The mainland of Argyll, off the coast of which these islands lay, was at this time in the occupation of the Scots of Dalriada, who had now possessed these districts for upwards of forty years. Their king was Gabhran, grandson of that Feargus Mor mac Erc who had led the colony from Ireland to Scotland in the beginning of the same century. Ireland had become nominally Christian before they left its shores, and they were, in name at least, a Christian people, and, during the first sixty years of the colony, had extended themselves so far over the western districts and islands, as to bear the name of kings of Alban. Whether Tyree was at this time included in their possessions may be doubted, but Seil certainly would be. They sustained, however, a great reverse in the year 560. Brude, the son of Mailchu, whom Bede terms a most powerful monarch, became king of the northern Picts, and had his royal seat at Inverness. By him the Dalriads were attacked, driven back, and their king Gabhran slain. For the time their limits were restricted to the peninsula of Kintyre and Knapdale and probably Cowal; but the islands were lost to them.[160] This great reverse called forth the mission of Columba, commonly called Columcille, and led to the foundation of the monastic church in Scotland.
In investigating the lives of these great fathers of the Church, and endeavouring to estimate the true character of their mission, we have to encounter a very considerable difficulty. They filled so large a space in the mind of the people, and became in consequence the subject of so much popular tradition, that the few authentic facts of their history preserved to us became overlaid with spurious matter stamped with the feelings and the prejudices of later periods; and these popular conceptions of the character and history of the saint and his work were interwoven by each of his successive biographers into their narrative of his life, till we are left with a statement of their career partly true and partly fictitious, and a false conception is thus formed of their character and mission. So it was with Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland; and Columba, the Apostle of Scotland, shared the same fate. In both cases it is necessary to separate the older and more authentic tradition from the later stratum of fable. For this purpose we possess, in the case of Patrick, his own account of himself as contained in his Confession and his epistle to Coroticus, and can test the statements of his later biographers by their consistency with these documents. In the case of Columba we have no such record to appeal to, and can only bring the narratives of the later biographers to the test of a comparison with the statements of those who wrote more near to his own time. Fortunately for us, his two earliest biographers, Cummene and Adamnan, were both his successors in the abbacy of the monastery founded by himself, and collected its traditions regarding its founder within so short a period after his death that we may appeal to their statements of fact, irrespective of the colouring given to them by the circumstances of the time in which these biographers lived, with some confidence as affording us the means of testing the later narratives. Cummene became abbot just sixty years, and Adamnan eighty-two, after Columba’s death. We are warranted therefore in concluding that supposed facts in his life, which either are ignored by them or are inconsistent with their narrative, are the fruit of later and spurious tradition.
In the old Irish Life, which Dr. Reeves considers to be a composition probably as old as the tenth century, and which was originally compiled to be read as a discourse upon his festival, a few statements are found which bear this character; but the grand repertory of all these later and questionable additions to his biography is the elaborate Life by Manus O’Donnell, chief of Tyrconnell, compiled in the year 1532, which professesprofesses to be a chronological digest of all the existing records concerning the patron of his family.