1276-1350." Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 2 (1981): 73-89.
- Ó Corráin, Donnchadh (1997), "Ireland, Wales, and the Hebrides", in Sawyer, Peter, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 105–6
