Transcript

Bhuel, bhí Dónall Ó Daoirí agus... Huddens agus Duddens agus Dónall Ó Daoirí. Trí chomharsan a bhí iontu. D'imigh siad agus thug siad leofa Dónall Ó Daoirí. Chaith siad isteach i mbaga[1] é agus thug siad leofa go muirfeadh[2] siad é. Chuaigh siad isteach i dtoigh tábhairne, an bheirt, Huddens agus Duddens. D'fhág siad Dónall Ó Daoirí amuigh ar an charr (is tháinig) droveóir thart ag ceannach eallaigh nó ag drove eallaigh leis in éis a gceannach.

"Tá mise ag goil 'na bhflaitheas, ag goil 'na bhflaitheas (...)," a déarfadh Dónall Ó Daoirí, "ag goil 'na bhflaitheas, ag goil 'na bhflaitheas (...)."

"Nach ligfidh tú mise i d'áit (...)?" (arsa) droveóir an eallaigh leis.

"Scaoil an baga go bhfeice mé an t-eallach."

Scaoil sé an baga ansin agus d'amharc sé ar an eallach.

"Feicim é," arsa seisean, "siúráilte (...)."

Chuir sé ansin isteach sa bhaga é agus cheangail[3] sé béal an bhaga agus, "Tá mise ag goil 'na bhflaitheas, ag goil 'na bhflaitheas (...) ar fad," deir sé.

Agus chaith siad amach ansin le binn (thiar é), Huddens agus Duddens, Dónall Ó Daoirí. Ansin, na bhí sé caite amach leis an bhinn acu, tháinig an bheirt 'na bhaile.

Lá harna mhárach bhí Dónall Ó Daoirí amuigh ag buachailleacht drove eallaigh agus fuaigh Huddens agus Duddens ionsairt agus d'fhiafraigh siad cá bhfuair sé drove an eallaigh.

"Ó, dá mbeadh sibhse (i mur mbeirt) (...) bheadh oiread eile eallaigh ann.

"Cuirfidh tú muidinne isteach i mbaga," arsa seisean, "hachan nduine a'inn agus (cuir ar an charr muid is tabhair siar muid)."

Thug. Cha dteachaigh seisean isteach (...). Chaith sé amach an bheirt. Bhí cuid na triúr aigesean.

Translation

Well, there was Dónall Ó Daoirí and.... Huddens and Duddens and Dónall Ó Daoirí. They were three neighbours. They went off and they brought Dónall Ó Daoirí with them. They threw him into a sack and planned on killing him. Huddens and Duddens went into a tavern house. They left Dónall Ó Daoirí outside on the cart, and a drover came past, buying cattle, or droving cattle he had bought.

"I am going to heaven, I am going to heaven (...)," Dónall Ó Daoirí kept saying, "going to heaven, going to heaven (...)."

"Won't you swap places with me?" said the cattle drover to him.

"Open the bag so I can see the cattle."

He then opened the bad and he looked at the cattle.

"I see them," he said, "surely (...)."

He put him into the bag and he tied the mouth of the bag and, "I am going to heaven, going to heaven (...)," he said.

And they threw him down a cliff beyond, Huddens and Duddens, Dónall Ó Daoirí. Then, when they had thrown him down the cliff, the two came home.

The following day Dónall Ó Daoirí was out herding a drove of cattle and Huddens and Duddens went up to him and they asked him where he got the cattle drove.

"Oh, if you two were (...) you would have as many cattle again.

"You will throw us into a bag," he said. "each of us and put us on the cart and bring us back (?)."

He did it. He didn't go in (...). He threw out the two. He had the possessions of all three then.

Footnotes

Commentary

The plot in this story appears to be confused or fragmented, but the overall narrative bears similarity to part of an international folktale, ATU 1535 The rich and the poor farmer. A section of the story describes how a rich farmer places his poor brother in a sack in order to drown him. The poor brother manages to convince a passing shepherd to trade places with him, and the shepherd is drowned. The poor brother returns to town with the shepherd's flock, and the rich brother enquires of him where he got the animals. He claims he found them under the water; the rich brother then drowns trying to retrieve some sheep for himself. This international folktale is often episodic, and can comprise of a number of different, related motifs. It first appeared in print in a tenth-century Dutch narrative known as Versus Unibove, and grew in popularity after the fifteenth century. It is now extremely well known in Europe, Asia, Africa and parts of the Americas. See Hans Jorg Uther, The types of international folktales: a classification and bibliography (3 vols, Helsinki, 2004). The story is extremely popular in Ireland, with a great number of versions having been recorded from all four provinces. In Irish versions, it is often combined with, or borrows motifs from, ATU 1539 Cleverness and gullibility. See Seán Ó Súilleabháin and Rieder Th. Christiansen, The types of the Irish folktale (Helsinki, 1968). This account may also contain an international folk motif, K842 Dupe persuaded to take prisoner’s place in a sack: killed. See Stith Thompson, Motif-index of folk literature (rev. and enlarged ed., 6 vols, Bloomington, Ind., 1955-8). Another version of this international folktale, featuring different motifs, is contained in the Doegen collection, under the title 'Bhí beirt fhear', from the county Donegal storyteller Maighréad Ní Dhomhnaill.