CHAPTER XII.

THE SCHOOL OF CLONMACNOISE.

"Quomodo sedet sola civitas plena populo." --_Jeremias._

I.--ST. CIARAN OF CLONMACNOISE.

How solitary now she sits by the great river that once thronged City! Her gates are broken, and her streets are silent. Yet in olden time she was a queen, and the children of many lands came to do her homage. She was the nursing mother of our saints, and the teacher of our highest learning for a long six hundred years. The most ancient and the most accurate of the Annals of Erin were written in her halls; the most learned 'Doctors of the Scots' lectured in her classrooms; the sweetest of our old Gaedhlic poems were composed by her professors; the noblest youth of France and England crowded her halls, and bore the renown of her holiness and learning to foreign lands. Even still her churches, her crosses, and her tombstones furnish the best and most characteristic specimens of our ancient Celtic art in sculpture and in architecture. View it as you may, Clonmacnoise was the greatest of our schools in the past, as it is the most interesting of our ruins in the present.

How well St. Ciaran chose the site of his monastic city in those turbulent and lawless days. It reposed in the bosom of a grassy lawn of fertile meadow land on the eastern bank of the Shannon, about ten miles south of Athlone. Just at this point the majestic river takes a wide semi-circular sweep first to the east and then to the south; presently it widens and deepens into calm repose under the shelter of that grassy ridge, which Ciaran chose as the site of his monastery. A vast expanse of bog lies beyond the river; and in the time of St. Ciaran the country all round about was an impassable morass to the east, south, and north of the verdant oasis on which he built his little church. So it became necessary to construct a causeway through the bog from the monastery somewhat on the line of the present road to Athlone. At this day the aspect of the place is very desolate and lonely. There is nothing to distract the attention of the stranger save the gray ruins, the sweep of the full-bosomed river stealing silently onwards like time in its flight, and vast flocks of plover and curlew that are now settled on the meadows, and a moment after are circling in flying clouds around us. The report of a gun had startled both them and us. It was like a voice in the regions of the dead.

St. Ciaran, the founder of Clonmacnoise, is usually called Ciaran Mac In Tsair, that is, the Son of the Carpenter, and sometimes Ciaran the Younger, to distinguish him from St. Ciaran of Saigher, the patron of the diocese of Ossory. His father, Beoit, son of Olcan, though a carpenter by trade, came of high descent. His mother, Darerca, was a daughter of the race that gave its name to the county Kerry. Beoit lived at Larne, in Antrim, but being greatly harassed by the exactions of Ainmire, king of the district, he migrated to the province of Connaught, and settled at a place called Rath Crimthann, near Fuerty, in the county Roscommon. He was, it seems, unmarried at the time, and there took to himself a wife from the daughters of the Ciarraighe, who about the same time had migrated from Irluachair, in Kerry, and had settled along the western bank of the Suck in that very district.[208] They were a holy couple, and trained up a holy family, for they had no less than five sons and three daughters, who were great servants of God.

Ciaran was baptized by the deacon Justus at Fuerty (_Fidharta_), in the year A.D. 512, which we take to be the date of the saint's birth.[209] He received his early education from the same holy man, and in his turn was not too proud to tend the herds of his tutor at Fuerty, especially during the absence of the holy deacon. We are told, too, that while tending the cattle he was also much given to study and prayer.

It is probable that young Ciaran went directly from home to the great School of Clonard, of which we have already spoken. While he was there, he gave himself up with great zeal to the study of holy Scripture under the direction of the wise and learned Finnian. He made the acquaintance, too, of nearly all the great and holy men who about this period lived in blessed brotherhood at Clonard, and were afterwards known as the Twelve Apostles of Erin. He was much beloved both by his master, who called him the "gentle youth," and by his companions, whom he was ever anxious to oblige. Books were then very scarce, and on one occasion when St. Ninnidius of Lough Erne was vainly searching for a copy of the Gospels, Ciaran gave him his own copy, saying that we should do to others as we would have others do to us--the text which he was studying in St. Matthew at the moment.

Ciaran once made a present of corn to his master and the brotherhood, which sufficed for their wants during forty days--it was said, too, this blessed food given by Ciaran had virtue to heal the sick, who partook of it, and a portion of it was reserved for that purpose. Finnian in return blessed his generous and holy pupil, and foretold that his Church in the coming years would be fruitful "of nobility and wisdom;" that it would have much glory and much land; and that half Ireland would one day be subject to his rule. When the master was absent, Ciaran was deputed to take his place, which shows the high opinion then entertained by Finnian of his learning and holiness. One day Finnian saw in vision two golden moons in the firmament of Erin; one he said was Columcille, to illumine the North with the lustre of his virtues and high descent; the other was Ciaran, who would shine over central Erin, with the mild radiance of charity and meekness.

At length the time came for Ciaran to leave Clonard. Both masters and scholars were sorry to part with the gentle youth. Finnian even offered to resign the master's chair in his favour; but Ciaran wisely declined the great honour, for he was too young and inexperienced for that office. Columcille was then at Clonard about the year A.D. 537 or 538, and was greatly attached to Ciaran; he composed regretful stanzas at his departure, and afterwards followed him all the way to Aran:--

"The noble youth that goeth westward, And leaves us mourning here-- Ah! gentle, loving, tender-hearted Is Ciaran Mac In Tsair."

We have in a previous chapter referred to Ciaran's sojourn in Aran with St. Enda. On his departure from the blessed isles Ciaran told the venerable Enda that he saw in a vision a large fruitful tree planted in the midst of Erin, and its boughs sheltered all the land. Its fair fruit was borne over land and sea, and all the birds of the air came and eat thereof. "That tree is thyself," said Enda; "all Erin shall be filled with thy name, and sheltered by the grace that will be in thee, and many men from all parts will be fed by thy prayers and thy fastings. Go, then, in God's name, and found thy Church on the Shannon's banks in the centre of the island."

After leaving Aran, Ciaran paid a short visit to St. Senan of Scattery Island, in the Lower Shannon, and was much edified by the example and conversation of that holy man. He then went north in obedience to the word of Enda and at first founded a church at a place called Isell Ciaran, where he remained only a short time. He then founded another oratory on Inis Ainghin, now called Hare Island, in Lough Ree, a beautifully wooded islet about two miles north of Athlone, where a ruined church may still be seen that was built on the site of Ciaran's more ancient oratory.

It was an admirable site for a monastery; far enough from the shore for security, but near enough for convenience, and situated just at the point where the wide and beautiful lake contracts its waters into the stately stream that flows beneath the historic arches of the bridge at Athlone.

For three years and three months only Ciaran remained at Hare Island. This would fix his arrival there in A.D. 540 if, as we shall see, he died in A.D. 544 at the age of thirty-three years. Going further south by the bank of the river to a place that would be nearer to the centre of the island, he stopped at the spot then called Ard Mantain, which in his opinion was too fertile and too beautiful to be chosen as the abode of fasting saints. "We might," he said, "have here much of the world's riches, but the souls going to heaven from it would be few." So he journeyed on still further to the south through what was then a desolate expanse of fens and brakes, until he came to Ard Tiprait, the Height of the Spring. "Here," he said to his companions, "let us remain, for many souls will ascend to heaven from this spot."[210] It was on the 10th of the Kalends of February that Ciaran took up his abode at Clonmacnoise with eight companions; and it was on the 10th of the Moon, and a Saturday. This is very specific information, and evidently authentic. It shows that the writer of Ciaran's life knew what he was saying, and was not afraid of being contradicted. These dates prove that the foundation of Clonmacnoise took place on Saturday, the 23rd of January, in the year A.D. 544.[211] It was finished on the 9th of May following; and the same ancient and accurate life tells us the circumstances of this most remarkable event--the founding of the greatest school and the greatest monastery in Ireland.

