Note: This article contains special characters.

Ogham (Old Irish: ogam IPA: [ˈɔɣam], Modern Irish [ˈoːm] or [ˈoːəm], English /ˈɒɡəm/) is an Early Medieval alphabet used primarily to represent the Old Irish language (and, occasionally, the Brythonic-Latin ancestor of Welsh). Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed Irish (ga ''Gaeilge'' is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family originating in Ireland and historically spoken by the Irish. The Early Middle Ages is a period in the History of Europe following the fall of the Western Roman Empire spanning roughly five centuries from AD 500 An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed ^[3] Ogham is sometimes referred to as the "Celtic Tree Alphabet", based on a High Medieval Bríatharogam traditions ascribing names of trees to the individual letters. In Early Irish literature a Bríatharogam ("word ogham" plural Bríatharogaim) is a two word Kenning which explains the meanings of the names

There are roughly 400 surviving ogham inscriptions on stone monuments throughout Ireland and Britain, the bulk of them stretching in arc from Co. There are roughly 400 known Ogham inscriptions on stone monuments scattered around the Irish Sea, the bulk of them dating to the 5th and 6th centuries Kerry in the south of Ireland across to Dyfed in south Wales. Dyfed ('dɪ ved is a preserved county of Wales. Dyfed was created by the Local Government Act 1972 on 1 April 1974. The remainder are mostly in south-eastern Ireland, western Scotland, the Isle of Man, and England around the Devon/Cornwall border. The Isle of Man (Ellan Vannin ˈɛlʲən ˈvanɪn or Mann (Mannin) is a self-governing Crown dependency, located in the Irish Sea at the geographical Devon is a large county in the South West of England. The county is also referred to as Devonshire, but that is an entirely unofficial name Cornwall ( Kernow ˈkɛɹnɔʊ is the most southwesterly county of England, on the Peninsula that lies to the west of the River Tamar The vast majority of the inscriptions consist of personal names.

The etymology of the word ogam or ogham remains unclear. One possible origin is from the Irish og-úaim - 'point-seam', referring to the seam made by the point of a sharp weapon. ^[4].

Origins

The evidence points to a creation date for ogham not post-dating the 4th century. Canadian Aboriginal syllabic writing', or simply syllabics, is a family of Abugidas {dubious}} used to write a number of Aboriginal Canadian Nearly all the segmental scripts (loosely " Alphabets " but see below for more precise terminology used around the globe appear to have derived from the As a means of recording the passage of Time, the 4th century (per the Julian calendar and Anno Domini / Common era) was that Century Although the use of "classical" ogham in stone inscriptions seems to have flowered in the 5th–6th centuries around the Irish Sea, from the phonological evidence it is clear that the alphabet predates the 5th century. The 5th century is the period from 401 to 500 in accordance with the Julian calendar in Anno Domini / Common Era. The 6th century is the period from 501 to 600 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian / Common Era. The Irish Sea ( Irish: Muir Éireann or Muir Meann; Scottish Gaelic: Muir Eireann Welsh: Môr Iwerddon, A period of writing on wood or other perishable material prior to the preserved monumental inscriptions needs to be assumed, sufficient for the loss of the phonemes represented by úath ("H") and straif ("Z"), as well as the voiced labiovelar, gétal, all of which are clearly part of the system, but unattested in inscriptions. Uath, Old Irish Úath, hÚath, is the sixth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚆ transcribed as ʜ according to manuscript tradition but unattested Straif is the Irish name of the fourteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚎ nGéadal is the Irish name of the thirteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚍ

In Ireland and in Wales, the language of the monumental stone inscriptions is termed Primitive Irish. Primitive Irish is the oldest known form of the Goidelic languages, known only from fragments mostly personal names inscribed on stone in the Ogham alphabet in The transition to Old Irish, the language of the earliest sources in the Latin alphabet, takes place in about the 6th century. Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed Since ogham inscriptions consist almost exclusively of personal names and marks possibly indicating land ownership, linguistic information that may be glimpsed from the Primitive Irish period is mostly restricted to phonological developments. Phonology ( Greek φωνή (phōnē voice sound + λόγος (lógos word speech subject of discussion is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning

Theories of origin

There are two main schools of thought among scholars as to the motivation for the creation of ogham. Scholars such as Carney and MacNeill have suggested that ogham was first created as a cryptic alphabet, designed by the Irish so as not to be understood by those with a knowledge of the Latin alphabet. ^[5] In other words, it was created by Irish scholars or druids for political, military or religious reasons to provide a secret means of communication in opposition to the authorities of Roman Britain. The Roman Empire, which then ruled over neighbouring Britain, represented a very real threat of invasion to Ireland, which may have acted as a spur to the creation of the alphabet. Alternatively, in later centuries when the threat of invasion had receded and the Irish were themselves invading the western parts of Britain, the desire to keep communications secret from Romans or Romanised Britons would still have provided an incentive.

The second main school of thought, put forward by scholars such as McManus ^[6] is that ogham was invented by the first Christian communities in early Ireland, out of a desire to have a unique alphabet for writing short messages and inscriptions in the Irish language. The argument is that the sounds of Primitive Irish were regarded as difficult to transcribe into the Latin alphabet, so the invention of a separate alphabet was deemed appropriate. A possible such origin, as suggested by McManus (1991:41), is the early Christian community known to have existed in Ireland from around AD 400 at the latest, the existence of which is attested by the mission of Palladius by Pope Celestine I in AD 431. Events By Place Western Roman Empire Italy is first invaded by Alaric (probable date Palladius (fl 408-431 probably died ca 457/461 was the first Bishop of the Christians of Ireland, preceding Saint Patrick. Pope Events By Place Western Roman Empire Aëtius pushes the Franks back across the Somme. Palladius died and was buried at Auchenblae in the Mearns in eastern Scotland. Auchenblae is a Village in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Auchenblae is one of the ancient Burghs of the Barony of its Medieval Scotland ( Gaelic: Alba) is a Country in northwest Europethat occupies the northern third of the island of Great Britain. These events may be associated with a Christian community there propagating ogham to the otherwise anomalous cluster of inscriptions in eastern Scotland.

