Tales of the Elders of Ireland (Oxford)

Translators: Ann Dooley, Harry Roe

File under: Oxford

ISBN: 9780199549856

Binding: paperback

Section: Literature of the Middle Ages

Tales of the Elders of Ireland is the first complete translation of the late Middle-Irish Acallam na Senórach, the largest literary text surviving from twelfth-century Ireland. It contains the earliest and most comprehensive collection of Fenian stories and poetry, intermingling the contemporary Christian world of Saint Patrick with his scribes; clerics; occasional angels and souls rescued from Hell; the earlier pagan world of the ancient, giant Fenians and Irish kings; and the parallel, timeless Otherworld (peopled by ever-young, shape-shifting fairies).