When Ciaran was planting the first post to mark out the site of the Cathair of Clonmacnoise, Diarmaid Mac Cearbhaill, who happened to be present with a few of his companions, helped the saint with his own hands to fix the post in the earth. "Though your companions to-day are few," said Ciaran, "to-morrow thou shalt be High King of Erin." This prophecy, like many others, helped to fulfil itself. One of Diarmaid's companions, Maelmor,[212] his foster brother, overheard the saint's word; and knowing that he was a man of God, he resolved to help in carrying it out. King Tuathal Maelgarbh, great grandson of Niall the Great, had set a price on Diarmaid's head, or rather on his heart, if brought to him in person; so Diarmaid was forced to hide himself and live in the deserts and bogs around Clonmacnoise. There he met the saint, and not only aided him to build his monastery, as stated above, but in reverence to the saint he placed his own hand beneath that of Ciaran in fixing the first pole. Now, Maelmor hearing the prediction, with Diarmaid's reluctant consent, took his fleet black horse, and a whelp's heart besprinkled with blood on the point of his spear, and rode post haste to a place called Greallach Eillte in Meath, where the king with his nobles happened to be at the time. Seeing the stranger riding post to the king with the bloody heart on his spear, all made way for him, for they, like the king himself, thought it was the heart of Diarmaid, which he was going to present to the king. But instead of Diarmaid's heart, Maelmor gave the monarch a fatal thrust with his spear, which killed him on the spot. Maelmor was immediately set upon by the royal guards and hewn to pieces. But his purpose was achieved--Diarmaid MacCearbhaill was the nearest heir to the throne, and was immediately proclaimed king without opposition. During his reign he was, as might be expected, a great patron and benefactor of Clonmacnoise, and although there is good reason to believe that he still kept Druids[213] and soothsayers in his palace, he gave that monastery large grants of land, and subjected to its authority no less than one hundred of the small churches in its neighbourhood. Such was the origin of the Diocese of Clonmacnoise, which after many vicissitudes is now united to that of Ardagh.[214]

St. Ciaran lived only four months after founding his monastery and little church--the Eclais Beg--on the banks of the Shannon. The same accurate writer of his life states with great precision that his death came upon him in the thirty-third year of his age, on the fifth of the Ides (the 9th) of September, on a Saturday, the fifteenth day of the moon. These data mark the year A.D. 544 (not 549), as the year of the saint's death. It was also the year in which King Diarmaid ascended the throne, and which brought with it a great plague that proved fatal to many of the saints of Erin, as well as to Ciaran himself.

The death of Ciaran was very touching. "Take me out a little," he said, "from the cell into the open air." Then looking up to the blue sky, he said--"Narrow indeed is the way which leads to heaven." "Not for you, father, will it be narrow," said one of his monks who was standing nigh. "It is not said in the Gospel that it will be easy for me or for any one," said Ciaran; "even the blessed Paul and David were afraid." He would not allow the stone pillow to be removed in order to give more ease to his head. He had kept it during life, and he would rest on it in death--"Blessed are they," he observed, "who persevere unto the end." The brethren now saw God's angels hovering in the air around them awaiting the moment of Ciaran's departure. He grew weaker, so they brought him in again to Eclais Beg. It was fitting he should die there; it was the scene of his prayers and tears. The skin on which he used to sleep in his little cell was stretched on the ground, and he was laid upon it. The end was now at hand. He gave his last blessing to the brethren, and asked them to close the church, and leave him alone with his soul's friend, St. Kevin of Glendaloch, whom he had known and loved at Clonard. Kevin blessed holy water according to the Church's rite, and sprinkled the little oratory, and the couch of the dying saint. Then he gave Ciaran the holy Communion and blessed him once more ere he died. Ciaran loved the holy Kevin much; God had sent him to his bedside at the prayer of Ciaran himself--and as a pledge of his love the dying saint gave to Kevin his bell--the symbol in those days of monastic rule--and bidding him a tender farewell, he gave up his pure and gentle soul to God.

He was, indeed, a wonderful man--that St. Ciaran. He died very young; it was at the sacred age of thirty-three, as all our Annals tell. In four months--from February to May--he built his convent; for four months more he ruled his community; and then he was called to his reward; yet that community grew to be the greatest and most learned of all the land.

All our martyrologies assign the festival of St. Ciaran to the 9th of September; and the day has been celebrated from that hour to the present. St. Ængus says that it is a solemnity that "fills territories and impels fast-going ships" on sea and river--hurrying to celebrate the glorious festival of Ciaran of Cluain.

Anyone who visits Clonmacnoise on the 9th of September will see the "territory" of the saint still filled with pilgrims, and the 'ships' laden with crowds of men and women crossing the Shannon to visit his holy shrine. St. Cummian of Clonfert in his Paschal Epistle, of which we have already spoken, ranks Ciaran, and most justly, amongst the "early Fathers of the Irish Church."[215] Alcuin, who studied at Clonmacnoise, calls him the glory of the Irish nation.[216] "The three worst counsels that were ever accomplished in Erin," says the gloss on Ængus, "by the advice of saints, were the shortening of Ciaran's life, the exile of Columcille, and the expulsion of Mochuda from Rahan." The 'saints,' it seems, were jealous because Diarmaid had conferred so many favours on Ciaran--so they prayed to God to take him out of the world before any harm came of it, and lo! it was done. A more thoughtful man, however, would say, not without reason, that these three counsels were great blessings for Ireland and for Scotland too. It was well that Ciaran was called away so soon to heaven before jealousy or rivalry made enemies for Clonmacnoise; it was well, surely, that Molaise of Innismurray sent Columba to Scotland to preach the Gospel; and it was well, too, that Mochuda left Rahan; for it was only to found a greater and more magnificent monastery at Lismore. So Providence always out of seeming evil brings forth good.

There was hardly time for Ciaran himself to do any literary work at Clonmacnoise--he built the house and blessed it; and was then summoned to his Father's House in heaven. There is, however, an old Gaelic poem widely celebrated, which is attributed to Ciaran. It begins with the words "An rim, an ri, an richid rain," and seems to have been a fruitless prayer that God would spare his life to do greater works for His glory. God thought, however, he had done enough, and called him home. He was, say the ancients, like to John the Apostle in his life and habits--pure, and young, and loving, soaring up to God on the wings of the eagle.

Like most of the Apostles of the early Irish Church, Ciaran led an extremely ascetic life. He never passed a day without manual labour for the benefit of the brethren. He was never idle. He slept on the naked clay; he had a stone for his pillow; he never wore a soft garment next his skin. He was, as we know, above all, humble, gentle and chaste; he never, it is said, told a lie and never looked on the face of a woman. He never drank ale or milk, except diluted one-third with water. He never ate any bread except one-third sand was mixed with it. He was thus a man of humility, abstinence, and prayer, and therefore God blessed the work of his hand, and exalted him both during his life and after his death. There was no saint more beloved by his own contemporaries--by Enda, and Kevin, and Finnian, and Columcille. They all loved him dearly whilst he was with them; and their hearts were sore at his departure. And to this day, at least by the Shannon's shore, there is no saint whose name is held in more affectionate remembrance than the founder of Clonmacnoise.

The Eclais Beg, in which St. Ciaran died, became not unnaturally a sacred spot. It was the very centre of the holiness of Clonmacnoise. He left several relics, which the piety of his children deemed most holy, and not without cause. The Imda Chiarain, or cow-skin couch,[217] on which he died was deemed a most precious relic, and cured the sick who were allowed to stretch their feeble frames over it. His holy body was buried in the Eclais Beg, or Tempull Chiaran, and his grave is still venerated by the faithful, although the site is rather doubtful. The "Cemetery of noble Cluain" was deemed as sacred a burial place as any in Rome itself; and the noblest families in all the land built mortuary chapels within the sacred enclosure. There were saints interred in its cemetery, it was said, "whose prayers would make even hell a heaven." The sound of its bell was holy, and frightened away the demons. The shadow of its round tower sanctified the soil that it fell upon. Ciaran brought to heaven by his prayers, during their life or after their death, the souls of all those who were buried in that holy ground. Or, as it is quaintly put in the _Registry of Clonmacnoise_--"What souls harboured in the bodies buried under that dust may never be adjudged to damnation--wherefore those of the same (royal) blood have divided the churchyard amongst themselves by the consent of Kyran, and of his holy clerks."

This is not the imagining of later writers, for the venerable Adamnan tells us that when after the Synod of Drumceat (A.D. 585) St. Columcille came to visit Clonmacnoise, he took a portion of the same holy clay to bring it home; but threw it into the sea at Coryvreckan to still the raging waves, which thereupon became quite calm.

II.--THE RUINED CHURCHES AT CLONMACNOISE.

The existing ruins at Clonmacnoise, though now so much dilapidated, are highly interesting, both from the historical and artistic point of view. They belong to different periods, the date of which can be easily ascertained, and thus furnish many authentic specimens of the Irish Romanesque.

