Literacy and Identity in Early Medieval Ireland - 9781843838555

Literacy and Identity in Early Medieval IrelandAuthor(s): Elva Johnston\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd, United Kingdom\nImprint: The Boydell Press\nISBN-13: 9781843838555, 978-1843838555\nSynopsis\nThe first comprehensive survey of the Irish literary elite in the early middle ages.\n\nWinner of the 2015 NUI Irish Historical Research Prize.\n\nMuch of our knowledge of early medieval Ireland comes from a rich literature written in a variety of genres and in two languages, Irish and Latin. Who wrote this literature and what role did they play within society? What did the introduction and expansion of literacy mean in a culture where the vast majority of the population continued to be non-literate? How did literacy operate in and intersect with the oral world? Was literacy a key element in the formation and articulation of communal and elite senses of identity?\n This book addresses these issues in the first full, inter-disciplinary examination of the Irish litera.