Texts

Irish weather prognostications (Calann Enair for domnach)

  • Irish
  • prose

Brief prose text attributed to Fintan (mac Bóchra?) offering prognostications of the weather from the day of the week on which the first (calends) of January falls. It belongs to the type of prognostics that is often known by the Latin title Revelatio (or Supputatio) Esdrae, after the prophet Ezra.

First words (prose)
  • Calann Enair for domnach
Author
Ascribed to: Fintan mac Bóchra
Fintan mac Bóchra
(time-frame ass. with universal history)
A figure of medieval Irish tradition who survives the Flood and lives to give eye-witness accounts of the history of Ireland

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The attribution to one Fintan is not elaborated. Meyer (1909) explains the reference as being that to the legendary Fintan mac Bóchra. Cf. the attributions to Fintan in TCD 1363 p. 161a and 161b (Torann Domhnaigh créd fatá attributed to Fintan mac Scáil).
Manuscripts
f. 43r
rubric: ‘Fintan hic’
beg. ‘Kaland Enair for Domnach’
Sunday-Friday.
f. 11ra
beg. ‘Calaind Enair for Dhomhnac[h bliadain] coencomrac[h]’
beg. ‘do égaibh innte 7rla’
ff. 50ra.1–51ra.19
beg. ‘Calaind Enair [for Domnach]’
beg. ‘forsin Callaind. Calaind Enair b.’
Language
  • Irish
Form
prose (primary)

Classification

Subjects

days of the weekyet to be classified
days of the week
id. 48667

Sources

Primary sources Text editions and/or modern translations – in whole or in part – along with publications containing additions and corrections, if known. Diplomatic editions, facsimiles and digital image reproductions of the manuscripts are not always listed here but may be found in entries for the relevant manuscripts. For historical purposes, early editions, transcriptions and translations are not excluded, even if their reliability does not meet modern standards.

[ed.] [tr.] Richards, G. Melville, “The auguries of Esdras concerning the character of the year”, Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies 8 (1936): 125–127.
Edition from NLI MS G 3, with readings from MS G 1.
[ed.] [tr.] Jackson, Kenneth H., “The auguries of Esdras concerning the character of the year”, Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies 7:1 (1933): 5–14.
Incomplete version from Egerton 1782.
[ed.] [tr.] Meyer, Kuno, “Le pronostic du premier jour de janvier: Old Irish texts”, Mélusine: recueil de mythologie, littérature populaire, traditions et usages 10 (1900–1901): 113–114.
Gallica: <link>
Egerton 1782. Items for Sunday-Tuesday only.
[ed.] Meyer, Kuno [ed. and tr.], The instructions of King Cormac mac Airt, Todd Lecture Series, 15, Dublin, 1909.
CELT – edition: <link> CELT – English translation: <link> Internet Archive: <link>
55 Egerton 1782. Largely repeated from the above. The end note is to Tecosca Cormaic § 17, in which Cormac explains weather prognostics in an eight-line poem beg. Máthair etha aig (‘Ice is the mother of corn’, etc.).
Contributors
C. A., Dennis Groenewegen
Page created
November 2018, last updated: September 2023