ollamh

The Oxford Companion to Irish History | 2007 | 696 words | Copyright

ollamh (perhaps from O.Ir. oll, ‘great’) signified master of an art, especially poetry, but originally including even a master of martial arts. To hold the ‘chair of ollamhship’ (cathaoir ollamhnachta) signified a royal appointment as court poet, judge, physician, or historian. In practice the tax‐free lands endowing such a post often became hereditary within a local learned family, whose kin‐head in each generation was chosen on the basis of his learning, and confirmed (or not) by the local king. Consequently all fully qualified junior members of such a family were called adhbhar ollamhan, ‘eligible to be ollamh’.

Katharine Simms

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