[161] The tale which it tells of the cause of Columba’s mission to Scotland, and which is popularly accepted as true, is shortly this:—In the year 561 a great battle was fought at a place called Cuil-dremhne in Connaught, not far from the boundary between that province and Ulster. The contending parties were Diarmaid son of Cerbaill, head of the southern Hy Neill and king of Ireland, on the one side, and, on the other, the northern Hy Neill under the sons of Murcertach mac Erca, chiefs of the Cinel Eoghain, Ainmere, son of Sedna chief of the Cinel Conaill, and the people of Connaught under their king Aedh. The king of Ireland was defeated with great slaughter, and the cause of the battle was twofold: First, that King Diarmaid had taken Curnan, the son of the king of Connaught, by force from under the protection of Columba; and secondly, that he had given judgment against Columba in a dispute between him and Finnian of Moyville regarding the possession of a transcript of a copy of the Book of Psalms belonging to the latter, which Columba had made without his permission, and which the king had adjudged to belong to Finnian on the ground of the adage, To every cow belongs its calf. Columba, who himself belonged to the race of the northern Hy Neill, was said to have incited his tribe to avenge him upon the king of Ireland, and to have by his prayers contributed to their success. A synod of the saints of Ireland was held, before whom Columba was arraigned as responsible for the great slaughter caused by this battle; and they decided that he must win from paganism as many souls as had been slain in this battle. The mode in which it was to be fulfilled was referred to Laisren, or Molaisse, of Inishmurry, who imposed as a penance upon Columba perpetual exile from Ireland, whose shores his eyes were not again to see and whose soil his feet were not again to tread. Columba accordingly left Ireland for the Western Isles. He first landed on the island of Colonsay and ascended the highest ground, when, finding he could see the coast of Ireland from it, he dared not remain there; and a cairn called Cairn Cul ri Erin marks the spot. Proceeding farther east, he landed on the south end of the island of Iona; and, ascending the nearest elevation, where a cairn, also called Cairn Cul ri Erin marks the spot, he found that Ireland was no longer in sight; upon which he remained there, and founded his church on the island. Such is the popular account of Columba’s mission.
That he may have in some degree, either directly or indirectly, been the cause of the battle of Culdremhne is not inconsistent with the narrative of Adamnan. He not only twice mentions the battle of Culdremhne, and on both occasions in connection with the date of Columba’s departure for Scotland,[162] but he gives some countenance to the tale when he tells us that Columba had been on one occasion excommunicated by a synod held at Taillte in Meath; but that when he came to this meeting, convened against him, St. Brendan of Birr, when he saw him approaching in the distance, quickly rose, and with head bowed down reverently kissed him; and when reproached by some of the seniors in the assembly for saluting an excommunicated person, he narrated that he had seen certain manifestations connected with his appearance, which convinced him that he was ‘foreordained by God to be the leader of his people to life. When he said this, they desisted, and so far from daring to hold the saint any longer excommunicated, they even treated him with the greatest respect and reverence.’[163] Adamnan does not connect this synod with the battle of Culdremhne, and only states that he had been excommunicated ‘for some pardonable and very trifling reasons, and indeed unjustly, as it afterwards appeared at the end’; but it is quite possible that these reasons may have been an imputation of responsibility for the blood shed at this battle. One of the causes given for the battle—that of the judgment given against Columba with regard to the transcript of the Book of Psalms—is, however, inconsistent with the terms of affection and respect which appear from Adamnan to have subsisted between Bishop Finnian and Columba, and bears the stamp of spurious tradition;[164] but the other cause, the violation of the protection of Columba, touched one of the most cherished privileges of the Irish monastic church at the time—the right of sanctuary; and it was not unnatural that Columba should have deeply felt the necessity of vindicating it, and his tribe, the Cinel Conaill, as well as the whole race of the northern Hy Neill, should have considered their honour involved in resenting its violation.
