Cormac’s Glossary (Sanas Cormaic)

Primary-source dossier

The excerpts below are reproduced from the Ictis Anthology — a working paper produced during research for the project. Some of the results were spun off into New Perspectives on the Ictis of Pytheas of Massalia.

Sanas Cormaic

Source: O’Davoren, D., Oengus, the C. and Stokes, W. (1862) Three Irish glossaries London pp.XLVIII-L

Mug-eime, the name of the first lap-dog that was in Ireland. Coirpre Músc, son of Conaire, brought it from the east, from Britain. For when great was the power of the Gael over Britain, they divided Scotland amongst them in districts, and each of them knew his friend’s habitation, and the Gael dwelt on the east of the sea no less than in Scotia, and their residences and royal forts were built there. Inde dicitur Dinn Tradui, i. e. Dún Tredue .i. the three-fossed fort of Crimthan Mór, son of Fidach, king of Ireland and Scotland and down to the Ictian sea, et inde Glasimpere nanGáedel (Glastonbury of the Irish) a church on the border of the Ictian sea. (There was Glass son of Cass, swineherd of the king of Hiruath, with his swine feeding, and he it was that Patrick raised from the dead twenty-six years after he had been killed by the champions of Mac Con.) In that part is the fort of Map Lethain, in the lands of the Cornish Britons i. e. fort of Mac Lethain, for mac is the same as map in British. Thus did each tribe of them (di suidiv) divide, for there was an equal proportion on the east, and they possessed that power long after the coming of Patrick.

Then was Coirpre Músc paying a visit in the east to his family and his friends. At that time a lap dog had never come into the Land of Erin: the Britons forbade that one should be given to the Gael for asking, or through free will, or through gratitude or friendship for the Gael. At that time the Britons had a law, to wit, “Every criminal for his crime who shall break the law”. There was a beautiful lapdog in the possession of a friend of Coirpre Musc’s in Britain, and Coirpre got it from him [thus]. Once Coirpre went to his house, and great welcome was made to him, except concerning the lap-dog. Coirpre Músc had a splendid dagger, with ornamentation of silver and gold on its hilt. It was a marvellous treasure. Now Coirpre put a great deal of grease about it, and rubbed fat on its hilt, and then left it before the lapdog. The lap-dog took to gnawing the hilt till morning. It wounded (loitid) the dagger then, so that it was not lovely. Next day Coirpre made great complaint of this, and was [seemingly] mournful (or wrathful) about it, and demanded justice for it from his friend. “That is fair,” and he said “I will pay* for the crime” (cin), said he. Said Coirpre: “I will take nothing but what is in the Britons,) law, namely, every criminal for his crime.” So then the lap-dog was given to Coirpre, and the name clave to it, namely Mug-éime, ‘slave of the hilt’, mug [= Goth. magus], i. e. a slave that was given on account of the hilt.

The lap dog, which was a bitch, was with young. Ailill Flann the Little was ruler of Munster at that time, and Cormac grandson of Conn was at Tara, and these three began to quarrel, asking for and contending about the lap-dog. This is the way in which the matter was settled between the three, namely, the dog spent a certain time in the house of each of them. The dog thereafter littered, and each of them got a pup from the litter. In that way then descends every lap-dog still in Ireland.

After a long time the lap-dog died, and Connla, son of Tadg, son of Cían, son of Ailill Olum, found that lap-dog’s bare skull, and brought it home to test a poet who had come with an ái or airchetul to his father. Máen mac Edaini was the poet’s name. Máen the bard then solved it through teinm laeda[14], and said ac Cain tonna etc. There is the head of Mug-éme, namely, the first lap-dog that ever was brought to Ireland.