New Series
1. Derick S. Thomson, Editor,
Alasdair Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair: Selected Poems
2. Dòmhnall E. Meek, Editor,
Màiri Mhòr nan Oran: Taghadh de a h-Orain
This book is a reprint of the first publication ever produced by the Society and has been in continual demand
in educational establishments and among private individuals over the years. The late Professor Watson, Professor
of Celtic in the University of Edinburgh, was the most distinguished scholar of his generation, a founder of the
Society, and its first President. With an introduction, translations of the poems and copious notes, this volume
is an invaluable tool for the study of this rich source of early Gaelic verse.
In 1952 the Scottish Gaelic Texts Society published what has come to be regarded as the definitive edition of
the poetry of Duncan Ban Macintyre, one of the outstanding Gaelic poets of the eighteenth century. Over the years
the demand for this book has been remarkably steady and sustained, and hence this reprint. Although mostly composed
over 200 years ago, Duncan Ban's poetry is still being read by successive generations and admired for its fresh,
natural and lyrical qualities. A large number of his compositions are still sung as part of the oral tradition.
Donald Lamont was one of the most productive writers of prose in the history of Gaelic writing. The late Professor
W.J. Watson of the Chair of Celtic at Edinburgh University described Lamont's writing as 'the canon of contemporary
Gaelic prose'. This book provides a selection of his best and most characteristic writing. Perhaps Dr Lamont's
best work is to be found in his sketches of the fictitious parish of 'Cille-Sgumain'. Apparent in these essays
is the profound thought, imaginative power, vigorous writing and idiomatic Gaelic which has for many years delighted
countless readers. The introduction surveys the history of Gaelic prose and analyses and assesses Donald Lamont's
position therein. An extensive vocabulary and glossaries of persons and places complete the book.
The Gaelic version of Calvin's Geneva Catechism was only the second Gaelic book to be printed in Scotland, and is of particular interest in a number of ways. In view of its linguistic interest, the text has been reproduced as it stands in the only surviving copy rather than risk obscuring evidence by correcting it in conformity with the Irish standard. The date of the book, hitherto doubtful, can now be fixed with fair accuracy on reliable grounds; its authorship, problematical once the improbable attribution to Carswell is given up, can be at least plausibly determined. It can be shown that this Gaelic version is translated from Latin, not from English, and in the notes frequent reference is made to the Latin and to the translator's technique in turning it into Gaelic, while in the glossary the detailed parallels are in Latin, with briefer glosses in English.
At the time this translation was made the written language in Gaelic Scotland was still made to conform to the standard of literary Irish, so that limited information about the spoken language is conveyed, but a prime source of interest here is what information about the Scottish Gaelic of the time can nevertheless be extracted from the text. In the notes comparative material from contemporary Manx, which was cut off from the Irish tradition, and the evidence of occasional lapses on the translator's part from the standard, are adduced to show to what extent Scottish Gaelic must already have reached its modern form. In support of this the text of the Shorter Catechism of 1659, in which the Irish standard is abandoned, is printed as an appendix. A fairly detailed survey of some aspects of the language of both these texts is given in the introduction.
The group of poems prefixed to the text, though apparently without any intimate connection with it, is also
studied and reconstructed in an appendix: a supplementary glossary covers these poems and the Shorter Catechism.
This is the first critical edition of the songs of John MacDonald, the seventeenth-century bard of Keppoch,
whose active life may have extended from the Montrose wars to the Union of the Parliaments. He was of course a
clan poet, celebrating the glories and achievements of the MacDonalds in their various branches, though not as
uncritically as other Gaelic poets of the period. But he was also much more. As a perfervid supporter of the Stuart
cause, he took a keen interest in the political events of his day, on which many of his songs provide a pungent
commentary. The text is accompanied by a parallel translation into English, introduction, notes and glossary. This
book should be of interest not only to students of Gaelic literature but also to historians, most of whom have
hitherto had access only to the few pieces that have appeared in English translation.
