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CELTIC IRELAND

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CELTIC IRELAND

BY

SOPHIE BRYANT,
Al'THOR OF

D.Sc.

EDUCATIONAL EMJS

'The only

better is a Past that lives

through an added Present stretching
"
In hope unchecked

On

still

George Eliot

LONDON
KEGAN PAUL, TRKNCII

& CO.,

i.

PATKKXOSTFR SQUAKi:

1SS9

SEHN BY

ATlON
SilRVlCtS

HATE

DA

/0.2-. S%3

(The rights 0/ translation and of reproduction are reserzed.)

CONTENTS
Introduction.

Chapter

I.

II.

Sources of Evidence

Erin and Alba

...

III.

Erin and Europe

IV.

Pagan Ireland

V.
VI.
VII.

...

Ethnology of Ireland

.\t

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

Home

Christianity in Ireland

...

...

in

Erin

...

...

...

30

...

68

54

106

...

Social and Political Institutions

The Arts

...

...

...

...

/'

ix

rj2
177

MAPS
(i)

Celtic Ireland, showing

the Divisions of the

Kingdom,

the

important Pagan Centres, the Chief Monastic Schools, and

the Danish Settlements

(2)

...

...

Frontispiece

Ethnological Map of Europe at the Dawn of History,

showing the probable Lines of various Race-Migrations
Ireland

(3)

...

Europe early
Range of

...

in

...

...

...

the Seventh Century, showing

Irish Missionary Influence in the

Dark Ages

to
...

the
...

60

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

ETHNOLOGY,
"Origins of English Histoiy."

Ere.

Charles Elton.

(B. Quarilch.)

" The Races of Britain." John Beddoe. (Triibner and Co.)

" Rude Stone Monuments. "
(John Murray.)
J. Fergusson.

W.F.Skene.

"Celtic Scotland."

" Early Britain."

"

J.Rhys.

Pre-historic Times."

Sir

(Edmonston and Douglas.)

(S.P.C.K.)

John Lubbock.

(Williams and Nor-

gate.)

AND LITERATI' RE.

HISTORY, TRADITION,
" History
O'Grady.

of

Ireland,

and

Critical

Philosophical."

Standi>li

(Sampson Low and Co.)

"History of Ireland."

JelTry

Keating.

(E.

O'Mahoney, New

York.)

" History of Ireland

son

Low and

" Early Bardic

son

Low and

Heroic Period." Standish O'Crady.

(Samp-

Standish O'Crady.

(Sanp-

Co.)
Literature of Ireland."

Co.

" Origin and Growth of Religion

dom."

J.

Rhys.

"Manuscript

as illustrated by Celtic

Heaiheii-

Ilibbert Lectures, 1SS7.

Materials

(Williams and Norgate.

of

Irish

History."'

Eugene

O'Curry.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

VI li

G. T. Stokes.

"Ireland and the Celtic Church."

(Hodder and

Sloughton.

"St. Patrick, Apostle of Iieland."

J.

(Hodges

H. Todd, D.D.

and Figgis.)
"Writings of

(Hodges and

St.

G. T. Stokes and C. H. Wright.

Patrick."

Figgis.)

"Tripartite Life of St. Patrick and other Documents."

Stokes.

Whitley

(Eyre and Spottiswoode.)

" Celtic Romances."

P.

W.

Joyce.

(Kegan Paul, Trench and Co.)

LAWS AND INSTITUTIONS.

" Manners and Customs
with Introduction by

W.

of the Ancient Irish."

" The Brehon Laws."

Translated by O'Donovan and O'Curry.

(Longmans, Green and Co.)

" Early History of Institutions."

Sir

THE FINE
" Early Christian Art
and Hall.)
" Notes on
(Bell

Eugene O'Curry,

(Williams and Norgate.)

K. Sullivan.

in Ireland."

H. Maine.

(John Murray.)

ARTS.
Margaret Stokes.

Irish Architecture," with Photographs.

(Chapman

Lord Dunraven.

and Sons.)

" Ancient Music of Ireland."

"Manners and Customs

4S4-636, and

vol.

iii.

E. Bunting.

(Hodges and

Figgis.)

of the Ancient Irish," Introduction, pp.

ch. xxx.-xxxviii.

INTRODUCTION,
SOURCES OF EVIDENCE.

The

study of history, at

the means by which

its

best, implies inquiry into

human

character, in

national varieties, has developed

Irish history,

writers

more perhaps than

itself.

in that of

and readers are alike apt to

Attention

concentrated, not

is

any of

its

In the study of

any

other,

lose sight of this.

unnaturally, on the

melancholy story of the Anglo-Irish quarrel, and generally with a

view to either excusing or accusing one or

other of the parties concerned.

it

may, indeed, be unavoidable that

be studied
it,

While the quarrel

in

as well as

interest

settled

all else in Irish history,

from the light

the

it

Nevertheless,

derives

its

highest

can shed on the inquiry,

of people were the ancient Irish, and

now
modern

they, with the infusion of other races

amongst them, developed

Irish nation
fitting

history should

the spirit of the partisan.

What manner
how have

its

lasts,

And

this,

it

may be

into

the

said with truth,

prelude to the further question,

is

What arc

INTRODUCTION.
the characteristic quahties of the Irish nation now,

and what are the circumstances necessary that

should

accomplish

mission

among

understand,

the nations which

upon

they

for

it,

out that mission to

it

it

who

is

to

question

upon

to feel

have to work

propose to deal with

history which

of Irish

invasion

will

by

fulfilment.

its

In the spirit of such inquiry,

portion

this

it

that

fulfil

laid

are called

in all times,

the answer to

Norman

is

answer to

the

part,

in

and Irishmen,

that

should

Englishmen are called upon to-day

gifts?

its

destiny

its

the

preceded the

Irish period of free develop-

Abundant ancient materials exist, out of

which have been constructed, by careful scholarly
ment.

minds,

accounts

valid

of that

history

in

all

its

most interesting and important aspects, although a

and

single complete

critical history

has never yet been written.

delay
It

in

Nor

is

of early Ireland
the reason for

the production of such a history far to seek.

were an easy task to write the story of a people

who had

a few annals

left

poetical literature

shows us a society
devoted to the

less

who

first

glimpse we catch of them

literary to the heart's core,

memory

literature revolves

heroes

but the ancient Irish were not

The

such a people.

and so

of the national past that

all

round the doings of the national

are represented

than heroes

and no great mass of

and

real history of the "

sometimes as gods no

concerns

men

itself solely

of Erin."

The bard

with the
is

in the

SOURCES OF EVIDEXCE.

XI

place of honour higher than the warrior, and he has

a definite duty to the society that supports and

His pubUc duty

honours him.

memory

the

cnslirine

in

historical

tales

it is

to preserve in his

of the

Irish

race,

to

new events as they occur, and to

composed and so pre-

verse

recite this bardic history, so

served, for the pleasure

In later times

we

and instruction of the people.

find a division of labour

among

the

and the emergence of two bardic or academic

the class of historians, whose duty coincided
classes
bards,

with that of the more ancient bards, but was probabl\'

conducted

in

a more prosaic and critical

and

spirit,

the class of poets (or Filidecht), litterateurs proper, to

whom

fell,

perhaps, the larger share of the educational

work which formed such a conspicuous

But, whether as poets or his-

early Irish society.

torians,

it is

quite clear that the definite duty of the

was

Irish bards

feature of

know compose and

to

teach, in

its

various branches, the gradually accumulating literature

of the Gael

and that

literature

had the one clear

conscious purpose, to give an account of the past

Ireland and the Irish.
are

told

that

namely

five

secondary
or

know by

should

times

stories.

any such as

this,

his

o'i

Book of Leinster we

the qualification required of a

before he could obtain

lie

In the

poet,

bardic degree, was that

heart seven times

fifty

stories,

fifty

prime stories and twice

It is

evident that this requirement,

was an

fift\-

effective guarantee against

the invention of bardic talcs out of relation to the

xu

INTRODUCTION.

general current of historical tradition

sequence we

find, as

we

and

positive, as well as negative, consistency

bardic

the

so

literature,

evidence to a

con-

in

should expect, a remarkable

throughout

each portion

that

consciousness of

whole

the

gives
in

the

narrator's mind.

