pax hibernia

Found the oldest book in the library that I have found thus far. It is a 1903 copy of Thomas Addis Emmet's Ireland Under English Rule: A Plea for the Plaintiff. Here is a quote:

The great affinity between the Phoenician and Irish language and alphabet has been shown by various learned antiquaries- as Vallancey, Sir Laurence Parsons, Sir Wm. Betham, Villanueva, and others; and they have likewise pointed out a similarity between the Irish language and that of the Carthaginians, who were a colony of the Tyrians and Phoenicians...And Phoenix, brother of Cadmus the Phoenician who first introduced letters among the Greeks and Phoenicians, is considered by O'Flaverty, Charles O'Connor and other to be the same as the celebrated Phoeniusa (or Feniusa) Farsaidh of the old historians, who state that he was King of Scythia and ancestor of the Milesians of Spain who came to Ireland; and that, being a man of great learning, he invented the Irish alphabet, which his Milesian posterity brought to Ireland; and it may be further observed that the Irish in their own language, were from Phoeniusa or Feniusa, called Feine, a term latinized Phoenii, and signifying Phoenicians, as shown by Charles O'Connor and in O'Brien's Dictionary.

[Note- the modern Sinn Fein Republicans.]

And a couple verses:

We hate the Saxon and the Dane,
We hate the Norman men-
We cursed their greed for blood and gain,
We curse them now again.

Sweet tongue of our Druids and bards of poet ages;
Sweet tongue of our Monarchs, our Saints and our Sages;
Sweet tongue of our heroes and free-born Sires,
When we cease to preserve thee our glory expires.

unrelated: check out Liquid Man flash thing. Also, equally interesting: Falling Girl (click+drag her if she gets stuck). Both of these were memed into my world from BoingBoing.