Lectures On The Early History Of Institutions

The great peculiarity of the ancient laws of Ireland, so far as they are accessible to us, is discussed, with much instructive illustration, in the General Preface to the Third Volume of the official translations. They are not a legislative structure, but the creation of a class of professional lawyers, the Brehons, whose occupation became hereditary, and who on that ground have been designated, though not with strict accuracy, a caste.