Ó Hamlet: To be or not to be?

IT’S just not cricket, is it? Not content with beating the auld enemy at their own game, it now appears we Irish may be denting English pride elsewhere — in equally dramatic fashion.

It turns out that Hamlet (or should that be Ó Hamlet?), the pride of English literature for centuries, was Irish, both in name and in legend.

Literature scholars have long understood that Shakespeare’s inspiration for his famous tragedy came from the ancient Danish tale of ‘Amleth’, which, in turn, was based on Scandinavian sagas from the 10th and 11th centuries, recorded by an Icelandic author known as Snow Bear.

But new literary scholarship has shown that the famous Prince of Denmark — or at least the story that inspired the famous character — wasn’t even Scandinavian.

Dr Lisa Collinson, an expert in old Nordic languages from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, claims to have found clear evidence that the character, which has a number of possible spellings, was, in fact, Irish.

“The name ‘Amlothi’ is highly unlikely to be Norse in origin,” says Collinson, who has found references to an ‘Admlithi’ — the ‘d’ is silent — in an Irish story from the eighth or ninth century, that tells of a king who breaks social taboos and pays the price in a bloody finale.

Togail Bruidne Dá Derga, which translates as The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel, is an Irish 8th century tale belonging to the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology.

How Admlithi of Éire became Hamlet of Elsinore can probably be traced to seamen who have plied the seas between Ireland, England and Denmark, trading goods and stories, since Viking times.

As ‘Liam Shakespeare’ himself put it, in Act 1, scene 2 of Hamlet: “The memory be green.”