edited by Hugh Buidhe MacCurtin, published in Paris Anno 1732. It is commonly known as MacCurtin’a “English-Irish Dictionary,” the first ever published.
Sir Charles G Duffy suggests that two lists of the best Irish books be formulated—one for the Students’ Irish Library, the other of works for general reading. 1 have made a selection of the best hundred Irish books, not for general reading, but for the student of Irish history, or the young historian. The works in this list will show what Ireland has been in the days before Niall the Great, and during the golden age of Catholic Ireland from A D 432 to 800, and during the incursions of the Lakemen or the Norsemen; again in the period of the renaissance from AD 1014 to 1172; and next to the penal period; and from the commencement of the penal period to the present.
The thanks of Irishmen at home and abroad, and of Irishmen unborn, are due to the Freeman's Journal, and in their name I offer the grateful thanks of a people whose history has hitherto been to a great extent neglected.—I remain your faithful servant,
U J Canon Bourke, PP, M R I A.
A LIST OF THE BEST HUNDRED IRISH BOOKS.
Ancient Laws of Ireland, known as the Brehon Laws, the Seanchus Mor; the Book of Aichill, 3 vols.
Dr Keating’s Ireland, edited with notes by John O’Mahony. Haverty, New York, 1857.
O’Curry’s Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish, edited by W K Sullivan, 3 vols. The first volume as introduction is from the pen of W K Sullivan, 1878.
Lectures by O’Curry on the MS Materials of Ancient Irish History. Dublin: James Duffy, 1861.
Sir William Wilde’s Beauties of the Boyne and Blackwater. In this work the writer gives an account of the pre-Christian mounds situate on the banks of the Boyne. They present an antiquity considerably beyond three thousand years.
Sir Wiliiam Wilde’s Loch Corrib. The fight between the Fir-Breg and the Tuatha De Danann is recorded in this volume.
Sir Henry Maine’s Lectures on the Early History of Institutions. London: Murray, 1875.
Dr. Petrie’s Tara Hill—Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy; vol 18, Part II, 1839. Every Irish scholar should have a copy.
Dr Petrie’s Round Towers of Ireland—The Ecclesiastical Architecture of Ireland. Hodges and Smith, Dublin, 1845.
The Four Masters—The Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland, translated, with notes, and edited by Dr O’Donovan, 6 vols.
A Series of County Maps, say that by Philips or that by Dr Joyce.
Sir William Wilde’s Catalogue of the Royal Irish Academy. A week’s study of all that is to be seen in the Royal Irish Academy will add much to the knowledge of any student of Irish antiquities.
The Transactions (some volumes) of the Royal Irish Academy.
The Transactions of the Kilkenny Archæcological Society.
The Volumes published by the Ossianic Society, Transactions of the Gaelic Society.
The Celtic Society and Archæological Society volumes.
The Ulster Archæological Society. One volume of the work done by the Ordnance Survey of Ireland—The County of Londonderry. Colonel Colby, superintendent; Hodges and Smith, 1837. This is the only volume of the rich mine of literary and antiquarian wealth dug up by the staff of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland. The History of County Londonderry was too good to have had it published. The landed proprietors at the time felt the bitterness of the truth told in its pages, and contrived by Parliamentary pressure to put a stop to the publication of the MS records connected with the other thirty-one counties. But are these records to be had? Certainly, In the Royal Irish Academy there are about one hundred MS volumes in quarto, three, and in some instances four volumes, relating to each county, containing an account of the part history of each townland and barony in each district in Ireland- No Irish scholar, no historian can know thoroughly the history of any townland without having had a peep into the pages of this thesaurus ot Irish native lore.
The Book of Rights.
The Book of Fenagh, edited by William M Hennessy.
Lives of Illustrious Irishmen, by James Wills; 12 vols.
The same in another form—The Irish Nation, its History and its Biography; 4 vols. J Wills.
Chronological account of Irish writers and a descriptive catalogue of their works by Edward O’Reilly, a volume published by the Iberno-Celtic Society.
Compendium of Irish Biography; Alfred Webb. Dublin: Gill.
The Genealogies, Tribes, and Customs of Hy-Fiachrach; edited by O’Donovan; one of the Archæological Society publications.
Battle of Magh Rath.
Archdall's Monasticon Hibernicum; edited by Cardinal Moran and his literary associates, with notes.
Loca Patriciana, by Father John F Shearman.
History of Ireland, by Haverty.
History of Ireland, by Miss Cusack.
History of Ireland, by Thomas Moore.
History of Ireland, by MacGeoghegan.
Lays of the Western Gael, by Sir Samuel Ferguson.
Romances Connected with this Period.
The Three Sorrows of Story-Telling; found in Atlantis from the pen of O’Curry; narrated by Dr Joyce in his Celtic Romances. Lay of the Children of Lir; Lay of the Children of Tiurenn and Deirdre. The Tale of Deirdre is told in prose in the transactions of the Gaelic Society and in verse by R M Joyce, M D. To these may be added —
Queen Meave, and other Legends of the Heroic Age, by Aubrey de Vere; also The Fair of Carman, The Fight of Ferdiad, and The Feats of the Heroes of the Red Branch.
Works on Keltic Philology throw much light on the early history of the Gaelic race. Of this class are —
Pritchard’s Eastern Origin of the Keltic Race.
The Aryan Origin of the Gaelic Race and Language.
Some of Max Muller’s Lectures.
Ancient Rome, by Newman.