Mary MacLeod was nurse to the chiefs of MacLeod during most of the seventeenth century. In her songs (some of
which are still sung) she draws freely on the bardic poetic tradition of her time, but she was one of the first
Scottish Gaelic poets who used popular diction and versification in composing court poetry, and her work is supremely
representative of the efflorescence of Scottish Gaelic vernacular poetry which occurred between 1560 and 1745.
Her values are purely heroic - often she praises a chief or a chief's son for his manly beauty, strength and valour,
and for his noble descent, hospitality, steadfastness and integrity; and her poetry is full of epic splendour,
as when she salutes "the lovely country of Duntulm, wherein waxen candles blaze, and wine is drunk...from
wan and gleaming cups of silver."
Some of the songs of Dòmhnall Ruadh Mac an t-Saoir, or Donald MacIntyre, were widely known during his own lifetime, and a few of his longer poems had been published, particularly in Gairm. It was not generally known, however, that he was so prolific a composer of poetry. Close on 10,000 lines of his verse have survived, the greater part in his own hand, and some in copies made by friends. In style and texture his work is often reminiscent of the eighteenth century, but many of his themes are contemporary. His verse is always rich in vocabulary and idiom, and is shot through with wit and humour.
The Scottish Gaelic Texts Society departed from its normal policy in presenting the works of a recent poet (MacIntyre
died in 1964). No translations have been given in this edition, but an extensive Glossary has been provided, together
with notes on the background of the poems. The Editor, the Rev. Somerled MacMillan, was a friend of Dòmhnall
Ruadh's, and he worked hard and fast to complete the edition, which was warmly welcomed both in Gaelic Scotland
and abroad.
The Gaelic translation of the Book of Common Order of the Church of Scotland made by John Carswell, Superintendent
of Argyll and Bishop of the Isles, was printed in Edinburgh in April 1567. Of this first Gaelic printed book three
copies are known to survive: one in the Library of Edinburgh University, a second in the British Museum, and a
third in the Pierpoint Morgan Library in New York, all in varying degrees defective. In 1873 Dr Thomas M'Lauchlan
published in Edinburgh a diplomatic reprint of the book, but one with a considerable number of misprints of letters
and accents, and a few accidental corrections of the original text. In this edition, begun by Professor Angus Matheson
and completed after his death in 1962 by R. L. Thomson, it was not thought necessary or useful to attempt an exact
reproduction of the original, and the text is printed more in accordance with modern practice. The language of
this important work is fully described in the Introduction, and there is a full Vocabulary and extensive Notes.
Roderick Morison, who was born about 1656 at Bragar in Lewis and who died about 1714, probably near Dunvegan in Skye, is the only known example in Gaelic Scotland of the Minstrel. "Like Demodocus he was blind and like him he graced his poetry with the music of the harp." This blind harper, or An Clàrsair Dall, the name by which he is best remembered, was skilled in both these arts. His songs are remarkable not only for their quality but also for their degree of self-disclosure and social awareness.
Into this volume has been brought together for the first time all that can be discovered about the work of the
Blind Harper. This has been set into a full account of his life and times.
The twenty-three poems here edited are the work of, or are usually ascribed to, Sìleas Nighean Mhic Raghnaill (c. 1660-c.1729), a daughter of Gilleasbaig, chief of the MacDonalds of Keppoch. She was married about 1685 to Alexander Gordon of Camdell in Banffshire, and had a large family from whom were descended the Gordons of Beldorney, Wardhouse and Kildrummy.
After her husband's death in 1720 she presumably lived on in the North-east, but the date of her death is uncertain. Her life covers a somewhat neglected period in the history of Gaelic verse, linking the period of Iain Lom with that of the great 18th century poets. Like Iain Lom, she is capable of strong partisan pleading (in her case related to the Rising of 1715), and her use of the long tradition of panegyric verse has given us what is probably her finest work, a group of laments which must surely figure among the highest achievements of Scottish Gaelic verse.
