Madam, - As a Briton of Irish extraction, who proudly bears a family name not unknown in the field of Old Irish, I have been labouring hard over the past 20 years to persuade the British Archaeological Establishment that the remarkable corpus of Old Irish Literature is a unique window into the culture of the Iron and Bronze Ages of Europe. In consequence I have been following the debate in your columns with some concern. If a body as great as UCD downgrades Old Irish from a full degree subject to a mere module, it necessarily signals a lack of respect for a great and ancient tradition.
The history, law, placenames and poetry of Old Irish are unrivalled in Western Europe, and the law in particular demonstrates the underlying Indo-European Common Law which predates (and gave rise to) the Roman Ius Non Scriptum of the early Republic, as well as the English Common Law.
The majestic appreciation of this rich culture can never, in my view, be replaced by any regime for "contextualising the subject anew" in a broader "modern" degree. In these circumstances I cannot help but give what support I can to Prof Liam Breatnach (June 19th) and the other distinguished signatories to the letter March 13th. To paraphrase the tenth century poet Eochaid Ua Flainn: "Listen, learned men, so glad,/ with a stout ship of knowledge,/ till I have told what I have learned/ of every generation who took Ireland."
Without a grounding in Old Irish, I greatly fear that a degree in "Celtic Civilisation" would be a Bád gan stiúr nó cú gan eireabul (a boat without a rudder or a hound without a tail). - Yours, etc,
TIMOTHY CONCANNON, Buriton, Hampshire, England.