Hi Tim. I can't find my original citation from the RIA right now. I'll look it up again at a local University. I do recall that it simply gave the author's name and the recipient's name and little bit of information such as that the piece was a poem by a priest. I've sat on this for a very long time because the Irish really boggled me, but since I have started writing it was important to try and discover more of the Irish side of this story. I was never sure this was the Fallon I'm working on but I needed to know hence my appeal to y'all. Dr. James Fallon was a polarizing figure during and after the American Revolution so I figured he raised a ruckus on the continent before he left in 1774 .

Thanks for that. Sometimes taking other routes brings up some surprises. I think some people are working on this (as I am, piece by piece) but it is tough, especially some of the characters. I write Irish this way for practice and fun but there is still a lot to learn about it. I hope someone can come up with something fairly soon. It would take me years . . .

You know I found another James Fallon who was bishop at Elphin during the same time period. Could he be the one who wrote the letter instead of the Dr. James Fallon you are talking about? Or are the one and the same person?

I think they are from the same family line, but different families in the line (if that makes sense). The James I'm working on was born in Roscommon in 1749 and died in 1793 in Kentucky, USA. If your interested, you can see a picture of his birthplace on the landed estates database. http://www.landedestates.ie/LandedEstat ... sp?id=1492 His brother Malachy is mentioned as a duelist which is true. It's hard to tell who the poem is about at this stage, I think the translation so far indicates that the O'Fallon in it left the holy orders.

Thanks for that. I would like to help but those scans of copies are hard to read. If we could only get a better scan . . . Maybe despeckling would work at the risk of losing some important things. I wonder how Caitríona is doing on it.

We can give that a try. Not sure how Caitríona is doing. I was amazed she could read the crappy copies I sent in the first posts.

If you're familiar with the old script, it's possible to read some parts of it. I have been able to do some. But then, there are parts where it's not readable or the character combinations are strange to me. I may end up posting some of what I can read just for fun. Maybe someone can help translate.

camburn, I'm still working on this. Is there any chance of some more scans, please? Even if you don't think the new set are any clearer, comparing the two may yield insight - what looked like a smudge may be revealed in the second scan as a dot or vice versa.

Here are the particular lines for which I need clarification:
the top of page 53 (say the first five lines - I have all the rest)
the top of page 54, especially the first two lines - again, I have the rest, more or less.

By the way, this ends with an "etc." at the bottom of page 54. I don't suppose there's more? It's also the end of a quatrain though (and the end of a long string of adjectives describing Death) so perhaps not.

Timluascein, you were right that the author is Díarmaid and not Donnchadh. Unfortunately I've never heard of Díarmaid Ruadh Ó Murchadha either, nor is there an entry for him in Beathaisnéis (the Irish biographical encyclopedia.)

Caitríona,
if you look at the scans that Breandán posted again, he has newly posted scans of the tops of those pages. Much clearer. Good luck to you on doing this. I've been poring over it now and again and making some notes, so if I can be of any help . . .