The resulting alphabet was sometimes known as Beth Luis Nuin, after the (original) first three letters, just as with ABC for our modern Western alphabet. The surviving layout of the alphabet means that the system should logically be called Beth Luis Fearn (one, two, and three horizontal strokes to the right, respectively). The fact that the alphabet is known as Beth Luis Nuin shows that there was a still older Gaelic system, of which only the nickname has survived.
Because the basis of the alphabet was a vertical line and the characters were lines branching to left and right from it, the system was like a tree, and it is sometimes called the Ogham Tree. This idea led on to giving the characters the names of trees. Beth means “birch,” Luis means “rowan,” and Nuin means “ash.” The system is a tree; the alphabet itself is a forest. Individual trees held high symbolic significance, so the forest alphabet was deemed to be a repository of wisdom. The word for “knowledge” also means “wood.”
Inscriptions are read from the bottom up, the way a tree grows.
The name “Ogham” comes from the name of the Irish god Ogma, the god of poetry and learning who is said to have devised the alphabet himself.
It is likely the Ogham alphabet was used for writing on perishable materials such as wood, leather, and bark, but these have not survived. The inscriptions that have survived are all on stone and they all date from AD 300 to 700.
The intensification of agriculture in Ireland meant that many Ogham stones were threatened. Some were rescued and put on display at University College Cork; the West Wing Stone Corridor there houses the largest collection of Ogham stones in Ireland. These stones are a national treasure, in that they represent the earliest examples of writing in Ireland, unless we count the remarkable Neolithic symbols carved on the Boyne passage graves. Another collection of Ogham stones is housed at Mount Melleray monastery near Cappoquin in County Waterford.
Some of the standing stones were raised as boundary markers. Some, mainly the later ones, were raised to mark graves. Many of the surviving Ogham inscriptions have been translated to read “name of person + name of father + name of tribe.”
An Ogham stone from Ballymorereagh in County Kerry carries a Latin inscription on its face, which reads FECT QUENILOC, “Made by Qeniloc.” Along the edge is Qeniloc’s name and ancestry in Ogham.
Ogham was not confined to Ireland; Irish migrants took it to Wales.
OLLAMH FOOLA
See Genealogy.
OPPIDUM
Each tribe had at least one oppidum: a big market center with everything except a defensive rampart. By the first century BC every civitas had at least one, which functioned as its capital. It was a kind of town, with residential areas and areas of workshops, though unlike modern towns, it also included pasturage for livestock. Julius Caesar noted that he found a great many livestock in Cassivellaunus’s oppidum.
Caesar’s account of the Gallic War is of particular interest because the date of his account is so precise, 58–51 BC, and this is exactly the time when the Celtic oppida were at their fullest development.
ORDOVICES
See Caratacus.
OSISMII
A Celtic tribe in Gaul, living in the extreme north-west of Brittany. They were first mentioned by the Greek traveler Pytheas in the fourth century BC. He located them on the western tip of Brittany, on a headland then called Kabaion; this was later known by the Latin name Finis Terrae, the End of the World, and is still known by the French version of this, Finistère.
The main town of the Osismii was Vorgium: modern Carhaix. The tribe submitted to Julius Caesar in 57 BC, though the following year they joined the Veneti in a revolt against Caesar, who suppressed them.
OSSIAN
Ossian was an ancient Gaelic bard invented by James Macpherson. The Poems of Ossian, also concocted by Macpherson, were published in the 1760s. They were an immediate sensation and Ossian acclaimed as a Celtic Homer.
During the next 30 years, the poems were widely read and translated into many languages. Goethe translated parts into German. Napoleon carried a copy with him on his march to Moscow. He also commissioned the artist Ingres to paint The Dream of Ossian.
The poems were extremely influential. They gave a huge impetus to the dawning Romantic movement. Poets as different from each other as Blake, Byron, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning were affected by them. The composers Mendelssohn, Schubert, and Brahms wrote music inspired by Ossian. The poems also stimulated the study of folklore and ancient Celtic languages.
When Macpherson first published his book, he claimed it was a translation of an ancient manuscript in Gaelic: a copy of an original work by Ossian. Several people challenged this, including Samuel Johnson, who said the poetry was the work of Macpherson himself, but Macpherson neither owned up nor produced the ancient manuscript. The controversy went on for many years.
Macpherson’s fake Celtic world was based on some authentic Celtic material. Fingal is based on Fionn Mac Cumhaill; Temora is Tara; Cuthulinn is Cú Chulainn; and Dar-Tula is Deirdre of the Sorrows. Parallels such as these create an air of authenticity, but most of the incident is Macpherson’s own invention.
One of the poems is Fingal. Macpherson presented his “translation” in continuous prose. Here I have broken it up into lines to make it easier to read. This is how Book 1 opens:
Cuthullin sat by Tura’s wall;
by the tree of the rustling sound.
His spear leaned against the rock.
His shield lay on the grass by his side.
Amid his thoughts of mighty Cairbar,
a hero slain by the chief in war;
the scout of ocean comes, Moran the son of Fithil!
“Arise,” said the youth, “Cuthullin, arise.
I see the ships of the north!
Many, chief of men, are the foe.
Many the heroes of the sea-borne Swaran!”
“Moran!’ replied the blue-eyed chief.
“Thou ever tremblest, son of Fithil!
Thy fears have increased the foe.
It is Fingal, king of deserts,
with aid to green Erin of streams.”
“I beheld their chief,” says Moran,
“tall as a glittering rock. His spear is a blasted pine.
His shield the rising moon! He