Thus, by carefully trained memories, assisted by

the use of the metrical form of literary composition,

and checked by the presence

considerable literary class,

same

the

tales,

all

in

the country of a

bent on remembering

and meeting periodically

the

for

exchange of bardic ideas and refreshment of bardic

memories
in

thus

nation, steeped

the history of the

the forms and colours of imagination that were

native to the people the soil and the age, was handed

down from generation to generation. When it began

we do not know when it began to be told we
do not know nor do we know even when it began

to be

to be written down, though there

is

good reason

to

think that written books were in Ireland before the

coming of Patrick
of dates
fact

is

the

The

of

little

in

the

fifth

century.

The

consequence, however

one that does matter

we

question

for of

one

are quite sure.

old bardic literature gives us the history of the

ancient Irish, as told spontaneously and believingly

by themselves in the pagan times before Europe had

begun at all to influence their ideas. It is Irish of
the Irish, more valuable for the imaginative element
in which it moves than even for the historical truth

SOURCES OF EVIDENCE.
which

certainly enshrines.

it

It is

xiii

the fount at which

the pagan Irish drank in their moral and religious

ideas

the source of their martial aspirations the

the well whence they drew the inspiration
in

heroic age

of gentle and noble thoughts, of family affections, of

loyalty to friends, of social justice, of faith in treaties,

of

play in war,

fair

the weak,

for

of

the heroes and the immortal gods

Those heroes and heroines," says Mr.

reverence

for

of Erin.

"

"

were the ideals of our ancestors

conduct and character were to them a religion

Standish Grady,
their

of respect

the bardic literature was their Bible.

and

nurture, the imagination

of our ancestors were

Under

its

spiritual susceptibilities

made capable

of that tremen-

dous outburst of religious fervour and

exaltation

which characterized the centuries that succeeded the

fifth,

and whose

effect

portion of Europe.

It

was

felt

was the

throughout a great
Irish bards

and that

heroic age of theirs which nourished the imagination,

intellect,

issue.

may
them

and idealism of the country

such an

to

They

Patrick did not create these qualities.

He

not be created.
into a

new

found them and directed

channel."

And

truly

it

is

in

the

reason of things that the best sequence of events for

the moral history of a nation should be that characteristic Irish

of heroes.

contempt
that

that

sequence of an age of saints to an age

When
for ease,

of an

the longing for great deeds, the

is

at

height,

its

object,

no need

worthy cause

is

greater

for

self-

INTRODUCTION.

'devotion.

such a time
strikes

is

sown on well-tilled land.

deep and fast, and plants for

like seed

roots

its

of self-devotion preached

religion

time the ideal of self-devotedness

at
It
all

in the hearts of the

people.

The

mixed

ancient Irish emerge in history a

predominantly Gaelic, and, as such,

They were

blue- eyed.

gentle, as

tall,

we

race,

fair-haired,

shall

see,

in

peace, fierce in war, loving enterprise and the joy of

great deeds

the gathering together, doubtless,

in that

remote island on the shores of the Western world, of

most adventurous, the most high-spirited, the

the

minds most curious

to see

limits of the world, the

new lands and

find the

hearts most susceptible to

the tender influences of Nature and apt to be fasci-

nated by the quest of that land which

setting sun

the

poetic spirits in

nearest the

new

worlds.

out of the foremost waves of the great

human

slowly or rapidly westwards to find

.

is

most imaginative and aspiring and

all those communities that moved

was

built up,

spirit

of enter-

that covered Europe, the Irish people

to issue forth presently in the

brought them

prise

that had

over

Europe and as
and secondly

warriors,

far

same

thither,

north as

So,
drift

speeding

Iceland,

first

all

as

as missionaries carrying scholar-

ship in their train.

After the introduction of Christianity, the bardic

literature

began

to

be committed to writing with

probable completeness.

Then,

too, the

work of the

SOURCES OF EVIDENCE.
annalists

commenced

a much

of historical record, and

fore,

xv

more conscious work

somewhat less valuable, thereHistorical manuscripts

than that of the bards.

accumulated as time went on

stories

and annals, as

well as law-books and other literature.

kept either

monasteries or

in

communities

in

These were

other houses of learned

but, during the troubled times of the

Danish and Norman invasions, many of the manuscript collections

were dispersed, and a large number

must certainly have been

lost

and destroyed.

Allu-

sions to books no longer forthcoming occur in the

books which we

still

have,

and so enable us

an imperfect idea as to some part of our

to form
loss.

body of manuscript literature has, howcome down to us, dating from lOO onwards, and
dealing with a great variety of subjects. Most of
these manuscripts are copies, or embody copies from
considerable
ever,

books,

older

and internal evidence based on the

structure of the language shows that

some

parts of

them have been handed down from early times.

Thus we have, as a survival to our own time of the
old Irish
ture

of

known

activit)-,

to reflect correctly,

tion, the

This

intellectual

well-ascertained

ideas

and

quantity of

antiquity,

and

litera-

certainly

by means of verbal

tradi-

tastes of an older antiquity

Irish literature

is

now

still.

to be found not only in

Ireland, but scattered through the great libraries of

Europe.

Collections

College, Dublin, in

e.xist

in

the Royal

the library of Trinity

Irish

Academy,

the

INTRODUCTION.

XVI

Museum, the Bodleian Library,

British

the National

Library at Paris, the Louvain College, Belgium, and

this literature is

tales

The

Rome.

the College of St. Isidor at

nature of

Besides

very various.

all

the bardic

and the annals, Ireland produced many ecclebooks

siastical

number

Latin

in

but she produced a larger

in the native Gaelic,

Latin text are numerous.

common
may mention

into Irish are

subjects,

ordinary for

its

Dicuil, about 825,

and

on the

Irish glosses

Classical stories translated

and, as one example of other

a work on geography, extra-

by an

Irish

monk,

which was discovered

in the

French

written

time,

National Library in the year 18 12.

But

have already said enough, and more than

enough, to show that

historian

the difficulty of the

is

ence in

of that very literary character which

it

His

the quantity of material, and the exist-

difficulty

it

Irish

not the lack of valuable materials.

is

makes

so valuable from a philosophic, as well as interest-

ing

from a

literature

is

point

literary,

there,

of view.

The

and the historian cannot neglect

too historical to be treated simply as romance,

it: it is

and too romantic to be treated simply as

And

so

it

chronicle

immersed
perhaps

bardic

it

is

probable that early Irish history, as a

of events,
in

history.

the

will

always be more or

atmosphere of speculation

will be, for that

far to the facts of the case

peoples who have had

less

and

very reason, more true by

than the history of other

less to

say about themselves.

SOURCES OF EVIDENCE.
Certainly,

for

is

it

that reason likely to exercise a

much more

powerful influence over the people whose

past record

it

registers.

not the object of the following pages, how-

It is

ever, to deal with details in the record of Irish events.

The main

facts

of that record are attested by the

unanimous voice of
evidence from
people,

and

supported by collateral

tradition,

the history and

of other

tradition

confirmed by the testimony of

finally

later investigation into the traces left

people of a social and national

which had been destroyed.

life,

among

the Irish

the substance of

not with the record

It is

of events, except in outline, that these pages will

deal, but with the salient features of this social

national

life

the

and

laws, customs,

the old Irish people.

and

institutions of

These are revealed

a completeness and evidence that leave

to us, with
little

to be

and annals and, above

the books that have descended to us containing

desired, in the bardic stories

all, in

the Irish or Brehon law.

In any intelligible account of these

common characteristics
among all the Aryan peoples.

the

it is

not

difficult to

of

we may

early

see

institutions

But we see more, and

determine the

line of distinction.

In Ireland these institutions had a longer

life, and
more elaborate development, than elsewhere in the Western world because Ireland, protected by her island isolation, and perhaps also by

therefore a

the reputed

fierceness

of her

warriors,

was never

INTROD UCTION.
interfered with

by the Roman power, nor ever came

under the influence of the

far as

tion

it

Roman

Imperial idea.

represents what the free development

North-western
doubt,

So

goes and generally, the Irish social organiza-

it

Aryan tended

be

to

of the

though, no

contains certain characteristics of

its

own

which do not appear elsewhere, and which, moreover,

can be traced as determining elements in the history
of the Irish nation throughout

times

all

elements

which enable us to understand the forms taken by the

Irish

national

movement

understand, too, the

assimilative

force

by

it,

own

day, and to

of that extraordinary

which

nationality has absorbed into

to prevent

our

in

secret

the

itself,

idea
despite

of

Irish

all efforts

the self-devotion of the motley groups

of strangers settled from time to time, as enemies,

within the borders of the land.

