(i.e. the sea of Wight or the English Channel); then to the Alps in the
north of the land of the Long-Beards, or Lombards. The Long-Beards do
not appear in Italy until the end of the sixth century; the suggestion
of North Saxon-Land reaching down to the sea of Wight suggests that
there was then a South Saxon-Land, familiar to an Irish writer, dating
this part of the story as before the end of the eighth century, when
both Saxons and Long-Beards were overcome by Charlemagne. The second
part of the story is, then, no original legend, but belongs to the
seventh or eighth century, or the classical period; and it looks as if
there were two writers, one of whom, like the author of the Egerton
version of Etain, embellished the love-story part of the original
legend, leaving the end alone, while another author wrote an account of
the legendary journey of the demi-god Fraech in search for his stolen
cattle, adding the geographical and historical knowledge of his time.
The whole was then put together, like the two parts of the Etain story;
the difference between the two stories in the matter of the wife does
not seem to have troubled the compilers.

The oldest manuscript authority for the Tain bo Fraich is the Book of
Leinster, written before 1150. There are at least two other manuscript
authorities, one; in Egerton, 1782 (published by Professor Kuno Meyer
in the Zeitschrift für Celt. Philologie, 1902); the other is in MS. XL.,
Advocates' Library, Edinburgh (published in the Revue Celtique, Vol.
XXIV.). Professor Meyer has kindly allowed me to copy his comparison
of these manuscripts and his revision of O'Beirne Crowe's translation
of the Book of Leinster text. The text of the literal translation
given here follows, however, in the main O'Beirne Crowe's translation,
which is in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy for 1870; a few
insertions are made from the other MSS.; when so made the insertion is
indicated by a note.