Of St. Ciaran's original church or oratory--the Eclais Beg--not a trace now remains. The grave of the saint is pointed out close by the southern wall of the ruin called Tempull Ciaran, which is in the very centre of the church-yard, and in all probability was built on the site of Ciaran's original oratory.

The following are the principal ruined churches still to be seen at Clonmacnoise:--

(1.) There is the Daimhlaig, or Great Stone-Church, called also M'Dermott's Church, and sometimes the Cathedral. We know for certain that it was built in A.D. 909 by Flann, King of Ireland, and by Colman, abbot of Clonmacnoise and Clonard at that time. The beautiful stone cross which was erected to commemorate the building of the church itself is still standing before the great western doorway, and tells its own story. In two of the compartments of the sculptured shaft a prayer is asked of every one who passes for the souls' rest of the founders of the church. In one it is:--OR DO FLAVND MAC MAELSECHLAIND--"A prayer for Fland, son of Maelsechlaind." In the other it is:--COLMAN DORROINI IN CROISSA AR IN RI FLAND--that is, "Colman made this cross for King Fland." The inscriptions are partly effaced, but not so as to obliterate the words completely. Taken in connection with the entry in the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_, A.D. 901 (_recte_ 908), they are highly interesting. "King Flann and Colman Connellagh this year founded the church in Clonmacnoise called the Church of the Kings." Colman outlived King Flann, who died in A.D. 916, by eight years, and no doubt this cross, as Petrie points out, was erected for the two-fold purpose of commemorating the foundation of the church, and of marking the sepulchre of King Flann, its pious founder. The sculptures on the west side of the shaft represent St. Ciaran and King Diarmaid in the act of planting the first pole of the Eclais Beg; the opposite side represents in high relief several events in the life of our Saviour, as recorded in Holy Scripture. Hence this great cross came to be called the Cross of the Scriptures--_Cros na Screaptra_. It is fifteen feet in height; and is a most interesting specimen of Celtic art in sculpture at that early and unpropitious period. This, the Cathedral Church, afterwards came to be called M'Dermott's Church, because, as the _Registry of Clonmacnoise_ informs us, "Tomaltach M'Dermott, chief of Moylurg, repaired or rebuilt the Great Church upon his own costs; and it was for the cemetery of the Clanmaolruany that he did so." This Tomaltach Mac Dermott, the King of Moylurg, "a most formidable and triumphant man against his enemies, and a man of the greatest bounty and alms-giving," died in the year A.D. 1336,[218] which sufficiently fixes the period of the restoration of the Great Church. There is an inscription over the northern doorway in Latin, which tells that "Odo, Dean of Clonmacnoise, caused it to be made," probably in the fifteenth century.

(2.) On the western boundary of the church-yard is the ruined chancel of the church called Tempull Finnian, which probably dates back to the ninth century, and was built on the site of a more ancient oratory dedicated to St. Finnian of Clonard, if not actually built by that saint. He was, as we have seen, the 'tutor' of Ciaran, and loved him much; so that doubtless he came to visit his former disciple at Clonmacnoise. Close at hand on the river's bank is Finnian's Well; and tradition still points out the grave in which he is said to be buried. The chancel arch of this church in three orders is highly ornamented, and is considered an excellent specimen of the Celtic Romanesque. The round tower, which adjoins this church, appears to be coeval with the building; and doubtless both were erected during the Danish wars. It is only 56 feet high, but it is 49 feet in circumference. The material is a fine sandstone, probably carried thither on the river, for there is none in the neighbourhood. Lord Dunraven considered it to be the most interesting monument at Clonmacnoise, and Petrie describes it as wholly built of ashlar masonry with a fine sandstone laid in horizontal courses. Its conical roof is built in a peculiar herring-bone ashlar, such as is not found elsewhere in Ireland.

This tower is commonly called M'Carthy's Tower; and the church is frequently called M'Carthy's Church, from a mistaken notion that it was built by Finneen M'Carthy of Desmond in the beginning of the thirteenth century. M'Carthy certainly gave some land to the community of Clonmacnoise to secure their prayers, and what he valued even more, a burial-place in its holy soil for his own royal race. Tempull Finnian was assigned to him for the purpose; and it was doubtless repaired by M'Carthy; but it was built long before any of his name was known at Clonmacnoise.

(3.) The O'Conors, Kings of Connaught, also gave a grant of many townlands to secure a mortuary chapel at Clonmacnoise. It was known as Tempull Conor, and was founded by Cathal, King of Connaught, who died A.D. 1010; he was son of that Conor (Conchobhar) who gave his name to their royal race.

(4.) Another kingly family of Connaught--the O'Kellys of Hy-Many--built themselves a sepulchral chapel within the sacred enclosure, which they paid for with many a broad acre. It was founded by Conor O'Kelly of Moenmoy, in the year A.D. 1167, as the Four Masters inform us. He was a great chief, famed for his royal bounty, and ruled over Hy-Many for forty years.

(5.) King Diarmaid, who helped St. Ciaran to fix the first stake enclosing the sacred boundary of Clonmacnoise, belonged to the southern Hy-Niall race. It is no wonder, therefore, that his royal descendants had their chapel there. It was called Tempull Righ--the King's Church--and sometimes Tempull Ua Maelshechlainn, from the family name, which the southern Hy-Niall afterwards assumed. It stands south-east of the cathedral, and measures 40 feet in length by 17 feet in breadth.

(6.) The beautiful round tower at the north-western corner of the cemetery is commonly called O'Rorke's Tower, because, as the _Registry of Clonmacnoise_ tells us, it was built by Fergal O'Rorke, King of Connaught, towards the middle of the tenth century. This prince, for his soul's sake, and as the price of his family sepulchre, undertook to keep all the churches in repair during his own life; and he also built the causeway still in part existing from the Yew Tree to the Lough. The portion of the tower built by O'Rorke's men in the tenth century is of fine-jointed ashlar masonry; but the upper portion, executed two centuries later in A.D. 1135, is of ruder and very inferior workmanship.[219] At that date lightning struck the tower, overthrowing its roof and twenty feet of wall. The coarser masonry represents the restoration then effected by Turlogh O'Conor and O'Malone, Abbot of Clonmacnoise. This tower is now sixty-two feet high, and fifty-six feet in circumference. There were other chapels and sepulchral oratories at Clonmacnoise, which have now completely disappeared, and to which it is unnecessary for us to make further reference. The nunnery whose foundations have only recently been brought to light, was about 1,000 paces to the east of the monastery.

On the western border beyond the cemetery are the ruins of a very striking Norman Keep, commonly called De Lacy's Castle. It was built, however, in A.D. 1214, not by De Lacy, who was then dead, but by John de Gray,[220] Bishop of Norwich, an able and vigorous justiciary, who built this strong keep to protect the monastery and defend the passes of the Shannon against the turbulent Connaught men. Like all the Norman work of that period in Ireland, it is as solid and massive as if it were built of solid rock, not by man but by nature.

The churchyard has many inscribed tombstones, which are fully described by Petrie and by Miss Stokes in her interesting work on Christian Inscriptions. These were the tombstones placed over the graves of the abbots of Clonmacnoise, for the humble brothers of the monastery were interred beneath 'noteless burial stones.' The most striking feature exhibited in these monuments is their wonderful variety of design and the delicacy of execution.

One of the most interesting of the tombstones is that placed over "Suibine, son of Mailae Humai," who, in the _Chronicon Scotorum_, is described as an anchorite and choice scribe, and whose death is marked at the year A.D. 890 or 891. He is beyond doubt the person who, as we shall see hereafter, is described by Florence of Worcester as the "most learned Doctor of the Scots"--Doctor Scotorum peritissimus--truly a high eulogy of Suibine, whose name is inscribed on this stone, and whose dust lies beneath it.

There is another stone on which is incised a cross of very peculiar form with the simple legend BLAIMAC, who, as we learn from the same _Chronicon Scotorum_, was princeps, or ruling Abbot of Clonmacnoise, and died in A.D. 896.

There were no less than one hundred and forty of these inscribed stones at Clonmacnoise, when it was first visited by Petrie in early life. Many of them have since disappeared, but a few new ones have been discovered during more recent excavations, so that the place is still a perfect treasury of the monuments of our ancient art. There is an ancient Gaedhlic poem in the Burgundian Library at Brussels which gives an account of the kings and warriors who are buried in "the city of Ciaran, the prayerful, the pious and the wise."[221] A somewhat similar poem, written by Conaing Buidhe O'Mulconry, is in Trinity College, and has been translated by the late Mr. Hennessy.[222] The second stanza tells how Turlough O'Conor and his ill-starred son, Roderick, the last King of Ireland, sleep on either side of the high altar in Temple Mor, which the Four Masters identify with Temple-Ciaran. The independence of Erin sleeps with them in their tomb.

