The First Inhabitation Of Ireland By Whome It Was Instructed In The Faith, With The Seueraix Inuasions The Authors Preface or Introduction to the Sequele of the Historie.

ALTHOUGH (vndoutedlie) the originall of all nations for the more part is so vncerteine, that who soeuer shall enter into the search thereof, further than he findeth in the holie scriptures, may seeme as it were rather to talke with men that dreame, than to gather authorities sufficient wherevpon to ground anie warranted opinion: yet for as much as the authors (whom in this Irish historie we chieflie follow) haue set downe what they haue found in the Irish antiquities, concerning the first inhabitation of this countrie of Ireland, and because the reader also may be peraduenture desirous to vnderstand the same, we haue thought good to recite what they haue written thereof, leauing the credit vnto the due consideration of the circumspect reader; and where the errors are too grosse, giuing by the way some cautions, in like sort as our authors themselues haue doone. According therefore to the order of all other nations and people that seeke to aduance the glorie of their countries, in fetching their beginning with the furthest from some one of ancient antiquitie: so likewise the Irishmen haue registred in their chronicles, that their countrie was first inhabited by one of Noahs neeces, after the manner following.