CELTIC IRELAND.
CHAPTER

I.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.

Who were
this will

the ancient Irish

the less interesting

Irishmen, at

least,

it

does not admit of a

Long

before historic times

because

simply definite answer.

the Irish were in Ireland
at its

To

always be an interesting question, and none

and early

in history, if

not

dawn, they appear to have had well-marked

traditions as

to

their

origin.

Later, the

monastic

chroniclers improved on the tradition and, connect-

ing Irish story with the Biblical narrative, completed

the history of the race backwards to the flood.
idea of the

monks makes

it

not hard

the early from the late traditions.

value of the traditions as

therefore,

tions

is

This

to distingui-^h

In estimating the

we have them,

the

first

step,

to separate the mediaeval monks' addi-

from the bardic story, by means of internal

evidence

and, then, the historical value of the bardic

B

CELTIC IRELAND.
must

story

reasonable

estimated according to

be

ment which belongs

to the

the

most

out the miraculous

First, sift

tests.

ele-

atmosphere of the times,

and does not detract from, any more than

it

adds

to,

the value of the residuum.

Then, consider the prob-

able motives nnconscionsly at

work
and

of a tale intended to be true,

in

the construction

select that part of

the tale the most probable motive of which appears

to

be

its

truth.

but this

much

There

More
of

are,

it

much more of may be

however, other sources of

The

besides Irish tradition.

of the

who once

remains are

evidence

physical characteristics

human remains found

a clue to a theory

peoples

true,

it

cannot at least be disregarded.

in ancient

of race-connections

tombs give

among

the

inhabited the countries where these

found

and something can be made

of this evidence for our present subject, though

it

is

much obscured by the fact that cremation was practised by many tribes in both Ireland and Britain.
In
Ireland and in North Britain this practice prevailed

most extensively, and

it

is

in

South

Britain, or

Eng-

land, therefore, that the observation of the pre-Celtic

types within these islands

may

best be made.

We can

by analogy to Ireland and Scotland where

the same types of tombs and monuments are to be
Comparing the evidence of pre-historic ethfound.
nology and archaeology collected in these islands
reason, then,

with similar evidence

in

continental

countries,

possible for ethnologists to construct the

it

is

most prob-

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
able theory of the early race-history of either Ireland

But the subject

or Britain.

and

is

complex and

some of

yet collected, while

it

difficult,

by no means been

the available evidence has

all

has been destroyed

in

the pursuit of archaeological, apart from ethnological,

studies.

The

earliest class of

ments only are found,

tombs,

fall

which stone imple-

in

two

into

sub-classes, dis-

tinguished by the presence or absence of a stone-built

chamber

inside.

The huge

"

long barrows

"

of Salis-

bury Plain are unchambered mounds, and are probably the graves of the earliest immigrants

while

the long chambered cairns of Caithness exemplify a

more advanced order of

In these

ideas.

tombs are

found the remains of a long-headed, short-statured,

lithe-limbed race, with brain capacity good, and features well formed.

It

has been thought that these

people were of the same race as the stout-hearted

who kept

Silurcs,

power

at

bay

so long the

for

South Wales, and as the

Roman

Atticotti,

another

hard-fighting foe beyond the southern wall.

If so,

in

this race has left its

mark on the

features of a con-

siderable portion of the population in both islands, and

to

its

admixture

may

be assigned, with probability,

most of the dark hair and dark

amongst
that

us.

Silures

As we
and

e\'es that are

proceed, howcxcr.

Atticotti, or

at

least

represent a probabl)- different and

ethnological

found

will

appear

the

former,

it

more

distinctive

element, which can be traced through

CELTIC IRELAND.
Europe by the track of the stone
monuments known as dolmens or cromlechs.
Later, came to Britain another and very different

south-western

race

broad- headed,

who

powerful

large-limbed,

built circular tombs for their dead, and buried bronze

implements with them. As metal-workers they were
comparatively skilled in the arts, and had thus

advantages for conquest.

settled

But they appear to have

down peaceably by the side

and with so much respect

habitants,

and

of the older inthat the earlier

later ancestor-revering peoples are

found to have

The round

buried their heroes in close proximity.

tombs of the bronze age men are

built in

on spots that were sacred to the elder

race.

numbers

Around

Stonehenge, long barrows abound, and there are indications that Stonehenge was built
ful,

and probably

fair

people.*

that the earlier settlers

example of

may be

It is

may have

the chambered tumulus for the

by

this tall,

power-

not improbable

learnt to substitute

mound of earth, from the

their later-coming neighbours.

If so,

it

that they, and not the so-called Iberians, were

the original builders of those rude stone

monuments

throughout Europe, part of Asia, and the North of

Africa, which

seem

to indicate the presence, or the

passage, of one people in the countries where they

are found.

though

it

This theory would solve some

difficulties,

leaves others.

* Elton's "Origins of English History," ch. vi. p. 146.

See also
Greenwell's " British Barrows," for full account of both classes of tombs.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
It
tall

appears, from the sepulchral remains, that this

race had established itself along

coasts from

Sweden

the opposite

to Finisterre before they

became

acquainted with the use of bronze, and, therefore,

before they
racteristics,

came
it

is

to Britain.

From their

inferred that they

Finnish type that

still

physical cha-

were

" of the fair

prevails so largely

among

the

modern inhabitants of Denmark and in the Wendish

and Slavonian countries." * A strong light is thrown
on the subject by the comparison of

inference

this

with the theory lately put forward by philologists,

that the probable
in

home

of the

Aryan language was

southern Scandinavia, and the speech of the Finns

The

nearest relative, f

its

type, that

was

early Finnish or Ugrian

wandered westwards from the

likely to

numerous Aryan
acted too as a

tribes that followed,

medium

into England,

and may have

of solution between them and

the ancient people that preceded both.

grations

north-east,

be amalgamated easily with the more

Later immi-

Scotland and Ireland

have included mixtures of a Ugrio-Iberian and

may
after-

wards of a Celto-Ugrio-Ibcrian stock, as well

mixtures of the Ugrian with the Celt.
ture as the latter

may have

been the

as

Such a mixtall,

red-haired

Caledonians described by Tacitus,^ and the Belgae of

* Elton's

" Origins

of English History," ch. vi. p. 144.

1887, Inaugural Address to Anthropological

by Professor Sayce and paper on the " Primitive Seat of the
Aryans," by Canon Isaac Taylor.
% These Caledonians were located in mid-Scotland, north and west
of the Tay basin, while we must look to the south-west of Scotland or
north-west of England for the Atticotti.
t British Association,

Section,

CELTIC IRELAND.

Gaul

may have been

some duplex

distinguished from the Celts by

or triplex mixture of blood.

In Ireland and Scotland the pre-Celtic evidence

of the early tombs

it
is,

is

much more

is

obscure, though

was

certain that the dark short race

there.

It

moreover, quite clear that, in semi-historic times,

monuments, the

builders of one class of Irish stone

circles

and the tumuli of circular form, spread over

these countries

and

conclusion that they

their distribution points to the

came from

the North,

down

the

west coast of Scotland to Ireland, where are found

the most remarkable examples of circular tumuli in
the historic cemetery of the Irish kings on the Boyne.*

Numerous stone

circles

mark

the spots where Irish

two great

tradition reports that

battles were fought

between the Firbolgs and the later-coming Tuatha

Danann, who are said

to have replaced

domination of Ireland. f

them

De

in the

Tradition also assigns to the

Tuatha the honour of having introduced a knowledge

of metals and
suggests

some

of the

arts

of

and

this

fact

association with the bronze age

men

life

of Britain.

The monuments known

as cromlechs or

dolmens

are also found in Ireland, the finest examples, built

with very large stones, being in the north, and the

smallest in the west.

