Part 20 (1/2)
[215] _Fifty-three_.--See Dr. O'Donovan's note to Annals, p. 747.
[216] _Fidh-Gaibhli_.--Now Feegile, near Portarlington.
[217] _Given_.--The Book of Rights mentions, that one of the rights to which the King of Leinster was ent.i.tled from the King of Ireland, was ”fine textured clothes at Tara,” as well as ”sevenscore suits of clothes of good colour, for the use of the sons of the great chieftain.”--Book of Rights, p. 251. From the conduct of Gormflaith, as related above, it is evident that the tunic was some token of va.s.salage.
[218] _Murrough_.--He was eldest son by Brian's first wife, Mor. He had three sons by this lady, who were all slain at Clontarf.
[219] _Yew-tree_.--This was a sharp insult. After the battle of Glen-Mama, Maelmordha had hidden himself in a yew-tree, where he was discovered and taken prisoner by Murrough.
[220] _Land.--Wars of the Gaedhil_, p. 151.
[221] _Brodir_.--It has been suggested that this was not his real name.
He was Ospak's _brother_, and Brodir may have been mistaken for a proper name. There was a Danish Viking named Gutring, who was an apostate deacon, and who may have been the Brodir of Irish history.
[222] _Baptism.--Burnt Njal_, ii. 332.
[223] _Combat.--Wars of the Gaedhil_, p. 157.
[224] _Magh-n-Ealta_.--The Plain of the Flocks, lying between Howth and Tallaght, so called from Eder, a chieftain who perished before the Christian era.
[225] _Clontarf_.--There is curious evidence that the account of the battle of Clontarf must have been written by an eye-witness, or by one who had obtained his information from an eye-witness. The author states that ”the foreigners came out to fight the battle in the morning at the full tide,” and that the tide came in again in the evening at the same place. The Danes suffered severely from this, ”for the tide had carried away their s.h.i.+ps from them.” Consequently, hundreds perished in the waves.--_Wars of the Gaedhil,_ p. 191. Dr. Todd mentions that he asked the Rev. S. Haughton, of Trinity College, Dublin, to calculate for him ”what was the hour of high water at the sh.o.r.e of Clontarf, in Dublin Bay, on the 23rd of April, 1014.” The result was a full confirmation of the account given by the author of the _Wars of the Gaedhil_--the Rev.
S. Haughton having calculated that the morning tide was full in at 5.30 a.m., the evening tide being full at 5.55 p.m.
[226] _Siguard_.--Various accounts are given of the disposition of forces on each side, so that it is impossible to speak with accuracy on the subject. We know how difficult it is to obtain correct particulars on such occasions, even with the a.s.sistance of ”own correspondents” and electric telegraphs.
[227] _Psalms_.--To recite the Psalter in this way was a special devotional practice of the middle ages.
[228] _Brian_.--_Burnt Njal_, ii. 337. If this account be reliable, Brian did not live to receive the last sacraments, as other authorities state.
CHAPTER XIV.
Distinguished Irish Scholars and Religious--Domestic Feuds--O'Brien's Illness caused by Fright--Pestilence and Severe Winters--Contentions between the Northerns and Southerns--Murtough's Circuit of Ireland--The Danes attempt an Invasion--An Irish King sent to the Isle of Man--Destruction of Kincora--St. Celsus makes Peace--The Synod of Fidh Aengussa--Subjects considered by the Synod: (1) The Regulation of the Number of Dioceses, (2) the Sacrament of Matrimony, (3) the Consecration of Bishops, (4) Ceremonies at Baptism--St. Malachy--The Traitor Dermod--Synod at Mellifont Abbey--St. Laurence O'Toole.
[A.D. 1022-1167.]
Domestic wars were, as usual, productive of the worst consequences, as regards the social state of the country. The schools and colleges, which had been founded and richly endowed by the converted Irish, were now, without exception, plundered of their wealth, and, in many cases, deprived of those who had dispensed that wealth for the common good. It has been already shown that men lived holy lives, and died peaceful deaths, during the two hundred years of Danish oppression; we shall now find that schools were revived, monasteries repeopled, and missionaries sent to convert and instruct in foreign lands. A few monks from Ireland settled in Glas...o...b..ry early in the tenth century, where they devoted themselves to the instruction of youth. St. Dunstan, who was famous for his skill in music, was one of their most ill.u.s.trious pupils: he was a scholar, an artist, and a musician. But English writers, who give him the credit of having brought ”Englishmen to care once more for learning, after they had quite lost the taste for it, and had sunk back into ignorance and barbarism,” forget to mention who were his instructors.
St. Maccallin, another Irishman, was teaching in France at the same period; and Duncan, who governed the Monastery of St. Remigius, at Rheims, was writing books of instruction for his students, which are still extant. Maria.n.u.s Scotus, whose chronicles are considered the most perfect compositions of their times, was teaching at Cologne. St.
Fingen, who succeeded St. Cadroe as Abbot of the Monastery of St. Felix at Metz, was invested with the government of the Monastery of St.
