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tyrologies. Cairbre Crum, Bishop of Clonmacnoise, on March 6, but he lived in the ninth century. Cairbre, Bishop of Moville, occurs on May 3, but there is no record as to the period at which he lived. The third is Cairbre or Coirpre, Bishop of Coleraine, on November II. He was a disciple of S. Finnian of Clonard and flourished about 540.1

Corbre is, no doubt, the original patron of Hên Eglwys. In the Extent of 1352 the villa libera of Hên Eglwys is given as held of SS. Faustinus and Bacellinus,2 by whom must be meant "Y Saint Llwydion." Of Bacellinus nothing seems to be known, nor anything definitely of Faustinus; but it is curious to note that Faustinus and Marcellinus, Roman priests, are coupled together as two Luciferians that were exiled in 369, in the time of Pope Damasus. The only name approximating these on November 19 or 22 is Faustus on the 19th, an obscure Eastern martyr of the early fourth century. A Marcellinus is coupled with Marcellus as patron of Llanddeusant, also in Anglesey. They may have been the two Popes Marcellus (January 16) and Marcellinus (April 26), martyrs in the early fourth century, the former of whom succeeded the latter as Pope; but the Gwyl Mabsant of the parish, September 25, does not favour the supposition. A Marcellus is supposed to be patron also of Martletwy, Pembrokeshire.

S. CORENTINE, Bishop, Confessor

THIS Saint was the son of one of the colonists from Britain in the fifth century, and was born about the year 410. He retired into solitude in Plou-Vodiern in Armorican Cornouaille, and was granted. lands by Grallo. He is reckoned the first Bishop of Quimper, and he signed the Canons of the Council of Angers in 453. Among these was one condemning "those vagabond monks who ramble about unnecessarily, and without letters of recommendation," a blow levelled against the Celtic Saints, who were greatly addicted to this rambling, but who did so to good purpose, for the establishment of lanns or religious centres for the several clans or tribes.

Corentine had a little pool, with a spring of water in it, near his cell. By a special miracle, a fish lived in this basin, which served Corentine with a meal every day. He put his hand into the water, drew out the fish, cut off as much of its flesh as he wanted, and then

1 Colgan, Acta SS. Hibern., pp. 313, 406; Trias Thaumat., pp. 183, 380.

2 Record of Carnarvon, 1838, p. 44. Lewis Morris, Celtic Remains, pp. 183, 242, gives the former saint by mistake as Franciscinus.

threw it back into the spring, where it recovered itself before his next meal. There was a lame priest, a hermit, named Primael, who had a chapel at Châteauneuf-du-Faou. Corentine went to visit him. He slept the night at his hermitage, and next morning Primael went to fetch water from the spring, which was at some distance. As the old man was lame, and the way long, Corentine pitied him, and driving his staff into the ground, elicited a bubbling fountain at the hermit's door.

Two eminent Saints visited him one day. Corentine was in despair. He had flour, and could give them pancakes for dinner, but pancakes, before it was understood how to season them with sugar, nutmeg, and lemon, were thought to be very insipid. He went to his fountain to have a look at the fish. It would be like killing the goose that laid the golden eggs, if he broiled for his visitors the entire fish. But, to his great joy, he found the spring full of plump eels. He cooked them for dinner in light wine; and his visitors left, praising heaven for having given them so dainty a meal.

However, one day King Grallo lost his way when hunting, and arrived hungry at the cell of the Saint. Corentine was obliged then to cut an unduly large slice out of the back of his fish. The king's cook, without whom Grallo prudently did not lose himself, scoffed at the small supply, but as he began to fry the slice of fish, it multiplied in the pan sufficiently to satisfy the king and all who came to the hermitage. Grallo was naturally curious to see the fish itself, and Corentine took him to the fountain, where they found the creature frolicking about quite uninjured. An attendant of the king tried his knife on the fish, and the wound remained unhealed till Corentine discovered what had been done, restored the fish to soundness, and bade it depart lest it should get into mischief again through the concourse of the curious who would be sure to come to the fountain on hearing of the miracle. The prose for the feast of S. Corentine in the Quimper Breviary says that it was the bishop of Léon who tried his knife on the fish, but the lesson for the festival in the Léon Breviary repudiates the charge, and lays the blame on an attendant of the king. Grallo, charmed with the miracles he had witnessed, presented the forest and the hunting-lodge of Plou-Vodiern to the Saint.

The Life of S. Corentine 1 is late and a very unsatisfactory production.

MSS. Fr. 22,321, f. 728,

1 Bibliothèque Nat., Paris, MSS. Lat. 12,665, f. 236; from the Breviaries of S. Brieuc and Nantes. Vita Sti. Corentini in Bullet, de

la Soc. Arch. de Finistère, xii, pp. 148, et seq. A Life composed in the thirteenth century. Also a Life in Albert le Grand from the Breviaries of Quimper, Léon and Nantes.

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It is meagre in historical detail, and diffuse in hortatory matter, which is conventional "padding." It was written after 848, when Nominoe asserted the independence of the Breton sees from the archiepiscopal crosier of Tours, and organized them under the metropolitanate of Dol. Dom Plaine, who has edited this Life, thinks with reason that it was composed before the Translation of the body of S. Corentine, shortly after 876. It was written for a polemical purpose, by some ecclesiastic adverse to the independence of the Breton Church, and who sought to give an historic basis for the claim to supremacy by the Church of Tours. It represents, accordingly, S. Corentine as going to Tours to receive consecration to the see of Quimper, at the hands of S. Martin, and as submitting to him a couple of abbots for confirmation.

The fraudulent composer of the Life was as stupid as he was unprincipled. He makes Corentine, who signed the decrees of the Council of Angers in 453, a contemporary of S. Martin, who died in 401. He makes him an associate with S. Padarn and S. Malo. Paternus of Vannes was, indeed, his contemporary, but the author confounds him with Padarn the cousin of S. Samson, who died about 560. And S. Malo died in or about 627. What seems to be fairly established is that Corentine was a contemporary of Grallo, King of Cornouaille, but the date of this prince cannot be fixed with any accuracy. Dom Plaine (Grallo le Grand, Vannes, 1893) makes him rule from 480 to 520. De la Borderie holds that he died in 505.

The compiler of the Life makes Winwaloe and Tudy disciples of S. Corentine, and appointed to their abbacies by him; whereas Winwaloe, born about 480, became a disciple of S. Budoc, about 492, and was established at Tibidy not before 515, and certainly did not found Landevenec much before 518.

Corentine may have known Winwaloe, but did not stand to him. in the relation of master to pupil.

Relying on this most untrustworthy Life, many writers have assumed that there must have been two Corentines, Bishops of Quimper, separated from each other by the interval of a century. But the date that nails Corentine is that of the Council of Angers, 453, to the decrees of which he subscribed, and we are bound to reject all the incidents introduced by the late and interested biographer for polemical purposes.

The date of Corentine's death may have been 500, not later, probably somewhat earlier. What was his connexion with Cornwall is difficult to determine. It is probable that Cury was a foundation made by Breton settlers planted by King Athelstan after 935.

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