Another notion which has accompanied the modern illusion of the "clan system," is that of the communal holding of land by the tribe or clan. This view, like that of the "clan system," has had its enthusiastic eulogists and its self-complacent censors. On one side we are asked to admire our forefathers for anticipating Sir Horace Plunkett. On the other side we are told that progress and even temporary well-doing in agriculture were rendered impossible by a system under which all the land belonged to everybody at once and to nobody for long. Once more we are faced with that canon of Irish history, "Credo quia impossibile." We are seriously asked to believe that the lands of a tribe, meaning the population under a territorial chief or even under a king, was held in common by all; and more than that, was periodically thrown into hotch-potch, taken from everybody and redistributed among all. Now we can imagine what an event that would be, taking place all over a district as large as the diocese of Ferns; or even as large as the barony of Forth; what a feature it would have been in the simple life of a large countryside. Strange, is it not? that no account of any such resettlement of a district appears in any Irish writing, even in the form of an incidental allusion. The fact is that no such communal system existed on any scale approaching to the territorial. I have described the constitution of the _deirbfine_, the legal unit of succession. There were larger family groups, based on the kinship of five, six and seven generations. It was among such groups that property was held in common, when it was property of a kind that did not lend itself to subdivision in accurate proportions--just as succession to the kingship, being indivisible, was common to a family group until its determination became necessary. But as new generations came forward, existing family groups were of necessity dissolved and reconstituted. When this happened, a redistribution of the family property was necessitated. Moreover, there were certain kinds of land--mountain, bog, forest, and marsh, which were not divided by fences or mearings into individual or family holdings--and these were held in common both in ancient and in modern times. And that, I think, is the foundation of prevalent notions about communal land tenure in ancient Ireland. Those who desire a studied account of ancient land tenures in Ireland--in preference to their own or other people's imaginings--should read the little book on Irish Land Tenures by Dr. Sigerson.