Manx language: Difference between revisions

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=== Literature ===

{{Main|Manx literature|Gaelic literature}}

Manx never had a large number of speakers, so it would not have been practical to mass-produce written literature. However, a body of oral literature did exist. The "[[Fianna]]" tales and others like them are known, including the Manx ballad {{lang|gv|Fin as Oshin}}, commemorating [[Finn MacCool|Finn MacCumhail]] and [[Ossian|Oisín]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/fulltext/mb1896/p002.htm |title=pp2/5 Manx Ballads - Fin as Oshin |publisher=Isle-of-man.com |access-date=15 November 2013}}</ref> With the coming of Protestantism, Manx spoken tales slowly disappeared, while a tradition of carvals, Christian ballads, developed with religious sanction.{{When|date=February 2009}}Even so, Bishop [[Mark Hildesley]], after his gardener overheard him discussing the ''[[Ossian]]'' poems of [[James Macpherson]] and admitted to known of Fionn and Oisin, the Bishop collected from the local [[oral tradition]] multiple lays in Manx from the [[Fenian Cycle]] of [[Celtic Mythology]], which were accordingly preserved for the future.<ref> ''Mannanan's Cloak: An Anthology of Manx Literature'' by [[Robert Corteen Carswell]], London: Francis Boutle Publishers, 2010, pp. 80–86. (translation by Robert Corteen Carswell)</ref>

There is no record of literature written distinctively in Manx before the [[Protestant Reformation|Reformation]]. By that time, any presumed literary link with Ireland and Scotland, such as through Irish-trained priests, had been lost. The first published literature in Manx was ''The Principles and Duties of Christianity ({{lang|gv|Coyrie Sodjey}})'', translated by [[Bishop of Sodor and Man]] [[Thomas Wilson (bishop)|Thomas Wilson]].<ref name=":1" />