To open the topic of Liadan and Cuirithir for discussion, I offer this from "A Short History of Irish Literature (A Backward Look)" By Frank O' Connor,(Michael Francis O'Connor O'Donovan) published by G.P. Putnam 1967 - a book based on a series of lectures given by Frank O' Connor at Trinity College.

"We have the prose context of Liadan and Cuirithir but only in the form of notes, which often maddeningly skirt the essential scenes. When the story opens, Liadan is on a professional tour in Connacht. The fact that she is a member of a poetic corporation, a purely male organization at nearly all periods, suggests that she was the daughter of one of the ecclesiastical families. She meets the poet Cuirithir, who makes her a proposition couched in unforgettable terms: "Liadan, why should you and I not sleep together? A son of ours should be splendid.

"Though the story implies that they did become lovers, Liadan formally declines, because it would interrupt her rouind of professional engagements, but invites him to visit her in Cork. Cuirithir sets off in a way that suggests we are watching how the professional classes functioned in the early Middle Ages. He removes the heads of his spears and packs his poet's gown with them; that is to say, he travels in ordinary dress and unarmed. Outside Liadan's house he resumes his gown, fixes his spearheads again, and asks the Holy Fool, Mac Da Cherda, to deliver a message in privacy to Liadan. As Mac Da Cherda does not know which of the girls she is, he shows off the fearful ingenuity of the Irish profesional poets by addresssing her in a poem, composed in a code based on a number of false entymologies, like "Liadam" ("stone church") and "Liathdoim" ("grey bird-flocks").

"Being a professional poet herself, Liadan gets the point, which is more than I do; but by this time she has apparently decided to become a nun; and the two lovers enter Clonfert under the spiritual guidance of St. Cummine. He separates them, and Liadan sings her first song in which she uses the word "atheces" (ex-poet). The common word for "monk" was "athloach" (ex-laic) and she twists it to suit Cuirithir's position. The word for "church" is...."derthach" meaning "oak-house", the one big wooden building in the older sort of monastery, mainly constructed with reed or wattle and daub.

"To test their virtue, Cummine suggests that they sleep together separated only by an acolyte, and both protest that this would be highly unsafe....They prove that they know their own passion better than Cummine, and Cruitithir leaves Clonfert in anger and remorse. Liadan then sings the most beautiful love song of the Middle Ages - a sort of eighth or ninth century Liebestod..."