These are also found

and South Wales and

* Fergusson's

in Cornwall,

" Rude Stone Monuments,"

t Ibid., p. 175, ct seq.

in

North

but scarcely at
p. 199, et seq.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
Hence it is clear that
homes of the people
who built the dolmens, at the period when this
type of architecture grew up. The North Europe
dolmens are found in Sweden and Denmark, along
all

elsewhere in England.

these parts must have been the

the shores of the Baltic and North Sea, as far west

as the eastern parts of Holland

and no

The

further.

second and greatest European group belongs to the

west of France and the coasts of Spain.

In

the

large tract of country between eastern Holland

and

the line of the Rhone, Loire, and Seine there are no

dolmens

and these were the parts peopled by the

Celts and Belgae in the time of the

Celtic peoples thus are

marked out

original dolmen-builders,

abundantly

in the

though

dolmen

The

Romans.

clearly as not the

later

they are found

districts.*

Considering the distribution of the dolmens,

seems probable that

their builders crossed over

it

from

Brittany to Cornwall, where they are very abundant,

and were thence propagated to Wales and the south of

Ireland

may

while the larger northern Irish dolmens

have come into Ireland by a different route, as an

stalment of the tumuli and

circles.

There

is,

in-

however,

one piece of literary evidence connecting Spain with

D. O'Campo, the

Britain which should be noticed.

compiler of an important Spanish chronicle

sixteenth century, records that,

"

in

the

Certain natives of

* Fergusson's '\Rude Stone Monuments," ch.

See also map showing distribution of the dohnens.

viii.

p.

326,

ct scq.

CELTIC IRELAND.
Spain called Silores (the
joined with another;

named

Brigantes, migrated to

two hundred and sixty-one years before

Britain about

our

a Biscayan tribe,

Siluri)),

and obtained possession of a

era,

on which they

settled." *

territory there

According to

this,

there

were early migrations from Spain, as well as from

France, to Britain, and possibly to Ireland also.
the

dolmen builders did proceed

Ireland,

it

the fact

direct

ought to be possible to

in

If

from Spain to

find evidence of

the nature and contents of these rude

At

structures in both countries.

present,

we

are

still

very ignorant on the subject generally.

We
dolmen

are ignorant, too, as to the ethnology of these

builders,

who have

left

traces in Asia

and

along the African Mediterranean coast, t as well as by

the Baltic and the

Bay

More

of Biscay,

tion will solve sorrie questions

for the

investiga-

dolmens were

erected as tombs in honour of their heroes and kings

by a people who must have highly reverenced and

possibly worshipped

their

dead

and the tombs

have not yet been asked consistently to yield up

Probably, they are not

their secrets.

hands, or built

do

all

mark

in

all

due to the

honour of the dead, of one

race, but

the dominance, or at least influence, of

* See a paper on the Migration from Spain to Ireland, by Dr.

Madden, "Proceedings

of Royal Irish

Academy,"

vol. viii. p. 371, etc.

Madden

has brought together a quantity of evidence showing that

the tradition of an emigration from Spain to Ireland is wrell marked in

Dr.

the Spanish annals.

t Fergusson's

" Rude Stone Monuments,"

ch. x.

and

xii.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
some one great family of mankind, which wandered
forth to various parts and mixed its blood with,
while

it

imparted

The

to,

the other races that

and were controlled by

either preceded

and controlled

ideas

its

it

or followed

it.

indications, so

far,

are that a people from the

south, through western Britain, and partly perhaps

came to Ireland in early

came from the north, round

direct from Spain or France,

times

while another

Scotland and

in

part through

it

and that neither

of these people were Celtic, though both were possibly

mixed

in blood,

a Celtic element.

race

on the direct

may

have contained

indeed, that the northern

It is likely,

may have had

of Gaelic blood

and both

a large, even a predominant, dash

but this suggestion depends rather

literary evidence to

which we

shall

come

presently.

The Celt and the other Aryan peoples throughout

Europe have not left in their path the same kind of
monumental evidence as those who preceded them.
Perhaps their tendencies to ancestor-worship were
always

less,

though we cannot doubt that they went

far in the direction of deifying their heroes.

It

may

have been a natural consequence of a more vivid and

poetic imagination that they deified Nature at least
as
less

much,

and worshipped

than they

tombs.

Be

certain that,

rivers

and grottoes, no

performed religious ceremonies at

that as

it

may,

it

appears to be quit

though they often adopted, they never

CELTIC IRELAND.

10

monuments

invented the practice of erecting stone

such as those which enable us to see dimly the track

For the movements of the

of their predecessors.
Celtic

and Teutonic nations

in

mainly to history and tradition.

and

Europe we must look

To

the Irish records,

their evidence as to Irish ethnology,

But

presently.

first let

we

shall

come

us consider another source of

the same kind.

This source of evidence

is

one which

Irish writers

the

evidence of

might naturally be apt to neglect

old

British

and tradition as preserved by

history

Wales, and of old Alban history and tradition as

found

in

Wales and Scotland can shed some

ethnology.

and the

Alba were

Picts of

Welsh

chronicles

we

identified that they are

and the Gwyddel

having

been

allies.'

Scotland,

may

Together,

and

Britain,

in

find their races so closely

spoken of as the Gwyddel

Ffichti.

compiled

close

Roman

in

The
the

Pictish

tenth

chronicle,

century,

therefore long after the Scottish dynasty

lished in

on Irish

light

In historic times, the Scots of Ireland

they harried the coasts of

the

Both

the records of the ancient Pictland.

and

was estab-

perhaps be regarded as a

source tainted with the amiable desire to unite in

social sentiment the
is

branches of one nation

but

it

impossible to regard as quite worthless for evidence

the fact that

it

makes out Scots and Picts to be

same race. The names too

different branches of the

that occur in the early part of the

list

of Pictish kings

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.

IT

are Gaelic, and such British elements as are found

in the

names of the southern

Welsh, thus pointing to an

Picts are Cornish, not

affinity

with some Celtic

race that preceded the settlement of the Britons, and

may have

been mixed with non-Aryan stock.

in the chronicle of

Again,

the Picts and Scots, which was

compiled in the fourteenth century, an important

piece of traditional evidence
that

told

in

is

We

recorded.

very early times seven kings

are

of the

Cruithnigh, or Picts, of Alba, reigned over Erin in

Tara

and we

find that the seven are

mentioned

the Irish annals as kings of the Firbolgs, the

them

being

celebrated

the

traditional

first

in

of

character,

Ollamh Fodhla, to whom some legends refer the

foundation of Tara as the capital of Ireland. Thus
both traditions point to a time when the same race
was settled over considerable portions of the two
islands under different names, and so impressed
themselves on the imagination, of their successors as
to appear to

time

have been the dominant races

for the

in each.

Coming now

to definitely historic times,

we

find

a colony of Picts settled in the north of Ireland under

the

name

of Cruithnigh, and the Irish annals contain

no hint that they spoke a different language from

the Irish proper,

whom

the

Romans

called Scots.

Either these Cruithnigh were a remnant of the old

settlement
points,

from Alba to which the Pictish record

and the Scots some new

race, different

though

CELTIC IRELAND.

12

now dominating the island, or the colony

new one, differentiated from the earlier settled

kindred,

was a

people of the same race by

its

alternative, so far at least as the divergence

the two races

is,

is

The

concerned.

however, important, and there

show that

We

mere newness.

shall see reason presently for inclining to the

former

between

identity of language
is

much evidence

to

and Scots spoke the same

historic Picts

language, or languages differing only as dialects of

the
the

same Gaelic speech.

Picts

For example,

in later

times

who were surrounded by

of Galloway,

Britons spoke, not Cymric, but the Gaelic tongue

and we know that

Picts, did

St.

Columba,

mission to the

not need an interpreter for his intercourse

when he

with the king, but only

went

in his

or his comrades

where probably the lan-

to outlying districts,

guage, as well as the race, of the early non-Celtic

settlers still held

ground.

The whole evidence

the Pict
far to

is

by Mr. Skene,* and goes

prove his conclusion that the

out in history,
races

as to the racial character of

carefully collated

Pict, as

he stands

a variety of Gael, whatever other

is

may have been

associated with him, or absorbed

by him, in the formation of that unconquered little

kingdom of Pictland. Professor Rhys's main conclusion does not differ so

appears at

sight.

first

non-Aryan people
*

much from Mr.

