by Tom Birkett
14 Preston-Matto, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, pp. 21–2.
15 A few of Mac Conglinne’s food visions go on for pages and pages: see Preston-Matto, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, pp. 37–9 and 43–6.
16 Scott James Gwara, ‘Gluttony, Lust and Penance in the B-Text of Aislinge Meic
Conglinne’, Celtica 20 (1988), 53–72.
17 Ibid., p. 71.
18 Ibid.
Aislinge Meic Conglinne
115
discussion of food to topics very much at the heart of discussion for the eleventh-
century church: sin, sanctity and the principles of forgiveness.
William Sayers also discusses the importance of food and religion, but his focus
is on the connection between food and fantasy within the tale; ultimately, he argues
that the food represented is not fantastical at al , but available within a traditional Irish diet. For example, he points out, ‘the repertory of foods rehearsed in the story coincides with that available in the Ireland of the time (no fountains of wine, no
stuffed peacocks, no oranges, in short no exotic foods), and that the food fantasy
differs from everyday experience not in quality but only in quantity.’19 One reason
for this, he posits, is the dietary regulations prescribed by many monastic rules of
the time, which the text may very well be referencing. It is clear that both Gwara and Sayers are intrigued by the role of food in the church’s definitions of sin and policies of bodily regulation. But I am interested in the political rather than religious uses of food as part of cultural regulatory practices and how those food uses overlap with
the law and conceptions of hospitality.
Food in Aislinge Meic Conglinne is the one civilising influence in human society.
I will again point out that almost all the food mentioned in the tale is processed in
some way: as Sayers notes, ‘few of the foodstuffs are in their natural raw state and
all have passed through some form of cultural treatment, if only the separation of
milk.’20 Foods that have been subjected to fire and/or heat, including roasted meat,
bread (particularly bread made of white flour), and custards and porridges, have
traditional y been an indicator of a civilised society, and often, the more work a
certain type of food takes to prepare, the higher it is in the hierarchy of civility.21
There are also high-status and low-status foods for every society: Jared Diamond
argues in his book Col apse that fish were not eaten in Greenland by the Norse who settled there because they were seen as a lower-status food, with the result that the
Greenland Norse probably wound up starving to death even with an abundant
food source at their very doorstep.22 The same status is probably assigned to fish
in Ireland, as there are almost no fish mentioned in the entirety of Aislinge Meic Conglinne, although other sea-related items, such as different types of seaweed, are.
Instead, as did the Greenland Norse and the rest of Europe, the Irish privileged
cows, pigs and sheep, in that order, as high-status food-producing animals. In
Aislinge Meic Conglinne it becomes immediately recognisable who is civilised and who is not by the type of food they offer. It is also clear what threatens the social
order, depending on the relationship of the character in question to food.
So, for example, if we look at Mac Conglinne’s reception by the monks of Cork,
we see that there is a threat to the social order because of the (lack of) food that Mac Conglinne is offered, and the social protocol that should be followed, but is not.
Hospitality was expected: Mac Conglinne should have been greeted by the monks
19 William Sayers, ‘Diet and Fantasy in Eleventh-Century Ireland: The Vision of Mac Con Glinne’, Food and Foodways 6:1 (1994), 1–17, at p. 8.
20 Ibid.
21 See Claude Lévi-Strauss, The Raw and the Cooked, trans. John Weightman and Doreen Weightman (New York, 1969), esp. pp. 330–42.
22 Jared Diamond, Col apse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (New York, 2005), pp. 268–76, especial y p. 274.
116
Lahney Preston-Matto
and offered food and a heated room with clean linens. Instead, the monks bring
him a small amount of raw peat (which will not burn very well) and a cup of whey-
water, and do not seem to notice the verminous blankets. Mac Conglinne is infuri-
ated all the more when he realises that the monks, and particularly the abbot of the
religious institution where he is staying, get much better food than he does. This
situation comments upon a number of cultural norms: treatment of and hospitality
to guests, which was a legal obligation; how the Church viewed itself in relation-
ship to others; and hierarchies among professions in general, as Mac Conglinne is
a religious scholar, but also a poet. There is much implicit and explicit criticism of some churchmen’s abrogation of their secular cultural responsibilities. When Mac
Conglinne sees what he has been brought, he immediately satirises the hospitality
of the monastery. In his satire, he mentions nothing but the food, or lack thereof:
A scolóc (ar Mac Con Glinne)
‘Brother,’ said Mac Conglinne,
cid ná dénum dá chammrand?
‘Why not contend in poesy?
Déna-su rand ar arán
You make stanzas on brown-
bread,
Co ndén-sa rand ar annland.
I’ll sing about the chutney.
Corcach i fil cluca binde,
Cork has sweet-sounding bel s,
although
Goirt a gainem,
Its sand wanting,
Gainem a grian;
Its soil sandy,
Nocon f(h)il biad inde.
In food it is lacking.
Co bráth nocon ísaind-sea
I won’t eat ‘til Kingdom-Come
Acht minu-s tecma gorta
Unless a famine happens,
Cuachán corca Corccaige,
The meager Cork oat-porridge,
Cuachán Corccaige corca.