A variation on both theories is that the alphabet was first invented, for whatever reason, in 4th century Irish settlements in west Wales after contact and intermarriage with Romanized Britons with a knowledge of the Latin alphabet. The country of Wales, or Cymru in Welsh has been inhabited by modern humans for at least 29000 years though continuous human habitation In fact, several ogham stones in Wales are bilingual, containing both Irish and Brythonic-Latin (an ancestor of contemporary Welsh), testifying to the Celtic contact that led to the existence of some of these stones. ^[7]

Drawing of the ogham inscription in Maumanorig, Co Kerry (CIIC no. 193): anm colman ailithir "[written in] the name of Colmán, the pilgrim"

A third theory put forward by the noted ogham scholar R. A. S. Macalaster was influential at one time, but finds little favour with scholars today ^[8] Macalister believed that ogham was first invented in Cisalpine Gaul around 600 B. C. by Gaulish druids as a secret system of hand signals, and was inspired by a form of the Greek alphabet current in Northern Italy at the time. According to this theory, the alphabet was transmitted in oral form or on wood only, until it was finally put into a written form on stone inscriptions in early Christian Ireland. Later scholars are largely united in rejecting this theory however ^[9], primarily because a detailed study of the letters show that they were created specifically for the Primitive Irish of the early centuries AD. The supposed links with the form of the Greek alphabet that Macalister proposed can also be disproved.

Macalister's theory of hand or finger signals as a source for ogham is a reflection of the fact that the signary consists of four groups of five letters, with a sequence of strokes from one to five. A theory popular among modern scholars is that one origin for the form of the letters was the various forms of numerical tally systems in existence at the time. This theory was first suggested by the scholars Thurneysen and Vendryes, who proposed that the ogham script was inspired by a pre-existing system of counting based around the numbers five and twenty, which was then adapted to an alphabet form by the first ogamists. ^[10]

It is clear that the ogham alphabet was modelled on another script, and some even consider it a mere cipher of its template script (Düwel 1968:^[11] points out similarity with ciphers of Germanic runes). Cipher runes, or cryptic runes, are the cryptographical replacement of the letters of the Runic alphabet. The largest number of scholars favours the Latin alphabet as this template, although the Elder Futhark and even the Greek alphabet have their supporters. The Elder Futhark (or Elder Fuþark, Older Futhark, Old Futhark) is the oldest form of the Runic alphabet, used by Germanic tribes The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early Runic origin would elegantly explain the presence of "H" and "Z" letters unused in Irish, as well as the presence of vocalic and consonantal variants "U" vs. "W" unknown to Latin or Greek writing. The Latin alphabet is the main contender mainly because its influence at the required period (4th century) is most easily established, viz. , via Britannia, while the runes in the 4th century were not very widespread even in continental Europe. Roman Britain refers to those parts of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire between AD 43 and 410 Continental Europe, also referred to as mainland Europe or simply the Continent, is the Continent of Europe, explicitly excluding European

fol. 170r of the Book of Ballymote (1390), the Auraicept na n-Éces explaining the ogham script. The Book of Ballymote ( Leabhar Bhaile an Mhóta, RIA MS 23 P 12 275 foll The Auraicept na n-Éces ("the scholars' primer" is claimed as a 7th century work of Irish grammarians written by a scholar named Longarad

Legendary accounts

According to the 11th c. Lebor Gabála Érenn, the 14th c. Lebor Gabála Érenn ( The Book of the Taking of Ireland) is the Middle Irish title of a loose collection of Poems and Prose narratives Auraicept na n-Éces, and other Medieval Irish folklore, ogham was first invented soon after the fall of the Tower of Babel, along with the Gaelic language, by the legendary Scythian king, Fenius Farsa. The Auraicept na n-Éces ("the scholars' primer" is claimed as a 7th century work of Irish grammarians written by a scholar named Longarad The Mythology of pre-Christian Ireland did not entirely survive the conversion to Christianity, but much of it was preserved shorn of its religious meanings The Tower of Babel (מגדל בבל Migdal Bavel برج بابل Burj Babil) is a structure featured in chapter 11 of the Book of Genesis, an enormous The Goidelic languages, (also sometimes called particularly in colloquial situations the Gaelic languages or collectively Gaelic) historically formed a Dialect The Scythians or Scyths (Σκύθες Σκύθοι were an Iranian speaking people of horse-riding Nomadic pastoralists who dominated the Pontic Fenius Farsa (also Phoeniusa Phenius Fénius Farsaid Farsaidh, many variant spellings was a legendary king of Scythia who shows up in many legends of Irish According to the Auraicept, Fenius journeyed from Scythia together with Goídel mac Ethéoir, Íar mac Nema and a retinue of 72 scholars. In Classical Antiquity, Scythia ( Greek Skuthia) was the area in Eurasia inhabited by the Scythians, from the 8th A retinue is a body of persons "retained" in the service of a noble or royal personage a suite (literal French meanings what follows of " They came to the plain of Shinar to study the confused languages at Nimrod's tower (the Tower of Babel). Shinar (Hebrew he שִׁנְעָר Šin`ar, Septuagint Σεννααρ Sennaar 'land of the rivers' is a broad designation applied to Mesopotamia, occurring The confusion of tongues ( confusio linguarum) is the initial fragmentation of human languages described in the Book of Genesis 111–9 as a result of the construction Nimrod ( was a Mesopotamian Monarch mentioned in the Jewish Tanakh, and who figures in many legends and folktales The Tower of Babel (מגדל בבל Migdal Bavel برج بابل Burj Babil) is a structure featured in chapter 11 of the Book of Genesis, an enormous Finding that they had already been dispersed, Fenius sent his scholars to study them, staying at the tower, coordinating the effort. After ten years, the investigations were complete, and Fenius created in Bérla tóbaide "the selected language", taking the best of each of the confused tongues, which he called Goídelc, Goidelic, after Goídel mac Ethéoir. The Goidelic languages, (also sometimes called particularly in colloquial situations the Gaelic languages or collectively Gaelic) historically formed a Dialect He also created extensions of Goídelc, called Bérla Féne, after himself, Íarmberla, after Íar mac Nema, and others, and the Beithe-luis-nuin (the ogham) as a perfected writing system for his languages. A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. The names he gave to the letters were those of his 25 best scholars.