He

Skene's as

finds the Picts to

be a

the original Iberians whose

"Celtic Scotland," vol.

i.

his-

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
tory

is

mixed

13

however, with that of the Cale-

up,

whom

donians dwelling to the south of them, and

considers

Mr.

be undoubtedly Gaelic*

to

Ugrian element

again, finds the

in the Pict,t

he

Elton,

and

his

some extent admitted if there

conclusions to which we have

conclusion must be to
is

anything

the

in

The exact

already come.

element

in

the

limitations of the Gaelic

ethnology of

Scotland does

not,

however, affect the question of Irish ethnology very

If there

greatly.

was a large Gaelic and Gaelic-

speaking element within the area of Pictland, which

paved the way

for its

Scotland, this was

ultimate

development into

probably the element that co-

operated with the Scots,

who were

certainly Gaels,

Gwyddel

in their

warlike expeditions, and was called

Ffichti

by the Welsh.

Pict to

which the traditions of the Pictish chronicle

This was undoubtedly the

refer.

This Pict
donian
foe

whom

naturally identified with the Cale-

Tacitus describes as the most powerful

which the enemies of

The

Gauls, he

tall

and

to

is

tells us,

fair-haired,

are

Rome met

in

somewhat

like the

North

Britain.

Germans,

and the Britons are not reported

be different from the Gauls, while the

remnants of the older

race, are

like the Iberians of Spain.

dark and

The

Silures,

curly-haired,

Caledonians, on the

other hand, are larger-limbed than any of these, and

" Early Britain," ch. v.
t Elton's " Origins of English History," ch.
* Rhys's

vi.

CELTIC IRELAND.

14

with redder hair, more similar to the Germans than

are the

On

Gauls.

account

of their appearance,

German

Tacitus imagines that the Caledonians had a

origin,

but the evidence of language, and the fact that

Germans were

the
this

idea.

It

that

inference

east of the

still

seems, however, to
the

Celtic

stock

Rhine

discredit

be

probable

whence the Cale-

donian sprang had a dash of some other race

in

it,

which tended to the production of larger limbs and

redder hair; and the

who
of

we

men

of the circular British tombs,

tombs

also resemble those found in the stone-age

Denmark,

rise inevitably to one's

mind.

And

here

are reminded of a tradition recorded, not only

the Pictish chronicle, but by Bede, by the

Britonum," and by the Welsh

the Picts

came from

"

by

Historia

triads, to the effect that

Scythia, and

first

acquired Ork-

ney and Caithness, spreading thence over Scotland

from the north. In the Irish legends we also find one
of the Irish races

not the Scots with physical cha-

racteristics not unlike those

Picts, as described

by

of the Caledonians, or

Tacitus, and with associations

pointing to an origin in the north-east.

But, probable as

were ethnic brothers

relationship,

more

whatever

it

is

that the Scots and Picts

to a certain point, with

was, to the Briton,

it

between

yawned between them.

their

social

institutions

The

still

some

difference

sufficiently

showing a marked divergence

some

is

certain that a great historical gulf must, at

time, have

this,

it

up

proves

in their past,

and

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
in the influences of racial

on them, by different

admixture which had acted

surviv^als

handed down from the

\t

past.

in

It is

the

institutions

pretty generally

known

that the Pictish law of inheritance

female

line.

throne,

for

but

his

Such a law
when,

for

sister's

is

sons,

Not a man's

were his natural

some reason or

by marriage

belonged

heirs.

a very clear reminiscence of a time

other, the tribal idea

a shape which prevented the formation of

dren

in the

on the fact that he was his

instance,

mother's, rather than his father's, son.

sons,

was

Pictish king based his right to the

time when the

woman and

always to her

tribe,

took

new families

the

her chil-

husband

attaching himself to her tribe rather than, as in the

ordinary case, she attaching herself to his.
Now, the
Gaelic tradition of Ireland gives not a single trace of

any such
had

it

idea.

Either the race never had

so long ago that even the imaginative

of the Gael had lost

all

hold of

it.

it,

or

had

memory

This single fact

would appear, enough to show that, if the

Gwyddel and the Gwyddel Ffichti really were ethnic
brothers, they were brothers that had parted long
ago and made their way by different paths to the
is,

it

sister

lands in which history finds them.

Professor

Rhys

considers that this institution of

descent in the female line

is

one of the strongest

proofs that the Picts were essentially

it

might, on the face of

*

it,

non-Aryan

;*

and

very well be that they

Rhys's " Early Britain," pp. i66, 167.

CELTIC IRELAND.

derived the institution from their non -Aryan side, the

primitive inhabitants with

more

or less

Tacitus described

The

whom

perhaps more

difificulty still

the

in

they amalgamated

days

after those

when

red-haired Caledonians.

tall,

remains, however, that

we have no

particular reason to assign these institutions to the

earlier settlers
it

any more than

to the

Aryan

folk,

and

seems more reasonable on the whole to think that

they represent the survival of a custom based on a

long-vanished state of society, which custom survived
in

this

and not

particular case,

in

others, because

circumstances did not arise to require or suggest

On

abolition.

that supposition

side of the channel

its

its

existence on one

and not on the other indicates a

separation of history very considerable between two

branches of the same

race.

So much we might

infer if the Irish ethnic tra-

but they do exist, and are

ditions were non-existent

the most light-giving of

all

the traditions that bear

on the history of the early peoples

Let us see now what they

say.

Do

in

both islands.

they

tell

us any-

thing of that long-headed, lithe-limbed race, whose

flint and their graves oblong, who
by some anthropologists to be of Iberian

weapons were of
are thought
stock,

and

to

be perceived

Do
headed man ?
to-day?

have contributed an element which can

in the British

they

And

tell
is

and

Irish populations of

us anything of the
there

any

round-

traditional evidence

that a Gaelic or semi-Gaelic race from the

north,

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.

1/

similar to the Pict, preceded the Scot, or Gael proper,

in the

settlement of Ireland

Throughout the ^vhole of the early

deeply imbedded

literature,

in the Irish idea of Irish origin,

find the tradition of three Celtic races

who

The

themselves successively as lords in the land.

first

of these

is

we

established

called the Firbolgs, the second the

Tuatha De Danann, and the third are the Milesians

from South Europe,*

victors

over

traditional

all,

and chivalry

depositaries of the vigour, enterprise,

of the Irish race, and presumably of the literature,

since they are

its

prime heroes.

predecessors, however, are

powers
but

of

magical

may

this

constitutes

the

skill

To

their

immediate

more

especially assigned

and

nature-knowledge

which

be connected with

the

main

interpreting the

legend, that these

difficulty

in

fact,

Tuatha De Danann appear

distinct characters,

first

in

two

as a real people preceding

the Milesians in the occupation of the country, and

secondly as that race of immortal beings to which the

soil of Ireland

not the

the mighty " Sidhe

"

race of Miledh

was

of Irish mythology,

sacred,

who degene-

rated later into the fairies of Irish folk-lore, dwelling

*

The Spanish

records agree with the Irish, as already noted, that

was emigration from Spain to Ireland.

Colmenar, in the
"Annals of Spain and Portugal" (1741), vol. ii. p. 55, sums up the
" History informs us that two hundred years before Jesus
matter thus
there

Christ the Biscayans plied on the sea in vessels

made

of the

tnmks of

hollowed and covered with leather, and with a fleet thus constructed they went to Hibernia, now called Ireland, and took possession
trees

of

it."

CELTIC IRELAND.

in the lakes

This

and

confusion

hills

and

at the

may

be

partly

many

of the stories

sea.

due to a natural

monks who wrote out

rationalizing tendency in the

so

bottom of the

tendency to minimize the

mythical element and represent the race of gods as a

men

race of

but

it is

likely

due to the native genius

enough

to

be as largely

for idealization,

which alike

transformed the Milesian hero into a heroic god

and

De Danann magic-worker

tire

who

controls in Ireland the

into the immortal

power of earth and

air

and sky.

Taking the Tuatha De Danann to be a real race

of men, they may have been the builders of circles
and circular tombs from the north, who came south

by the Orkneys and Caithness, and were

in

identical

with the Picts of Scotland, though separated

in part

If so, the

their later history.

bronze-age

cannot be wholly dissociated

Britain

men

of

from them

though, since these came probably by a different

route,

from the Frisian coast to Yorkshire, quite

different mixtures

One

contrast

is

may

be represented by the two.

remarkable.