III.--THE SCHOLARS OF CLONMACNOISE.

There was one feature in the government of the monastery of Clonmacnoise which served to make it more than any other school in Ireland a kind of national seminary--it belonged to no tribe. Its monks and its scholars came from all parts of the country; and its abbots were chosen not from any family, or from any tribe, but from all the provinces without distinction. Its founder was a Connaughtman of half-northern and half-southern extraction. His successor, St. Oena, was from the territory of Laeghis (Leix) in Leinster. The third abbot, MacNisse, was of the Ultonians; and the fourth, Alithir, who died in A.D. 599, was a Munsterman. This wise policy tended to develop a generous and large-minded spirit in the community, which must have been productive of the happiest effects.

The influence of Clonmacnoise as a great school was first displayed during the discussions on the Easter question. The Columbian houses in the north of Ireland, following the example of the mother house at Hy, adhered to the ancient method of fixing the date of Easter. On the other hand the religious houses of the south and south-eastern parts of Ireland, in obedience to the directions of Pope Honorious, convoked a Synod at Magh Lene in King's County to discuss this most important question. Magh Lene was near Durrow, and not far from Clonmacnoise; but Durrow was Columbian, and its abbot remained away. Cummian, however, expressly tells us that Ciaran's successor was present at that great assembly and sanctioned its decrees. Though belonging to the northern half--for Clonmacnoise was in the ancient Meath--the abbot had learning and courage enough to see that the Irish practice was opposed to that of the universal Church, and ought to be given up in favour of the Roman discipline.

It is from this time forward that Clonmacnoise begins to rank as the first of our Irish Schools. It was already largely endowed by the kings of Meath and Hy-Many, to both of whom, so to speak, it belonged, for the river was the only boundary. These possessions were constantly growing larger. In A.D. 648 or 649, Diarmaid, King of Meath, crossed the Shannon to fight Guaire, King of Connaught, and his Munster allies. Diarmaid on his way to battle stopped at Clonmacnoise, and begged the congregation of Ciaran to pray to God that he would return safe home "through the merits of their guarantee." Then the King, full of courage, continued his march, and fought the great battle of Carn Conaile, near Gort, in which he was completely victorious. On his return he granted the territory of Tuaim-n-Eirc, now Lemanaghan, in King's County, with all its sub-divisions, as an altar sod, _i.e._, church land, to God and St. Ciaran for ever, so that no king of Meath might take so much as a 'drink of water from its well without paying for it.' For this grant King Diarmaid also secured the right of sepulchre at Clonmacnoise, and was himself buried there. What is stranger still, his rival, Guaire, towards the close of his life came to do penance at Clonmacnoise; and he, too, the Generous and Hospitable, was buried there in A.D. 663, and no doubt did not forget the monks when he was dying. Just at this time the plague wrought great havoc amongst the saints and students of Clonmacnoise. Two or three abbots died in rapid succession, and doubtless the family of the monastery suffered severely, for the frightened students fled far away. In A.D. 719 the monastery was burned. Most of the buildings up to this time were probably of wood, for it was not easy to procure stone at Clonmacnoise. But the schools were soon again at work. In A.D. 724 we hear of the death of Mac Concumba, a learned scribe of this monastery. His duty was to multiply copies of valuable works, and record in the annals of the monastery from year to year entries of all those noteworthy events which happened throughout the kingdom. It was these scribes who prepared the materials afterwards so admirably compiled by Tighernach and his associates. Another 'choice scribe' died in A.D. 768; and we are told that the monastery was burned again in A.D. 751, and a third time in A.D. 773--on both occasions probably by accident.

At this time Clonmacnoise was at the height of its literary glory. The Danes had not yet arrived on the coasts of Ireland. Great scholars flourished there, the fame of whose learning attracted students from many lands. Fortunately here we are not left to vague conjecture; we have definite historical proofs both native and foreign. In the very year the Danes first landed at Rathlin--in A.D. 794 or 795--we find recorded the death of Colgan (or Colgu or Colcu), a professor of Clonmacnoise, who was probably the teacher of the greatest scholar of that age. He was a Munster-man by birth, but seems to have lived and died at Clonmacnoise. His fame was very great amongst his contemporaries, who called him Colgu the Wise. He was lecturer in Theology, and seems also to have been Rector of the Monastic College. That he was a diligent student of St. Paul's Epistles we may infer from a story told in his life. One day returning from his class hall with his leathern book-satchel on his shoulder, he sat down to rest at the place called Mointireanir. As he sat a stranger came up and began to converse in the kindest and most affable way with the professor, and even ventured to give him counsel and instruction. Nay, more, he took up the book-satchel, and carried it on his own shoulders, letting the tired master walk on by his side. The kind stranger turned out to be the Apostle Paul himself. On another occasion when public disputation was being held at the college, it seems certain scholars were objecting vigorously to Colgu's views, when St. Paul once more appeared as a learned stranger, and was invited to take part in the discussion. The unknown scholar accepted the invitation, and reasoned so convincingly that in a very short time he clearly showed to the satisfaction of all present that Colgu's view of the question at issue was the correct one.

The celebrated Alcuin was the most distinguished scholar of his own time in Europe. There is fortunately a letter of his still preserved, which shows quite clearly that he was a student of Clonmacnoise, and a pupil of Colgu, and which also exhibits the affectionate veneration that he retained through life for his _Alma Mater_ at Clonmacnoise. It is addressed to "Colgu, Professor (_lectorem_) in Ireland--the blessed Master and Pious Father of Albinus,"[223] the more usual name given to Alcuin in France, by Charlemagne and his courtiers. The writer complains that for some time past he was not deemed worthy to receive any of those letters 'so precious in my sight from your Fatherhood,' but he daily feels the benefit of his absent Father's prayers. He adds that he sends by the same messenger an alms of fifty sicles of silver from the bounty of King Charles, and fifty more from his own resources for the brotherhood. He also sends a quantity of (olive) oil which it was then very difficult to procure in Ireland, and asks that it may be distributed amongst the Bishops in God's honour for sacramental purposes. This shows the thoughtful piety of Alcuin, who doubtless noticed, when he was a student of Clonmacnoise, the difficulty of procuring pure olive oil for the holy Chrism and Extreme Unction. This letter breathes the most beautiful spirit of piety, and shows the affectionate gratitude of Alcuin for the home and the teachers of his youth.

Colgu, or Colgan, of Clonmacnoise, is the earliest _Ferlegind_ who is noticed in our Annals. During the course of the ninth century the Ferlegind appears by name in the School of Armagh, and during the tenth and eleventh centuries we find reference made to these 'Readers' in several of our Irish monasteries. We may infer the nature of his office, not only from his name--the 'reading-man' or lecturer--but also from the position, which he appears to have held in the monastery. He is different from the abbot, and subject to him, but he appears superior to all the other teachers and officials, so that he may be described not only as chief professor, but also as the Rector of the Monastic School under the abbot. His position corresponded to that of the scholasticus in the early Continental schools. He arranged the programme of study, superintended the classes, kept the other officials, like the _scribneoir_ and _aeconomus_, to their duties, and lectured himself in the most important subjects--especially in Scripture and theology. To be an accomplished 'scribe,' however, required very special gifts not merely of beautiful penmanship, but also a knowledge of the subject, which would prevent the writer from making grave mistakes in transcription, thus destroying the value of his manuscript. Hence we find the same person is frequently described as 'scribe and bishop;' and sometimes 'scribe, abbot and bishop.'

Colgu has been called a saint, and justly; his piety seems to have been quite equal to his learning. The "Prayer of St. Colgu," written by the saint in Latin, has been rendered into English from the copy in the ancient Book of Clonmacnoise, called _Leabhar-na-h-Uidhre_. It is a prayer, full of the deepest and most ardent devotion, in which the holy man implores, "With Thee, O holy Jesus," the intercession of all the heavenly host and of all the saints, apostles, and martyrs, and bishops, and virgins of the Old and New Law, that, "Thou, O Holy Trinity, may take me this night under Thy protection and shelter, and defend me from the demons.... and from desires, from sins, from transgressions, from disobediences ... from the fire of hell and eternity ... and that God may light up in their souls meekness and charity, and gratitude and mercy, and forgiveness in their hearts, and in their thoughts, and in their souls, and in their minds, and in their bowels."