The remainder of the tale is clearly at utter variance with the narrative of Adamnan. So far from the excommunication by the Synod of Taillte being followed by a sentence of exile from Ireland, he expressly tells us that it was not persisted in. He repeatedly alludes to Columba’s great affection for Ireland, and the yearning of his heart towards his early home; but not a word as to any prohibition against returning thither, or that his exile was otherwise than voluntary. He presents him to us as exercising a constant and vigilant superintendence over his Irish monasteries, and as repeatedly visiting Ireland, without a hint as to there being any reason for his refraining from doing so.[165] We must therefore entirely reject this part of the story. Adamnan had no idea that Columba was actuated by any other motive than that of a desire to carry the gospel to a pagan nation, when he attributes his pilgrimage to a love of Christ.[166] The old Irish Life knows no other reason than that ‘his native country was left by the illustrious saint and illustrious sage and son, chosen of God, for the love and favour of Christ.’ The author of the prophecy of Saint Berchan admits that he was responsible for the battle of Culdremhne:—
but assigns as one reason of his going, the subjection of the Dalriads to the Picts:—
His real motives for undertaking this mission seem therefore to have been partly religious and partly political. He was one of the twelve apostles of Ireland who had emerged from the school of Finnian of Clonard; and he no doubt shared the missionary spirit which so deeply characterised the Monastic Church of Ireland at this period. He was also closely connected, through his grandmother, with the line of the Dalriadic kings, and, as an Irishman, must have been interested in the maintenance of the Irish colony in the west of Scotland. Separated from him by the Irish Channel was the great pagan nation of the northern Picts, who, under a powerful king, had just inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Scots of Dalriada, and threatened their expulsion from the country; and, while his missionary zeal impelled him to attempt the conversion of the Picts, he must have felt that, if he succeeded in winning a pagan people to the religion of Christ, he would at the same time rescue the Irish colony of Dalriada from a great danger, and render them an important service, by establishing peaceable relations between them and their greatly more numerous and powerful neighbours, and replacing them in the more secure possession of the western districts they had colonised.
80. They appear to have excluded not only women but laymen generally from the monasteries. Jonas tells us, in his Life of Columbanus, who belongs to this order of saints, that Theodoric, king of Burgundy, came to Luxeuil and demanded of Columbanus why he did not allow all Christians to have access to the more secret enclosures of the monastery; to which he replied that it was not the custom to open the habitations of God’s servants to secular men and strangers to religion, and that he had fit and proper places for the purpose of receiving guests.—Vit. S. Col. cxviii.
81. Omnes presbyteri, diaconi, cantores, lectores, ceterique gradus ecclesiastici monachicam per omnia cum ipso episcopo regulam servent.—Vit. S. Cuthberti, c. xvi.
82. By the episcopal functions, as distinguished from diocesan jurisdiction, are meant those ecclesiastical functions appropriated to bishops in virtue of their orders, irrespective of any territorial supervision, such as ordination, confirmation, and celebration of the mass pontificali ritu.
83. The Bollandists take the same view, and quote the case of the monastery of Fulda as an example. They say, ‘Presbyteriani obliti distinctionis inter potestatem ordinis et jurisdictionis, dum abbatem presbyterum vident primatem totius provinciæ cui et ipsi episcopi subduntur, continuo eliminatam potestatem ordinis episcopalis effinxere. Quasi vero, ut ratiocinationem exemplo illustremus, Fuldenses monachi ad medium usque sæculum præterlapsum, presbyterianismum sectati fuissent, habentes abbatem presbyterum, jurisdictionem quasi episcopalem in vastum territorium exercentem, qui unum ex subditis monachis habebat, episcopali charactere insignitum, ad ea, quæ sunt pontificalis ordinis peragenda; qui rerum status continuavit usque ad annum 1752, quo Benedictus XIV. Fuldense territorium in episcopatum erexit bulla sua, data iii. Nonas Octobris 1752. Erat igitur et Fuldæ ordo, ut Bedæ verbis utamur, inusitatus; de quo tamen dicere licet, exceptionem firmare regulam, nec quidquam decrescere dignitati et necessitati ordinis episcopalis, si, propter speciales rerum et temporum circumstantias, extraordinaria via, alicui presbytero amplior quædam jurisdictionis potestas obtingat.’—Boll. A.SS., October, vol. viii. p. 165.
84. Eusebius bishop of Vercelli, and Augustine bishop of Hippo, united with their clergy in adopting a strictly monastic life.
85. Habere autem solet ipsa insula rectorem semper abbatem presbyterum, cujus juri et omnis provincia et ipsi etiam episcopi, ordine inusitato, debeant esse subjecti.—Η. E., B. iii. c. iv.
86. Cujus monasterium in cunctis pene Septentrionalium Scottorum et omnium Pictorum monasteriis non parvo tempore arcem tenebat, regendisque eorum populis præerat.—Η. E., B. iii. c. iii.