The Scotch and

Irish

same kind as those in England show that

tombs
cremation had been more generally adopted by the
races which buried in them. This indicates some quite
of the

different
* It

is

implies a

dominant

idea,*

only a surmise of

more

and points to the conclusion

my own,

but I suspect that this practice

spiritual conception of immortality in the races to

was indigenous, and indicates the presence

its wide grasp of imaginative reason.
it

of the

Aryan

which

intellect

with

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.

that the Scotch and Irish tomb-builders of this class

were not

in the

main of the same race and period

as those in England.

Danann, they spoke

If they

De

were the Tuatha

Perhaps they came out

Gaelic.

from their Scandinavian home after the dominance

of the Aryan had been long established there, the
Finnish element having mainly migrated
But, however that

parts.

may

be, this

to

other

wave of immi-

gration to Ireland was, without doubt, chiefly Gaelic,

if

the evidence of tradition counts for anything at

The

Irish

all.

legends, however, have something

to

say about earlier settlers than the three races already

mentioned, and the Fomorian sea-rovers, who, according to the story, settled and fought in the north-west
of Ireland before the coming of the Celts, may have

been a

tribe of pure

Ugrian extraction coming round

the north of Scotland from

land,

Denmark

or Scandinavia.

Ugrian race

settled, however sparsely, in Scotand the Tuatha De Danann came to Ireland

If this

from that country, it is easy to imagine one way in

which the modification of Gael by Ugrian might have

come

to pass in them.

It is

Mr. Skene's opinion,

and the description of physical characteristics

legend tends to bear

Danann correspond

it

to

out,

that

in Irish

the Tuatha

De

Tacitus's large-limbed, red-

haired Caledonians, and the brown-haired Scot to a

purer Celtic

tj'pe,

or a type which,

a different mixture.*
*

"

Celtic Scotland," p. 179.

if

mixed, was

CELTIC IRELAND.

20
It

seems so natural to identify the Firbolg of

tradition

with the so-called

Irish

Iberian or dark-haired

stock, that writers not familiar with the Irish litera-

The evidence

ture often do so unhesitatingly.

literature

is,

however, a stumbling-block to this iden-

The

tification.

of the

Iberians were small

we

the Firbolgs,

are sometimes told, were of great stature

the Milesians, though less beautiful.

taller

The

were dark-haired, but the Firbolg Ferdiad

than

Iberians
in

the

greatest of the Irish heroic tales has golden hair

and

blue eyes, as well as noble stature.

Milesian foster-brother,
slay

him

in single fight,

who

Cuculain, his

has been compelled to

mourns over him with these

words
" Dear
Dear
Dear
Dear

Of
is

this

to
to
to
to

me was thy beautiful ruddiness,

me thy comely perfect form,
me thy clear gray-blue eye,
me thy wisdom and eloquence." *

kind of evidence there

impossible to reconcile

it

is

abundance, and

Firbolgs were simply of Iberian race.

they must surely have

left

it

with the idea that the

If

they were

a different tradition behind

them, even supposing that they were very early fused

in the rest of

the peoples.

Hence

Irish scholars see

first

wave of

of Celtic extraction

like the

in the Firbolg, not the Iberian, but the

the

Aryan immigration

other two, though

it

may

* Introduction to O'Curry's "

Irish," p. Ixxii.

be mixed with non-Aryan

Manners and Customs of the Ancient

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
elements before
adulterated

in

The more

it

arrived

21

Ireland,

in

and further

same way afterwards.

the

the Irish tradition

is

studied, with the

other evidence and the antecedent probabilities, the

more probable

it

seems that

it

an exact

reflects

fact,

The Firbolg

a really threefold Celtic immigration.

came, as some scholars think with good general reason,

from the Belgic coasts, across South Britain and

Wales

an impure Gaelic type absorbing

the earlier British races before

further

still

reached the Irish

it

Next came the Tuatha De Danann from the

North through Caledonia. Last came the warlike

shores.

Milesian from Spain or South France.

Nevertheless, the Iberian
land.

Once he may

there even

is

now

have been the ruler there

in the

and

may be that Irish legend has faintly reflected the

memory of that time in its story of the Partholanians,
who preceded, not only the Gaels, but the Fomorians
also.
However that may be, it is certain that in

it

Ireland, as in Britain, the Iberian has left his

on the physique of the people.

Dr.

Sullivan,*

"

few broad

"

There

were two

distinct

types

In the

are," writes

regarding

facts

ethnology of ancient Ireland which

sidered as fairly established.

stamp

may

first

of people

the

be con-

place, there

one

high-

statured, golden-coloured or red-haired, fair-skinned,

and blue or grey-blue eyed race

* Introduction to O'Curry's

Irish," p. Ixxii.

''

the other a dark-

Manners and Customs of

the Ancient

CELTIC IRELAND.

22

or mediumThe two types may still

dark-eyed, pale-skinned, small

haired,

statured, lithe-limbed race.

be traced

in

the country, and are curiously contrasted in

their blushes

the other a

the fair-haired type has a pinkish tinge,

full red,

with scarcely a trace of pink,

their blush.

The same, or an analogous

basis of the

Welsh population, and

to a varying but

England

often inconsiderable extent of that part of

west and north-west of a

... So

Tees.

from Dorsetshire to the

far as the early ancient tales,

Bo Chuailgne,

the Tain

line

the

in

type, form the

such as

Tochmarc Eimire, and

the Bruidin Daderga enable us to judge, the Fir-

Tuatha De Danaan, and Milesians belonged

first type."
As regards the second and

bolgs,

alike to the
earlier

type,

Dr.

now

exists in a

than

in the

ing to

Sullivan argues that

much

it

probably

smaller proportion in Ireland

west of Britain, since the people belong-

having been dispossessed of the land at a

it,

very early period, were the poorest, and must, therefore,

have

fallen victims, in a larger proportion

than

other races, to that plague of famine and war which

has fallen

more

upon Ireland so much more often and

bitterly than

must be

set

upon

Britain.

Against

this fact

another important fact with an opposite

tendency, namely the just and sympathetic govern-

ment, under which

all

races in Ireland at an early

date lived, which showed

customs and laws

weak

itself in

the institution of

for the protection of the

poor and

against the rich and strong, and in the opening

up to

talent

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.

23

and industry of the path that leads

to

Dr. Sulliv-an's argument goes,

honour and wealth.*

however, to prove that only the descendants of the

among

" fittest "

the Iberian race

Ireland are veiy

in

now only the able and industrious

who had used the advantages of the Irish

likely to be there

families

law to win a social vantage-ground for themselves, or

endowed with such

those

stitution as enabled

a vitality of physical con-

them, poor as they were, to

live

through the horrible periods of privation and physical

suffering so familiar to students of later Irish history.

The
light

on

however, throw

this subject of the aboriginal

"

the

all

Hence
is

legends,

little

it

men

of Erin

that, despite

is

"

or no

Iberian settle-

Evidently there was early a bardic

ment.
that

Irish

fiction

were of the same

race.

evidence to the contrary,

it

so tempting to identify him, in part at kast, with

Perhaps the most satisfactory hypo-

the Firbolg.
thesis

would be that the Firbolg represents the

result

of a Celtic wave of immigration, which had partly

absorbed the aboriginal element on

tinued

still

further to absorb

it

its

way, and con-

after the

Milesian

conquest had brought the preceding colonists into

The rent-paying

of the

second

century would, then, consist mainly of this

mixed

subjection.

tribes

Firbolgic element, with a Milesian infusion of those

who, by the action of natural causes, had

social scale

till

fallen in the

the servile ranks were reached.

* See Chapter \'I.

CELTIC IRELAND.

24

The most

definite account

Mac

distinctions

of the

between the three Irish races that

have been able

book of the genealogies, covipiled in the years 1650 to 1666, and said
by him to be " taken from an old book " as " the
distinction which the
profound historians draw
to find

is

given in

between the
"

Firbis's

which are

different races

Every one who

in Erin."

white (of skin), brown (of hair),

is

bold, honourable, daring, prosperous, bountiful in the

bestowal of property, wealth, and rings, and

not afraid of battle or combat

who

is

they are the de-

scendants of the sons of Milesius in Erin.

