Front matter

AN OLD IRISH LAW-TRACT
ON BEE-KEEPING
EDITED BY
THOMAS CHARLES-EDWARDS
AND
FERGUS KELLY
.
DUBLIN INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDIES
'1983

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BECHBRETHA

EARLY IRISH LAW SERIES
VOLUME I
BECHBRETHA
EDITED BY
THOMAS CHARLES-EDWARDS
AND
FERGUS KELLY
DUBLIN INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDIES
10 Burlington Road, Dublin 4
1983

© Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies
Printed by
W. & S. Magowan ( Ireland ) Ltd.
Dublin & Dundalk

TO
D. A. Binchy

CONTENTS
FOREWORD . . . . . . . . . . jx
ABBREVIATIONS . . . . . . . . xj
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . ]
Manuscripts . . . . . . . . . . 1
Language . . . . . . . . . . 12
The value of the Glosses and Commentary . . . . 14
Legal Introduction . . . . . . . . 24
Bee-keeping in Early Ireland 38
text . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
TRANSLATION .. .. .. .. .. 51
NOTES . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
appendix 1 (H.2.15A Commentary) .. .. .. 169
appendix 2 (Egerton 88 Commentary) . . . . 176
appendix 3 (H.3. 17 Commentary) .. .. .. 182
appendix 4 (H.3. 18 Commentary) .. .. .. 184
appendix 5 (Caithchi bech ‘ trespass-penalties of bees ’) .. 186
appendix 6 ( Athgaba l bech ‘ distraint of bees ’) . . 189
appendix 7 (Bees in the Welsh Laws) . . . . 192
INDEX OF IRISH WORDS . . . . . . . . 206
INDEX OF PROPER NAMES . . . . . . . . 213
INDEX OF WELSH AND BRETON WORDS . . . . 214

FOREWORD
We hope that this edition of Bechbretha will be of interest to
students of the Old Irish language and of Early Irish law. As well
as the law of bee-keeping, this text touches on many other legal
topics, and provides information on the important subject of
comaithches ‘ co-operative farming The main manuscript, H.2. 1 5 A,
preserves the Old Irish text particularly well, and we hope that our
attempts to distinguish the hands of the different scribes who
contributed to text, glosses, and commentary will be of interest to
palaeographers.
Although most of our introduction and notes is taken up with
textual and linguistic problems, we hope that this book will also be
of assistance to those interested in the early history of bee-keeping
in Ireland and Britain. In the fifth section of the Introduction
(pp. 38-49) we summarise what can be gleaned from Bechbretha and
other written sources about Early Irish bee-keeping. For this section
we have received useful information from Arthur Hunter, Colin
Butler, Michael Telford, Morfydd Owen, Ken Saunders, Chris
McAll, Daniel Deasy, Oliver Padel, Malachy McKenna, Cathy
Crimmins, Katharine Simms, Seamus O Cathain and many others.
We are especially grateful to Dr. Eva Crane of the International
Bee Research Association, and Dr. John Breen of Thomond College
of Education, Limerick. Both read earlier drafts of this section, and
made many important corrections and suggestions.
The text of Bechbretha was studied at a weekly seminar in the
Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies from January to March 1976.
We would like to thank all who attended this seminar, and in
particular to register our indebtedness to Liam Breatnach, Anders
Ahlqvist, E. G. Quin, John Armstrong and the late David Greene for
a number of suggestions which we have used in our edition.
Above all, D. A. Binchy has been of immeasurable assistance
to us during the preparation of this edition, and has been most
generous with advice, encouragement and enlightenment. In
addition, as he had read Bechbretha with Rudolf Thurneysen in Bonn
in 1932, he was able to pass on to us some of Thurneysen’s unpublished opinions. Both Dr. Binchy and Liam Breatnach read the
final draft of our edition, and saved us from numerous errors.

X
FOREWORD
Finally, we would like to thank Miss Cathleen Sheppard and Mrs.
Pat Dunne for their accurate typing of our manuscript, Maire
Ui Chinnseala for skilfully preparing the book for the press, and
W. & S. Magowan Ltd. for the very high standard of their printing.
Thomas Charles-Edwards
Fergus Kelly

