The early Irish epic was a prose narrative that usually contained nonnarrative poetic passages, often in dialogue form. The resemblance between this and the type of epic found in early Sanskrit suggests that the tradition went back to the early history of Indo-European languages. The oldest sagas probably were first written down in the 7th and 8th centuries, from an oral tradition. These were imperfectly preserved, since Scandinavian invasions in the 9th and 10th centuries disrupted literary studies. Not until the 11th century did life become sufficiently settled for works to be collected in monasteries, and even then the collecting seems to have been haphazard. The great codex Lebor na hUidre (The Book of the Dun Cow), written in the early 12th century, showed older treatments of saga material than are found in The Book of Leinster, written in the mid-12th century. The material has preserved a picture of a hierarchical warrior society—fighting from chariots, taking heads as trophies, the elite position of the Druids, the force of taboos—for which there is little or no evidence from strictly historical sources.

Also of note are the imram (“rowing about” or “voyaging”) tales, which describe fantastic voyages to the otherworld (echtrae), imagined sometimes as a place underground and sometimes as islands in the sea. The most famous of these is Immram Brain (The Voyage of Bran), composed in the 8th century. This genre also includes tales of saints, in particular St. Brendan, voyaging by sea to other lands, though the best known of these were written in Latin.

The most important cycle was that of the Ulaid, a people who gave their name to Ulster. Conchobar (king of the Ulaid), Cú Chulainn (a boy warrior), Medb (queen of Connaught), and Noísi and Deirdre (two doomed lovers) were outstanding figures in early Irish literature, and it was on elements from the sagas of the Ulaid that the nearest approach to an Irish epic was built—Táin Bó Cuailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley). First put together in the 7th or 8th century, it is striking chiefly for its terse vividness. The finest section is that in which Fergus, an exile from Ulster, recalls the deeds of Cú Chulainn’s youth. But the value of the Táin generally lies in that, as it was being continually worked over, it provides a record of the degeneration of Irish style. The Táin collected around itself a number of ancillary stories, including the story of its revelation to the filid in the 7th century by the ghost of Fergus and that of the tragedy of Noísi and Deirdre.

In this period stories with an origin outside the recognized tradition began to appear. A foreign element was represented by the appearance of The Taking of Troy and The Story of Alexander in the oldest saga lists, but classical learning had comparatively little effect until the next period. Stories of Finn, whose traditions went back to an early period, only really developed when the filid were no longer in control. The “wild man of the woods” cycle associated with Suibhne Geilt (“Mad Sweeney”) had its origins in Strathclyde, where Irish and Brythonic literature must have been in contact at an early date. This mixture of hagiography, saga, and nature material was one of the most attractive stories of the later period.

The earliest didactic writings, Irish in language but mostly of Latin origin in content, comprised monastic rules, homilies, and hagiography. The lives of the saints were mainly works of fantasy, increasingly incorporating elements from folklore and saga material. The emphasis was always on the miraculous, but they are also valuable as social documents. Another important genre of religious work was the aisling (vision), exemplified in Fís Adamnáín (The Vision of Adamnan), whose soul is represented as leaving his body for a time to visit heaven and hell under the guidance of an angel. Both the saints’ lives and the visions tended to border on the extravagant, so that parodies were composed, notably Aislinge Meic Con Glinne (The Vision of MacConglinne).

Theory has always been important in Irish cultural life, and the filid built up a considerable body of academic speculation. A few surviving fragments discuss the nature of inspiration and the origin of language, with practical instruction on matters of metrics and style. Early on, a technical vocabulary was built up to deal with Latin, as well as Irish, grammar. In several ancient texts discussion of the art of the poet was mixed with questions relating to a poet’s legal status.

Bardic verse

The bardic reform of verse was sweeping. The language was modernized, the large number of meters used by the filid was greatly reduced, and greater rhythmic control and ornamentation were required. The scope of the verse narrowed; the bulk was poetry praising the poet’s patron or God. No longer associated with monastic foundations, the bards, who trained for six or seven years, confidently looked to patrons to secure their living. One of the earliest poets of the great bardic family of Ó Dálaigh, Muireadhach Albanach, left a fine elegy on the death of his wife, as well as a stirring defense of his action in killing a tax collector. The courtly love themes, introduced into Irish literature by Norman invaders in the 12th century, were used with native bardic wit and felicitous style to produce the enchanting poems called dánta grádha (“love poems”). A different departure from praise poetry was the crosánacht (from the Irish word crosán, meaning a jester or satirist), in which verse was frequently interspersed with humorous or satirical prose passages.