But there is also a variety of poetry on other themes: a sizeable proportion of religious (Roman Catholic) verse, poems addressed to members of her own family, and two well-known poems giving advice to young girls on how to behave during courtship.
An attempt is made in the Introduction to establish some historical facts on the poet's life. All the sources
known to the editor are used to provide the text of the poems, which is accompanied by a face-to-face English translation,
and notes. Tunes for the poems, where available, are also given.
The main purpose of this publication was to get the poetry of Eachann Bacach (floruit c.1650) into print. In his day he was highly esteemed as a poet and he also enjoyed some kind of official status as a family poet to the Chief of Duart in Mull. He is, in fact, one of a group of seventeenth-century Gaelic poets to whom the title aos-dàna has been attached, implying that while he had official status he is clearly to be distinguished from the professional classical bards of an earlier age.
Unfortunately, only a very small proportion of his work seems to have survived. The opportunity was taken, therefore, to include, along with the seven poems usually ascribed to him, the work of other MacLean poets of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries whose extant work is also so small as to make it unlikely that any of them will be published separately. The major Maclean poets of the period (e.g. Iain Mac Ailein) have, of course, been excluded from this collection, as have the Maclean poetesses (e.g. Mairearad Nighean Lachlainn), and also all surviving related but anonymous poetry of the period, even where the author is considered very likely to have been a Maclean.
Although drawn in this way from a variety of sources, the Maclean poetry edited here forms a collection of surprising
unity. It is, in a very real sense, the poetry of the Macleans in their decline, "Dol sìos Chloinn
Ghill-Eathain." In several of the poems that is the specific theme and it is interesting to reflect that,
by comparison, there is little Maclean poetry to correspond with the period of their expansion and power.
This anthology of Gaelic poetry connected with the Forty-Five is part of a large body of Gaelic political verse composed between the years 1640 and 1750. No historian of Scotland can afford to neglect this important source of evidence.
During the century that commenced with the Montrose wars and ended with the Forty-Five, the Highlands attained the greatest political importance they have ever possessed. This importance was based upon the power of the Highlanders to exercise armed intervention on behalf of certain of their ideas and ideals, and principally in the cause of their legitimate monarchs. The fact that the Gaelic language was officially proscribed, and unknown outside the Highlands, made it an easy matter for hostile propagandists to misrepresent the motives and malign the character of the Highlanders. This anthology is an attempt to show what their thoughts and feelings, as revealed in their vernacular poetry, really were.
There are few historical events which have acquired the literary interest that surrounds the last of the Jacobite
Risings, best known as the 'Forty-Five'. Although there have been many equally glamorous episodes in Scotland's
past, of no less historical importance and military interest, the Forty-Five has obscured the memories of nearly
all the others in the popular mind. The remarkable personal attractiveness of its leader, and the daring success
of his small army, together with the uncommon personal devotion of his followers, have endowed it with an interest
and fascination that have never showed any sign of waning.
This book is the first published collection of the Gaelic prose of the Rev. Dr Kenneth MacLeod, compiled by Thomas Murchison together with a small committee of the Scottish Gaelic Texts Society.
The main text is in Gaelic and the introduction, which gives full information on Kenneth MacLeod and his life and times, is in English.
Kenneth MacLeod was a native of the island of Eigg and had a deep knowledge of Gaelic lore including folksongs, stories and proverbs. He was minister of Gigha in Argyll and is probably best remembered in the non-Gaelic world as collaborating with the late Marjory Kennedy Fraser in publishing Songs of the Hebrides, earlier this century.
He was only 16 years of age when his first published contribution to Gaelic folklore attracted attention. As
a folklorist, as a repository of Hebridean lore, a composer of melodies, a writer of prose and verse both in Gaelic
and in English, of rare imagination and with inimitable style, he became well-known in Scotland and the rest of
Britain and Ireland and wherever Gaelic is used throughout the world.