87. The following extracts from the Irish Annals will illustrate this:—
624 S. Maodocc Epscop Ferna dec.
652 S. Dachua Luachra Abb. Ferna dec.
713 Cillene Epscop Abb. Ferna dec.
766 Aedgen Epscop agus Abb. Fobhair dec.
769 Forandan, Scribneoir agus Epscop Treoit dec.
791 Clothchu Epscop agus Angcoire Cluana Ioraird, Suibhne Epscop Atha Truim decc.
88. The Monks of the West, by Montalembert, vol. i. pp. 452-460. Dupuy, Histoire de Saint Martin, p. 50. His biographer, Sulpicius Severus, says that he filled the high function of bishop without abandoning the spirit and virtue of the monk.—C. 10.
89. Chron. Picts and Scots, p. 55.
90. Deinde beatus puer libertati restitutus S. Monenni disciplinis et monitis in Rosnatensi monasterio quod alio nomine Alba vocatur.—In Vit. S. Tighernac, Colgan, A.SS. p. 438.
Quos duos viros sanctus ac sapiens Nennio, qui Mancennus dicitur, de Rosnacensi monasterio ... Post aliquot vero annos Eugenius atque Tyghernachus cum præfati Manchenii ac fratrum jussione et oratione ad Hiberniam navigauerunt.—In Vit. S. Eugenii, ib.
91. Vade ad Britanniam at Rosnatum monasterium et esto humilis discipulus Manceni magistri illius monasterii.—In Vit. S. Endei, ib.
92. Inter alias Dei famulas quædam Dei virgo, nomine Brignat cum sancta virgine cohabitasse traditur: hujus enim futuræ sanctitatis indicia considerans, eam in Britanniam insulam de Rostnatensi monasterio, conversationis monasticæ regulas accepturam misisse perhibetur.—Boll. A.SS. Julii, tom. ii. p. 294.
93. Cum eodem repatriante navigavit et in ejus sede quæ Magnum vocatur Monasterium regulas et institutiones monasticæ vitæ aliquot annis probus monachus didicit.—Colgan, A.SS. p. 438.
94. Modo factum est quod magister suus Mugentius nomine, que in civitate quæ dicitur Candida liberales disciplinas eum docuerat.—Colg. A.SS., p. 634.
95. Liber Hymnorum, Part i. p. 97, with notes by the Rev. J. H. Todd.
96. Tri cocait descipul la Manchan magister, hos omnes invoco.
97. Dupuy, Histoire de Saint Martin, pp. 215, 217. Haddan and Stubbs’ Councils, vol. ii. pp. 86, 87, 91.
98. Gildas the historian is said in his Life to have gone to Ireland in the reign of King Anmericus or Ainmire, ‘qui et ipse misit ad beatum Gildam, rogans ut ad se veniret; promittens se ipsius doctrinis in omnibus obediturum, si veniens ecclesiasticum ordinem in suo regno restauraret; quia pœne Catholicam fidem in ipsa insula omnes reliquerant.’—Colg. A.SS. p. 183.
Columbanus, who was alive and in Ireland at the time, refers to him in his epistle to Pope Gregory, in these terms,—‘Cæterum de episcopis illis quid judicas, interrogo, qui contra canones ordinantur, id est, quæstu: simoniacos et Giltas auctor pestes scripsistis.’—Ep. ad S. Greg. Pap. Migne, Patrologia, vol. 37, col. 262.
99. Cathmael was the baptismal name of Cadoc of Nantgarvan. See Vita S. Cadoci in Lives of Cambro-British Saints, pp. 25-27.
100. Vita S. Finniani, apud Colgan, A.SS., p. 393.
101. Dr. Todd’s Life of Saint Patrick, p. 101.
102. Tandem Romam meditans, in Hiberniam reditum angelus Domini suasit, ad fidem post B. Patrici obitum neglectam restaurandam, etc.—Colgan, A.SS., p. 401. See also Dr. Todd’s remarks upon this subject in his Life of Saint Patrick, p. 101.