Cork’s gruel, tiny platters.
Geb-si chucat in n-arán
You take back the bread again,
Ima ndernais-(s)iu t’oróit;
Who prayed over it farther,
In chuit-si is mairg do-s-méla;
Who would eat this, woe
deserves
Is iat mo scéla, a scoló(i)c.’23
That’s my story, my brother.’24
As we can see from this poem, Mac Conglinne receives the rudeness of the monks
with rudeness of his own, and verbal satire was a powerful weapon in the hands
of an accomplished poet during this time period. Mac Conglinne is commenting
upon the close-fistedness of the church, which was probably one of the wealthiest
institutions in Ireland at the time. This demonstrates what is wrong with Manchín’s
monastery at the very least, and may be meant to implicate other monasteries and
churches as well; the church is supposed to be a charitable institution, but is shirking its responsibilities here. It is no surprise, then, that what saves Mac Conglinne from crucifixion at the hands of the monks – matters between them escalated rather
23 Jackson, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, pp. 6–7.
24 Preston-Matto, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, pp. 10–11.
Aislinge Meic Conglinne
117
quickly – is a recounting of his food-filled vision, part of which recounts the gene-
alogy of Manchín in food back to Adam. This vision is what convinces Manchín to
release Mac Conglinne and to send him to Cathal mac Finguine in an attempt to<
br />
rescue him from the demon of gluttony in his throat.
Even while Mac Conglinne is commenting on the stinginess of the monastery, he
is doing so in a way that cal s to the young man’s attention their shared background
as men of learning. Scolóc is a noun that means monastic servant or lay-brother, one who would not necessarily be educated, but throughout the poem Mac Conglinne emphasises that the lay brother should understand the very traditions that
he himself is using to mock the young fellow, such as poetic stanzas ( rand). What I chose to emphasise in my translation, then, in addition to Mac Conglinne’s palpable
dismay at the quality of the food, were instances where I could expand on Mac
Conglinne’s understanding of what else should happen at a monastery. So, instead
of having Mac Conlinne simply ‘make’ ( dén, the present subjunctive singular of do-gní) a stanza about the chutney, I elected to have him sing, a practice with which all the brothers would be familiar. Further, I translated bráth as ‘Kingdom-Come’
instead of Doomsday, as I wanted to get more at the sense of a Christian paradise
rather than simply the end of the world (although Doomsday can also refer to the
Judgement Day). While the essence of the poem is indeed about the terrible quality
of the food and how that reflects on the monastery at Cork, there are other subtle
confluences I wanted to hint at in the translation.
A religious chapter that ignores its social obligations is one thing, but a king
who eats himself out of his kingship and causes a famine for the rest of his people
is another entirely. As king of Munster, Cathal is entitled to a certain amount of
stores from the local túatha 25 in his demesne, but because of the demon of gluttony Cathal has overeaten his entire kingdom. This is a direct threat to his kingship itself, as a king is directly responsible for the wealth and plenty of his people; a good king ensures bumper crops, but should not then endanger his people’s welfare by eating
the entirety of those crops.
When Mac Conglinne first meets Cathal mac Finguine, it becomes immediately
clear what Cathal’s shortcomings are. Although he has dozens of companions and
retainers, Cathal stuffs his mouth with apples, and does not offer them to anyone
else. Mac Conglinne begins to smack his lips quite loudly, but Cathal does not
notice. Cathal only notices Mac Conglinne when he begins to grind his teeth against
a stone used for sharpening weapons. The grinding of his teeth is loud enough to
penetrate the interior sound of Cathal’s eating, and he pauses to ask Mac Conglinne
what ‘makes him demented’. Mac Conglinne replies in the most ornate of terms:
‘Fil dá ní,’ ar Mac Con Glinne, ‘.i. Cathal mac fír-álaind Finguine, ard-rí mór-Lethi
Moga Nuadat, ard-c[h]osnamaid Érenn fria clanna Cuinn Chét-Chathaig, fer ro
h-oirdned ó Dia [agus] ó Dúilem, laech saer socheneóil d’Eóganacht gríbda Glen-
damnach iar ceneól a atharda, saeth lem-sa a acsin a aenur ic tomailt neich, [agus]
25 There is not an exact English equivalent to túath (sing.). Fergus Kel y, in A Guide to Early Irish Law, p. 3, describes it as a ‘tribe’ or ‘petty kingdom’. It is the ‘basic territorial unit’ of medieval Ireland, but also includes the people who live in that territorial unit, so is a combination of the two English terms that Kel y uses.
