The various Irish language societies of the nineteenth century had maintained an almost continuous interest in the study and publication of existing Irish literature. To this the operations of practically all of them were confined. They produced no new literature, and they ignored or neglected the living language itself. Yet, while they were thus rescuing from the dust of centuries the works of ancient writers, the language in which these were written bade fair to die away. That language, which, despite seven centuries of disorder and five centuries of hostile legislation, had been still vigorous enough to bind together the nation, and to assimilate the latest colonist, was threatened by internal decay. The cessation of literary activity had been the first sign of a growing weakness in the power of the language amongst the people.

To this decay nearly every element in the country contributed. English became more and more the language of religion and of popular agitation : poetry in English voiced the national feelings, and superseded that of the eighteenth-century poets : the ” national ” schools, established in 1831, were spreading over the country, and from them the Irish language was excluded, and English-speaking teachers endeavoured to teach Irish-speaking children through a tongue that the latter did not understand : the development of administrative machinery spread a host of officials over the country, and all its operations were carried out in English : the uprooting of the old social life brought final disaster on the language with which it had been interwoven.

The arrest in the development of Irish literature, which has been noted as marking the advent of the Normans, continued during the succeeding two centuries. If original literature worthy of the name was then produced, all trace and record of it has been lost.

Yet our annals clearly show that learning and scholarship flourished and were encouraged. They record, year after year, the names of those who were famous as scholars, bards, historians, and lawyers ; they constantly preserve the names of Gaelic chiefs and Norman lords who were conspicuous for their patronage and hospitality to poets and men of learning. Every Gaelic family, and many Norman ones, still had their hereditary bards and historians occupying honoured and privileged positions.

Learned and famous books were produced, as will be shown, but these were mostly compilations. At the time that the new nations were developing popular literature, the Gaelic voice was suppressed. While England, France, Spain and Italy were creating their national languages, and the Renascence was spreading over Europe, the cultured mind of Ireland was forcibly turned back upon the past.