103. Martyrology of Donegal, p. 335. A list of these twelve apostles is given in the Life of St. Finnian.
104. The year is fixed by calculation from Adamnan’s data; see Reeves’s Adamnan, ed. 1874, p. 225. The summary of Saint Columba’s life in the introduction to this edition, and the notes, may be consulted for all the events of Saint Columba’s life. The subject is most exhaustively treated in Dr. Reeves’s great work.
105. See Dr. Reeves’s Note, p. 225. Adamnan alludes to his having been under the care of Cruithnechan, a priest, in B. iii. c. 3.
106. Adamnan alludes to this, B. ii. c. 1.
107. Adamnan alludes to his being under Gemman, B. ii. c. 26; see also Reeves’s Adamnan, p. 274.
108. The story of how S. Columba obtained his priest’s orders appears only in the Scholia or Annotations on the Feliré of Angus the Culdee. It is thus translated by Dr. Todd:—‘Bishop Etchen is venerated in Cluainfota-Boetain in Fera-Bile in the south of Meath, and it was to him Columcille went to have the order of a bishop conferred upon him. Columcille sat under the tree which is on the west side of the church, and asked where the cleric was; “There he is,” said a certain man, “in the field where they are ploughing below.” “I think,” said Columcille, “that it is not meet for us that a ploughman should confer orders on us; but let us test him.”... Then Columcille went up to the cleric, after having thus tested him, and told him what he came for. “It shall be done,” said the cleric. The order of a priest was then conferred upon Columcille, although it was the order of a bishop he wished to have conferred upon him,’ etc. Dr. Todd’s Life of Saint Patrick, p. 71. This tale does not appear in the old Irish Life, and is probably a mere attempt to explain why so great a saint was merely a presbyter; but his master, Finnian of Clonard, was a presbyter-abbot, and his disciples would naturally follow his example in what indeed was the main characteristic of this second order of the saints.
109. Monasterium nobile in Hibernia, quod a copia roborum Dearmach lingua Scottorum, hoc est, campus roborum cognominatur.—B. iii. c. 10. It is termed by Adamnan ‘Roboreti Campus. Roboris Campus. Roboreus Campus.’
110. See Dr. Reeves’s Adamnan, ed. 1874, p. xlix., for a complete list of his Irish foundations.
111. Constituitque magnum monasterium, quod vocatur Bennchor, in regione, quæ dicitur Altitudo Ultorum (Ards) juxta mare orientale; et maxima multitudo monachorum illuc venit ad S. Comgallum ut non potuissent esse in uno loco, et inde plurimas cellas et multa monasteria non solum in regione Ultorum sed per alias Hiberniæ provincias; et in diversis cellis et monasteriis tria millia monachorum sub cura sancti patris Comgelli erant; sed maior et nominatior cæteris locis prædictum monasterium Benchor est.—Boll. A.SS. in Vit. S. Comgalli, cap. 13.
112. Ipsum quoque locum Benchor tradidit ei princeps, ut ædificaret ibi monasterium, vel potius reædificaret. Nempe nobilissimum extiterat ante sub primo patre Congello, multa millia monachorum generans, multorum monasteriorum caput. Locus vere sanctus fœcundusque sanctorum, copiosissime fructificans Deo, ita ut unus ex filiis sanctæ illius congregationis, nomine Luanus, centum solus monasteriorum fundator extitisse feratur. Hiberniam Scotiamque repleverunt genimina ejus. Nec modo in præfatas, sed in exteras etiam regiones, quasi inundatione facta, illa se sanctorum examina effuderunt; e quibus ad has nostras Gallicanas partes sanctus Columbanus ascendens Lexoviense construxit monasterium, factus ibi in gentem magnam. Hæc de antiqua dicta sint Benchorensis monasterii gloria.—Vit. S. Malachiæ, cap. 5.
113. xl. mili manach co rath De fo mam Chomgaill Benchuir, hos omnes invoco.