Alternatively, the Ogam Tract credits Ogma mac Elathan (Ogmios) with the script's invention. In Lebor Ogaim ("The Book of Ogams" also known as the Ogam Tract, is an Old Irish treatise on the Ogham alphabet Ogma or Oghma is a character from Irish mythology. A member of the Tuatha Dé Danann, he is often considered a Deity and may be related to the Ogmios was a Gaulish Deity, who Lucian records was depicted as a bald old man with a bow and club leading an apparently happy band of men with chains attached Ogma was skilled in speech and poetry, and created the system for the learned, to the exclusion of rustics and fools. The first message written in Ogam were seven b's on a birch, sent as a warning to Lug mac Elathan, meaning: "your wife will be carried away seven times to the otherworld unless the birch protects her". Lugh (ˈluː modern Irish Lú, earlier Lug) is an Irish Deity represented in mythological texts as a hero and High King of the distant For this reason, the letter b is said to be named after the birch, and In Lebor Ogaim goes on to tell the tradition that all letters were named after trees, a claim also referred to by the Auraicept as an alternative to the naming after Fenius' disciples.

Alphabet - the Beith-Luis-Nin

Strictly speaking, the word ogham refers only to the form of letters or script, while the letters themselves are known collectively as the Beith-luis-nin after the letter names of the first letters (in the same manner as the Greek Alpha and Beta). The fact that the order of the letters is in fact BLFSN led the scholar Macalister to propose that the letter order was originally BLNFS. This was to fit into his own theories which linked the Beith-luis-nin to a form of the Greek alphabet current in Northern Italy in the 5th and 6th centuries BC. However, there is no evidence for Macalister's theories and they have since been discounted by later scholars. There are in fact other explanations for the name Beith-luis-nin. One explanation is that the word nin which literally means 'a forked branch' was also regularly used to mean a written letter in general. Beith-luis-nin could therefore mean simply 'Beith-luis letters'. The other explanation is that Beith-luis-nin is a convenient contraction of the first five letters thus: Beith-LVS-nin. ^[12]

The ogham alphabet originally consisted of twenty distinct characters (feda), arranged in four series aicmí (plural of aicme "family"; compare aett). The Scandinavian clan or ætt (ˈɛtt in Old Norse) was a social group based on common descent or on the formal acceptance into the group at a þing Each aicme was named after its first character (Aicme Beithe, Aicme hÚatha, Aicme Muine, Aicme Ailme, "the B Group", "the H Group", "the M Group", "the A Group"). Five additional letters were later introduced (mainly in the manuscript tradition), the so-called forfeda. The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs

the ogam airenach, closeup from the page shown above.

The Ogam Tract also gives a variety of some 100 variant or secret modes of writing ogham (92 in the Book of Ballymote), for example the "shield ogham" (ogam airenach, nr. In Lebor Ogaim ("The Book of Ogams" also known as the Ogam Tract, is an Old Irish treatise on the Ogham alphabet The Book of Ballymote ( Leabhar Bhaile an Mhóta, RIA MS 23 P 12 275 foll 73). Even the Younger Futhark are introduced as a kind of "Viking ogham" (nrs. The Younger Futhark, also called the Scandinavian runes, is a Runic alphabet, a reduced form of the Elder Futhark, consisting of only 16 characters in 91, 92).

The four primary aicmí are, with their transcriptions in manuscript tradition and their names according to manuscript tradition in normalized Old Irish, followed by the their Primitive Irish sound values, and their presumed original name in Primitive Irish in cases where the name's etymology is known:

The consonants of the ogham alphabet (non-IPA). The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic

The vowels of the ogham alphabet (non-IPA). The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic Note: This is the vertical writing of ogham. In the horizontal form, the right side would face downward.