"

Every one who

adepts in

all

every musical

Druidical and magical arts

are the descendents of the

"

Every one who

is

wretched,

mean,

Tuatha De Danann

black-haired,
noisy,

tale-telling,

guileful,

who

every slave, every

every churl, every one

who

is

contemptible

the
;

they

in Erin.
tattler,

every

unsteady, harsh, and in-

strolling,

hospitable person

person

and entertaining performances

professors of musical

who are

fair-haired, vengeful, large

is

and every plunderer

mean

thief,

loves not to listen to music

and entertainment, the disturbers of every council and

every assembly, and the promoters of discord among
people

these are the descendants of the Firbolgs, of

the Gailiuns of Liogarne, and of the Fir

in

Erinn.

Domhnaans

But, however, the descendants of the Fir-

bolgs are the most numerous of

* O'Curry's

'*

Lectures on

MS.

all these."

Materials/* p. 223.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAND.
The

description

is

clearly Milesian in sentiment,

and breathes somewhat strongly the

ency

25

but, passing that,

it

of ascend-

spirit

brings out very clearly the

idea of two dominant races well contrasted, and

an unmistakable indication

black hair of this race

is

of Iberian

and

affinities

if

all

the

of Irish

rest

tradition were consistent with this passage, from

writer

whose

date

is

The

subject-race containing miscellaneous materials.

unknown,

would

there

be

nothing to prevent our acceptance of the hypothesis

that the Irish Firbolgs were mainly Iberian.
is

we cannot

accept

It is certain,

As

it

it.

however, that at the

dawn

of Irish

tradition all the peoples of Erin spoke one language,

and were settling down together side by side under

one

set

of

to

make such

ideas

social

obvious tendency

and

with an

institutions,

to obliterate race-distinctions,

and

natural paths of communication between

the aristocracy and the democracy that the social rise

of families, on the one hand, and their

other, should

be very possible.

fall,

Doubtless,

it

on the

was the

pressure of this social tendency to national unity of

thought and feeling

that, acting

on the bardic mind,

produced the beautiful legend of Nemidh and

in

his sons,

which the three peoples of Ireland are exhibited

as having sprung from a

Ireland.

and, after

common

Thence they parted

many

Irish ancestor in

in different directions,

wanderings, returned one by one to

the old home, meeting each other as foes, but soon to

26

CELTIC IRELAND.

be reconciled and to rejoice

old

common

the recognition of the

in

language which

The

had kept.

all

Nemidh, so runs the story,* were scattered

over Europe in three bands. The band first to return,
children of

after

wanderings

in

Northern Europe, was that of the

The second band went

Firbolgs.

to

Scythia, and,

returning thence, met their brethren in Ireland and

fought a mighty battle for the possession of the country.

The

story

from the

tells

us

how when
own

the other speak in his

common

the

discover

found to be different
thick,

ends, while the

shaped,

The

thin,

third

after

other's

the Firbolg was

De Danann
slender,

up

played the principal part

spears.

Southern Europe, and,

sail

from Spain for

their royal dynasties,

in

and character of that nation

race were

at the

two beautifully

sharp-pointed

forth to

set

armed with

rounded

carried

long,

years had passed, set

where they

But

weapons, these were

pointless spears,

band went

many

Ireland,

language, and delighted to

lineage of their tribes.

when they examined each

two heavy,

the two ambassadors

each was surprised to hear

rival hosts met,

perhaps as easily

and

moulding the fortunes

in

which distinctions of

lost

in those

times as

they have always inevitably tended to lose themselves

since

that people whose most familiar

men

of Erin,"

who never

suffered a

to be given to their island. f

* O'Curry's "Lectures on
t

MS.

title

was

"

the

mere race-name

have told

this legend

Materials," p. 245.

For etymology of the name Ireland, from the Gaelic Eriu (old

ETHyOLOGY OF IRELAND.
not because

believe

have any probable bearing

to

it

2/

on the actual history of events, but because

forth

an

which

ideal truth

is

In terms of ethnic legend

potent

in

on

effects

its

it

later

shadows

it

much more

important.
fact,

so

Irish history, that

no

expresses the

race once planted on Irish shores can escape absorption into the substance of the Irish people.

Some may

think

improbable that a band of

it

immigrants should come to Ireland direct from the

Continent without naturally landing

in Britain first

way from

but, as a matter of fact, the idea that the

the world to Ireland

modern

origin.

across Britain

lies

one of quite

is

In the historic period of the early

Christian centuries, Ireland was in

constant direct

communication with France and continental Europe

and we have

generally,

it

on the authority of Tacitus

that the ports of Ireland were well

in

Indeed,

his time.

map

is

it

known

to

merchants

sufficient to look at the

of Europe, and realize the conditions of travelling

before the growth of the

Roman

empire, to see that

nothing could be more natural than the descent from

the South of the Milesian Gael on the south-west
coast of Ireland, which

is

the traditional place of his

Nor could anything be more improbable

landing.

than that a southern

tribe

should

reach

Ireland

through Britain, as northern and eastern tribes probIrish

Iveriu),

MUller's

thinks

'"'

it

" western

see

note

by

]\Ir.

Whitley Stokes

in

Lectures on the Science of Language," vol.

is

probably connected with the

" or

"

posterior."

Professor
i.

p. 284.

Max
He

Sanskrit avara, meaning

28

CELTIC IRELAND.

Add

ably would.
that

the

to these considerations the

early historic

travelling,

having

Irish

the northern

explored

fact

were much given to

Christian times as far as Iceland at least,

seas

and

in

the

improbability of the Milesian story entirely vanishes.

Indeed,

we may go

general,

though vague,

Irish tradition that the island

was

more

periods

in

a step further,

distant

settlers

from the south and east

though

it

and see that the

home

various

probable enough,

is

lacks sufficient positive evidence.

In the making of the Irish people, as

them, the

for

last

we

first

find

band of Gaelic-speaking immigrants

played, as the rulers of the country, a leading part.

What

further evidence

is

there that they

came

direct

from Spain, without contact with Britain, as the legend

clearly tells us

We

have already seen good reason

to associate the Irish Gael with his

Caledonian

Pict,

and yet

Alban brother the

them also. The

to dissociate

theory of an immigration direct from the continent of

Europe does
tionally.

and the legend

this,

Thus

probability.

it

It

has an
accounts,

fills

the

gap uninten-

independent antecedent
too,

for

the

difference

between the fair-haired and the brown-haired Gael,

though

this

is

not important.

Again, the discovery

by Grimm of a Gaelic element

in

the language of

Aquitaine, in the fourth century,* affords substantial

support to the Irish tradition that the Milesians came

* Sullivan's Introduction to

the Ancient Irish," pp.

O'Cuny's " Manners and Customs of

lix., ct scq.

ETHNOLOGY OF IRELAXD.
from Spain (or at

least thereabouts), since

settled

in

shows us

it

were at some time

people

that a Gaelic-speaking

29

south of France, near to the place

the

whence the sons of Miledh are said to have come, in

search of new lands and with a spirit high for adventure, preferring the

to the less distant

noticed,

more distant Erin, we may

Alban

Aquitaine,

coasts.

it

infer,

may

between the Garonne and the Pyrenees,

is

be
the

one piece of south-west France which yields no dol-

mens;* and

this,

Another

as

link

Milesian story

is

we have seen, is a mark

in

the

of the Celt.

chain of evidence for the

suggested by the presence on the

west and south-west coast of pre-historic

forts,

very

large and strong, which are not to be found, with one

We

or two exceptions, in the rest of Ireland. f

have occasion to
will suffice to

shall

Here

refer to these again later.

it

remark that as defences they are incom-

parably superior to the earthen

forts, so-called,

of the

ancient Briton and of the Irish in the eastern parts,

and that

it is

imagine

difficult to

where they

are, unless

settlement,

making good

built

why they

should be

by some race bent on

their position in the country.

That race could not have

built

them coming

direct

from Britain, for that would imply a sudden architectural inspiration of a fabulous sort.

a race would have been

more

the side of the country where

pt.

i.

likely to build
it first

them on

planted itself

" Rude Stone Monuments," p. 32S.

Dunraven's " Notes on Irish Architecture," with Photographs,

* Fergiisson's
t

Moreover, such

sect.

i.

CELTIC IRELAND.

30

CHAPTER

II.