114. Martyr. Donegal, p. 177.
115. Aper statim in conspectu viri Dei virgas et fenum ad materiem cellæ construendæ dentibus suis fortiter abscidit.—Colgan, A.SS., p. 458.
116. Boll. A.SS., Jun. 1, 316.
117. Ecclesia in monasterio sanctæ Monennæ cum supradicta abbatissa construitur tabulis dedolatis, juxta morem Scotticarum gentium, eo quod macerias Scotti non solent facere, nec factas habere.—Vit. S. Mon.
118. Durthech .i. dairtech .i. tech darach no deirthech .i. tech .i. telgter dera. ‘Durthech, i.e. dairtech, i.e. a house of oak, or deirtech, i.e. a house in which tears are shed.’—Petrie’s Round Towers, p. 342.
119. Dr. Petrie has made the history and use of these buildings perfectly plain in his great work on the Round Towers of Ireland.
120. It is thus explained in the old glossaries:—Daimliag .i. tegais cloch. ‘Daimliag, i.e. an edifice of stone.’—Petrie’s Round Towers, pp. 141, 142.
121. Petrie’s Round Towers, pp. 343, 344.
122. In Cormac’s Glossary it is thus explained:—Aurdom, i.e. urdom, i.e. side house, or against a house externally.
123. See Petrie’s Round Towers, pp. 425, 426.
124. Ib., p. 442. See description of Inis macsaint, an island in Lough Erne, where Saint Ninnidh, one of the twelve apostles of Ireland, founded a monastery. ‘To the west and north of the church extend mounds of earth, which indicate the forms and positions of the ancient community dwellings. There was a rampart of mixed earth and stones, and this probably formed a rath, or cashel.’—O’Hanlon’s Lives of the Saints, vol. i. p. 322. The following is a good description of a small monastery:—Erat enim habitatio eorum sparsa. Tamen unanimiter illorum conversatio in spe, fide et charitate fundata erat. Una refectio, ad opus Dei perficiendum una ecclesia est. Nihil aliud cibi ministrabatur illis, nisi poma et nuces atque radices et cetera genera herbarum. Fratres, post completorium, in singulis cellulis usque ad gallorum cantus seu campanæ pulsum pernoctabant.—Acta S. Brendani, p. 86.
125. This is stated in their acts. The Martyrology of Donegal has under Enda, abbot of Ara, ‘Thrice fifty was his congregation;’ and under Ruadhan, son of Ferghus, abbot of Lothra, ‘There were one hundred and fifty in his congregation, and they used to obtain sufficiency always without human labour to sustain them, by continually praying to, and praising, the Lord of the elements.’—Mart. Don., pp. 83, 103.
126. It is used by Tighernac in this sense. He has at 718, ‘Tonsura corona super familiam Iae datur’ (Chron. Picts and Scots, p. 74); while Bede in his account of the same event says, ‘Nec multo post illi quoque qui insulam Hii incolebant monachi Scotticæ nationis, cum his quæ sibi erant subdita monasteriis, ad ritum paschæ ac tonsuræ canonicum Domino procurante perducti sunt.’sunt.’—B. v. c. 22.
127. Mart. Donegal, p. 216. See also Adam. Vit. S. Col., B. iii. c. 4.
128. Auditoque ejus accessu, universi undique ab agellulis monasterio vicinis cum his qui ibidem inventi sunt congregati, etc.—Adam. Vit. S. Col., B. i. c. 3.
129. Ib. B. iii. c. 22.
130. Colgan, A.SS., p. 707.
131. Accepitque Sanctus Brendanus cum esset sacerdos habitum monasticum sanctum. Et multi relinquentes sæculum hinc inde venerunt ad eum et fecit eos Sanctus Brendanus monachos. Deinde cellas et monasteria fundavit in sua propria regione et multa monasteria et cellas per diversas regiones Hyberniæ fundavit in quibus tria millia monachorum ut perhibetur a senioribus sub eo erant.—Acta S. Brendani, p. 10.