Colgan also wrote another celebrated work in Irish, called _Scuap Chrabhaigh_, or the "Besom of Devotion," which his namesake, the renowned Franciscan, also a lector in theology, pronounces to be a "book of most fervent prayers, after the manner of a litany; a book, moreover, of most ardent devotion and elevation of the soul to God."[224] Some think that the "Besom of Devotion" referred to by Colgan, is only the Litany or Prayer of St. Colgan, under another name.

In spite of the devastations both of the Danes and native princes during the ninth century, learning still flourished at Clonmacnoise. That Suibhne, son of Maeluma, whose grave-stone may still be seen at Clonmacnoise, died in A.D. 891. His fame was great, not only in Ireland, but in England also. The _Saxon Chronicle_ and the _Annals of Cambria_, as well as Florence of Worcester, all notice his death and describe him as the wisest and the greatest Doctor of the Scots or Irish, and the _Annals of Ulster_ call him a "most excellent scribe." Unfortunately we have none of his writings extant to confirm the judgment of his contemporaries.

Yet during this and the following century, which produced these great scholars, we read a shameful record of the burnings, pillage, and slaughter wrought both by native and foreigner in this peaceful home of sanctity and learning.

It was plundered or burned--generally both--on at least ten different occasions by the Danes. But the Irish themselves exceeded even that bloody record, and laid sacrilegious hands on these holy shrines and their inmates no less than fourteen or fifteen times. The Danes began this foul work; both Danes and Irish continued it at short intervals; the English of Athlone completed the job. Nothing more shameful, or so shameful, can be found in the annals of any even half-civilized country. There were many accidental fires that destroyed the monastic buildings during the first three hundred years of its existence, but no pillage, no slaughter is recorded during that period. The Danes set the bad example, and several of the native princes were not slow to follow it. The worst of them was Felim Mac Criffan (Fedhlimidh Mac Crimthann), King of Cashel. He plundered Clonmacnoise and its termon lands three times, at one of which, A.D. 833, he spoiled and pillaged up to the church doors, and butchered the monks like sheep--_jugulatio_ is the word in the Annals. He did the same to Durrow and several other religious houses. He broke into the oratory of Kildare in A.D. 836, and took Forannan, the Primate of Armagh and his attendants prisoners, forcing the Primate to give a reluctant consent to his claim to be recognised as High King of all Erin. Ten years later he died after a stormy life, and the _Annals of Ulster_ describe him as the best of the Scots--_optimus Scotorum_--a scribe and an anchorite! There is no foundation for Dr. Todd's assertion that he was an 'abbot and bishop,'[225] except a poetic reference to his _bachall_, which the poet mockingly says he left in the shrubbery,[226] and which was carried off by his rival, Niall Caille, King of the North. Neither is there any ground for O'Donovan's assertion in the note that "he was Abbot and Bishop of Cashel in right of his crown of Munster." There was neither an abbot nor bishop of Cashel at the time, nor for many years after; and although Cormac Mac Cullinan was certainly a bishop, he is not described as Bishop of Cashel either in our Annals or our Martyrologies.[227] The warlike Felim Mac Criffan retired to a hermitage a short time before his death to do penance for his many crimes; and he seems to have employed his leisure in copying MSS. Hence the _Martyrology of Donegal_ commemorates him simply as an 'anchorite'[228] who retired into solitude to bewail his sins, and as his penance seems to have been sincere, there was nothing to prevent him becoming a saint. The _Chronicon Scotorum_, whilst recording his death, as that of 'a scribe and anchorite, and the best of the Scots,' records a little before that Ciaran followed him to Munster after the last violation of his monastery, and gave him a thrust of his crozier, causing an internal wound, which, no doubt, hastened his death, and perhaps prompted him to do penance. The true date of his death is A.D. 847.

We cannot stay to record the many similar deeds of violence from which the sanctuary of Ciaran suffered during these lawless times. Even the religious communities themselves were infected with the evil spirit that prevailed around them. The monks sometimes took up arms, not merely to protect themselves against murderous aggression, which would be reasonable enough, but to wage war on their own account as well. It was a woful time for Inisfail. She was writhing in the grasp of the invader; and no sooner did that grasp begin to relax than her own false princes drew their aimless swords in fratricidal strife. Even the salt of the earth lost its savour--lay usurpers called themselves the Heirs of Patrick in Armagh, and the monks of St. Ciaran forgot to pray, and put their trust in sword and shield, like the lawless chieftains around them:--

"Sure it was a maddening prospect thus to see this storied land, Like some wretched culprit, writhing in the strong avenger's hand-- Kneeling, foaming, weeping, shrieking, woman-weak and woman-loud-- Better, better, Mother Erin! they had wrapped thee in thy shroud."

IV.--ANNALISTS OF CLONMACNOISE.

During the eleventh century Clonmacnoise produced several most distinguished scholars. This was the earliest era for prose chroniclers in Ireland. Hitherto the chronicles of the kingdom were written in verse, which greatly facilitated the work of the professional sheanachies. It was the safest way to preserve history in those turbulent days. The monastery might be burned, and the parchments all destroyed; but so long as the rhyming chronicler, or even one of his disciples survived, the historical poem committed to their faithful memory could not perish. Amongst these rhyming chroniclers there are several whose poems are still extant, although unpublished. Such, for instance, were Eochy O'Flinn and Kennett O'Hartigan, and in the eleventh century Gilla Caemhain, who died in A.D. 1072. But during that century a new race of prose chroniclers arose for the first time in Ireland. Of these the two most distinguished were Flann of Monasterboice, who died in A.D. 1056, and his illustrious contemporary Tighernach, the greatest glory of the School of Clonmacnoise.

Of the personal history of Tighernach we unfortunately know little. He belonged to the Sil Muiredhaigh of Magh Aei--the royal race of Connaught--of which the O'Conors were the chiefs. His family name was O'Braoin,[229] and we are merely told that he was Erenach of Clonmacnoise, and elsewhere, that he was Comarb of Ciaran and Coman of Roscommon. Like St. Ciaran himself, he was a native of the co. Roscommon, which bordered on Clonmacnoise; and he was doubtless educated in that monastery. His death is recorded under date of A.D. 1088, in all our Annals; and he is described as a _Saoi_ or Chief Doctor, in Wisdom, Learning, and Oratory. His bones repose in the holy clay of Clonmacnoise, but the exact place is not known.

Tighernach truly was one of the greatest Doctors of the Gael. His Annals are yet extant, and prove him to have been a man of great and various learning. Unfortunately we have no perfect copy of his Annals. There are many gaps in the entries, and the original text has been greatly defaced by the errors of ignorant copyists. Dr. O'Conor's edition in the _Rerum Hibernicarum Scriptores_ is by no means faultless, and the book is so rare and expensive, that although Tighernach is much talked about he is very little read.

Both Flann of the Monastery and Tighernach have done much to fix the true chronology of Irish historical events. They were men of wide culture, and were familiar with the great Ecclesiastical historians--Eusebius, Jerome, Orosius, Africanus--and followed their example in giving a sketch of universal history in the opening pages of their Annals. They were acquainted not merely with the chronology of the Bible, like several of their predecessors, but also with the history and chronology of Greece and Rome and the great Eastern Empires. The special value of their work is that for the first time in our history they synchronize the leading facts in Irish history with the great events of the general history of antiquity. They were perfectly well acquainted with the use of the Olympian Era, the Era from the Building of the City, and the Christian Era, and were thus enabled to fix the true dates of the reigns of our early monarchs. This was no easy task; for hitherto there were confused lists of Kings often handed down by memory with the length of their reigns; but there was, so to speak, no definite starting point. Tighernach himself, who was a man of highly critical mind, saw this difficulty, and made the famous statement that before the reign of Cimbaeth and the founding of Emania all the historical monuments of the Scots were uncertain. It is strange indeed that he dates our authentic history from the reign of a mere provincial king. The real reason, however, seems to be that from Cimbaeth forward, he found in the poems of Eochaidh O'Flinn definite lists of the Ulster Kings, and of the High Kings also, which enabled him to trace their genealogy, and fix the dates. But he could find no such accurate lists of the earlier kings, and hence he pronounces the bardic histories of the earlier period to be uncertain.

