Classic Studies on the Ancient Irish church offers a wealth of perspectives on the history of the early Irish Church and the lives of its saints. It offers valuable insight from noted nineteenth- and twentieth-century Celtic scholars and historians, such as Charles Plummer and Whitley Stokes, along with translations of Lives of Irish saints into Latin, Irish, Middle Irish, and English. The collection brings together fact and legend, poetry and prose, and historical and modern thought, delving into the past to illuminate the storied history of Christianity’s beginnings in Ireland.

The Latin and Irish Lives of Ciaran offers translations by renowned Irish archaeologist Stewart Macalister of four accounts of the life of Ciaran of Clonmacnois. Macalister believed that Ciaran was the most important native Irish saint, apart from St. Brigit of Kildare. This volume includes a harmony of the four Lives of St. Ciaran, the first, second, and third Latin Lives of St. Ciran, the Irish Life of St. Ciaran, annotations to the Lives, and the Latin text of the second Life.