• Left side/downward strokes
  1. B beith [b] (*betwias)
  2. L luis [l]
  3. F fearn [w] (*wernā)
  4. S saille [s] (*salis)
  5. N nuin [n]
• Right side/upward strokes
  1. H úath [y]?
  2. D duir [d] (*daris)
  3. T tinne [t]
  4. C coll [k] (*coslas)
  5. Q ceirt [k^w] (*k^wertā)
• Across/pendicular strokes
  1. M muin [m]
  2. G gort [g] (*gortas)
  3. NG gétal [g^w] (*g^wēddlan)
  4. Z straif [sw] or [ts]?
  5. R ruis [r]
• notches (vowels)
  1. A ailm [a]
  2. O onn [o] (*osen)
  3. U úr [u]
  4. E edad [e]
  5. I idad [i]

A letter for p is conspicuously absent, since the phoneme was lost in Proto-Celtic, and the gap was not filled in Q-Celtic, and no sign was needed before loanwords from Latin containing p appeared in Irish (e. Phonological reconstruction Consonants The phonological changes from Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Celtic Consonants may be summarised as follows The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic" a branch of the greater Indo-European Language family. Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. g. Patrick). Conversely, there is a letter for the labiovelar q (ᚊ ceirt), a phoneme lost in Old Irish. The term labiovelar is ambiguous It may mean labial-velar (a Consonant made at two places of articulation, one at the lips and the other at the soft The base alphabet is therefore, as it were, designed for Proto-Q-Celtic.

Of the five forfeda or supplementary letters, only the first, ébad regularly appears in inscriptions, but mostly with the value K (McManus, § 5. The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs 3, 1991). The others, except for emancholl, have at most only one certain 'orthodox' (see below) inscription each. ^[13] Due to their limited practical use, later ogamists turned the supplementary letters into a series of diphthongs, changing completely the values for pín and emancholl. ^[14] This meant that the alphabet was once again without a letter for the P sound, forcing the invention of the letter peithboc (soft 'B'), which appears in the manuscripts only.

• EA ébad
• OI óir
• UI uillenn
• P , later IO pín (later iphín)
• X or Ch (as in loch), later AE emancholl

Letter names

Main article: Bríatharogam

The letter names are interpreted as names of trees or shrubs in manuscript tradition, both in Auraicept na n-Éces ('The Scholars' Primer') and In Lebor Ogaim ('The Ogam Tract'). In Early Irish literature a Bríatharogam ("word ogham" plural Bríatharogaim) is a two word Kenning which explains the meanings of the names The Auraicept na n-Éces ("the scholars' primer" is claimed as a 7th century work of Irish grammarians written by a scholar named Longarad In Lebor Ogaim ("The Book of Ogams" also known as the Ogam Tract, is an Old Irish treatise on the Ogham alphabet They were first discussed in modern times by Roderic O'Flaherty (1685), who took them at face value. Roderick O Flaherty ( Irish name Ruaidhrí Ó Flaithbheartaigh, Ruairí Ó Flaitheartaigh) (1629 &ndash 1718 or 1716 was an Irish historian The Auraicept itself is aware that not all names are known tree names, saying "Now all these are wood names such as are found in the Ogham Book of Woods, and are not derived from men", admitting that "some of these trees are not known today". The Auraicept gives a short phrase or kenning for each letter, known as a Bríatharogam, that traditionally accompanied each letter name, and a further gloss explaining their meanings and identifying the tree or plant linked to each letter. Only five of the twenty primary letters have tree names that the Auraicept considers comprehensible without further glosses, namely beith "birch", fearn "alder", saille "willow" , duir "oak" and coll "hazel". All the other names have to be glossed or "translated" with a plant name. A phytonym ( Greek phuto- phuton, "plant" + Greek onuma, "name" is a Plant Name.

According to the leading modern ogham scholar, Damian McManus the "Tree Alphabet" idea dates to the Old Irish period (say, 10th century), but it post-dates the Primitive Irish period, or at least the time when the letters were originally named. Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed Its origin is probably due to the letters themselves being called feda "trees", or nin "forking branches" due to their shape. Since a few of the letters were, in fact, named after trees, the interpretation arose that they were called feda because of that. Some of the other letter names had fallen out of use as independent words, and were thus free to be claimed as "Old Gaelic" tree names, while others (such as ruis, úath or gort) were more or less forcefully re-interpreted as epitheta of trees by the medieval glossators.

McManus (1991, §3. 15) discusses possible etymologies of all the letter names, and as well as the five mentioned above, he adds one other definite tree name: onn "ash" (the Auraicept wrongly has furze). McManus (1988, p164) also believes that the name Idad is probably an artificial form of Iubhar or yew, as the kennings support that meaning, and concedes that Ailm may possibly mean "pine tree" as it appears to be used to mean that in an eighth century poem. ^[15] Thus out of twenty letter names, only eight at most are the names of trees. The other names have a variety of meanings, which are set out in the list below.