Tighernach was probably the first Irish historian who used the common era--that of the Incarnation. But in the earlier entries he dates from the Creation, giving also the Lunar Epact, and the Day of the Week for the Kalends of January. There are certainly some errors in these dates; but they have arisen probably from the ignorance of the transcribers. The Annals written by himself came down to the date of his death in A.D. 1088; and the scribe continued them to A.D. 1178. Various subsequent additions were made by different writers down to A.D. 1407, where the entire chronicle ends.

These Annals undoubtedly furnish the earliest and most authentic record that we possess of our national history. Their author was a man of judgment, learning, and candour. Hence the statements of Tighernach, supported as they are by collateral evidence in very many cases, may always be accepted as authentic history. It is very probable the work was left in an unfinished state; and this is all the more to be regretted, because he had materials at hand, very many of which have since unfortunately perished. The Irish of Tighernach is considered very pure, like that of Cormac Mac Cullinan, for it was the classic era of the Gaedhlic language. The Annals, however, are too often half-Latin, half-Gaedhlic, although the writer could have done the work much better by adopting either language exclusively.

To Clonmacnoise we also owe the _Chronicon Scotorum_, which has been very ably edited by the late lamented W. M. Hennessy, and is published in the Rolls Series. The text is mainly taken from a transcript made by the celebrated Duald M'Firbis, and now preserved in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin. O'Curry thought it was a compilation made by M'Firbis[230] from different sources, but in this opinion that eminent scholar was mistaken. The work produced by M'Firbis is a mere copy of the original work, which was undoubtedly composed and preserved at Clonmacnoise. This is quite evident, as Hennessy remarks, from an entry made under date of the year A.D. 718 by M'Firbis himself. "A front of two leaves of the old book out of which I copy this is wanting, and I leave what is before me of this page for them. I am Dubhaltach Firbisigh."

The entries in this Chronicle of the Scots are very brief and condensed; but contain scraps of most valuable information not to be found in other authorities. They are particularly valuable in all that refers to Clonmacnoise as well as to its neighbouring territories and monastic houses. In the MS. of the Royal Irish Academy there is prefixed a note written in Gaedhlic, which attributes the composition of the Chronicle to Gilla-Christ O'Maeileoin--that is O'Malone--abbot of Clonmacnoise, who flourished in the twelfth century. This is highly probable. O'Malone was a very distinguished scholar of Clonmacnoise, and was present at the Synod of Uisneach held in the year A.D. 1111, of which Synod this Chronicle alone gives original and detailed information. The writer takes care to add that Gillachrist Ua Maeileoin, abbot of Cluain, with the congregation of Ciaran were present at the Synod. The death of this learned abbot is noticed at A.D. 1123, where he is described as "the fountain of knowledge and charity, the head of the prosperity and affluence of Erin." In its present form the Chronicle has been continued by another hand down to the year A.D. 1150. It is, therefore, a later, but hardly less important Chronicle, than that of Tighernach himself.

The Four Masters had before them when compiling their own immortal work a book which they call the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_, coming down to the year A.D. 1227. It has been conjectured that the Four Masters in that statement refer to the _Chronicon Scotorum_, which they do not mention under that name, and which doubtless must have come into their hands. But the _Chronicon Scotorum_, although it might properly be called the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_, as having been compiled in that monastery, does not in its present form come down beyond the year A.D. 1150. Neither can the work referred to by the Four Masters be the _Book of Clonmacnoise_, translated by MacGeoghegan in A.D. 1627, for that work comes down to A.D. 1407, and, moreover, does not contain important passages, which we know were in the work used by the Four Masters. Our own opinion is that the _Book of Clonmacnoise_, and the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_, to which the Four Masters frequently refer, are identical with the _Chronicon Scotorum_, and that the work in their time did come down to A.D. 1227, but the folios containing the years from A.D. 1050 to that date have perished from mere careless use, if not from accident.

V.--THE LEABHAR-NA-H-UIDHRE.

Another celebrated work, undoubtedly composed at Clonmacnoise, is the _Leabhar-na-h-Uidhre_, now in the Royal Irish Academy. A great part of the work has unfortunately perished, so that the 138 folio pages still remaining can only be regarded as a fragment. The history of the book is very strange. The author, or rather compiler, was Maelmuire--that is, Servant of Mary--a grandson of the celebrated Conn-na-mBocht, or Conn of the Poor. Conn himself was a holy and learned man, but seems to have never taken Orders. He was greatly esteemed at Clonmacnoise; and founded an hospital or refuge for poor laymen, of which he himself seems to have been the head. He had at least two sons, one called Gellananaeve, arch-priest of Clonmacnoise, and another called Ceileachair, probably the father of this Maelmuire. Both were distinguished scholars and writers, whose books Conal MacGeoghegan quotes as sources for his own _Annals of Clonmacnoise_. Conn's grandson Maelmuire, must have been a very distinguished scholar, and was also in all probability a lay brother of the community of Clonmacnoise. The _Annals of the Four Masters_ record the tragic end of the industrious scribe. In A.D. 1106 he was slain by a party of robbers in the midst of the great stone church of Clonmacnoise. His work was written therefore during the last years of the eleventh, and the beginning of the twelfth century; and with the exception of the _Book of Armagh_ is, so far as it goes, the oldest transcript now existing of our great historical works.

From Clonmacnoise the Book was carried, we know not when or by whom, all the way to Donegal. About the year A.D. 1340 it was given to O'Connor Sligo, so an entry in the Book itself informs us, as a ransom for O'Donnell's chief historian, who had been taken prisoner by Cathal Oge O'Conor. Donnell O'Conor, a chieftain of the same race, ordered his own historian, Sigraidh O'Cuirnin, to make an entry of the name of the author, who composed "this beautiful book," and he made that entry a week before Good Friday in the year A.D. 1345. It seems that even then the opening pages were lost, and it is to Donnell O'Conor we owe our knowledge of the writer, small as it is. The book remained in Sligo, where it was highly prized, for about 130 years, when the fortune of war brought it back again to Donegal. In A.D. 1470, Hugh Roe O'Donnell took the Castle of Sligo from the O'Conors; and amongst other trophies carried off this book again to Donegal, as the Four Masters proudly record under date of that year. How it came to the Royal Irish Academy we are not informed, but it is quite evident that the work was just as highly prized in Sligo and in Donegal, as it is in the Academy; and what is more to the purpose, the O'Clerys and O'Cuirnins knew much better how to interpret its contents than any of the members of that learned body.

The contents of the fragment are of a very varied character, partly biblical, partly historical, partly old romantic tales. One of the most important documents contained in the _Leabhar-na-h-Uidhre_ is the ancient elegy on Columcille, composed by another bard, the celebrated Dallan Forgaill so early as the end of the sixth century. This poem is undoubtedly genuine. The language is so ancient that even the great scholars of Clonmacnoise in the eleventh century found it necessary to write an interlinear gloss in order to render it intelligible to ordinary readers at that early date.

VI.--DICUIL THE GEOGRAPHER.

In connection with the School of Clonmacnoise an account of Dicuil, the celebrated Geographer, as he is called, will not be deemed out of place. For there is very good reason to believe that he was trained at Clonmacnoise; and if not trained there, he was certainly a pupil of some of the Columbian Schools, of which we shall treat in our next chapter. A sketch of his history and his writings, therefore, is most appropriate in this place.

Dicuil's treatise, _De Mensura Orbis Terrarum_, is one of the most interesting monuments of ancient Irish scholarship, and furnishes most conclusive proof that the culture of our writers and the learning of our schools in the ninth century were superior to almost anything yet exhibited in Western Europe since the fall of the Roman Empire. This work has been published in Paris, but it is now very rare, and hence we purpose giving a fuller account of its contents than might otherwise be deemed necessary. It is not to the credit of Irish learning in the present day that no attempt has been made even by any of our learned Societies to print this treatise in Ireland. It is to French scholarship we are indebted for editing and annotating Dicuil's treatise.[231]

Unfortunately we know nothing whatsoever of the personal history of Dicuil except what can be gathered from a few incidental references which he makes to himself in this treatise; but these, though very brief, are clear and definite. He tells us first of all that his name was Dicuil, and that he finished his task in the spring of the year A.D. 825. Like most of his countrymen at that time, he was fond of poetry, and gives us this information in a neat poem, written in Latin hexameters at the end of the MS., to which we shall refer again. He also implies in his opening statement, or prologue, that he had already written an _Epistola de questionibus decem Artis Grammaticae_, which was probably intended to be copied and circulated amongst the Irish monastic schools of the time, but of which we know nothing more. He tells us that a certain Suibneus (Suibhne), or Sweeney, was his master to whom under God he owed whatever knowledge he possessed. His native country was Ireland, which he describes in affectionate language as "nostra Hibernia,"--our own Ireland--in opposition to the foreign countries of which he had been speaking. Elsewhere he calls it in accordance with the usage of the time _nostra Scottia_. He also adds when referring to the islands in the north and north-west of Scotland, that he had dwelt in some of them, he had visited others, more of them he had merely seen, and some of them he had only read of.