This is the first edition of the anonymous poems and songs in the McDiarmid MS of 1770, compiled by a Perthshire minister who used a variety of oral and some MS sources. Approximately half of the 48 items are not found elsewhere, and in many other cases there are additional stanzas and new readings. There is a preponderance of love songs in a variety of modes, formal and informal, but also panegyrics, satires and a heroic ballad.
Close analysis of items in the collection, in comparison with later versions recorded in the Outer Hebrides this century, provides evidence both of continuity and of radical change in texts. The editor provides an introduction which analyses the different kinds of poems, historical and linguistic notes, variant readings and a very full glossary.
This important collection of poems and songs serves to expand our understanding of the Gaelic poetry and song
tradition in many ways.
This is the first printed anthology of Gaelic poetry dealing with the Clearances and the Land Agitation. It brings together 44 poems, covering the main genres produced in the period from 1800 to 1890. It includes satires on shepherds, landlords and factors, laments on social change, exile and emigration, and songs of reaction and resurgence from the 'land war' of the 1880s. Drawing on oral tradition, contemporary newspapers and printed collections by individual poets, it covers most parts of the Highlands and Islands, from Islay to Sutherland.
The edition illumines the role of the poems and their composers in nineteenth-century Highland communities. A wide-ranging introduction places the poems in their literary contexts, and considers the significance of such verse as historical evidence. Extensive notes on textual sources and general background accompany each poem. Translations of all poems are given, together with a very full glossary. Biographical indexes provide information on the poets and the principal political figures mentioned in the poems.
This book will be of interest to all concerned with assessing the impact of social change on the Highlands and
Islands after 1800. It recovers the 'alternative voice' of Gaelic poetry of social protest submerged for more than
a century and allows the reader to experience the various responses of those affected by the policies of 'improvement'
which have shaped the recent history of the Highlands and Islands.
This selection of fourteen poems, running to some 2300 lines, represents over a third of Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair's surviving poetry. The selection includes his core work, and illustrates its wide range. A detailed Introduction attempts to set his life and work in their eighteenth-century context. The edition draws on a number of printed and manuscript sources not critically used in earlier editions, and provides full notes and an extensive glossary.
Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair is widely regarded as the premier Gaelic poet of the eighteenth century.
This revised and expanded edition of Professor Dòmhnall Meek's Màiri Mhòr nan Oran, first published in 1977 and long out of print, contains 40 of the Skye poet's songs. As well as the eight new songs in this edition, there is greater detail about her life, greater analysis of her songs and a new assessment of the standing of both the poet and her work. Along with extensive notes on individual poems, there is a useful glossary of rarer words. It is a very welcome addition to the Society's list of publications in the year of the 100th anniversary of Màiri Mhòr's death.
Màiri Mhòr (Mary MacDonald c.1821-1898) belonged to Skeabost in Skye. In the mid-1840's she moved to Inverness, where she married Isaac MacPherson. The sudden death of her husband in 1871 was followd by a further tradegy in 1872, when she went into domestic service in Inverness and was accused (apparently unjustly) of theft. She was sentences and imprisoned but released before serving her full sentence. This painful expression liberated her expression as a poet and she went on to compose many songs. The best known of these celebrate the life and landscape of her native island and were composed while she was resident in Glasgow and Greenock. Her personal suffering and intimate knowledge of community life in Skye moved her to empathise with the wider experience of Highland people through clearance and social change and she supported the crofters' cause fearlessly in the Land Agitation of the late 1870's and 1880's. Her numerous political songs boosted morale generally in the Highlands and her powerful personality, which enlivened ceilidhs and political meetings in the Lowlands and Highlands, ensured that she became a legend in her own lifetime. That legend lives on in her songs and in recent celebrations of her life in film and drama.
This new, all-Gaelic selection from Màiri's surviving output represents and discusses the main genres
of her verse. Combining many moods and themes, this edition of her verse illumines not only her range of styles
and interests, but also the role of Gaelic song in the 19th century Highlands.