law – OG(H)AM

Ogam script and cryptography in the Irish legal manuscript tradition; Guest blog by Dr Chantal Kobel

We are grateful to Dr Chantal Kobel for contributing a guest blog this month. She is a Bergin Fellow in the School of Celtic Studies, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. Her main research interests centre on medieval Irish language, literature and manuscript culture, in particular the extant medieval Irish law manuscripts. In an earlier blog, Deborah… Continue reading Ogam script and cryptography in the Irish legal manuscript tradition; Guest blog by Dr Chantal Kobel

This stone originally stood as part of the Bryn y Beddau monumental landscape, populated with up to six barrows and two stone circles. In the late fifth or early sixth century, the stone was reused to display a name in two scripts, Roman and Ogham.
Roman-letter: SIMILINI / TOVISACI
‘Similin(i)us Tovisacos’
Ogham: S[I]B[I]L[I]N[I] / [TO]VISACI
‘Sibilin(i)us Tovisacos’
Both inscriptions are simply a name, Si(m/b)ilin(i)us, followed by the title or patronymic Tovisacos, meaning ‘leader’ representing an early form of later Welsh tywysog and Old Irish toísech, Modern Irish Taoiseach. This could reflect a method of communicating identity and authority, a way of legitimising land claims, or perhaps an attempt to relate to myths and leaders important in the land.