132. Adam. Vit. Col., B. ii. c. 26.
133. Annals of the Four Masters, p. 193.
134. Petrie’s Antiquities of Tara Hill, pp. 125, 127.
135. Thus Bede, after narrating the foundation of Iona and Dearmagh by Columba, adds—‘Ex quo utroque monasterio plurima exinde monasteria per discipulos ejus et in Britannia et in Hibernia propagata sunt: in quibus omnibus idem monasterium insulanum, in quo ipse requiescit corpore, principatum teneret.’—B. iii. c. 4.
136. See the very able paper by Dr. Reeves on this subject in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. vi. p. 447.
137. Ancient Laws of Ireland, vol. iii. p. 75.
138. Ancient Laws of Ireland, vol. iii. p. 75. The translation of these passages has been made a little more literal, but the meaning of the last sentence is not very apparent.
139. Annoit—andoit .i. eclais do et in aile as cenn agas is tuiside; that is, a church which precedes another is a head and is earlier—a parent church.—O’Don. sup.
140. From Dalta, a pupil, a disciple.
141. Pairche, a parochia.—Cormac’s Glossary. Compairche is conparochia.
142. ConchadConchad went to Armagh, and Fland Feblae gave his Cell (Cheill) to him, and he himself took the abbacy (Abbaith).—Book of Armagh.
Deinde cellas et monasteria fundavit in sua propria regione.—Act. S. Brendani, c. ii.
143. This expression is translated in the Ancient Laws ‘a pilgrim,’ but the pilgrim in the true sense of the term is expressed in Irish by the word ‘ailithir.’ Deoraid, advena.—O’Don. sup.
144. Ancient Laws of Ireland, vol. iii. p. 79.
145. The explanation given in the commentary of this obscure expression is, if ten sons are born after the first, then ‘to set aside the three worst sons, and to cast lots between the seven best sons to see which of them should be due to the church.’
146. Ancient Laws, vol. iii. pp. 39, 40, 41.
147. Ancient Laws, vol. iii. p. 31.
148. Ib. p. 33.
149. MS., Brit. Mus., Nero, A. vii.
150. Ancient Laws, vol. iii. p. 13.
151. Ib. p. 17.
152. Ib. p. 35.
153. This is the number we have seen in the small establishment of Mobhi Clarenach. Saint Brendan went to Bishop Ere when five years old, ‘ad legendum ... et quinquaginta ex illis manserunt sub lege Sancti Episcopi Erci usque ad mortem suam.’—Act. S. Brendani, c. vi.
154. Postea navigavit Sanctus Brendanus in peregrinatione ad Britanniam, adivitque sanctissimum senem Gilldam, virum sapientissimum in Britannia habitantem, cujus fama sanctitatis magna erat.—Act. Brendani, c. xv. It is usually stated that he went to Armorica, or Bretagne, but by Britannia, when used without qualification, Britain can only be meant.
155. Et benedicentibus se invicem Sanctus Brendanus et Sanctus Gilldas cum suis fratribus civitatisque illius habitatoribus, recessit inde. Et in alia regione in Britannia monasterium nomine Ailech sanctissimus Brendanus fundavit. Atque in loco alio in Britannia in regione Heth, ecclesiam et villam circa eam assignavit et ibi magnas virtutes beatus Pater Brendanus fecit: et postea navigavit ad Hyberniam.—Vit. Brendani, c. xvi. The passage is thus given in the Brussels edition:—Postea flentibus omnibus profectus est ac in Britanniam remeavit ac duo monasteria, unum in insula Ailech, alterum in terra Ethica in loco nomine Bledua fundavit.
156. See Reeves’s Adamnan, ed. 1874, p. 303.
157. In the Life quoted, the term ‘regio’ is applied equally to both; but Dr. Reeves has shown that this term is used for an island, and in the Brussels edition of the Life, it is expressly called ‘insula.’ It is supposed by Dr. Lanigan to be Alectum in Armorica, but the name of Britannia usually designates Britain.