ABBREVIATIONS
AFM
Al
AL
ALIW
ACL
AT
AU
BB
BBCS
B Comaithchesa
B Crolige
BFG
BG
BNnE
Biirgschaft
CA
CCF
CG
CGH
CIH
CLP
CU
CS
DIL
Dw C
EIHM
Eel. Oen.
GPC
Grammar
Gw C
IEW
JRSAI
Annals of the Four Masters i-vii ed. O’Donovan, Dublin
1848-51
Annals of Inisfallen ed. Mac Airt, Dublin 1951
Ancient Laws of Ireland i-vi, Dublin 1865-1901
Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales i-ii ed. Owen, London
1841
Archiv fur celtische Lexikographie i-iii ed. Stokes and Meyer,
Halle 1898-1907
Annals ofTigernach ed. Stokes, RC xvi-xviii, 1895-7
Annals of Ulster i-iv ed. Hennessy and MacCarthy, Dublin
1887-1901
Bechbretha {CIH 444. 12-457. 10)
Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies (Cardiff)
Bretha Comaithchesa, AL iv 67-159 {CIH 64.6-79.13 etc.*)
Bretha Crolige ed. Binchy, Erin xii 1-77 (CIH 2286.24-2305.3)
Bretha im Fuillema Gell, AL v 375-423 (CIH 462.19-476.26)
Bretha im Gatta ed. Hull, ZCP xxv 211-25 {CIH 477.3 1-479. 18)
Bethada Naem nErenn i-ii ed. Plummer, Oxford 1922
Die Bilrgschaft im irischen Recht ed. Thurneysen, Berlin 1928
{CIH 591.8-599.38 etc.*)
Cain Aicillne ed. Thurneysen, ZCP xiv 334-94 {CIH 480.1502.6 etc.*)
Coic Conara Fugill ed. Thurneysen, Berlin 1926 {CIH 22002203 etc.*)
Crith Gablach ed. Binchy, Dublin 1941 {CIH 777.1-783.38
etc.*)
Corpus Genealogiarum Hiberniae ed. O’Brien, Dublin 1962
Corpus Iuris Hibernici i-vi ed. Binchy, Dublin 1978
Celtic Law Papers ed. Jenkins, Brussels 1973
Coibnes Uisci Thairidne ed. Binchy, Erin xxvii 52-85 (CIH
457.11-462.18)
Chronicum Scotorum ed. Hennessy, London 1866
(Contributions to a) Dictionary of the Irish Language, Royal
Irish Academy, Dublin 1913-75
Damweiniau Colan ed. Jenkins, Aberystwyth 1973
Early Irish History and Mythology T. F. O’Rahilly, Dublin
1946
Eelire Oengusso Cell De ed. Stokes, Henry Bradshaw Society
xxix, London 1905
Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru, Cardiff 1950A Grammar of Old Irish Thurneysen, Dublin 1961
‘ Gwentian Code ’ in ALIW i 620-797
Indogermanisches etymo/ogisches Wbrterbuch Pokorny, Bern
1959
Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland (Dublin)

Xll
ABBREVIATIONS
KZ
LHEB
LL
LTWL
LU
ML
O'Dav.
OMulc.
Patric. Texts
RC
Sg.
SR
Stud. E.Ir.Law
TBC (Rec. I)
TBDD
Thes.
TPS
Trip.
UB
VC
VKG
VSC
VSH
Wb.
WLW
WML
ZCP
(Kuhn’s) Zeitschrift fur vergleicheude Sprachforschung (Berlin)
Language and History in Early Britain Jackson, Edinburgh
1953
The Book of Leinster i-v ed. Best, Bergin and O’Brien, Dublin
1954-67
The Latin Texts of the Welsh Laws ed. Emanuel, Cardiff 1967
Lebor na Huidre ed. Best and Bergin, Dublin 1929
Milan Glosses on the Psalms (Thes. i)
O' Davoren's Glossary ed. Stokes Arch, ii 197-504 ( CIH
1466.11-1531.28 etc.*)
O'Mulconry's Glossary ed. Stokes Arch, i 232-324
Patrician Texts in the Book of Armagh ed. Bieler, Dublin 1979
Revue Celtique (Paris)
St. Gall Glosses on Priscian (Thes. ii)
Sal fair na Rann ed. Stokes, Oxford 1883
Studies in Early Irish Law ed. Dillon and Binchy, Dublin 1936
Tain Bo Cuailnge (Recension I) ed. C. O’Rahilly, Dublin 1976
Togail Bruidne Da Derga ed. Knott, Dublin 1936
Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus i-ii ed. Stokes and Strachan,
Cambridge 1901-3
Transactions of the Philological Society (London)
The Tripartite Life of Patrick, ed. Mulchrone, Dublin 1939
Uraicecht Becc, AL v 1-116 (CIH 1 590-1 61 8 etc.* forthcoming
ed. R. C. McAll)
‘ Venedotian Code ’ in ALIW i 1-335
Vergleicheude Grammatik der keltischen Sprachen i-ii Pedersen,
Gottingen 1908-11
Vita Sancti Columbae Adomnan’s Life of Columba, ed. A. O.
and M. O. Anderson, London 1961
Vitae Sanctorum Hiberniae i-ii ed. Plummer, Oxford 1910
Wurzburg Glosses on the Pauline Epistles (Thes. i)
The Welsh Law of Women ed. Jenkins and Owen, Cardiff 1980
Welsh Medieval Law ed. Wade-Evans, Oxford 1909
Zeitschrift fur celtische Philologie (Elalle)
*We give only one CIH reference in the case of legal texts which occur in a
number of MSS. For the other references, see CIH, Introduction to vol. i
pp. xxiii-xxv.