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Brehon Law
Despite the Roman and subsequently Anglo-Norman and English descriptions of the Celts as a bunch of lawless barbarians the Celts owned one of the oldest and perhaps most humane collection of laws in Europe. These laws are commonly known as the Brehon Law, a name derived from the Gaelic breitheamh, meaning judge or probably more accurate arbitrator. The real, but rarely used, name of this law system is Feineachas, which is usually translated as Laws of the Freemen.
Great Fair at Tara
It is believed that the basic principles of the Brehon Law go back as far as 2000 BCE. Unlike other contemporary and modern laws the Brehon Law was a law of precedents instead of a pre-designed set of rules. When a conflict occurred which was not covered by an existing law the judgement of the breitheamh, or arbitrator, became law. Obviously this resulted in local differences and it is said that Ollamh Fodhla, or Master of Ireland (Fodhla is one of the poetic names for Ireland), established a triennial conference, the Feis Teamhrach, or Great Fair, at the Hill of Tara to tackle this legal inequality and to maintain juristic unity throughout Ireland.
The historical relevance of Ollamh Fodhla, who is also known as Ollothair, meaning All-Father, is disputed and the legends aren't conclusive either. Some assume that Ollamh Fodhla was primarily used as title and in this scope it may refer to the Dagda, the supreme deity of the mythological Tuatha de Danaan and master of magic, warfare and arts, who - still according the legends - was the Ard Rí, or High King, in the seventh century BCE. A small group push the envelope a bit further and underline the name Ollothair, anglicised to Eochaid, which was the assumed Celtic name of the Biblical Jeremiah. They assume that Jeremiah, who is also associated with the Stone of Destiny and the occurrence of the Star of David and the so-called Red Hand of O'Neill in the Ulster flag, arrived in Ireland after his escape from Egypt and acquired the title Ollamh Fodhla by marriage. Based on inscriptions in the mysterious Cairn T at Loughcrew, his alleged burial place, this fraction pinpoints the reign of Eochaid, hence Jeremiah, in the sixth century BCE.
Whoever convened the first Great Fair was aware of the fact that conferences were rather boring by nature and to lure the pick of the bunch of the ancient Irish community to the official part he was compelled to threw a party which lasted six solid days. Whether caused by debates or feasts, the collection of laws increased dramatically and in the course of the years even the most trivial aspects of life had become subject to the Brehon Law.
Like the druids and bards the breitheamh relied entirely on their memory. It was not until the third century CE that Ard Rí Cormac Mac Art wrote down some of his decisions and verdicts in what became known as the Book of Aicill.
It is written in the Annals of the Four Masters that under Ard Rí Laeghaire the Brehon Law was put to vellum in the year 438 CE. This however is far from the truth, which is remarkable because this source is considered rather reliable. What really happened was that Laeghaire participated in a commission, supervised by Saint Patrick, that revised the Brehon Law to suit Christian principles. It took the commission of nine men three years of hard labour to produce a completely revised edition of the Brehon Law. Without a doubt Saint Patrick left his marks on this manuscript which became known as the Senchus Mór. In fact the Senchus Mór was known for some time as Cain Patrick, or Patrick's Law. Unfortunately the original manuscript is lost somewhere down the curvy road of history and all that's left are copies of certain passages and marginal notes made by the copier. Although little more than a diluted extract from the ancient laws the Senchus Mór and the derived manuscripts formed the legal foundation of the Irish community until the British introduced their laws after the Anglo-Norman Invasion.
In general it is believed that Cennfaeladh, a warrior who earned his nickname The Learned by becoming a jurist, started to write down the latest pre-Christian version of the Brehon Law in the early seventh century. Thereafter his work was continued and refined for centuries, but unfortunately large amounts of these studies are lost or intentionally destroyed by the Anglo-Normans and English. Thanks to the devotion of O'Curry and O'Donovan, who tried to recover and translate the remaining manuscripts in the nineteenth century, we have access to approximately 5,300 pages with laws. Not bad at all for a lawless, barbarian tribe!
Irish Ways, Irish Laws
The Brehon Law didn't seized to exist with the Christianisation of Ireland nor with the Anglo-Norman invasion. On the contrary, many of the early English and Scottish settlers adopted the Irish ways and Irish laws. Some of these so-called Old English settler, such as the Butlers of Ormonde, even stood up to their former queen to preserve their newly acquired lifestyle.
Effectively the Brehon Law came to an end when Hugh O'Neill, the last officially recognised King of Ulster, surrendered to King James I at Millifont Abbey in 1603. In order to regain their estates after the Nine Years War several Irish nobles swore loyalty to the English Crown and disbanded their private armies. Unable to resume the Irish way of life many of them left Ireland in an exodus known as the Fight of Earls.
