Ogham writing | Celtic Language, Ireland & Picts (2024)

ogham writing, alphabetic script dating from the 4th century ad, used for writing the Irish and Pictish languages on stone monuments; according to Irish tradition, it was also used for writing on pieces of wood, but there is no material evidence for this. In its simplest form, ogham consists of four sets of strokes, or notches, each set containing five letters composed of from one to five strokes, thus giving 20 letters. These were incised along the edge of a stone, often vertically or from right to left. A fifth set of five symbols, called in Irish tradition forfeda (“extra letters”), is seemingly a later development. The origin of ogham is in dispute; some scholars see a connection with the runic and, ultimately, Etruscan alphabets, while others maintain that it is simply a transformation of the Latin alphabet. The fact that it has signs for h and z, which are not used in Irish, speaks against a purely Irish origin. The inscriptions in ogham are very short, usually consisting of a name and patronymic in the genitive case; they are of linguistic interest because they show an earlier state of the Irish language than can be attested by any other source and probably date from the 4th century ad. Of the more than 375 ogham inscriptions known, about 300 are from Ireland. Most of those found in Wales are accompanied by Latin transliterations or equivalents.