"Were poetry suppressed, my friends, with no history, no ancient lays,
save that each had a father, nothing of any man would be heard hereafter."
__ Giolla Brighde Mhac Con Midhe in Osborn Bergin, "Irish Bardic Poetry"
Celtuic poets not only sang praises and songs to their patrons, but they were also the repositories of history and genealogy. These were passed down to poets from generation to generation until the era when the church wrote them down.
Before the coming of St. Patrick to Ireland, it is said that only three classes of people were premitted to speak in public with any authority: the chronicler to relate events and tell stories, the poet to eulogize and satirize, and the brehon, or judge, to pass sentences from precedents and commentaries.
We may wonder at the way that poetry and history are conjoined. In order that historical, poetic. and legal traditions could be recalled accurately, memory was aided and strengthened by the 'thread of poetry' that bound together the teachings. The memory of these teachings can be likened to a preserving shrine or storehouse of knowledge, or to a brigh candle of knowledge conveyed from one person to another. The memory of wise traditions is called 'the old road to knowledge' - the road by which people can walk to their ancestral wisdom.
Our own chronicles normally record events, trends, and times, and are rarely seen as the preservers of wisdom. The poetry of the living knowledge is a skill of more benefit than a bald recital of events: it becomes a road upon which we can walk all the way down to the depths of time and find the ageless knowledge. Without its mythic levels, history is shorn of glory and usefulness.
"Meditate upon the history of your people. What parts of it come alive for you? Down which 'old
roads of knowledge' can you walk?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]
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