Cattle Lords and Clansmen

The Social Structure of Early Ireland

Nerys T. Patterson

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Patterson provides an analysis of the social structure of medieval Ireland, focusing on the pre-Norman period. This book produces a unique approach to the study of early Ireland—one that challenges previous scholarship.

Reviews

”...Nerys Patterson has given a fresh and lively account of Irish society from a sociological point of view, based on considerable familiarity with translated editions of the Old Irish law texts and literary sources in Old, Middle and Early Modern Irish. She has a number of thought-provoking observations to make about points of detail, such as the Irish attitude to sheep (pp 84-5), the varying social status accorded to druids (p. 41), and the anomalous distribution of the cró and díre compensation payments among a victim’s patrilinear and matrilinear kin (pp 53-4). More importantly, she has an overall view based on comparative studies of other societies of how economic and social pressures should have operated within early Irish society.” — Irish Historical Studies