118
Lahney Preston-Matto
dia mbet doíne a críchaib ciana istaig ic cuinchid áil nó aisc, do-génut écnach cen
m’uchain-se ic comscísachtaig fria t’ulchain-sea.’26
(‘Two things,’ answered Mac Conglinne, ‘Cathal, truly beautiful son of Finguine,
high king of the great Southern Half of Ireland, chief defender of Ireland against the descendants of Conn of the Hundred Battles, a man chosen by God, a noble, well-born
hero of the fierce Eóganachta of Glendamain, by his paternal heritage: it grieves me
to see him eat anything alone. And if people from distant lands were here requesting
favors or boons, they would scoff if my mouth were not munching at the same time
as yours.’)27
Mac Conglinne stresses Cathal’s noble heritage and the importance of his lineage in
his reply, which are fairly standard terms for addressing the nobility. More impor-
tantly for our purposes here, however, is Mac Conglinne’s stress upon Cathal’s lack of hospitality. Cathal is not at his own house, but at one of his landholders, Pichán mac Mael Find, who will hold a feast for Cathal as part of his political responsibilities to his king but is petrified that he will not be able to provide enough food for Cathal,
and that providing for Cathal, even insufficiently, will financial y ruin him. Never-
theless, when a king appears at someone’s house on his circuit, he takes precedence
over the landholder, and is expected to provide hospitality for whoever is there: the
sign of a good king is his generous nature. If a king is not generous with food, this
is also a sign that he is not generous with other things, such as gifts or the granting of land and women, and his political reputation will suffer accordingly. Add to this
the idea that a king is symbolical y connected to his land; if he exploits the entire
resources of the land, be it food or people, his kingdom will crumple, leaving his
people wide open to invasion from other surrounding kings. Cathal’s treatment of
food, then, as Mac Conglinne points out, is implicitly tied to his political reputation, and if he is stingy with his food, he makes himself look bad, not only in front of
his own people, but also people ‘from distant lands’. Cathal takes Mac Conglinne’s
point, and passes him an apple, whereupon Mac Conglinne makes a game of seeing
how many apples he can win from Cathal before his patience is exhausted. In the
text as a whole, the restitution of normal eating brings about the restitution of the
social order.
Translating Metrics in Aislinge Meic Conglinne
I would now like to turn to the verse passages that I have referred to in this chapter.
These are just a few samples of the verse in the text, and each verse form has very
specific requirements. I am not a poet, but I have tried to replicate the formal requirements of each type of poem used in the text. The first vision poem I cited above is part of a poem that has no fixed metre or rhyme scheme; however, the last four stanzas
of the poem, cited above, are in the sétnad metre. Sétnad is comprised of four-line stanzas in which the first and third lines are eight syl ables long, terminating in two syl ables, and the second and fourth lines are seven syl ables, terminating in one
26 Jackson, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, pp. 19–20.
27 Preston-Matto, Aislinge Meic Conglinne, p. 28.
Aislinge Meic Conglinne
119
syl able. B and D – the second and fourth lines – rhyme, and there is usual y aicill between C and D, the third and fourth lines. Aicill is a type of rhyme where the end of one line has to rhyme with the beginning or interior of the next line. Additional y, in sétnad, the first and second lines are tied together by either aicill or alliteration.28
In Irish, as opposed to English, only stressed words can rhyme. And Irish allows
certain classes of consonants to rhyme, not just vowels, although vowel and conso-
nant length must be considered when rhyming.29 Needless to say, this is extremely
difficult to replicate in English. As a refresher, I have included the stanza here; I was able to replicate the metre, but not the rhyme, although I was able to occasional y
match the alliteration.
A dí ersaind
bocai brechtáin,
The doorposts were of soft
custard
A léibend do gruth is d’imm,
The floor of butter and curds
Imdadai do blonaig bladaig,
Couches made of splendid suet,
Scéith iumdai do thanaig thimm.30
And shields of pliant pressed
cheese.31
Because of the metric constraints, I needed to translate brechtán in the first line with a two-syl able word, and chose ‘custard’. But I also needed a two-syl able word at the end of the third line to work with blonaig bladaig, meaning ‘famous’ or ‘splendid’
and ‘lard’ or ‘suet’. In the Irish, the noun comes first, with the modifying adjec-
tive following, and while you can do that in poetry (and, to a certain extent, it is
expected to invert word order to be able to match metre), I decided to use ‘splendid
suet’ to give some essence of the alliteration, but also to work the matching finishing dentals in lines A and C. With the rhyming lines B and D, I was not able even to
match dentals. I needed one-syl able words, and resorted to ‘butter and curds’ and
‘pliant pressed cheese’ for ‘gruth is d’imm’ and ‘tanaic thimm’. Obviously, ‘d’imm’ and
‘thimm’ rhyme in Irish, but I found no way to complete that rhyme in English. These
were often the kinds of considerations that I was faced with, but I was occasional y
able to be satisfied with what I had done. So, for instance, although I was not able to rhyme any of the second and fourth lines in any of these stanzas, and I was not able
to replicate any of the aicill, I did try to alliterate in the first two lines of the stanzas.32
In the second poem cited here, the poet has used a six-line stanza organised
around two sets of triplets instead of quatrains. In each triplet there are two hepta-
syl abic lines that conclude with a three-syl able word which are followed by a
five-syl able line in which there is a final monosyl able. This is a variety of eochraid metre. Here, only C and F rhyme and there is alliteration throughout. As a refresher,
and so that the specific metre can be observed, here is the first stanza again:
28 Gerard Murphy, Early Irish Metrics (Dublin, 1961), pp. 49–50, 54.
29 Ibid., pp. 26–45.