• Beith, Old Irish Beithe means "birch-tree", cognate to Latin betula. Beith is the Irish name of the first letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚁ meaning " Birch " For the lost continent sometimes called Muin see Mu (lost continent Muin is the Irish name of the eleventh letter of the Ogham Luis (ᚂ is the second letter of the Ogham alphabet derived either from luise " flame " or from lus " Herb " Gort is the Irish name of the twelfth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚌ meaning "field" which is related to Welsh garth 'garden' Fearn is the Irish name of the third letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚃ meaning " alder-tree " nGéadal is the Irish name of the thirteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚍ Sail or Saille is the Irish name of the fourth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚄ meaning " Willow " Straif is the Irish name of the fourteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚎ Nion is the Irish name of the fifth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚅ probably meaning " Fork " Ruis (ᚂ is the fifteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet derived from ruise " Red " Uath, Old Irish Úath, hÚath, is the sixth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚆ transcribed as ʜ according to manuscript tradition but unattested Ailm is the Irish name of the twentieth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚐ Dair is the Irish name of the seventh letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚇ meaning " Oak " which is related to Welsh derw(en Onn is the Irish name of the seventeenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚑ meaning " Ash-tree " which is related to Welsh onn(en Tinne is the Irish name of the eighth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚈ meaning " Ingot " Úr is the Irish name of the eighteenth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚒ meaning " Clay " " Earth " " Soil Coll is the Irish name of the ninth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚉ meaning " hazel-tree " which is related to Welsh collen Eadhadh is the Irish name of the twenty-fourth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚓ Ceirt ( queirt) ᚊ is a letter of the Ogham alphabet transcribed as Q Iodhadh is the Irish name of the twenty-fifth letter of the Ogham alphabet ᚔ The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs Ifín ᚘ (also spelled iphin) is one of the Forfeda, the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs Birch is the name of any Tree of the genus Betula ( Bé-tu-la) in the family Betulaceae, closely related to the
• Luis, Old Irish Luis is either related to luise "blaze" or lus "herb". The arboreal tradition has caertheand "rowan". The rowans or mountain-ashes are Plants in the family Rosaceae, in the Genus Sorbus, subgenus Sorbus
• Fearn, Old Irish Fern means "alder-tree", Primitive Irish *wernā, so that the original value of the letter was [w]. Alder is the common name of a Genus of Flowering plants ( Alnus) belonging to the Birch family (Family Betulaceae)
• Sail, Old Irish Sail means "willow-tree", cognate to Latin salix. Willows, sallows and osiers form the Genus Salix, around 400 species of Deciduous Trees and Shrubs found primarily
• Nion, Old Irish Nin means either "fork" or "loft". The arboreal tradition has uinnius "ash-tree". Fraxinus excelsior ( Ash; also European Ash or Common Ash on occasion to distinguish it from other ash species is a species of
• Uath, Old Irish Úath means úath "horror, fear", the arboreal tradition has "white-thorn". Crataegus monogyna, known as Common Hawthorn, is a species of hawthorn native to Europe, northwest Africa and western Asia The original etymology of the name, and the letter's value, are however unclear. McManus (1986) suggested a value [y]. Peter Schrijver (see McManus 1991:37) suggested that if úath "fear" is cognate with Latin pavere, a trace of PIE *p might have survived into Primitive Irish, but there is no independent evidence for this.
• Dair, Old Irish Dair means "oak" (PIE *doru-). The term oak can be used as part of the common name of any of about 400 species of Trees and Shrubs in the Genus Quercus (from Latin
• Tinne, Old Irish Tinne from the evidence of the kennings means "bar of metal, ingot". A kenning ( Old Norse kenning, Modern Icelandic pronunciation) is a Circumlocution used instead of an ordinary Noun in Old Norse The arboreal tradition has cuileand "holly". Holly ( Ilex) is a Genus of about 600 Species of Flowering plants in the family Aquifoliaceae, and the only
• Coll, Old Irish Coll meant "hazel-tree", cognate with Welsh collen, correctly glossed as cainfidh "fair-wood" ("hazel") by the arboreal interpretation. The hazels ( Corylus) are a genus of Deciduous Trees and large Shrubs native to the temperate northern hemisphere The Latin corylus is a possible cognate.
• Ceirt, Old Irish Cert is cognate with Welsh pert "bush" , Latin quercus "oak" (PIE *perkwos). It was confused with Old Irish ceirt "rag", reflected in the kennings. The Auraicept glosses aball "apple". The apple is the pomaceous Fruit of the apple tree Species Malus domestica in the Rose family Rosaceae.
• Muin, Old Irish Muin: the kennings connect this name to three different words, muin "neck, upper part of the back", muin "wile, ruse", and muin "love, esteem". The arboreal tradition has finemhain "vine". A vine is any plant of Genus Vitis (the Grape plants or by extension any similar climbing or trailing plant
• Gort, Old Irish Gort means "field" (cognate to garden). The arboreal tradition has edind "ivy". Hedera (English name ivy, plural ivies) is a genus of 15 species of climbing or ground-creeping Evergreen woody plants in the family
• nGéadal, Old Irish Gétal from the kennings has a meaning of "killing", maybe cognate to gonid "slays", from PIE gwen-. The value of the letter in Primitive Irish, then, was a voiced labiovelar, [g^w]. The arboreal tradition glosses cilcach, "broom" or "fern". Brooms are a group of Evergreen, semi-evergreen and Deciduous Shrubs in the subfamily Faboideae of the Legume family Fabaceae A fern is any one of a group of about 20000 Species of Plants classified in the phylum or division Pteridophyta, also known as Filicophyta
• Straif, Old Irish Straiph means "sulphur". The Primitive Irish letter value is uncertain, it may have been a sibilant different from s, which is taken by sail, maybe a reflex of /st/ or /sw/. The arboreal tradition glosses draighin "blackthorn". Blackthorn redirects here for other uses see Blackthorn (disambiguation Prunus spinosa ( Blackthorn or Sloe
• Ruis, Old Irish Ruis means "red" or "redness", glossed as trom "elder". Sambucus ( Elder or Elderberry) is a genus of between 5 and 30 species of Shrubs or small Trees (two species Herbaceous)
• Ailm, Old Irish Ailm is of uncertain meaning, possibly "pine-tree". The Auraicept has crand giuis . i. ochtach, "fir-tree" or "pinetree". Firs ( Abies) are a genus of between 45-55 species of Evergreen conifers in the family Pinaceae. Pine/Pinetree may refer to Vegetation Pine, coniferous trees classified in the genus Pinus Other coniferous trees such as Norfolk
• Onn, Old Irish Onn means "ash-tree", although the Auraicept glosses aiten "furze". An ash can be any of four different tree genera from four very distinct families; most commonly in a combined form (e Gorse ( Ulex) comprises a Genus of about 20 species of Evergreen Shrubs in the subfamily Faboideae of the pea family
• Úr, Old Irish Úr, based on the kennings, means "earth, clay, soil". The Auraicept glosses fraech "heath". Erica is a Genus of over 700 species of Flowering plants in the family Ericaceae; two English common names both shared with some other closely
• Eadhadh, Old Irish Edad of unknown meaning. The Auraicept glosses crand fir no crithach "test-tree or aspen"
• Iodhadh, Old Irish Idad is of uncertain meaning, but is probably a form of ibhar "yew", which is the meaning given to it in the arboreal tradition. Aspens are Trees of the willow family and comprise a section of the Poplar genus Populus sect Taxus baccata is a conifer native to western central and southern Europe, northwest Africa, northern Iran and southwest

of the forfeda, four are glossed by the Auraicept:

• Eabhadh, Old Irish Ebhadh with crithach "aspen";
• Ór, "gold" (from Latin aurum); the arboreal tradition has feorus no edind, "spindle tree or ivy"
• Uilleann, Old Irish Uilleand "elbow"; the arboreal tradition has edleand "honeysuckle"
• Pín, later Ifín, Old Irish Iphin with spinan no ispin "gooseberry or thorn". The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs Honeysuckles ( Lonicera; syn Caprifolium Mill) are arching Shrubs or twining Vines in the family Caprifoliaceae The gooseberry Ribes uva-crispa ( syn R grossularia) is a species of Ribes, native to Europe, northwestern Africa

The fifth letter is Emancholl which means 'twin of hazel'

Corpus

Main article: Ogham inscriptions

Ogham stone from the Isle of Man showing the droim in centre. There are roughly 400 known Ogham inscriptions on stone monuments scattered around the Irish Sea, the bulk of them dating to the 5th and 6th centuries Text reads BIVAIDONAS MAQI MUCOI CUNAVA[LI], or in English Of Bivaidonas, son of the tribe Cunava[li]

Monumental ogham inscriptions are found in Ireland and Wales, with a few additional specimens found in England, the Isle of Man, Scotland and Shetland. Ireland (pronounced /ˈaɾlənd/ Éire) is the third largest island in Europe, and the twentieth-largest island in the world England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland The Isle of Man (Ellan Vannin ˈɛlʲən ˈvanɪn or Mann (Mannin) is a self-governing Crown dependency, located in the Irish Sea at the geographical Scotland ( Gaelic: Alba) is a Country in northwest Europethat occupies the northern third of the island of Great Britain. Shetland (formerly spelled Zetland, from etland; Old Norse non Hjaltland; Sealtainn is an Archipelago off the northeast coast of They were mainly employed as territorial markers and memorials (grave stones). The stone commemorating Vortiporius, a 6th century king of Dyfed (originally located in Clynderwen), is the only ogham stone inscription that bears the name of an identifiable individual. Vortiporius (Old Welsh Guortepir) was a 6th century king or ruler of Dyfed in south-west Wales, an area roughly corresponding to the modern The 6th century is the period from 501 to 600 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian / Common Era. Dyfed ('dɪ ved is a preserved county of Wales. Dyfed was created by the Local Government Act 1972 on 1 April 1974. Clynderwen ( Clunderwen) ( is a Rural Village in Pembrokeshire, Wales. ^[16] The language of the inscriptions is predominantly Primitive Irish and Old Irish, apart from the few examples in Scotland, such as the Lunnasting stone, which record fragments of what is probably the Pictish language. Primitive Irish is the oldest known form of the Goidelic languages, known only from fragments mostly personal names inscribed on stone in the Ogham alphabet in Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed The Lunnasting stone is a stone bearing an Ogham inscription found in Lunnasting, Shetland and donated to the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland

The more ancient examples are standing stones, where the script was carved into the edge (droim or faobhar) of the stone, which formed the stemline against which individual characters are cut. Standing stones, orthostats, liths or more commonly Megaliths ' because of their large and cumbersome size are solitary stones set vertically in the The text of these "Orthodox Ogham" inscriptions is read beginning from the bottom left-hand side of a stone, continuing upward along the edge, across the top and down the right-hand side (in the case of long inscriptions). Roughly 380 inscriptions are known in total (a number, incidentally, very close to the number of known inscriptions in the contemporary Elder Futhark), of which the highest concentration by far is found in the southwestern Irish province of Munster. The Elder Futhark (or Elder Fuþark, Older Futhark, Old Futhark) is the oldest form of the Runic alphabet, used by Germanic tribes Munster ( Irish: An Mhumhain, ənˈvuːnʲ Cúige Mumhan or Mumha) is the southernmost of the four Provinces of Ireland. One third of the total are found in Co Kerry alone. County Kerry ( Contae Chiarraí in Irish) is a southwestern county of Ireland.

Later inscriptions are known as "scholastic", and are post 6th century in date. The term 'scholastic' derives from the fact that the inscriptions are believed to have been inspired by the manuscript sources, instead of being continuations of the original monument tradition. Unlike orthodox ogham, some mediæval inscriptions feature all five Forfeda. The Forfeda are the "additional" letters of the Ogham alphabet beyond the basic inventory of twenty signs Scholastic inscriptions are written on stemlines cut into the face of the stone, instead of along its edge. Ogham was also occasionally used for notes in manuscripts down to the 16th century. A modern ogham inscription is found on a gravestone dating to 1802 in Ahenny, County Tipperary. Year 1802 ( MDCCCII) was a Common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar or a Common year starting on Wednesday of the County Tipperary (Contae Thiobraid Árann is a County in Ireland situated in the Province of Munster.