Symphorian in that city[229]. It was then ordered by the bishop, that none but Irish monks should be received into his house, unless their supply failed. In 975 the Monastery of St. Martin, near Cologne, was made over to the Irish monks in perpetuity. Happily, however, Ireland still retained many of her pious and gifted sons. We have mentioned elsewhere the Annals of Tighernach, and the remarkable erudition they evince. The name of Cormac Mac Cullinan may also be added to the list of literary men of the period. The poems of Kenneth O'Hartigan are still extant, as well as those of Eochd O'Flynn. The authors.h.i.+p of the _Wars of the Gaedhil and the Gall_, has been attributed to Brian Boroimhe's secretary, Mac Liag; it is, at least, tolerably certain that it was written by one who witnessed the events described. The obituaries of several saints also occur at the close of the tenth and commencement of the eleventh centuries. Amongst these we find St. Duncheadh, Abbot of Clonmacnois, who is said to have been the last Irish saint who raised the dead. St. Aedh (Hugh) died in the year 1004, ”after a good life, at Ard-Macha, with great honour and veneration.” And in the year 1018, we have the mortuary record of St. Gormgal, of Ardvilean, ”the remains of whose humble oratory and cloghan cell are still to be seen on that rocky island, amid the surges of the Atlantic, off the coast of Connemara.”[230]
Dr. Todd has well observed, in his admirably written ”Introduction” to the _Wars of the Gaedhil and the Gall_, that from the death of Malachy to the days of Strongbow, the history of Ireland is little more than a history of the struggles for ascendency between the great clans or families of O'Neill, O'Connor, O'Brien, and the chieftains of Leinster.
After the death of Brian Boroimhe, his son Donough obtained the undisputed sovereignty of Munster. He defeated the Desmonians, and instigated the murder of his brother Teigue. His next step was to claim the t.i.tle of King of Ireland, but he had a formidable opponent in Dermod Mac Mael-na-mbo, King of Leinster. Strange to say, though he had the guilt of fratricide on his conscience, he a.s.sembled the clergy and chieftains of Munster at Killaloe, in the year 1050, to pa.s.s laws for the protection of life and property--a famine, which occurred at this time, making such precautions of the first necessity. In 1033, his nephew, Turlough, avenged the death of Teigue, in a battle, wherein Donough was defeated. After his reverse he went on a pilgrimage to Rome, where he died in the following year, after doing penance for his brother's murder. The Annals say that ”he died under the victory of penance, in the Monastery of Stephen the Martyr.”[231] Dermod Mac Mael-na-mbo was killed in battle by the King of Meath, A.D. 1072, and Turlough O'Brien, consequently, was regarded as his successor to the monarchy of Ireland. Turlough, as usual, commenced by taking hostages, but he found serious opposition from the northern Hy-Nials. His princ.i.p.al opponents were the Mac Loughlins of Aileach, and the O'Melaghlins of Meath. In 1079 O'Brien invaded the territory of Roderic O'Connor, King of Connaught, expelled him from his kingdom, and plundered it as far as Croagh Patrick. Next year he led an army to Dublin, and received the submission of the men of Meath, appointing his son Murtough lord of the Danes of Dublin. The Annals of the Four Masters give a curious account of O'Brien's death. They say that the head of Connor O'Melaghlin, King of Meath, was taken from the church of Clonmacnois, and brought to Th.o.m.ond, by his order. When the king took the head in his hand, a mouse ran out of it, and the shock was so great that ”he fell ill of a sore disease by the miracles (intervention) of St. Ciaran.” This happened on the night of Good Friday. The day of the resurrection (Easter Sunday) the head was restored, with two rings of gold as a peace-offering. But Turlough never recovered from the effects of his fright, and lingered on in bad health until the year 1086, when he died. He is called the ”modest Turlough” in the Annals, for what special reason does not appear. It is also recorded that he performed ”intense penance for his sins”--a grace which the kings and princes of Ireland seem often to have needed, and, if we may believe the Annals, always to have obtained.
A period of anarchy ensued, during which several princes contended for royal honours. This compliment was finally awarded to Mac Loughlin, King of Aileach, and a temporary peace ensued. Its continuance was brief. In 1095 there was a pestilence all over Europe, ”and some say that the fourth part of the men of Ireland died of the malady.” A long list is given of its victims, lay and ecclesiastical. Several severe winters are recorded as having preceded this fatal event; probably they were its remote cause. In the year 1096, the festival of St. John Baptist fell on Friday. This event caused general consternation, in consequence of some old prophecy. A resolution ”of the clergy of Ireland, with the successor of St. Patrick[232] at their head,” enjoined a general abstinence from Wednesday to Sunday every month, with other penitential observances; and ”the men of Ireland were saved for that time from the fire of vengeance.”[233]
But the most important event of the period was the contention between the northern and southern Hy-Nials. Murtough was planning, with great military ability, to obtain the supreme rule. The Archbishop of Armagh and the clergy strove twice to avert hostilities, but their interference was almost ineffectual. ”A year's peace” was all they could obtain. In the year 1100, Murtough brought a Danish fleet against the northerns, but they were cut off by O'Loughlin, ”by killing or drowning.” He also a.s.sembled an army at a.s.saroe, near Ballyshannon, ”with the choice part of the men of Ireland,” but the Cinel-Connaill defended their country bravely, and compelled him to retire ”without booty, without hostages, without pledges.” In 1101, when the twelvemonths' truce obtained by the clergy had expired, Murtough collected a powerful army, and devastated the north, without opposition. He demolished the palace of the Hy-Nials, called the Grianan of Aileach.[234] This was an act of revenge for a similar raid, committed a few years before, on the stronghold of the O'Briens, at Kincora, by O'Loughlin. So determined was he on devastation, that he commanded a stone to be carried away from the building in each of the sacks which had contained provisions for the army. He then took hostages of Ulidia, and returned to the south, having completed the circuit of Ireland in six weeks. The expedition was called the ”circuitous hosting.” His rather original method of razing a palace, is commemorated in the following quatrain:--
”I never heard of the billeting of grit stones, Though I heard _[sic]_ of the billeting of companies, Until the stones of Aileach was billeted On the horses of the king of the west.”[235]