taken into the text, e.g.: daig isinn immelbordaib int shrotha
sin robid a hait 7 a hadba 185; 7 robad scith lim scur don
chathugud sin, mani thairmiscdis i n-urchur 3263; 7 is eiside
cetduine risar-cumdaigead miir na Teibi ar tus... 849-852; cf
2670.
2. The language is in part archaic. Def. art.: in cluichi cain-
teacha sin 2589; the dual: isinn immelbordaib int shrotha sin
185; the neuter gender: ni hurchar n-imroill tuc 3769. V. Vocab.
These old forms are not numerous, and might owe their place
in the text to the archaic tastes of the various scribes. But
when the verbs are taken into account, the case for the greater
antiquity of the MS. becomes immeasurably stronger. The de-
ponent verbs are numerous, and deeply imbedded in the ms.
The deponent is a regular feature of Old Irish but tends rapidly
to disappear in the Early and Middle Irish periods.
xiv. INTRODUCTION

E. A Professional Work.
It is explicitly stated in the above-mentioned note to Eg. that
the scribe, if not strictly non-professional in status, was dependent
on the liberality of patrons for his subsistence. There are, on the
other hand, many indications that the scribe of E. was one of
the regular scribes of a monastery. Besides those already men-
tioned, the MS. itself by its ruling and its general finish, its
well-formed capital letters and its artistic crosses, claims its
origia in the scriptorium as the work of skilled hands there —
work too which had been long in ecclesiastical keeping.
E. THE Work of Two Scribes.
