INFORMATION
Dallan Forgaill, (flourished 6th century AD), chief Irish poet of his time, probably the author of the Amra Choluim Chille, or Elegy of St. Columba, one of the earliest Irish poems of any length. The poem was composed after St. Columba’s death in 597 in the alliterative, accentual poetic form of the period, in stanzas of irregular length. It has survived in the language of later transcripts; its earliest extant copies are in The Book of the Dun Cow (c. 1100) and in the Liber hymnorum, a collection of Irish and Latin hymns begun in 860. The obscure text is accompanied by extensive glosses and commentary.