It considered the legal rights of individuals to fish not just in terms of the then existing common law system but also from Magna Carta before it and then even further back to Ancient Gaelic laws. Two of the leading scholarly authorities in Brehon law at that time, Eoin MacNeill and D.A. Binchy were called on to give evidence on behalf the Kildoney Fishermen. Eoin MacNeill and Binchy produced extracts from the Senchas Mar as evidence in trial. In Ancient Ireland everyone had equal rights to fish within the boundaries of any individual Tuatha or Petty State, ‘aé áite’ or ‘the salmon of the place’, under the old system there was no evidence of individuals or groups having sole ownership to the exclusion of all others. At the trial MacNeill and Binchy also supported their case with the ancient tract ‘Do Fastad Cirt ocus Dligid’ or ‘Of the Confirmation of Right and Law’. It was the first court case to be decided on interpretation of the Brehon laws in over three centuries.