rebellion, furnished by her father. Such aid, afforded by Murkertach to the rebel subjects of Henry I., would seem inconsistent with the feelings of devotedness towards that monarch, which William of Malmesbury attributes to the Irish king.* This historian owns, it is true, that Murkertach assumed, for a short time, a tone of defiance against the English; but adds that, when threatened with restraints upon his commerce and navigation, he returned to his former state of composure: "For what," says the monk of Malmesbury, "could Ireland do, if the merchandise of England were not carried to her shores?"-a proof that the intercourse between the two countries, before the time of the English invasion, was far more frequent and habitual than is in general supposed. Among the circumstances adduced to prove the friendly terms on which he stood with neighbouring princes is especially recorded the gift of a camel" of wonderful magnitude," which he received from the King of Albany.t A few years after, in a desperate encounter with his rival, Mac-Lochlin, on the A. D. plains of Cobha, in Tyrone, Murkertach sustained a severe defeat, from which he 1103. seems never after to have entirely recovered ;t—his own imprudence,'in detaching a portion of his army to lay waste and reduce the territory then called Dalaradia, having so far diminished and divided his force as to enable the enemy to reap an easy triumph. The victorious return of the northern Hy-Neills to their royal fortress, carrying away with them the royal pavilion and standards, the stores of pearls and other precious treasures, of which they had despoiled the Momonians, is dwelt on with more than usual detail by the annalists of Ulster, and the Four Masters; while in the Annals of Inisfallen, the accustomed partiality to the cause of Munster is allowed to prevail, and the rich display of spoils by her conquerors is passed over in sullen silence. For several years after this great victory, no event of any importance is recorded of Murkertach or his rival. From time to time we find the interposition of the spiritual authority called in to prevent them from breaking out into actual hostilities; and, on more than one occasion, the pious and able Archbishop Celsus succeeded in averting a conflict between them when brought face to face, at the head of their respective armies, in the field. In the year 1114, Murkertach was seized with an attack of illness so violent as to incapacitate him, for the time, from managing, in person, the affairs of his kingdom;|| and a chance of succession was thus opened to his ambitious brother, Dermot, of which that prince eagerly took advantage, and had himself proclaimed king of Munster. In the following year, however, an amicable understanding appears to have been entered into by the two brothers; and the monarch, finding his malady continue, and being desirous of passing the remainder of his days in seclusion and devotion, resigned the royal authority into Dermot's hands, and took holy orders in the monastery of Lismore. There, after two or three years of humbling penitence, he died A. D. 1119, and was interred in the church of Killaloe, to which he had been always a munificent benefactor. His warlike competitor in the government of the kingdom, Domnal Mac Lochlin, survived him but two years, devoting also his last days to devotion and penitence in the monastery of Derry. The affairs and transactions of the Church during the long period comprised in this double reign, though as usual mixed up, as they actually occurred, with most of the secular interests and passions of the time, I have thought it convenient, for the sake of clearness, to reserve for separate consideration. It has been seen that though, at this period, the Northmen inhabiting the three cities of Dublin, Waterford, and Limerick, looked to Canterbury as their primatial see, and derived from thence the consecration of their bishops, the ancient Church of the kingdom acknowledged no such jurisdiction; and that though, in some few instances, Irishmen were consecrated by the Archbishop of Canterbury, they were, in all such cases, natives who had been appointed bishops by the Danes, and whose dioceses were situated in Danish cities. T * "Eum (Murkertach) et successores ejus quos fama non extulit, ita devotos habuit noster Henricus, ut nihil nisi quod eum palparet scriberent, nihil nisi quod juberent, agerent. Quamvis feratur Murchardum, nescio qua de causa, paucis diebus inflatius in Anglos egisse; sed mox pro interdicto navigio et mercimonio navigantium, tumorem pectoris sedasse-Quantum enim valeret Hibernia, si non adnavigaret merces ex Anglia?-Gul. Malmesb. de Reg. Angl., lib. v. "Amicitiam quoque cum Albaniæ rege coluit a quo camelum 'miræ magnitudinis' dono recepit."