Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 29, 1918.djvu/180

170 possible. She gives a good collection of facts, and moreover quotes her sources in full so that everybody can judge for himself. A good feature of her papers is the fact that she does not rely on the genealogies alone, but also derives her information from the sagas. This is very important, because the sagas, especially in cases where a personage is inseparably connected with a saga motive, etc., cannot be so easily altered as a genealogy could be and often was.

Miss Dobbs seems to overrate the importance of the agreement of the Irish tradition, e.g. she says (p. 22), "Taking all the traditions about Clanna D[edad] as a whole they are consistent and rational. There are contradictions in details The Irish records acknowledge this  Where they speak decidedly, therefore, they must have good ground for believing their statements to be founded on fact. The references to Clanna D. come from over twenty different MSS. It is impossible they could be drawn from one source." Yet the case seems somewhat different: There was an early Irish tradition, but this represents already a redaction of certain local sources, and this tradition was a standard for later generations, divergent local traditions being carefully (or not carefully) adapted to this standard. If we find that all the traditions agree about a certain subject, it is little wonder; yet the inconsistencies in traditions are far more important, because they may represent a local tradition which may be more valuable than the current literary tradition.

The statement that Clanna Dedad were a powerful tribe until the time of Mog Nuadat contradicts the statement that Clann Dedad was exterminated by the Clann Rury (Rudraige) (see L.U. 22b). The fact that the enemies of Clanna D. (Síl Ebhir) relate that Clanna Dedad had once overthrown their ancestors is not so decisive as it seems. It may be a fiction intending to represent the ruling race, Síl Ebhir, i.e. descendants of Ebher, as reinstalled in a sovereignty which they really did usurp.

Miss Dobbs quotes a passage suggesting the Érna ware Fir Bolg (see also Hogan Onomasticon Gaedelicum, sub "Erna"