Táin Bó

The Táin Bó, or cattle raid (literally "driving-off of cows"), is one of the genres of early Irish literature. The medieval Irish literati organised their work into genres such as the Cattle Raid (Táin Bó), the Voyage (Imram), the Feast (Fled or Feis), the Wooing (Tochmarc), the Conception (Compert) and the Death (Aided), rather than the familiar but relatively modern division into cycles.

Táin Bó Cúailnge, "the Cattle Raid of Cooley" or simply The Táin, is by far the táin best known to modern audiences. Likewise this was the táin best known to this literature's audience from the 11th to the 14th century and is the central story of the Ulster Cycle. Its likely this story had a similar prominence in the endemic oral literature before medieval Christian put them in written form.

There was also a plethora of lesser tána (plural of táin). Some of these are known only by name, but most of them are extant and have been translated into English. Among these lesser tána are the following.

It seems to have been customary in ancient Ireland to precede the recital of "The Great Táin" and other very long tales with a number of shorter stories. These preludes, or remscéla, are sometimes incorrectly regarded as a part of the Táin Bó Cúailnge due to the static nature of printed and bound materials. This misconception is enforced by the fact that the Thomas Kinsella translation, which contains eight remscéla chosen by the translator, has been popular for three decades.

Many of the lesser tána were well-suited to serve as remscéla as these could be framed as preludes to the epic events at Cúailnge. For example, a surviving of Táin Bó Fraích ends with the segue:

They brought their cows over it thither. It is there they flung their horns from them... Fraech goes away then to his territory after, and his wife, and his sons, and his cows with him, until he goes with Ailill and Medb for the Spoil of the Cows from Cualnge.

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Wikipedia