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A fragmentary Irish Life is in Egerton MS. 91. Another, a transcript made in 1758 by John Murphy of Carrignaver, in Cork, is among the MSS. of the Royal Irish Academy; and another in the Egerton MS. 112. It has been printed in the Silva Gadhelica, 1891; also by Mulcahy, Life of S. Kiaran the Elder of Seir, Dublin, 1895. A Latin Life by John of Tynemouth is in Capgrave's Nova Legenda Angliæ, as Vita Sti. Pirani.

The original basis of all these Lives was probably The Migrations of Ciaran, attributed to his scribe, Cairnech the Bald, a book long preserved at Saighir. The glossator on the Félire of Oengus says that it existed in his day, and that it was a book of wondrous writing, with many gressa (illuminations ?) and with the colophon-" Let everyone who shall read it give a blessing to the soul of Cairnech the Bald.” 1

A work on S. Ciaran by John Hogan, S. Ciaran, Patron of Ossory, Kilkenny, 1876, deserves notice. It is an ingenious attempt to show that Ciaran preceded S. Patrick in Ireland. His calculations are based mainly on the early genealogies. By allowing thirty years for a generation and taking Ciaran as tenth in descent from Oengus Osraighe, he gives 375 as the date of Ciaran's birth.

But in order to arrive at this, some serious assumptions have to be made; as that A.D. 105 was the true date of Oengus Osraighe, and next that the pedigree is complete, and that there are no blanks in it.

The period at which the saint lived has been confused by interested persons for a definite object. At the beginning of the eleventh century, perhaps as late as the twelfth, a desire manifested itself among the chieftains of Munster to have an archbishop of their own; and to give colour to a demand for one, it was pretended that there had been four bishops in the South of Ireland before the arrival of S. Patrick, and these were Ciaran, Ailbe, Declan and Ibar. Something to this effect was accordingly foisted into their Lives. This naturally produced anachronisms.

According to the garbled Life, at the age of thirty he went to Rome, where he was ordained by Pope Celestine (422-30), after he had spent twenty years in Rome. This would throw his birth back to about 376 or 378. But Ciaran was allowed to make his foundations by Aengus MacNadfraich, who fell in battle 489. He was visited at Saighir by Lugaidh, son of Laogaire, who ruled from 483 to 506, and he was the associate of saints who belonged to the close of the fifth century. The Martyrologist of Donegal, confronted with these difficulties, extricated himself by fabling that Ciaran lived to the age

1 Félire of Oengus, ed. Stokes, p. lxii.

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of 360 years,1 which was indeed a liberal and quite unnecessary allow

ance.

In order to understand the history of S. Ciaran, it is necessary for us briefly to consider the limits and condition of the old kingdom of Ossory. This kingdom anciently occupied the entire tract of land between the Suire, the Barrow and the Slieve Bloom Mountains. The name signifies the land between the waters. The Nore flows through it, and all three rivers unite in Waterford Harbour.

It is a district that comprises three extensive plains, separated from each other by ranges of mountains. Northernmost is the Magh (plain) Airget Ros, extending approximately through the present Queen's County. The second plain is Magh Reighna, bounded in the north by the Thornback range, and in the south by the Dundergh mountains. It is roughly represented by the county of Kilkenny. This communicates by the "Wind Gap" with Magh Feimhin in Tipperary, a wide plain in which rises the Rock of Cashel.

From a century before the Christian era the kings of Munster claimed a fine from the kings of Leinster, called the Eric of Eidersceal, to be levied annually on the two southern plains of Ossory. The enforcement of this fine proved a fruitful source of feuds down to the end of the tenth century.

The Ossorians attempted to shake off the burden in the second century. They were assisted by Lughaid Laoghis, from Leinster; but, as a price for his aid, were forced to surrender a portion of the northern plain between the Nore and the Barrow, which was formed into the little kingdom of Leix, under the suzerainty of Leinster.

Another cession of land took place later, when a slice was yielded up to the Hy Bairrche.

Next, Corc, King of Munster, abandoned the old royal seat at Knock Grafton, and seized on the Rock of Cashel in Magh Feimhin, commanding the whole plain. At the same time he re-demanded the payment of the hated tax. At this time Ruman Duach was king of Ossory, and he was founder of the Hy Duach, a sub-clan of the royal race of the Hy Connla.

Corc of Munster, who died in 420, was succeeded by his grandson, Aengus MacNadfraich, who was converted to the faith by S. Patrick about fifty years later.

Before 470 a struggle had been undertaken by the Ossorians to free their country from subjection to Munster; but with the most disastrous effects. From Cashel Aengus poured his forces over Magh Feimhin

1 Todd, Life of S. Patrick, 1864, pp. 198-221.

at the same time that his kinsman Cucraidh burst into the two other plains and overran them. A series of battles ensued. The Ossorians were driven out of one plain after another, and Aengus constituted of the two plains, Magh Airget Ros and Magh Reighna, an Ossorian kingdom which he gave up to Cucraidh, to be held under the overlordship of Munster; and he swept all the Ossorians out of Magh Feimhin and delivered it over to the Southern Deisi of Waterford, to repeople and to hold as their own.1

The date of this high-handed proceeding is given in the Chronicon Scottorum as 445.

Most of the royal race of Ossory were slaughtered, but Lughaidh, grandson of Ruman Duach, was spared, and sent among the Corca Laoighe, his wife's family, in the south, on the sea-board of the present county of Cork from Cork to Bantry Bay. It was precisely from this district that Cucraidh, the usurper of Ossory, came, Lughaidh could be safely kept and watched among the people of Cucraidh's own clan, the Corca Laoighe. His brothers were forced to embrace the ecclesiastical profession, so as to incapacitate them from becoming claimants for the confiscated crown. They were suffered for a while to have churches in the Hy Duach (Odagh) country.

In exile, Lughaidh lived with his wife Liadhain, daughter of Maine Cerr, related to Aengus and to Cucraidh, and it was due to this that his life was spared. He seems to have been sent to Inis Cliar, now Clear Island, the southernmost point of Ireland, as a further precaution against his giving trouble. Here Ciaran was born, and was given to be nursed by an exile, Cuach of the Clan Cliu, and she was a Christian; she formed his young mind, and instilled into his heart the love and fear of God. We are hardly wrong in attributing to her the giving of direction to Ciaran's whole after life (see S. CIWA).

Cuach returned with her tribe from exile in 458 or thereabouts. Ciaran's birth cannot be fixed with certainty. It might have taken place as early as 438, when the Clan Cliu were exiled, or it may have taken place somewhat later.

We are told in his Life that Ciaran did not leave Ireland till thirty years old, and he was not then baptized; and we are informed that he remained twenty years abroad.2

1 The Expulsion of the Dessi, by Prof. Kuno Meyer; in Y Cymmrodor, xiv (1901); O'Flaherty, Ogygia, ii, p. 243; Hogan, S. Ciaran; Keating, History of Ireland, etc.

2 44

Permansit itaque ibidem per annos xxti.," Vita in Cod. Sal., col. 806. In this Life his age before leaving Ireland is not given. The Irish Life says: "Thirty years did Ciaran spend in Erin . . . before he was baptized," Life, ed. Mulcahy, p. 31.

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