Book of the Dean of Lismore
Encyclopedia
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
manuscript, compiled in eastern Perthshire
Perthshire
Perthshire, officially the County of Perth , is a registration county in central Scotland. It extends from Strathmore in the east, to the Pass of Drumochter in the north, Rannoch Moor and Ben Lui in the west, and Aberfoyle in the south...
in the first half of the 16th century. The chief compiler, after whom it is named, was James MacGregor (Seumas MacGriogair), vicar
Vicar
In the broadest sense, a vicar is a representative, deputy or substitute; anyone acting "in the person of" or agent for a superior . In this sense, the title is comparable to lieutenant...
of Fortingall
Fortingall
Fortingall is a small village in highland Perthshire, Scotland, in the glen of the River Lyon. Place-name Gaelic Fartairchill, 'church at the foot' . Its nearest sizable neighbours are Aberfeldy and Kenmore.According to legend it was the birthplace of Pontius Pilate...
and titular Dean
Dean (religion)
A dean, in a church context, is a cleric holding certain positions of authority within a religious hierarchy. The title is used mainly in the Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church.-Anglican Communion:...
of Lismore Cathedral, although there are other probable scribes, including his brother Donnchadh and William Drummond, curate
Curate
A curate is a person who is invested with the care or cure of souls of a parish. In this sense "curate" correctly means a parish priest but in English-speaking countries a curate is an assistant to the parish priest...
of Fortingall. It should not be confused with the similarly named Book of Lismore
Book of Lismore
The Book of Lismore is a Medieval Irish manuscript.-Overview:The Book of Lismore is an Irish vellum manuscript, compiled in early 15th century, Lismore, Ireland. Its original name was Leabhar Mhic Cárthaigh Riabhaigh...
, an Irish manuscript from the early 15th century.
It is primarily written in the "secretary hand" of Scotland, rather than the corr-litir style of hand-writing employed by Gaelic speakers in Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
. The orthography
Orthography
The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...
is the same kind used to write the Scots
Scots language
Scots is the Germanic language variety spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster . It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety spoken in most of the western Highlands and in the Hebrides.Since there are no universally accepted...
variety of English, and was a common way of writing Scottish Gaelic in the Late Middle Ages
Scotland in the Late Middle Ages
Scotland in the late Middle Ages established its independence from England under figures including William Wallace in the late 13th century and Robert Bruce in the 14th century...
.
Although the principal part of the manuscript's contents are in Gaelic, the manuscript as a whole is multilingual, and there are a significant number of texts written in Scots and Latin
Medieval Latin
Medieval Latin was the form of Latin used in the Middle Ages, primarily as a medium of scholarly exchange and as the liturgical language of the medieval Roman Catholic Church, but also as a language of science, literature, law, and administration. Despite the clerical origin of many of its authors,...
, including extracts from the Scots poets William Dunbar
William Dunbar
William Dunbar was a Scottish poet. He was probably a native of East Lothian, as assumed from a satirical reference in the Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie , where, too, it is hinted that he was a member of the noble house of Dunbar....
and Robert Henryson
Robert Henryson
Robert Henryson was a poet who flourished in Scotland in the period c. 1460–1500. Counted among the Scots makars, he lived in the royal burgh of Dunfermline and is a distinctive voice in the Northern Renaissance at a time when the culture was on a cusp between medieval and renaissance sensibilities...
, and there is a great deal of Gaelic-English diglossia
Diglossia
In linguistics, diglossia refers to a situation in which two dialects or languages are used by a single language community. In addition to the community's everyday or vernacular language variety , a second, highly codified variety is used in certain situations such as literature, formal...
throughout the manuscript. Many of the Gaelic texts are of Irish provenance, and in the case of bardic poetry, Irish poems outnumber Scottish poems 44 to 21.
The patrons of the manuscript appear to have been the Campbells
Clan Campbell
Clan Campbell is a Highland Scottish clan. Historically one of the largest, most powerful and most successful of the Highland clans, their lands were in Argyll and the chief of the clan became the Earl and later Duke of Argyll.-Origins:...
of Glen Orchy
Glen Orchy
Glen Orchy is a long glen in Argyll and Bute in Scotland. It runs south-westerly from the Bridge of Orchy to Inverlochy following the River Orchy...
, and the manuscript itself includes some of the poetry of Duncan Campbell (Donnchadh Caimbeul) of Glen Orchy. The manuscript currently lies in the National Library of Scotland
National Library of Scotland
The National Library of Scotland is the legal deposit library of Scotland and is one of the country's National Collections. It is based in a collection of buildings in Edinburgh city centre. The headquarters is on George IV Bridge, between the Old Town and the university quarter...
, as Adv. 72.1.37.
Further reading
- Quiggin, E. C. (ed.), Poems from the Book of the Dean of Lismore, (Cambridge, 1937)
- Ross, Neil (ed.), Heroic Poetry from the Book of the Dean of Lismore, Scottish Gaelic Texts Society, (Edinburgh, 1939)
- Watson, William J.William J. WatsonProfessor William J. Watson was a toponymist, one of the greatest Scottish scholars of the 20th century, and was the first scholar to place the study of Scottish place names on a firm linguistic basis....
(ed.), Scottish Verse from the Book of the Dean of Lismore, Scottish Gaelic Texts Society, (Edinburgh, 1937) - Watson, William J., "Vernacular Gaelic in the Book of the Dean of Lismore", Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, vol. 31 (1927)