However, because the Brehon Law had regulated every aspect of life over a period of more than three millennia there was a thin line between formal laws and informal conventions. The phrase Irish ways, Irish laws illustrates the fusion between Brehon Law and Irish culture. Therefore it's hard, if not impossible, to establish a date on which the Brehon Law was abolished completely. In fact, we think that some aspects of this ancient law are still in place in modern day Ireland. The hunger strike, used as political lever throughout Irish history but mainly known due to the prison protests in the 1970's and 80's, for example appear in the Brehon Law as a method to convince a debtor to redeem his debts, the famous Irish hospitality might well originate from the statutory regulation to provide housing and meals to travellers and the feeling of solidarity with the colours of the hurling team from one's county reflects the vital importance of the tuath, for the time being translated as tribe or clan.
Brehon Law and Punishment
Characteristic for the Brehon Law is the omission of corporal punishment and death penalty. The most severe punishment was exile, but most disputes got settled with an eric, or fine, due to the victim or his surviving relatives. The fine for murder, for example, was twice as high as the fine for manslaughter. The penalty was not only related to the violation, but also to the status of the perpetrator and the victim. A perpetrator of higher standing had to pay a higher fine and an offence against a victim of higher standing was punished more severe. There was no arguing about the height of the fine as they all were nailed down.
Violent crimes could be sentenced with an order to pay eineachlan, or honour-money. Due to this option, which was intended to financially compensate victims or relatives, people rarely took justice into their own hands. This whole idea was deemed reprehensible and abolished by the Anglo-Normans at the introduction of the death penalty.
For lack of a law enforcement organisation and bailiffs the execution of a verdict was a matter between the debtor and his creditor or their families. The Brehon Law provided guidelines to extract overdue payments by Troscad, fasting on a person. If a flaith, or nobleman, was money due to a féine, meaning free farmer, the latter was empowered to fast on the doorstep of the aire. This by it self would of course cause embarrassment, but if the féine died of starvation the aire was likely to face a murder trail. If fasting on a debtor wasn't lawful, for example when both parties belonged to the nobility or if the debt was just too small to justify a starving plaintiff on a doorstep, the debtor was allowed to hand over jewellery as a deposit. This deposit however had to be returned when the debtor was summoned at the Great Fair or any other important meeting. Seemingly a debt not worth fasting for was too small to justify the embarrassment sustained when appearing without jewellery.
An slightly different form of fasting was known as Cealacha, which is usually translated as achieving justice by starvation. Throughout Irish history and especially during The Troubles in Northern Ireland fasting, as meant by Cealacha, was often used as a method to embarrass the authorities.
On the face of it the Celtic meaning of Troscad and Cealacha conflicted with the Christian concept of purification through self-sacrifice, but the early Christians somehow came up with a common feature. A prayer said by a purified believer, thus a believer observing the fast, was more likely to be heard and compelled with. In other words, fasting enabled the ordinary mortal to enforce obedience upon the Almighty. This line of thought comes dangerously close to the Celtic meaning of Troscad. Probably this is why stories of Saint Patrick and other saints fasting were, excusé le mot, meat and drink for the Irish.
As already mentioned the Brehon Law applied to almost every aspect of life and because of this there are some strange and even humorous laws.
Brehon Law was concerned about the welfare of animals and thus: It is illegal to override a horse, force a weakened ox to do excessive work or threaten (sec) an animal with angry vehemence which breaks bones.. The Celts also understood the specific and odd appetite from their pregnant wives: If a pregnant women craves a morsel of food and her husband withholds it through stinginess, meanness or neglect he must pay a fine..
Perhaps the term hair-splitting originates from the Brehon Law: For pulling off the hairs of a virgin one yearling for each 20 hairs..
Beside these humorous examples there are laws indicating an unprecedented progressiveness. Community of property in a marriage was unknown and both men and women retained the property of goods brought into the marriage. Sexual offences were well described as if a woman invites a man and screams during the act it was not considered rape, if she did not invites the man and screams it was rape and punished accordingly. Minimum wages were established by law: two lambs a year for the wife who minds the sheep and twenty-one cows, plus land to feed them, and two hounds and two horses for the chief poet of a tribe.
Brehon Law today
Some principles of the Brehon Law still remain in Ireland. We have already mentioned the hunger strike as mean of putting pressure on. But also the highly-praised hospitality of the Irish originates from ancient times when only young children, madman and old people were released from the obligation to provide housing and meals to travellers.
Even the sentence It is the Law, which you can read in every pub or along the road, make sense to us now. The whole purpose of the law is to organise and guide civil relations. They are not intended to make life miserable, they are intended to make the community more pleasing. In other words: "Laws were made for people and the law can never scorn" (from the song Free the People).