About LEIGHEAS

Welcome to the website of the project LEIGHEAS: Language, Education and Medical Learning in the Premodern Gaelic World, which is funded by a Consolidator Laureate Award from Research Ireland and led by Prof. Deborah Hayden from 2022–2026.

The central aim of LEIGHEAS (the Irish word for ‘remedy’ or ‘the art of healing’) is to advance our knowledge of the nature and scope of medical learning in the premodern Gaelic world by charting the vernacular translation and transmission of medical texts across Ireland and Scotland, ca 1350–1700. The project aims to facilitate future research in this area by creating a searchable digital handlist of medical sources written in the Gaelic languages. It also seeks to open up new questions about this written genre, however, by applying digital tools for network analysis of scribes, locations and texts attested in the vernacular medical sources that survive from this region.

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Manuscript of the Month

Our Manuscript of the Month page showcases one Gaelic-language medical manuscript each month for the duration of the LEIGHEAS project.

Blog Series

The LEIGHEAS Blog Series features monthly entries on various aspects of medical tradition across the premodern Gaelic world, contributed by project team members, affiliates and guests.