This is really all the information we have about Dicuil, and from data so meagre, it is very difficult to identify Dicuil the Geographer, amongst the many Irish monks who bore that name.

By a careful examination, however, of these and some other facts to which he refers, we can conjecture with some probability where and by whom he was educated.

When speaking of Iceland Dicuil refers to information communicated to him thirty years before by certain Irish clerics, who had spent some months in that island. This brings us back to A.D. 795, so that when Dicuil wrote in A.D. 825, he must have been a man considerably advanced in years. We may infer, too, that his master, Suibhne, to whom he owed so much, flourished as a teacher at a still earlier period than A.D. 795. There were several abbots who bore that name between A.D. 750 and A.D. 850; but it appears to us that the master of Dicuil must have been either Suibhne, Abbot of Iona, who died in A.D. 772, or Suibhne, son of Cuana, Abbot of Clonmacnoise, who died in A.D. 816. If Dicuil were, suppose, seventy-five when he wrote his book, he must have been born in A.D. 750. He would then be about sixteen years of age when Suibhne, Vice-Abbot of Iona, came over to his native Ireland in A.D. 766, where he remained some time. Suppose that Dicuil returned with him as a novice in that year, he could have been six years under the instruction of Suibhne before that abbot's death in A.D. 772. It is likely that Dicuil remained in Iona for several years after the death of his beloved master. It was, doubtless, during these years that he visited the Scottish islands, and dwelt with some of the communities whom St. Columba had established there. On this point his own statement is clear and explicit.

The founder of Iona, Columcille, with his kinsmen, originally came from Donegal, and the monastery seems to have been principally recruited at all times by members of the Cenel-conal race. Amongst the saints who were called Dicuil, or Diucholl, were two who were venerated in Donegal; one the son of Neman, whose memory was venerated at Kilmacrenan on December 25th; the other was Dicuil of Inishowen, whose feast-day is December 18th. The latter is described as a hermit; and it may be that our geographer, after his return from Iona, retired to a life of solitude in Inishowen, and there, towards the close of his life, composed this treatise, of which the most valuable portion is that containing the reminiscences of his early life in the Scottish islands.

The chief difficulty against this hypothesis, that Suibhne, Dicuil's master, was the Abbot of Iona who died in A.D. 772, is the great age at which, in that case, the pupil must have written his book, in A.D. 825. The monks of those days, however, were often intellectually and physically vigorous at the age of eighty, and even of ninety years.

The other hypothesis certainly fits in better with the dates; so we must assume that Dicuil was trained at the great College of Clonmacnoise, which at this period was certainly the most celebrated school in Ireland, if not in Europe. Suibhne, we are told, was abbot for two years before his death, in A.D. 816; but had been, no doubt, for many years previously, a _fer-legind_, or professor in Clonmacnoise. It was nothing new for the younger monks to travel to other religious houses in pursuit of knowledge and sanctity; and in this way Dicuil, like so many of his countrymen, would visit Iona and the Scottish islands.

The treatise _De Mensura Orbis Terrarum_ is very valuable as affording evidence of the varied classical culture that existed in our Irish monastic schools at this period. In the prologue the author tells us that he derived his information mainly from two sources; first, from the Report of the Commissioners whom the divine Emperor Theodosius had sent to survey the provinces of the Roman Empire; and secondly, from the excellent work of Plinius Secundus--that is, the _Natural History_ which is so well known to scholars. Dicuil complains that the manuscripts of the Report in his possession were very faulty; but still, being of more recent date than Pliny's work, he values it more highly. He adds that he leaves vacant places in his own manuscript for the numbers, in order to be able to fill them in afterwards when he can verify or correct them by collating his own with other manuscripts of the Report. He also quotes numerous passages from other writers, who, we are afraid, are not very familiar to the classical scholars of our own times. The first of these works is that of Caius Julius Solinus, known as the Polyhistor. Of his personal history we know as little as we do of Dicuil himself. He flourished about the middle of the third century, and appears to have borrowed his matter, and sometimes even his language, from Pliny's _Natural History_. The contents of this work of Solinus may be inferred from the title of an English translation, published in A.D. 1587: "_The Excellent and Pleasant Work of Julius Solinus, Polyhistor, containing the Noble Actions of Humaine Creatures, the Secretes and Providence of Nature, the Description of Countries, the Manners of the People, &c., &c._ Translated out of the Latin by Arthur Golding, Gent." Another work, equally unknown to the present generation, but frequently quoted by Dicuil, is the _Periegesis_ of Priscian. It is a metrical translation into Latin hexameters of a Greek work bearing the same title, which was originally composed by Dionysius, surnamed from that fact Periegetes, or the "Traveller," in Goldsmith's sense. He appears to have flourished in the second half of the third century of the Christian era.

Such are the principal authorities whom Dicuil follows; and as he knew nothing of foreign countries himself, he cites his authorities textually for the benefit of his own countrymen. It is surely a singular and interesting fact that we should find an Irish monk, in the beginning of the ninth century, collating and criticising various manuscripts of those writers either in some Irish monastic school at home, or in the equally Irish school of Iona, though surrounded by Scottish waters and in view of the Scottish hills.

For us, however, the information which Dicuil gives us of his own knowledge, or gathered from his own countrymen, is far more valuable; and to this we would especially invite the reader's attention.

In the sixth chapter, when speaking of the Nile, he says

"Although we never read in any book that any branch of the Nile flows into the Red Sea, yet Brother Fidelis[232] told in my presence, to my master Suibhne (to whom, under God, I owe whatever knowledge I possess), that certain clerics and laymen from Ireland, who went to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, sailed up the Nile for a long way."

--and thence continued their voyage by canal to the entrance of the Red Sea.

This Irish pilgrimage to Jerusalem is worthy of notice, for many of our critics where they find mention of such pilgrimages to Rome and to Jerusalem in the Lives of our early Saints, seem to regard it as an exaggeration, if not a kind of pious fraud. But here we have the testimony of one in every way worthy of credit, who himself spoke to such pilgrims after their return from the Holy Land.

Then their testimony is peculiarly valuable in reference to a vexed geographical question regarding the existence of a navigable canal in those days from the Nile to the Red Sea. A canal called the "River of Ptolemy" and afterwards "The River of Trajan," was certainly cut from the Pelusiac branch of the Nile to the Red Sea at Arisnoe. It was certainly open for commerce in the time of Trajan, but during the decline of the Roman empire became partially filled with sand. Trajan, it seems, however, when re-opening the canal connected it with the Nile at a point higher up the river than the old route, opposite Memphis, near Babylon, in order that the fresh water might flow through the canal and help to keep it open. Under the Arabians this canal of Trajan was re-opened, but geographers have asserted that it became choked shortly afterwards and remained so ever since. The testimony of the Irish pilgrims quoted by Dicuil is the only satisfactory evidence that we now possess to prove that this canal was open at the end of the eighth century for the purposes of commerce and navigation.[233]

The pilgrims also give some interesting information with reference to the Pyramids, which they call the "Barns of Joseph." "The pilgrims," he says, "saw them from the river rising like mountains four in one place and three in another." Then they landed to view these wonders close at hand and coming to one of the three greater pyramids, they saw eight men and one woman and a great lion stretched dead beside it. The lion had attacked them, and the men in turn had attacked the lion with their spears, with the result that all perished in the mutual slaughter, for the place was a desert and there was no one at hand to help then. From top to bottom the pyramids were all built of stone, square at the base, but rounded towards the summit, and tapering to a point. The aforesaid brother Fidelis measured one of them, and found that the square face was 400 feet in length. Going thence by the canal to the Red Sea, they found the passage across to the eastern shore at the Road of Moses to be only a short distance. The brother who had measured the base of the pyramid wished to examine the exact point where Moses had entered the Red Sea, in order to try if he could find any traces of the Chariots of Pharaoh, or the wheel tracks; but the sailors were in a hurry and would not allow him to go on this excursion. The breadth of the sea at this point appeared to him to be about six miles. Then they sailed up this narrow bay which once kept the murmuring Israelites from returning to Egypt.

