Early Social Structure

    Judges were called brehons; and the law they administered is, therefore, now commonly known as the ” Brehon Law.”* To become a brehon a person had to go through a regular, well-defined course oftraining. The brehons were a very influential class of men, and those attached to chiefs had free lands for their maintenance. Those not so attached lived simply on the fees of their profession. It generally required great technical skill to decide cases, the legal rules, as set forth in the law-books, were so complicated, and so many circumstances had to be taken into account. The brehon, moreover, had to be very careful, for he was himself liable to damages if he delivered a false or an unjust judgment.

Above : One Of Irish Clan Family Logo

The political organisation was based upon groups of various sizes from the family upwards. The family was the group consisting of the living parents and all their descendants. The fine* was a group related by blood within certain recognised degrees. The sept * was a larger group descended from common parents long since dead. All the members of a sept were nearly related, and in later times bore the same surname. The clan * or house was still larger. Clann means children, and the word therefore implied descent from one ancestor. The tribe * was made up of several septs or clans, and usually claimed, like the subordinate groups, to be descended from a common ancestor. The entire basis, therefore, was kinship. But as strangers were often adopted into all the groups, there was much admixture ; and the theory of common descent became in great measure a fiction except in the leading families.

Above : One Of Irish Clan Family Logo

Socially every group was divided into classes, from the king or chief down to the slave, and the law took cognisance of all—setting forth their rights, duties and privileges. These classes were not castes ; for under certain conditions persons could pass from one to the next above. There were five main classes:—(i) Kings of various grades from the king of the tuath up to the Ard Ri ; (2) nobles ; (3) freemen with property ; (4) freemen without property (or with very little); (5) the non-free classes. The first three were the privileged classes: a person belonging to these was an ” aire” (arra) or chief.