— Gratian. Lucius. IV. Mag. ad ann. 1103. Once in 1109 (IV. Mag.,) and twice in the course of 1113. Ib. "That illness of the king," says the annalist (Inisfall.,) "was the cause of many and great calamities, of battles and deeds of guilt, of devastations and massacres, of violations of churches and of the sanctuaries of the saints of Erin; and all these evils continued as long as that malady of the King of Erin lasted." In remarking on an assertion of Campion, that persons appointed to sees in Ireland were always directed to the Archbishop of Canterbury to be consecrated by him, Usher shows that such was not the case with the bishops of all Ireland; this practice being peculiar, he says, "to the Ostman strangers that possessed the That the distinguished prelates, Lanfranc and Anselm, who held in succession the see of Canterbury during this period, took a strong interest in the ecclesiastical affairs of Ireland, appears from their correspondence, still extant, with some bishops of their own ordination in this country, as well as with two of its most able and enterprising sovereigns, Turlough and Murkertach.* In a letter from Lanfranc to the former of these princes, of which some notice has already been taken, complaints are made of the prevalence, in Ireland, of certain abuses and uncanonical practices, some of them relating merely to points of discipline, but others more serious in their consequences, as affecting the purity and strictness of the matrimonial tie. For the purpose of correcting these abuses, the primate recommended to Turlough, that an assembly "of bishops and religious men should be convoked, at which the king and his nobles would attend, and assist in exterminating from the country these and all other bad practices which were condemned by the sacred laws of the Church."+ It has been well remarked that the tone of this letter is wholly inconsistent with the notion assumed by some writers, of a jurisdiction vested in the see of Canterbury over the concerns of the Irish church; as here, on points relating not merely to discipline, but affecting Christian morals, and in which, therefore, the primate was more than ordinarily interested, he uses no language that in any degree savours of authority, nor issues any orders to the Irish bishops and clergy (as would have been his duty, had he conceived that he possessed the power) to assemble and act upon an occasion which appeared to him of such great and pressing importance. In the course of a short time, the two other Danish cities, Waterford and Limerick, became also episcopal sees: and the first bishop of the former city, whose name was Malchus, was chosen (as appears from the Letter of the electors to Anselm) by the following personages,-the King Murkertach, the Bishop of Cashel, Bishop Domnald, and the Prince Dermod, or "duke," as he is styled, brother of the king. Notwithstanding that Murkertach, as ruler of the south of Ireland, included Waterford among his subject territories, the wish of the Danish inhabitants of this city to be connected, in spirituals, with the Normans of England, was, in the case of Dublin, complied with; the king himself, as has just been stated, joining the clergy and inhabitants in the letter addressed on this occasion to Anselm, requesting him to consecrate their new bishop. To this practice, followed by the Danish towns, of requiring ordination from Canterbury, the city of Limerick presents an exception, in the instance of its first bishop, Gillibert; this zealous prelate, who appears to have been an Irishman,]] having been already a bishop when placed over Limerick. From letters, still extant, which passed between him and Anselm, we learn that they had been acquainted with each other at Rouen;¶ and Gillibert, in writing to the archbishop, says, I send you as a little token, both of my poverty and affection, twenty-five small pearls,** the best, though worthless, that I three cities of Dublin, Waterford, and Limerick. For these being a colony (continues Usher) of the Norwe gians and Livonians, and so countrymen to the Normans, when they had seen England subdued by the Con. queror, and Normans advanced to the chief archbishopric there, would needs now assume to themselves the name of Normans also, and cause their bishops to receive their consecrations from no other metropolitan but the Archbishop of Canterbury; and forasmuch as they were confined within the walls of their own cities, the bishops which they had made had no other diocese to exercise their jurisdiction in, but only the bare circuit of those cities."-Discourse on the Religion, &c. &c. What is said here of Normans being advanced to the chief archbishoprics is not altogether true,-both Lanfranc and Anselm having been natives of Italy. In Murkertach's answer to Anselm (Syllog., epist. 