The language of Caithréim Thoirdhealbhaigh

The historical text Caithreim Thoirdhealbhaigh has received relatively little linguistic or textual attention in spite of the fact that Standish Hayes O'Grady's edition of the text was made available over eighty years ago. The only work of this nature to be carried out to date consists of a short note by Vemam Hull on the preterite passive plural as it occurs in the text, and two articles by Leo McNamara.' A linguistic analysis is presented in the present paper where the text is discussed under the headings of transmission and edition, date, language and style.