ABSTRACT
Despite geographical proximity and periods of close cultural ties, evidence of such influence on Irish literature is surprisingly scarce. Several reasons for this can be suggested at least for the seventh and early eighth centuries. During that period the Anglo-Saxons were much more likely to have been the recipients than the donors of influence. Ireland sent Christian missionaries to England in the seventh century who introduced Latin literacy and Irish script, while also providing hospitality for considerable numbers of Anglo-Saxon students who came to study in its schools of higher learning. Moreover, Anglo-Saxon literature in the vernacular was unlikely to have had much influence on its Irish counterpart, not only because of the language barrier but also because the English literary tradition was not well established until a full century after that of Ireland. An exception may be King Aldfrith of Northumbria (685-705), known as Flann Fína in Irish, to whom Irish literary tradition dubiously attributed several gnomic works in Irish.