37,) he returns his best thanks to that prelate for remembering in his prayers a sinner like himself, and likewise for the friendly aid and intervention, which (as far as was consistent with his high dignity) he had afforded to Murkertach's son in-law, Arnulf de Mont. gomery."Quan magnas vobis grates (Domine) referre debeo; quod, sicut mihi relatum est, memoriam mei peccatoris in continuis vestris peragis orationibus; sed et genero meo Ernulfo auxilio et interventione (quan. tum fuerat dignitati vestræ fas) succurristi." Episcopos et religiosos quosque viros in unum convenire jubete, sacro eorum conventui præsentiam vestram cum vestris optimatibus exhibete, has pravas consuetudine omnesque alias quæ a sacris legibus improbantur, a regno vestro exterminare studete."-Vet. Epist. Hib. Sylloge, Epist. 27. Camden is one of the writers by whom this mistaken notion is sanctioned:-" Before this period," he says (meaning before the year 1142,)" the bishops of Ireland were always consecrated by the archbishops of Canterbury, by reason of their primacy in that kingdom." He then enumerates instances of such consecration, which, however, are all confined to the Danish cities. § On the return of Malchus from England, after bis consecration, he and the Danes of Waterford built the Cathedral of the Blessed Trinity, now called Christ Church." See Smith's Hist. of Waterford, chap. 4. Lanigan, chap. 25. § 9. A tract written by Gillibert, called "De Statu Ecclesiæ," and giving an account of a painted image of the Church which he had made, will be found in Usher's Sylloge, ep. 30. Among the various utensils for the service of the church, which, according to the rules laid down in this treatise, were to be consecrated by the bishop, is mentioned the Judicial Iron, an instrument of purgation, or trial, the use of which was common among the Saxons and Danes, and most probably, from this mention of it by Gillibert, prevailed also in Ireland. Ib. ep. 31. TQuoniam autem olim nos apud Rothomagum invicem cognovimus."-Syllog. ep. 32. **"* Munusculum paupertatis meæ et devotionis transmitto, xxv. margaritulas inter optimas et viliores; et rogo ne sitis immemor mei in orationibus vestris."-Of the pearls found in the lake of Killarney, a writer in the Philosophical Transact. (vol. xviii.) says:—" I myself saw one pearl bought for 50s. that was valued at 407. could procure, and I entreat of you not to be unmindful of me in your prayers." The archbishop, in his answer to this letter, without pointing out the particular abuses of which he complains, intimates generally a no less unfavourable opinion of the Irish church than had been expressed by his predecessor, Lanfranc; and presses earnestly on his brother prelate, the duty of correcting, as far as lay in his power, so grievous a state of things, by implanting morals and good doctrines among the people over whom he spiri. tually presides. But by far the most gloomy picture drawn of the state of religion and morals in Ireland at this time, is that which remains to us from the pen of the celebrated St. Bernard, an effusion, which, together with the fervid and impetuous zeal that marked his whole life and writings, betrays also no small portion of the spirit of exaggeration and over-statement which naturally belongs to such a temperament.* The marriage of the clergy, and the intrusion of laymen into ecclesiastical property,-the two great scandals that then drew down the fulminations of popes and councils were the chief irregularities that provoked the anger of St. Bernard against Ireland; and in the known and flagrant fact of so many married laymen having usurped the rank and, rerogatives of the archbishop of Armagh, the saint found, it must be owned, a subject highly deserving of his most stern and denunciatory censure. Of the fidelity, however, of his general picture of the state of Ireland, there appear good reasons for feeling distrustful. Having never himself been in the country, and deriving his sole information from natives, on the spot-a source of intelligence, too apt, in all times, to be imbittered by local and factious prejudices-he was led to generalize upon particular cases, not always in themselves authentic, and thus to present, on the whole, a false, or at least exaggerated, representation. Learning, for instance, that in the diocese of Connor-a place to which, from the nature of the task he was employed upon,t his inquiries were chiefly directed-there prevailed a frightful degree of immorality and barbarism, this vehement censor extends the charge at once to the whole kingdom; and, from ignorance of the peculiar forms observed in the marriages of the Irish, imputes to them, among other irregularities, that "they did not enter into lawful wedlock." This charge, followed up by what Giraldus alleged at a later period, namely, that the natives" did not yet contract marriage," has furnished grounds for accusing the Irish of those times of having lived in a state of almost universal concubinage; whereas, in both instances, the meaning of a charge so ambiguously worded was not that the Irish dispensed with the ceremony of marriage altogether, but that they did not contract it in that particular form which the English and some other nations considered alone to be lawful.