INTRODUCTION.
The oldest extant version of the Cath Finntrága, here printed for the first time, is preserved in the Bodleian MS. Rawlinson B 487, ff. 1-11, a vellum quarto, dating from the fifteenth century. In a list of contents bound up with the MS. this tale is called: Finleachi o Catasai Gigantomachia Hibernice, vel potius Acta Finni mac Cooli (cum praelio de Fintra). It is followed by the oldest copy of the Agallam na Senórach, ff. 12-54. Bound up with these two texts are three pieces written on paper, the first in Irish, the last two in Latin, which are thus enumerated in the list of contents: Leges Ecclesiasticae Hibernice, fol. 53. — Miscellanea quaedam de rebus Hibernicis, fol. 68. — Pars aliqua Chronici Henrici Martiburgensis vicarii de Ballysraddan in diocesi Dubliniensi, fol. 76.
Our text was written by a certain Finnlaech ó Chathasaig (Finlay O'Casey) who gives his name at the end[1], and states that he wrote it for Sadb, the daughter of Tadg ó Maille (Teague O'Malley), in whose praise some Irish verses, mutilated in the conclusion, are added. There are two gaps in the MS., one between ff. 3 and 4, the other between ff. 6 and 7, two leaves being missing in the first place, and one in the second.
There are fourteen paper copies of the Cath Finntrága, all of them of a later date, belonging to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. They are enumerated by Jubainville, Essai d'un Catalogue de la Littérature épique de l'Irlande, pp. 67 and 68, who, however, omits to mention a copy contained in the Edinburgh MS. lviii. pp. 197-237, and written in 1733. I have seen all of these and collated one or two of them. They all represent a different version of the tale from that contained in Rawlinson, the most remarkable difference being the insertion of the list of the harbours of Erinn in the beginning, and the omission at the end
- ↑ This colophon runs thus: Arna scribadh d'Ḟinnlaech ó Chathasaidh do tSaidhb ingin Taidhg hi Mhaille .i. sain mhna ar ghais ⁊ ar eineach ⁊ gheanmnaighacht ri.