In Scotland, a number of inscriptions using the ogham writing system are known, but their language is still the subject of debate. It has been argued by Richard Cox in The Language of Ogham Inscriptions in Scotland (1999) that the language of these is Old Norse, but others remain unconvinced by this analysis, and regard the stones as being Pictish in origin. The Picts were a Confederation of tribes in what was later to become eastern and northern Scotland from Roman times until the 10th century However due to the lack of knowledge about the Picts, the inscriptions remain undeciphered, their language possibly being non-Indo-European. The Pictish inscriptions are scholastic, and are believed to have been inspired by the manuscript tradition brought into Scotland by Gaelic settlers.

The Buckquoy spindle-whorl, containing an Old Irish inscription written in 8th century Orkney with scholastic ogham. The Buckquoy spindle-whorl is a famous spindle-whorl dating from the Early Middle Ages, probably the 8th century excavated in 1970 in Buckquoy Birsay Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language, or rather the Goidelic languages, for which extensive written texts are possessed It is benedictive, and reads Benddact anim L. , meaning "a blessing on the soul of L. "

Non-monumental uses

Main article: Ogham - non-monumental uses

As well as its use for monumental inscriptions, the evidence from early Irish sagas and legends indicates that ogham was used for short messages on wood or metal, either to relay messages or to denote ownership of the object inscribed. Some of these messages seem to have been cryptic in nature and some were also for magical purposes. In addition, there is evidence from sources such as In Lebor Ogaim, or the Ogham Tract, that ogham may have been used to keep records or lists, such as geneologies and numerical tallies of property and business transactions. In Lebor Ogaim ("The Book of Ogams" also known as the Ogam Tract, is an Old Irish treatise on the Ogham alphabet There is also evidence that ogham may have been used as a system of finger or hand signals.

In later centuries when ogham ceased to be used as a practical alphabet, it retained its place in the learning of Gaelic scholars and poets as the basis of grammar and the rules of poetry. Indeed, until modern times the Latin alphabet in Gaelic continued to be taught using letter names borrowed from the Beith-Luis-Nin, along with the Medieval association of each letter with a different tree.

Unicode

The ogham alphabet is allotted Unicode range U+1680 – U+169F (as of version 4. In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's 1). The spelling of the names given is a standardization dating to 1997, used in Unicode Standard and in Irish Standard 434:1999.

U+1680   OGHAM SPACE MARK

U+1681 ᚁ OGHAM LETTER BEITH

U+1682 ᚂ OGHAM LETTER LUIS

U+1683 ᚃ OGHAM LETTER FEARN

U+1684 ᚄ OGHAM LETTER SAIL

U+1685 ᚅ OGHAM LETTER NION

U+1686 ᚆ OGHAM LETTER UATH

U+1687 ᚇ OGHAM LETTER DAIR

U+1688 ᚈ OGHAM LETTER TINNE

U+1689 ᚉ OGHAM LETTER COLL

U+168A ᚊ OGHAM LETTER CEIRT

U+168B ᚋ OGHAM LETTER MUIN

U+168C ᚌ OGHAM LETTER GORT

U+168D ᚍ OGHAM LETTER NGEADAL

U+168E ᚎ OGHAM LETTER STRAIF

U+168F ᚏ OGHAM LETTER RUIS

U+1690 ᚐ OGHAM LETTER AILM

U+1691 ᚑ OGHAM LETTER ONN

U+1692 ᚒ OGHAM LETTER UR

U+1693 ᚓ OGHAM LETTER EADHADH

U+1694 ᚔ OGHAM LETTER IODHADH

U+1695 ᚕ OGHAM LETTER EABHADH

U+1696 ᚖ OGHAM LETTER OR

U+1697 ᚗ OGHAM LETTER UILLEANN

U+1698 ᚘ OGHAM LETTER IFIN

U+1699 ᚙ OGHAM LETTER EAMHANCHOLL

U+169A ᚚ OGHAM LETTER PEITH

U+169B ᚛ OGHAM FEATHER MARK (marks beginning of text)

U+169C ᚜ OGHAM REVERSED FEATHER MARK (marks end of text)

Neopaganism

Modern New Age and Neopagan approaches to ogham largely derive from the theories of Robert Graves in his book 'The White Goddess'. New Age ( New Age Movement and New Age Spirituality) is a Social Collective Phenomenon and a Spiritual Nature Neopaganism or Neo-Paganism is an Umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements particularly those influenced by historical Robert Graves (24 July 1895 &ndash 7 December 1985 was an English Poet, Translator and Novelist. The White Goddess is a book-length essay upon the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. In this work Graves took his inspiration from the theories of the ogham scholar R. A. S Macalister (see above) and elaborated on them much further. Graves proposed that the ogham alphabet encoded a set of beliefs originating in the Middle-east in Stone Age times, concerning the ceremonies surrounding the worship of the Moon-goddess in her various forms. The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric time period during which Humans widely used stone for toolmaking Graves' argument is extremely complex, but in essence he argues that the Hebrews, Greeks and Celts were all influenced by a people originating in the Aegean, called 'the people of the sea' by the Egyptians, who spread out around Europe in the 2nd Millennium BC, taking their religious beliefs with them. The Sea Peoples is the term used for a confederacy of seafaring raiders of the second millennium BC who sailed into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, caused political ^[17] At some early stage these teachings were encoded in alphabet form by poets in order to pass on their worship of the goddess (as the muse and inspiration of all poets) in a secret fashion, understandable only to initiates. Eventually, via the druids of Gaul, this knowledge was passed on to the poets of early Ireland and Wales. Graves therefore looked at the Tree Alphabet tradition surrounding ogham and explored the tree folklore of each of the letter names, proposing that the order of the letters formed an ancient "seasonal calendar of tree magic" ^[18]. Although his theories have been disregarded by modern scholars (including Macalister himself, with whom Graves corresponded ) ^[19], they have been taken up with enthusiasm by the neopagan movement. In addition, Graves followed the BLNFS order of ogham letter put forward by Macalister (see above), with the result that this has been taken up by New Age and Neopagan writers as the 'correct' order of the letters, despite its rejection by scholars.