‡ There was, doubtless, then, as there has been unfortunately at most periods of our history, quite enough in the real condition of the country to mourn over and condemn, without calling in also the hand of calumny to add new shadows to the picture. Of the ecclesiastical transactions of the reign of Murkertach, one of the most remarkable-his dedication of the royal city of Cashel to the uses of the Church-has already been mentioned. In the year 1111 a great synod, of which neither the objects or acts are clearly specified, was held at Fiodh-Angusa, or Ængus's Grove, a place in the neighbourhood of the famed hill of Usneach, where, of old, the Druids held their rites. At this convention, besides Murkertach and the nobles of his kingdom, there attended also Moelmurry, Archbishop of Cashel-this see having been lately elevated to archiepiscopal rank-50 other bishops, 300 priests, and 3,000 persons of the clerical order. Shortly after this national meeting, there was held another great synod at Rath-Breasail, presided over by Gillibert, Bishop of Limerick, who was then apostolic legate in Ireland, and the first, it appears, appointed to that high office. By this synod a regular division A miller took out a pearl which he sold for 10% to one who sold it to the late Lady Glenanly for 304. with whom I saw it in a necklace. She refused 802. for it from the late Duchess of Ormond." *As is said by a French author, who truly edited the writings of one of his victims, Abelard, "he spared nobody,"-nec enim ulli pepercit.-See Bayle, art. St. Bernard. He was then writing his Life of St. Malachy. The following is a specimen of his account of the state of Connor:-"Tunc intellexit homo Dei non ad homines se sed ad bestias destinatum. Nusquam adhuc tales expertus fuerat in quantacunque barbarie; nusquam repererat sic protervos ad mores, sic ferales ad ritus, sic ad fidem impios, ad leges barbaros," &c. After quoting the whole of this description, Camden adds,-"Thus St. Bernard-and, as I am informed, the present bishop, even at this day, is hardly able to give a better character of his flock." 1 See an explanation by Dr. Lanigan (Hist. c. xxvi. note 52,) of the two different sorts of sponsalia, or espousals, distinguished by the old canon law; one called de præsenti, and the other de futuro. The latter form of contract, called in English betrothment, is what was chiefly practised by the Irish; and that their marriages were by high authority considered legitimate, appears from the language used on the subject by Lanfranc and Anselm, the former of whom speaks of the lawfully wedded wives of the Irish: "legitime sibi copulatam uxorem ;"-" legitime sibi copulatas."-See their letters, above referred to, in Archbishop Usher's Sylloge. § Supposed to be the same as Hy-Bressail, now Clanbrassil, in the county of Armagh. of the dioceses of Ireland was made, and their respective boundaries fixed;* while by another important regulation, it was declared that the church revenues and lands allotted to the several bishops for their maintenance, were exempted from tribute, chief rents, and other public contributions. Among the abuses complained of by St. Bernard in Ireland, was the excessive number of bishops,—an evil partly caused, as already has been explained, by the practice adopted, from the example of the primitive church, of appointing chorepiscopi, or rural bishops; and this multiplication of the episcopal jurisdiction it was one of the objects of the synod of Clanbrassil to correct. So far was their purpose, however, from being attained, that at the time of the great council of Kells, about thirty years after, the bishoprics alone, exclusive of the archiepiscopal sees, amounted in number to thirty-four. CHAPTER XXV. Learned Irishmen of the eleventh century.-Tigernach, the chronicler.-Great value of his Annals.-Dates of Eclipses preserved by him.-Proofs of the antiquity of Irish records.Marianus Scotus.-Account of his works.-St. Colman, a patron saint of Austria.-Helias, of the Monastery of Monaghan, introduced first the Roman chant at Cologne.-Monastery erected for the Irish at Erford.-Another at Fulda.-Poems by Mac Liag, the secretary of Brian Boru.-Flann and Gilla-Coeman, metrical chronographers.-Learning of Gilla-Coeman.-Visit of Sulgenus, Bishop of St. David's, to the schools of Ireland.