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LITERABY INFLUENCE 67
Irish literature it would seem to have existed at a very
early period ; so early, that its very origin is obscure. There
is, for example, mention of a king’s
"
company of story
tellers
"
in the eight lines of satirical verse, said to have
been composed by the poet Cairbre on Bress, the niggardly
king of the Formorians. 1
Story-telling was one of the many attractions of the great
aonachs or fairs which played the same part in the national
life of Ireland as the things or popular assemblies in Iceland.
From the poem on the ancient fair of Carman preserved
in the Book of Ballymote, we can form an idea of the enter-
tainment provided by the professional story-teller :
"
The tales of Fianna of Erin, a never-wearying enter-
tainment : stories of destructions, cattle-preys, courtships,
rhapsodies, battle-odes, royal precepts and the truthful
instructions of Fithil the sage : the wide precepts of Coirfic
and Cormac." 2
The Book of Leinster states that the poet who had
1
The poem is preserved in the Book of the Dun Cow (twelfth
century), but the form of the language in which it is written is
considerably earlier than this date ; indeed, the meaning of the
verses would be quite obscure if we did not possess explanatory
glosses.
Cf. D’Arbois de Jubainville : The Irish Mythological Cycle, p. 96
(Best’s translation) : also D. Hyde : A Literarv History of Ireland,
p. 285.
There is a possible reference to an Irish storyteller in an inscription
on a stone cross at Bridgend (Glamorganshire). The inscription,
which is thought to date from the seventh century, runs :
( Co)nbellini
possuit hanc crucem pro anima eius Scitliuissi . . .
Rhys takes
scitlivissi to be an Irish word, a compound of viss (Ir. fis,
’
knowledge ’)
and scitl (section, seel, a
’
story,"
’
news ’) and surmises that
scitliviss might mean a
’
messenger,’ a
’
bringer of news,’ a
’
scout.’
(Cf. Celtic Britain, pp. 313-315.) But scitliviss can also be explained
as
’
one who knows stories." In that case we might infer that story-
telling was a profession in Ireland as early as the seventh century ;
but the reading appears to be too uncertain to justify us in attaching
any great importance to the inscription.
2
O’Curry : Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish, II., p. 543.
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