Apgitir Chrábaid

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Title	Apgitir Chrábaid (variously spelled Apgitir/Aipgitir Crábaid/Chrábaid/Crabuid) ‘The alphabet of piety / The alphabet of devotion’
Ascribed to	Colmán mac Béognae (d. 611, founder of Lann Elo, now Lynally, Co. Offaly)[1]
Manuscripts	The four main manuscript copies are: Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Rawlinson B 512 [s. xv-xviin], ff. 37r (col. a, 1)—39r (col. a1) Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, MS 3 B 23 (1227) = Tallaght manuscript [s. xv2], pp. 47 (col. a, 22) — 51 London, British Library, MS Harleian 5280 [s. xviin], ff. 39v—41r Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, MS 23 N 10 (Betham 145, 967) [s. xvi], pp. 44—48 Incomplete copies: Dublin, Trinity College, MS 1318 (H 2. 16) = Yellow Book of Lecan [s. xiv-xv], pp. 252–253, cols 570—572 Dublin, Trinity College, MS 1318 (H 2. 16) = Yellow Book of Lecan [s. xiv-xv], p. 410, cols 228—229. Fragment. Dublin, Trinity College, MS 1363 (H 4. 22) [various], p. 60 Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, MS 23 P 3 (1242) [s. xv-xvi (?)], f. 15v. Fragment 'A' Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, MS 23 P 3 (1242) [s. xv-xvi (?)], f. 18v. Fragment 'A' Dublin, National Library of Ireland, MS G 10 (Phillipps 10266) [s. xvi], pp. 46, 48 Dublin, Trinity College, MS 1337 (H 3. 18) [s. xv-xvi], p. 40.. Fragment. Chatsworth (Derbyshire), Book of Lismore [s. xv], f. 81v Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, MS 5100-5104 (507) [1630], f. 6r, p. 1. Fragment. Brussels, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, MS 2324–2340 (3410) [1629], f. 65r. Copy. London, British Library, MS Egerton 1782 [1516-1518], f. 45r[2][3]
Language	a mixture of Old Irish and early Middle Irish forms (Hull)[4]
Date	Vernam Hull dates the first part of the text (as it occurs in Harleian 5280) to c. 600, but assigns the composite text as a whole to the first half of the 8th century.
Description	The word apgitir or aipgitir, often translated literally as "alphabet", denotes the fundamentals of religious or monastic devotion.[5]
Sources	John Cassian

Description

Notes

Sources

Editions and translations

Hull, Vernam (ed. and tr.), “Apgitir chrábaid: the alphabet of piety”, Celtica 8 (1968): 44—89.  » Critical edition from all manuscripts.

Meyer, Kuno (ed.), “Mitteilungen aus irischen Handschriften: IV. Aus Harleian 5280. Das Apgitir Crábaid des Colmán maccu Béognae”, Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 3 (1901): 447—455.  » Edition based on Harleian 5280. CELT: edition; Celtic Digital Initiative (all Mitteilungen in ZCP 3); Internet Archive

Clancy, Thomas Owen, and Gilbert Márkus, Iona: the earliest poetry of a Celtic monastery, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1995. 195–207 (translation, with introduction).

Carey, John, King of Mysteries: early Irish religious writings, 2nd ed. [1998], Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000. 231—245 (translation).

Meyer, Kuno (ed.), “Mitteilungen aus irischen Handschriften: Fursa Crāiptech profetauit”, Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 9 (1913): 168.  » Fragment from YBL (p. 410b), Additional 30512 and Harleian 5280. CELT: edition; Internet Archive

Secondary sources

Follett, Westley, Céli Dé in Ireland: monastic writing and identity in the early Middle Ages, Studies in Celtic History 23, Woodbridge, 2006.

Hull, Vernam, “The date of Aipgitir Crábaid”, Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 25 (1956): 88—90.

Ó Néill, Pádraig, “The date and authorship of Apgitir Chrábaid: some internal evidence”, in: Ní Chatháin, Próinséas, and Michael Richter (eds.), Irland und die Christenheit: Bibelstudien und Mission. Ireland and Christendom: the Bible and the missions, Veröffentlichungen des Europa Zentrums Tübingen. Kulturwissenschaftliche Reihe, Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1987. 203—215.