-English students at Armagh. BEFORE We advance any farther into the twelfth century, I shall briefly advert to the few distinguished names in literature and science, that lie thinly but shiningly scattered throughout the period we have just traversed; this being a portion of my historic task, which, as offering a change and relief from its ordinary details, I would not willingly omit. Of that class of humble but useful writers, the annalists, who merely narrate, says Cicero, without adorning the course of public affairs, Ireland produced in this century, two of the most eminent, perhaps, in all Europe, Marianus Scotus and Tigernach. The latter of these writers, whose valuable annals have been so frequently referred to in these pages, is said to have been of the sept called the Muireadhaigh, or Murrays, in Connaught, and was abbot of Clonmacnois. His Annals, which were brought down by him to the year of his death, 1088, are scarcely more valuable for the materials of history which their own pages furnish, than for the proofs they afford of still earlier records existing when they were written ;t-records which, as appear from the dates of eclipses preserved by this chronicler, and which could not otherwise than by written memorials have reached him so accurately, must have extended, at least, as far back as the period when Christianity became the religion of the country. Another service conferred on the cause of Irish antiquities by this work, independently of its own intrinsic utility, arises from the number of metrical fragments we find scat Exclusive of Dublin, which was left subject to Canterbury, there were to be, according to this division, twenty-four dioceses: twelve in Leath Cuinn, or the northern portion of Ireland, subject to the Archbishop of Armagh, and twelve in the southern portion, or Leath-Mogh, under the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Cashel. On looking over the boundaries," says Dr. Lanigan, "marked for these dioceses, a very great part of which can scarcely be pointed out at present, on account of the changes of names, it is clear that the synod intended, besides reducing the number of sees, to render all the dioceses of Ireland nearly of equal extent; but it did not succeed to any considerable degree in reducing the number: whereas, we find at the time of the Council of Kells, in 1152, many more sees than those here laid down; and, on the other hand, some of the said twenty-four sees not even spoken of; as if, notwithstanding the decree of Rath-Breasail, they had either not been established, or had, in a very short time, ceased to exist."-Chap. 25. § 14. "We have, accordingly, fragments preserved by Tigernach of Irish writers, who flourished so early as before the 6th, 7th, and 8th centuries, whose names, whose periods, whose very words are preserved, and the antiquity of whose idiom confirms, to a certainty, the ancient date which Tigernach himself assigns to them."-Dr. O'Connor, Ep. Nunc. Rer. Hib. Scrip. cxvi. "Quod si inquiras unde harum defectionum notitiam hauserit Tigernachus, aut qua ratione eas ad Regum Hibernorum annos potuerit tam accurate accommodare? Id procul dubio effecisse respondeo, non calculis astronomicis, sed veterum ope Scriptorum Hiberniensium, qui ea quæ vel ipsi viderunt, vel quæ in Monasteriorum Bibliothecis reposita erant, ad posterorum memoriam servavère.”—16. p. xcviii. tered throughout its pages, cited from writings still more ancient, which were then evidently existing, though at present no other vestige of them remains. That Tigernach had access to some library or libraries furnished with books of every description,* is manifest from his numerous references; and the correctness of his citations from foreign authors, with whose works we are acquainted, may be taken as a surety for the genuineness of his extracts from the writings of our own native authors, now lost:-thus affording an answer to those skeptical objectors who, because there are extant no Irish manuscripts of an earlier date than about the eleventh or tenth century, contend that our pretensions to a vernacular literature, in the two or three centuries preceding that period, must be mere imposture or self-delusion. Marianus Scotus, the contemporary of Tigernach, and, as some suppose, a monk in the very monastery over which he presided, stands, as a chronographer, among the highest of his times. He wrote also Notes on the Epistles of St. Paul, a copy of which, transcribed by himself, is still extant in the imperial library of Vienna. Leaving Ireland about the year 1056, this learned man joined at first a religious community of his own countrymen, at Cologne, and from thence repaired to Fulda, where he remained a recluse for the space of ten years. Being removed from thence, by order of the ecclesiastical authorities, to Mentz, he was there again, as he himself informs us, shut up, and remained a recluse till the year of his death, 1086. In one of the chief merits of a chronicler, that of skilfully turning to account the labours of his predecessors, Marianus appears to have been pre-eminent; and a learned antiquary, in speaking of the use thus made by him of Asser's interesting Life of King Alfred, says that, "enamoured with the flowers of that work, he transplanted them to shine like stars in his own pages."