Early Irish Literature

Ravens have been linked to death in a variety of cultures due to their black feathering and scavenger diet. In Scandinavia and Ireland the corvid was often paired with a supernatural patron, who shared the corvid's role as symbol of death, prophet and mentor of the hero, and were known to take up the bird’s shape besides. The first part of this thesis is dedicated to the similar function of the corvid in the Irish and Norse texts, while the second part discusses the corvid as a sine qua non.

In the texts connteted to the Ulster Cycle of Tales we find a number of references to snow. This study investigates descriptions of heavy snowfall and bad weather conditions in Ulster Cycle tales to determine the function of the description of such phenomena.
It finds that snow was a not infrequent phenomenon in early Irish life. Yet, mention of this type of natural phenomenon appears to used as a narrative instrument and it is used to delay or otherwise influence the development of the tale. Natural forces are controlled by higher powers and may connive with heroes or turn against them.

The paper investigates the use of motifs from Early Irish Voyage Literature in the Kildare Poems, written in Ireland in the mid-14th century. The study identifies potential Irish literary motifs, particularly those connected to the Otherworld as seen in early Irish voyage literature. However, the motifs are unusually explicit in their sexual imagery and may be understood as satirical. It is suggested that the exaggerated presentation of motifs from early Irish voyage  literature points to a cultural distance of the author towards a culture he was well familiar with.

Adomnán's sixth-century "Life of St. Columba" has often been used to "bolster" belief in the Loch Ness Monster, yet specific historical and cultural analysis of Adomnán tends to completely separate  Adomnán’s story about St. Columba from the modern myth of the Loch Ness Monster, and finds an earlier and more culturally significant use of Celtic “water beast” folklore along the way. Judicious application of Critical Theory and structural analysis can discredit any strong connection between kelpies and water-horses on the one hand and the modern “media-augmented” creation of the Loch Ness Monster on the other. Without St. Columba, the myth of the Loch Ness Monster falters,
for belief in the creature can be seen to rest upon several oft-cited but easily discredited foundations.

The ninth-century Irish voyage tale known as Immram Maíle Dúin, or the Voyage of Máel Dúin, is a cleverly structured inter-textual narrative which draws on many sources. It interrogates the role of the Church in Irish society. It presents a world which is deeply flawed and violent.

Published in: Judith Devlin & Howard B. Clarke (eds), European Encounters: Essays in Memory of Albert Lovett (Dublin: UCD Press, 2003) 239–52.

this paper looks at how leaders in 12th C Ireland gained agricultural or commodity wealth from their subjects and how they transformed this into monetary or at any rate metallurgical resources with the help of foreign merchants of largely Scandinavian and English extraction