Dallan Forgaill

Holy Dallan Forgaill (Dallan Forchella; Dallan Forgaill; Dallan de Cluain Dallain; Eochaidh) was a Christian Poète Irish, born towards 530 in Magh Slécht, in the Comté of Cavan in Ireland. It is said that he studied and that he wrote Poésie in a way so intensive that he became about it blind. It was the German Cousin of Saint Mogue. Dallan was martyrized in 598, when Pirate S attacked the monastery of the island of Inniskeel. He was decapitated, and its head was thrown to the sea. It is said that God miraculeusement reunified his body after his martyrdom. It was buried in this island.

Dallan was largely made know like the chief of the poets of Ireland. It reformed the order of the bards S, thus supporting the safeguarding of the language and the gaelic culture . He is especially known by reduced S, which were allotted to him, written with the address of contemporary Irish saints. One can quote Amra Choluim Chille ( Élégie of Saint Columba ) for Colomba d' Iona, one of the oldest Irish poems, Amra Senain ( Élégie Saint Senan ), and Amra Connaill ( Élégie Saint Connall ). The Amra Choluim Chille was published into 597 after the death of Colomba. The oldest copies which us remain about it find in the Liber hymnorum , a collection of Hymne S Latin S and Irish, started about year 860, as in the Lebor Na hUidre ( Livre of the gray cow ), written about the year 1100 with the monastery of Clonmacnoise.

These poems, seldom translated, use metric a accented alliterative characteristic of the time. The worms, gathered in stanzas irregular length, are of such a darkness, that the following scribes added to it bulky Glose S. the typical example is the " Amra Choluim Chille" , where the gloses themselves contain poems, of which some treat Cycle Fenian.

Some think that Dallan is the author of “Be Thou My Vision”, which was often put in music, in particular by the group Jars off Clay.
Be Thou my vision, O Lord off my heart;
Naught Be all else to me save that Thou Article
Thou my best thought by day gold by night,
Waking gold sleeping Thy presence my light.

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