} It appears that, by Marianus, as well as by his countryman, Tigernach, who had never been out of Ireland, the error of the Dionysian Cycle was clearly perceived; and to the former is even attributed the credit of having endeavoured, however unsuccessfully, to correct it.|| Besides Marianus, T there appeared, in this century, several other distinguished Irishmen on the continent; among the foremost of whom may be mentioned St. Colman, whom Austria placed on the list of her patrons, and whose praise was celebrated in an ode by Stabius, the historiographer of the emperor Maximilian.** Having been unjustly "Bibliothecan penes se habuisse patet, omni librorum genere refertam, unde plures adducit auctores, tam exteros quam Hibernos, quorum quæ supersunt opera, ab eo accurate, etiam quoad verba producta, plane indicant eum reliquos jam deflendos, pari fidelitate, etiam quoad verba produxisse."-Ib. p. cxviii. We find in the obituary of Armagh not many years after Tigernach flourished, a notice of the death of the chief antiquary and librarian of that school." Primh Criochare a leabhar Coimhed." For remarks on the causes which led to the loss of the earlier manuscripts, see chap. 14, of this Work. This supposition, for which there appears to be no foundation, arose from the mention which he makes of a certain Tigernach, as being the superior of the establishment he belonged to before he left Ireland.— "Hoc autem mihi retulit Tigernach Senior meus." Leland, Comment. de Scriptor. Britan. The following is the florid language of the great antiquary : "Quarum et Marianus Scotus venustate totus captus, flores ex eisdem avidus, veluti stellulas, quibus suam inpolaret historiam selegit." Chap. cxix. Sigebert (Chronic.) According to the editor, however, of Marianus (Basil. 1559, of which edition there is a splendid copy in the British Museum,) this chronicler succeeded in correcting the errors of this cycle; "Præstitit mebercle Marianus hic noster quod eorum qui Temporum rationes descripserunt nemo hactenus tentavit. Errores enim in Cycli Decemnovalis ratiocinatione a Dionysio introductos, animadversione studiosa correxit." This enthusiastic editor is perhaps hardly to be trusted, as, besides adorning the recluse of the cell with every possible talent and accomplishment, he tells us that he travelled almost over the whole globe. But Henry de Knyghton also assigns to Marianus the credit of having been the first who corrected the error of the Dionysian period. This chronicler, whose testimony to the merit of Marianus has escaped, as far as I can see, the notice of Dr. O'Connor, thus explains the mode in which our countryman corrected the Cycle. Itaque ab initio seculi annos singulos recensens xxii annos qui cyclis prædictis deerant superaddidit." In the instance of Marianus, as in many others which I have had occasion to notice, an effort has been made to transfer to Scotland a reputation which belongs legitimately to Ireland. On these points, the learned of the continent show far more accuracy, not to say honesty, than some of our authorities nearer home. Among the many proofs collected by Usher in confirmation of Ireland's right to Marianus, the following may be worth mentioning. In the great controversy arising out of the claim of Edward I. to a feudal superiority over Scotland, Marianus Scotus was one of the authorities brought forward by the English king; and again, when the same claim was revived under Henry IV. this chronicler was appealed to, as a Scottish authority, in favour of his pretensions. But the advocate who argued for the rights of Robert, in allowing full credit to Marianus, contended, and successfully, that he was a Scot of Hibernia, not of Scotland.-Eccles. Primord. p. 735. It is curious that Marianus himself was, as far as can be discovered, the first writer by whom the name of Scotia, appropriated previously to Ireland alone, was given to the present Scotland." See a Letter of Lynch (the author of Cambrensis Eversus) appended to O'Flaherty's Ogygia Vindicated. **Surius, Vies des Saints. In the commencement of the historiographer's ode there is an allusion to this Irish saint's royal descent, and his visit to the Holy Land: "Austriæ sanctus canitur patronus, |