BARRING reincarnation, I can't have been alive at the start of the Dark Ages. But even so, a sense of déjà vu from those days has been overpowering me of late. It must be folk memory, inherited from a 6th-century monk, writes Frank McNally
If you're similarly afflicted, you may recall that, back then, the entire future of Europe hung in the balance. Barbarians had overrun the continent, burning books and libraries and places of learning. The whole Western classical tradition faced oblivion. And suddenly, a hitherto obscure, mist-covered Atlantic island - whose very remoteness from the centres of power had protected it from the Goths and Vandals - found itself pivotal to Europe's fate.
The holy men of Ireland rose to the challenge, rescuing whatever old texts they could find, sacred and profane, and bringing them back to their cells and monasteries. There, they copied them painstakingly for the benefit of posterity. But they didn't just copy. They also embellished, illuminating the manuscripts with glorious colours, marginal notes, and even doodles for their own and other readers' amusement.
By the time the Vikings came rampaging, the monks had scattered across Europe again, re-evangelising the continent. The darkest hour had passed. The books were safe. And in the process, like that anonymous 9th-century scribe who wrote Pangur Bán, the monks had lain the foundations of modern literature: "I and Pangur Bán my cat,/ 'Tis a like task we are at:/ Hunting mice is his delight,/ Hunting words I sit all night."
In a similarly playful mode, Thomas Cahill has told the story of the saints-and-scholars era in a book called How the Irish Saved Civilisation. Naturally, he exaggerated a bit: he had inherited a great story-telling tradition, after all. But his book represented a conscious attempt to celebrate his race and what was - in his words - its "one moment of unblemished glory".
Until 2008, that is: because, a whole millennium-and-a-half later, another such moment may just have presented itself. Once again, it seems, Europe's future lies in the balance. And once again, that misty island on its western periphery has been thrust centre stage.
Conditions have changed somewhat, of course. "Rome" has not fallen this time, exactly: it has merely been amended into oblivion by subsequent treaties, of which the latest is "Lisbon". The barbarians are not what they used to be, either. Rather than pillage Western Europe, traditional style, they applied politely for membership. But the EU is crumbling under the strain, even so. And again, it is only the Irish who can save it.
The good news, this time, is that we have only one text to transcribe. The bad news is: what a text! The Lisbon Treaty presents a broadly similar challenge to the lay reader as a Latin psalter must have done to that original Eurosceptic, Attila the Hun. And reacting to the document as Attila might have done would be entirely understandable.
Faced with its dense forest of verbiage - a forest that the No campaign claims is populated by hobgoblins and shape-shifting monsters - one may at least be prompted to paraphrase another mediaeval scribe, quoted by Cahill.
The scribe had preserved a Celtic saga for posterity, but felt the need to attach a health warning: "I who have copied down this story, or more accurately, fantasy, do not credit the details of the story or fantasy. Some things in it are devilish lies and some are poetical figments. Some seem possible and others not. Some are for the enjoyment of idiots." And yet our modern-day monks must not only make Lisbon intelligible to themselves and their electorate but - by extension - to the electorates of all member-states. For the rest of the EU has arranged, in its wisdom or cynicism, that the treaty need not be put to the ballot. In accepting or rejecting it, therefore, Irish voters will do so for all of Europe. The responsibility is awe-inspiring.
In such circumstances, I am ashamed to say that - even with the benefit of Jamie Smyth's ongoing and admirably concise deconstruction - I remain confused about parts of the treaty. My embarrassment is lessened by the news that some of the lawyers who wrote it are confused too. But either way, I fear that official attempts to explain the document may fall short.
Which is why, even at this late stage, I suggest that the Government should go the whole hog and have the manuscript illuminated. It's a radical plan, I know. But I propose that Dick Roche and a team of graphic artists be locked away in stone cells somewhere (Glendalough is in his constituency, by the way) immediately, with or without a cat.
There, they should be required to transcribe the entire document, adding Celtic swirls, strange animal pictures, and such other marginalia as they see fit. Their brief should be to make the manuscript intelligible to an average member of the public - or, failing that, at least to amuse anyone who ever looks at it again.
Ideally, the finished work would go on display in Trinity College, with curators turning a new page every day. Yes, it would take months to get through it in this manner, and the June 12th referendum will be long over by then. But in the event that people vote "No" in the first vote, they should at least have finished reading it before the replay.