The feast of Bricrind is one of the tales preserved in this
manuscript. The author of the tale in its present form, whenever he
lived, composed it, having before him original books which he
collated, using his judgment at times upon the materials to his
hand. At one stage he observes that the books are at variance on a
certain point, namely, that at which Cuculain, Conal the
Victorious, and Laery Buada go to the lake of Uath in order to be
judged by him. Some of the books, according to the author, stated
that on this occasion the two latter behaved unfairly, but he
agreed with those books which did not state this.

We have, therefore, a tale penned in the eleventh century, composed
at some time prior to this, and itself collected, not from oral
tradition, but from books. These considerations would, therefore,
render it extremely probable that the tales of the Ultonian period,
with which the Leabhar na Huidhre is principally concerned, were
committed to writing at a very early period.

To strengthen still further the general historic credibility of
these tales, and to show how close to the events and heroes
described must have been the bards who originally composed them, I
would urge the following considerations.

With the advent of Christianity the mound-raising period passed
away. The Irish heroic tales have their source in, and draw their
interest from, the mounds and those laid in them. It would,
therefore, be extremely improbable that the bards of the Christian
period, when the days of rath and cairn had departed, would modify,
to any considerable extent, the literature produced in conditions
of society which had passed away.