Bretha Déin Chécht
Bretha Déin Chécht (Old Irish for "Judgments of Dian Cécht"[1]: xvi ) is an early Irish legal text on the law of illegal injury, detailing the fines due to the injured in a great multitude of cases. The title attributes it to the mythological physician Dian Cécht.
It is the 34th text of the Senchas Már. It directly follows Bretha Crólige, a sister-tract on illegal injury.
Manuscripts
[edit]A single manuscript preserves the complete text of Bretha Déin Chécht (National Library of Ireland MS G 11), alongside three other texts from the final third of the Senchas Már.[2]: 90, 303 D. A. Binchy edited this copy of the Bretha Déin Chécht, with translation and commentary, in 1966. A number of excerpts and commentaries on it have also survived, though fewer than have survived of Bretha Crólige. A purported quote from Bretha Déin Chécht in Bretha Étgid is probably a later invention.[3]: 1
Contents
[edit]Bretha Déin Chécht is the 34th text of the collection of legal texts called the Senchas Már, placed in the final third of that collection.[2]: 303 The Senchas Már is generally dated between the late 7th and early 8th century CE.[1]: 33 A sister-tract on illegal injury, Bretha Crólige, directly precedes it in the Senchas Már.[2]: 303 [4]: 18
Bretha Déin Chécht deals primarily with the fines a culprit must pay after illegal injury, detailing the percentage of that fine due to the physician and the percentage due to the victim.[5]: 131, 271 The complicated (and sometimes contradictory) tiers of fines detailed here appear to have perplexed later commentators. One such commentator deemed the text the anaicne diancecht ("exotic law of Dian Cécht").[6]: 381 [3]: 5
The tract is attributed to Dian Cécht, a figure of Irish mythology who appears as the physician to the Tuatha Dé Danann, a band of euhemerized pre-Christian deities. He was presumably a pre-Christian healing or medicine god.[6]: 381 [7] The Senchas Már carries a late and pseudo-historical preface, which details the codification and Christianization of the compilation by Saint Patrick and his commissioners. Dian Cécht is explicitly listed as among the pre-Christian authors whose judgements were accepted because they did not contradict Christian teaching.[3]: 2
Beyond their value as a source for early Irish law, Bretha Crólige and Bretha Déin Chécht reveal much about the extent of medical knowledge and the kinds of treatment available in the period.[8]: 234 For example, the six classes of tooth-injury (each with different fines) delineated in the Bretha Déin Chécht tell us something about the knowledge of dentistry in early medieval Ireland.[5]: 132 The other available medical manuscripts reproduce medicine of a much later date (mostly borrowed from Arabic sources).[3]: 5
References
[edit]- ^ a b Eska, Charlene M. (2022). Lost and Found in Early Irish Law: Aidbred, Heptad 64, and Muirbretha. Medieval Law and its Practice. Vol. 36. Leiden / Boston: Brill.
- ^ a b c Breatnach, Liam (2005). A Companion to the Corpus Iuris Hibernici. Early Irish Law Series. Vol. 5. Dublin: Institute for Advanced Studies.
- ^ a b c d Binchy, D. A. (1966). "Bretha Déin Chécht". Ériu. 20: 1–66. JSTOR 30008048.
- ^ Charles-Edwards, T. M. (1999). The Early Mediaeval Gaelic Lawyer (PDF). E. C. Quiggin Memorial Lectures. Vol. 4. Cambridge: University of Cambridge.
- ^ a b Kelly, Fergus (1988). A Guide to Early Irish Law. Early Irish Law Series. Vol. 3. Dublin: Institute for Advanced Studies.
- ^ a b McLeod, Neil (2000). "The Not-So-Exotic Law Of Dian Cecht". In Evans, G.; Martin, B.; Wooding, J. (eds.). Origins and Revivals: Proceedings of the First Australian Conference of Celtic Studies. Sydney: Centre for Celtic Studies University of Sydney. pp. 381–399.
- ^ MacKillop, James (2004). "Dian Cécht". A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- ^ Kelly, Fergus (2002). "Texts and transmissions: the law-texts". In Chatháin, Próinséas Ní; Richter, Michael (eds.). Ireland and Europe in the early Middle Ages: texts and transmissions. Dublin: Four Courts Press. pp. 230–242.
Further reading
[edit]- Binchy, D. A. (1978). Corpus Iuris Hibernici (6 vols.). Dublin: Institute for Advanced Studies. 2283.1-4; 1212.35-1213.2. (diplomatic edition of the manuscripts for Bretha Déin Chécht).
- Binchy, D. A. (1966). "Bretha Déin Chécht". Ériu. 20: 1–66. JSTOR 30008048. (edition of the Bretha Déin Chécht with English translation and commentary).