From A Compendium of Irish Biography, 1878
« Samuel Crumpe | Index | Cumian »
Cuchulaind, called by Tigernach "fortissimus heros Scotorum," one of the Red Branch knights, flourished about the 1st century. He was a native of Ulster, and was a cousin of Conall Cearnach, and of the three sons of Uisneach, the children of his aunt Ailbi. At seven years of age he was initiated into the military order, and received most of his education at Skye. At twenty-seven he was slain, according to one account by Lugaidh, grandson of Cairbre Niaser, at the battle of Murthemni, in Louth; according to another, by the sons of Calitin. His residence was at Dun-Dealgan (Dundalk): his wife, the beautiful princess Emer. Innumerable references to him are to be found in the Irish annals and Fenian tales. In O'Curry's Manners and Customs his name appears no less than 153 times. He is one of the principal characters in the Tain-Bo-Chuailgne (The Cattle Prey of Cooley), the Irish Iliad. [See MEAVE.] He is described riding in his chariot, armed with thirty-four spears and darts, and eight shields. "And he then put on his helmet of battle, and of combat, and of fighting, on his head; and from every recess and from every angle of which issued the shout as it were of an hundred warriors; because it was alike that women of the valley, and hobgoblins, and wild people of the glen, and demons of the air, shouted in front of it, and rear of it, and over it, and around it, wherever he went, at the spouting of the blood of warriors and heroes upon it."[261] His head and right hand were buried at Tara.
Sources
171. Ireland, History of, from the earliest period to the English Invasion: Rev. Geoffrey Keating: Translated from the Irish, and Noted by John O'Mahony. New York, 1857.
261. O'Curry, Eugene: Ancient Irish Manners and Customs: Edited by W. K. Sullivan, Ph.D. 3 vols. London, 1873.
« Samuel Crumpe | Index | Cumian »
Truelove's Journal: A Bookshop Novella
From a sad, comfortless childhood Giles Truelove developed into a reclusive and uncommunicative man whose sole passion was books. For so long they were the only meaning to his existence. But when fate eventually intervened to have the outside world intrude upon his life, he began to discover emotions that he never knew he had.
A story for the genuine booklover, penned by an Irish bookseller under the pseudonym of Ralph St. John Featherstonehaugh.
FREE download 23rd - 27th May
Annals of the Famine in Ireland
Annals of the Famine in Ireland, by Asenath Nicholson, still has the power to shock and sadden even though the events described are ever-receding further into the past. When you read, for example, of the poor widowed mother who was caught trying to salvage a few potatoes from her landlord's field, and what the magistrate discovered in the pot in her cabin, you cannot help but be appalled and distressed.
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
Ireland's Welcome to the Stranger
This book, the prequel to Annals of the Famine in Ireland cannot be recommended highly enough to those interested in Irish social history. The author, Mrs Asenath Nicholson, travelled from her native America to assess the condition of the poor in Ireland during the mid 1840s. Refusing the luxury of hotels and first class travel, she stayed at a variety of lodging-houses, and even in the crude cabins of the very poorest. Not to be missed!
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
Henry Ford Jones' book, first published in 1915 by Princeton University, is a classic in its field. It covers the history of the Scotch-Irish from the first settlement in Ulster to the American Revolutionary period and the foundation of the country.
The ebook is available for download in .mobi (Kindle), .epub (iBooks, etc.) and .pdf formats. For further information on the book and author see details ».
Join our mailing list to receive updates on new content on Library, our latest ebooks, and more.
You won't be inundated with emails! — we'll just keep you posted periodically — about once a monthish — on what's happening with the library.