This is a very interesting and manifestly authentic narrative. Another interesting chapter is that in which Dicuil describes Iceland and the Faroe Islands. "It is now thirty years," he says, "since certain clerics, who remained in that island (Ultima Thule) from the 1st of February to the 1st of August, told me that not only at the Summer solstice, (as Solinus said), but also for several days about the solstice, the setting sun at eventide merely hid himself, as it were, for a little behind a hill, so that there was no darkness even for a moment, and whatever a man wished to do, if it were only to pick vermin off his shirt--vol pediculos de camisia abstrahere--he could do as it were in the light of the sun, and if he were on a mountain of any height, he could doubtless see the sun all through." This way of putting it is certainly more graphic than elegant, but it is at the same time strictly accurate, and shows that the Irish monks had really spent the summer in Iceland. For the arctic circle just touches the extreme north of Iceland, and therefore in any part of that country the sun would even at the solstice set for a short time, but it would be only, as it were, going behind a hill to reappear in an hour or in half an hour. So that by the aid of refraction and twilight a man would always have light enough to perform even those delicate operations to which Dicuil refers.

He then observes with much acuteness that at the middle point of this brief twilight it is midnight at the equator, or middle of the earth; and in like manner he infers that about the Winter solstice there must be daylight for a very short time in Thule, when it is noonday at the equator. These observations show a keen observant mind, and would lead us to infer that Dicuil, like his countryman Virgilius, who flourished a little earlier, had been taught the sphericity of the earth in the schools of his native country. He says also in this same chapter, what is certainly true, that those writers are greatly mistaken who describe the Icelandic Sea as always frozen, and who say that there is a perpetual day from Spring to Autumn, and perpetual night from Autumn to Spring. For the Irish monks sailed thither, he says, through an open sea in a month of great natural cold, and whilst they were there enjoyed alternate day and night except about the Summer solstice, as already explained. But one day's sail further north brought them to the frozen sea.

Dicuil's reference to Iceland is interesting from another point of view. In almost all our books of popular instruction, and even in many standard works on geography, it is stated that the Danes, or Norwegians, "discovered" Iceland about the year A.D. 860, and shortly afterward colonized it during the reign of Harold Harfager. But Dicuil clearly shows that it was well known to Irish monks at least more than half a century before Dane or Norwegian ever set foot on the island, as is now generally admitted by scholars who are familiar with Icelandic literature and history.

The following interesting passage which shows the roving spirit that animated some of the Irish monks at that period is contained in the third section of the same seventh chapter. "There are several other islands in the ocean to the north of Britain, which can be reached in a voyage of two days and two nights with a favourable breeze. A certain trustworthy monk (religiosus) told me that he reached one of them by sailing for two summer days and one night in a vessel with two benches of rowers (duorum navicula transtrorum). Some of these islands are very small and separated by narrow straits. In these islands for almost a hundred years there dwelt hermits, who sailed there from our own Ireland (nostra Scottia). But now they are once more deserted, as they were from the beginning, on account of the ravages of the Norman pirates. They are, however, still full of sheep, and of various kinds of sea birds. We have never found these islands mentioned by any author."

It is quite evident that Dicuil here refers to the Faroe Islands, which are about 250 miles north of the Scottish coast. A glance at the map will show that they are rather small, and separated from each other by very narrow channels, and in this respect differing from the Shetland Islands, to which this description could not therefore apply. Besides, the Shetlands are only 50 miles from the Orkneys, and about 100 from the mainland; hence they could easily be reached in a single day by an open boat sailing before a favourable wind; whereas the islands occupied by the Irish hermits could only be reached after a voyage of two days and a night, even in the most favourable circumstances. The word "nostra Scottia" of course refers to Ireland; for up to the time that Dicuil wrote, that word had never been applied to North Britain. Skene, himself a learned Scot, has shown by numerous citations from ancient authors that beyond all doubt the name "Scottia" was applied to Ireland, and to Ireland alone, prior to the tenth century.[234] Up to that time the name of Scotland was Alban or Albania.

The love of the ancient Irish monks for island solitudes is one of the most remarkable features in their character. There is hardly an island round our coasts, which does not contain the remains of some ancient oratory or monastic cells. But they did not always remain in sight of land. Inspired partly with the hope of finding a "desert" in the ocean, partly, no doubt, also with a love of adventure and a vague hope of discovering the "Land of Promise," they sailed out into the Atlantic in their currachs in search of these lonely islands. Every one has heard of the seven years' voyage of St. Brendan in the western ocean. St. Ailbe of Emly had resolved to find out the island of Thule, which the Roman geographers placed somewhere in the northern sea. He was, however, prevented from going himself, but "he sent twenty men into exile over the sea in his stead."[235] St. Cormac the Navigator, made three voyages in the pathless ocean seeking some desert island where he might devote himself to an eremitic life. It is highly probable he went as far north as Iceland; for Adamnan tells us that he sailed northwards for fourteen days, until he was frightened by the sight of the monsters of the deep, when he returned home touching on his way at the Orkney islands.

When the Norwegians first discovered Iceland in A.D. 860, they found Irish books, and bells, and pilgrims' staffs, or croziers, which were left there by men who professed the Christian religion and whom the Norwegians called "papas" or "fathers." Dicuil, however, gives us the earliest authentic testimony that Iceland and the Faroe Isles had been discovered and occupied by Irish monks long before the Danes or Norwegians discovered these islands. Of Ireland itself, Dicuil unfortunately gives us no information. He was writing for his own countrymen, and he assumed that they knew as much about Ireland--"our own Ireland"--as he did. The only observation he makes in reference to Ireland is that there were islands round the coast, and that some were small, and others very small. But he takes one quotation from Solinus, who says that--

"Britain is surrounded by many important islands, one of which, Ireland, approaches to Britain itself in size. It abounds in pastures so rich, that if the cattle are not sometimes driven away from them they run the risk of bursting. The sea between Britain and Ireland is so wide and stormy throughout the entire year that it is only navigable on a very few days. The channel is about 120 miles broad."

Dicuil, however, good Irishman as he was, does not quote two other statements which Solinus made about the pre-Christian Scots--for he wrote before the time of St. Patrick--first, that the Irish recognised no difference between right and wrong at all; and, secondly, that they fed their children from the point of the sword--a rather inconvenient kind of spoon we should think. In fact the Romans of those days knew as little, and wrote as confidently, about Ireland as most Englishmen do at present, and that is saying a good deal.

There is one incidental reference in Dicuil--chapter V., section ii.--which is of the highest importance, because it settles the question as to the nationality of the celebrated Irish poet, Sedulius, the author of the hymns _Crudelis Herodes_ and _A solis ortus Cardine_, in the Roman Breviary. Dicuil quoting twelve lines of poetry from the Report of the Commissioners of Theodosius, observes, that the first foot of the seventh and eighth of these hexameter lines is an amphimacrus. Here are the lines:--

"Cōnfĭcī ter quinis aperit cum fastibus annum. Sūpplĭcēs hoc famuli, dum scribit, pingit et alter."

"At the same time," says Dicuil, "I do not think it was from ignorance of prosody these lines were so written, for the writers had the authority of other poets in their favour, and especially of Virgil, whom in similar cases _our own Sedulius_ imitated, and he, in his heroic stanzas, rarely uses feet different from those of Virgil and the classical poets." "Noster Sedulius," here applied to the great religious poet by his own countryman, in the ninth century, settles the question of his Irish birth. The reader will observe also, what a keen critic Dicuil was of Latin poetry, and will probably come to the conclusion that they knew Prosody better in the Irish schools of the ninth than they do in those of the nineteenth century.

In the closing stanzas of his own short poem on the classic mountains, Dicuil implies that he finished his work in the Spring of A.D. 825, when night gives grateful rest to the wearied oxen who had covered the seed-wheat in the dusty soil.

"Post octingentos viginti quinque peractos Summi annos Domini terrae, aethrae, carceris atri, Semine triticeo sub ruris pulvere tecto Nocte bobus requies largitur fine laboris."