The main use of ogham by modern Druids, Neo-Pagans is for the purpose of divination. Neo-druidism or neo-druidry (referred to simply as Druidry by some adherents is a form of modern Spirituality or Religion that promotes Neopaganism or Neo-Paganism is an Umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements particularly those influenced by historical Divination by using ogham symbols is mentioned in Tochmarc Étaíne, a tale in the Irish Mythological Cycle. Tochmarc Étaíne ( Old Irish: "The Wooing of Étaín " is an early text of the Irish Mythological Cycle, and also features The Mythological Cycle is one of the four major cycles of Irish mythology, and is so called because it represents the remains of the pagan Mythology of In the story, druid Dalan takes four wands of yew, and writes ogham letters upon them. A druid was a member of the priestly and learned class in the ancient Celtic societies Then he uses the tools for divination. Divination (from Latin divinare "to be inspired by a god" related to Divine, Diva and Deus) is the attempt of ascertaining ^[20] The tale doesn't explain further how the sticks are handled or interpreted. ^[21]

Some Neopagans and other interested people use ogham as a divination system, in a manner reminiscent of the incomplete description in Tochmarc Étaíne. They create a series of sticks, one for each letter. The sticks may be used in a fashion similar to runic divination. ^[22] Another method requires a cloth marked out with Finn's Window. The Auraicept na n-Éces ("the scholars' primer" is claimed as a 7th century work of Irish grammarians written by a scholar named Longarad ^[23] A person selects some sticks randomly, throws them on the cloth, and then looks both at the symbols and where they fell. ^[24]

The divinatory meanings are usually based on the tree ogham, rather than the kennings of the Bríatharogam. ^[25] Each letter is associated with a tree or other plant, and meanings are derived from them. Robert Graves' book The White Goddess has been a major influence on assigning divinatory meanings for ogham. Robert Graves (24 July 1895 &ndash 7 December 1985 was an English Poet, Translator and Novelist. The White Goddess is a book-length essay upon the nature of poetic myth-making by author and poet Robert Graves. ^[23] Some reconstructionists of Druidic ways use Briatharogam kennings as a basis for divinatory meanings in ogham divination. The three sets of kennings can be separated into Past-Present-Future or Land-Sea-Sky groupings in such systems, but other organizing structures are used, as well. ^[26][27]

See also

• Auraicept na n-Éces
• Ogham inscriptions
• Primitive Irish
• Runic alphabet
• Scottish Gaelic alphabet

Notes

References

• Carney, James. The Invention of the Ogam Cipher 'Ériu' 22, 1975, pp 62 -3, Dublin: Royal Irish Academy
• Düwel, Klaus. Runenkunde (runic studies). Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler, 1968. OCLC 183700
• Forsyth, Katherine. The Ogham Inscriptions of Scotland: An Edited Corpus, PhD Dissertation, Harvard University (Ann Arbor: UMI, 1996). OCLC 48938210
• Gippert, Jost; Hlaváček, Ivan; Homolka, Jaromír. Ogam. Eine frühe keltische Schrifterfindung, Praha: Charles University, 1992. ISBN 80-901489-3-X OCLC 39570484
• Macalister, Robert A. S. The Secret Languages of Ireland, pp27 - 36, Cambridge University Press, 1937
• Macalister, Robert A. S. Corpus inscriptionum insularum celticarum. First edition. Dublin: Stationery Office, 1945-1949. OCLC 71392234
• McManus, Damian. Ogam: Archaizing, Orthography and the Authenticity of the Manuscript Key to the Alphabet, Ériu 37, 1988, 1-31. Dublin: Royal Irish Academy. OCLC 56088345
• McManus, Damian. A Guide to Ogam, Maynooth 1991. ISBN 1-870684-17-6 OCLC 24181838
• MacNeill, Eoin. Archaisms in the Ogham Inscriptions, 'Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy' 39, pp 33-53, Dublin
• O'Brien, M. A. Corpus Genealogiarum Hiberniae Maynooth: An Sagart, 1991, vol. 1, 2nd edition. ISBN 0-901282-31-6 OCLC 56540733
• Raftery, Barry. A Late Ogham Inscription from Co. Tipperary, Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 99, 1969. ISSN 0035-9106 OCLC 6906544
• Swift, C. Ogam Stones and the Earliest Irish Christians, Maynooth: Dept. of Old and Middle Irish, St. Patrick's College, 1997. ISBN 0-901519-98-7 OCLC 37398935
• Ranke-Graves, Robert von. Die Weisse Göttin: Sprache des Mythos (The White Goddess), ISBN 978-3-499-55416-2 OCLC 52100148, several re-editions, but rarely available. Editions available in German and English.
• Sims-Williams, Patrick. The Celtic Inscriptions of Britain: Phonology and Chronology, c. 400—1200. (Publications of the Philological Society 37) Oxford : Blackwell Publishing, 2003. ISBN 1-4051-0903-3
• Thurneysen, Zum ogam Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur, pp196-7, 1937
• Vendryes L'écriture ogamique et ses origines Études Celtiques, 4, 1931, pp110- 113,

External links

• Description and history of the ogham script
• TITUS: The Ogham Script& Project Ogamica
• The Ogham Stone
• Every Ogham Thing on the Web
• Irish Ogham Stones
• Pictish Ogham Inscriptions
• Time Team - Manx Gaelic Ogham Stone
• The writing system of the Celts
• Free ogham font download