ERIN AND ALBA.

The

first

event

Irish history of

in

any certainty that

it

happened,

as his point of departure

is

The

marked out

Irish historian

As

the testimony

of scholars since goes on

we cannot do

the one

feel

by the great

Tighernach, seven centuries ago.

selection,

which we can

the whole to support his

better than follow his lead.

chronicles compiled

by the monks take us back

into far distant regions of time, thousands of years

before the birth of Christ.

But the

critical

intellect

of Tighernach pronounced the accepted chronology

to be uncertain.

So, while a protest should be entered

against the neglect of

all

this

mass of tradition and

even the chronology inferred from

line will

draws

it,

the historical

probably best be drawn where Tighernach

it.

In 299

B.C.,

Kimbay Mac

the children of lar, founded

entrenched seat of

Fiontann, the chief of

the royal

Emain Macha, and

Ulster a powerful confederacy.

palace

and

established in

His wife

is

repre-

ERIN AND ALBA.

sented to be Macha,

who appears

in Irish story as the

war-goddess of the Ultonians, and he built the palace

on the heights of Macha, called Ard-Macha,

the place

which

is

now known

as

the ancient capital of Ulster was that

St.

in Gaelic,

Armagh.

Thus

Armagh where

Patrick afterwards established the primacy of the

The true capital of Ireland

however, Armagh, but Tara, so soon as there

Irish Christian Church.

was

not,

was a

capital at

It is

all.

not the purpose of these pages to follow up

the record of Irish internal history from this starting

The

point.

fact

with

its

date

is

rather set

down

here

as a landmark showing the antiquity of that history

apart from mere legend.

with

it

and with much

Among the

details associated

later events there

the m}'thical mingled with the history

is

plenty of

but leaving

aside such details, both of legend and event,

pass on to notice certain broad

dawned

and we

facts.

find four powerful tribes

let

us

History has

contending

for the right to preside over the great national festival,

The king who had

High King of Erin, with

the triennial Feis of Tara.

that right

was

for the

time the

such honours, rights, and privileges as might pertain

to his position.

None but

the four Milesian families

had a right to celebrate the

known
lar,

These were
Heremon, Ith, and

festival.

as the children of Heber,

descendants of the four sons of Miledh according

to the tradition

we may

and

in

this distinction of families

see the basis of the country's division into

CELTIC IRELAND.

32

The

provinces.

four

struggle

made by one

strong

king or another, not only to hold Tara, but to gain

an admission of his right to hold
life

or for his family,

is

at

it,

own

either for his

once the main source of

internecine conflict and a striving to attain

by

force

Force of arms was not, however,

means by which a king was raised to
In theory, he was
the dignity of presiding at Tara.
elected by the four families, and probably the presence
to national unity.

the legitimate

in the

country of

many

powerful non-Milesian septs

contributed to the prevention of frequent combats that

might otherwise have taken

The main

place.

facts

to be noticed are, however, these, that the Irish people

had a custom of meeting

social,

at

it

was usual

to

a king to convene the assembly and preside over

and that the king who held

King

of Erin.

by

the king of this

fifth

time

this post

In later times, a

established side

for

political,

commercial, and probably religious purposes,

Tara on the plains of Meath, that

elect
it,

triennially, for

the

fifth

was the High

province was

side with the original four,

and

province of Meath came to have

right

to

Tara and

the

supreme

monarchy.

About

the middle of the

first

century after Christ,

the Aithech Tuatha, or rent-paying tribes of Erin, rose

up

in rebellion against the great

aristocracy of the land.

Milesian families, the

They succeeded in accomown leader,

plishing a revolution which placed their

Cairbre Cinn Cait, on the throne of Tara.

But, after

ERIN AND ALBA.

33

successor was defeated

by Tuathal Teachtmar, the chosen leader of

twenty-five years, Cairbre's

and

slain

the royal tribes and son of the last legitimate monarch.

Tuathal,

we

are told, immediately set about the task

of reducing his enemies to obedience

large

numbers of them

fled,

The remnant

country.

and probabl}-

or were driven out of the

of the Aithech

Tuatha were

redistributed, so as to ensure better their continued

quiescence and eventual absorption

And

races.

finally,

by the dominant

Tuathal having reorganized the

nation on a basis that

is

reputed to have been just

as well as strong, received the allegiance of

subjects,

and established

his

his

all

dynasty on the throne of

Tara.

has been supposed that these Aithech Tuatha

It

were identical with the Atticotti of contemporary

The

history.

idea

was

on

founded

fallacious

resemblance between the two names, but there

essential truth in
cotti

is

it

nevertheless, for the

considered by authorities

now

is

word Atti-

to

mean

the

ancient people,* and thus points clearly to the aboriginal inhabitants of Britain, the kindred of the Irish

displaced tribes.

It

that the Atticotti in

by the

forcible

conquered

may very

well therefore have been

North Britain were strengthened

displacement from

tribes.

Ireland

of the

Large bodies of them may also

have acted as mercenaries to the Irish monarchs on

their frequent warlike expeditions abroad.

And

* Rhys's " Early Britain," p.

275.

in

CELTIC IRELAND.

34

these ways they represent one element in the reflux

of people

during the

in

eastwards that took place from

first

four centuries of the Christian era.

an early date the sons of Erin were known

For

at

the

neighbouring countries as

We

plunder.

Ireland

men

of war and

hear of them in British history as the

Scots who, with the Picts, contributed to the general

discomfort of

on

life

the

British

These

coasts.

expeditions began, or increased, about the beginning

of the Christian era, and Irish tradition gives us

glimpses of plunder and sovereignty

Between

Alba.

lOO

B.C.

appear to have shared

north-western peoples,

in

by

and

A.D.

in

the
the

400,

the general

some

isle

of

Irish

movement

of

a reflux eastward, directed

principally towards the neighbouring larger island

and during these times they

left their

mark on the

ethnology and institutions of the British people

in

the west.

The comparatively

settled state of the country

which followed the completion of the

and counter-revolution

Irish revolution

in the first century,

bore

its

natural fruit in the result that the predatory excursions from Ireland to Britain

purpose of conquest.*

assumed a more steady

The mineral wealth

of South

Britain had been largely developed under the

rule,

Roman

and thus South Britain was a suitable object of

prey to

all

the barbarian hosts from the north-west

* Introduction to O'Curry's

Irish," p. xxxiv.,

et seq.

"Manners and Customs

of the Ancient

'

ERIN AND ALBA.

and

Picts Scots

east,

common
first

attack on

met

met, and

and Saxons

Roman

In

alike.

and Saxon

Briton, Gael

It is

curious to note that the

mention of the Saxons as enemies occurs

seventh, and of the

that the

first

Danes

and

of hostility between the races had

rise

But

in the

in the eighth century,

reference to the quarrel between the Irish

Churches.

their

as friends in that not quite holy

alliance of plunder.
first

35

in these earlier

and

Roman

centuries the Irish

attack on Britain was simply a factor in the general

descent of the young northern races

on

Roman

the

empire.^

In

the

barbarians

one of

Claudian's

poems, Briton, personified, is made to speak of Stilicho

the

Roman

general as protecting her from neighbour-

ing nations,

"when

move all lerne, and the

oars."
Cormac Mac Art in

the Scots

sea foams with hostile

the third century, and Niall of the Nine Hostages

at the

end of the

fourth, are conspicuous as leaders

of the Irish forces in these incursions.

The

relation of Ireland to

West

was of a

Britain

more interesting and permanent character.

tradition

occupation of Wales by the

colonization,

Welsh

Welsh

and topography alike bear witness

Irish, after

to the

the British

and before that determining event

history, the settlement of

western Britons, or Cumbrians, under Cunedda,

bound together

in

in

Wales by the north-

one nation, with a national

ture that has never ceased to grow,

all

who

litera-

the tribes

between the Clyde and the Severn, under the

common

CELTIC IRELAND.

36

name

of

Cymry

or

fellow-countrymen.

The Gael

was expelled from Wales, but he has left his

vestiges behind him There appea*- in fact to have been
retired, or

two

of

distinct settlements

one of Munstcr tribes

in

tribes

Irish

in

Britain,

South Wales, Devonshire

and Cornwall, and the other of Erimonian Scots

in

Anglesey and North Wales, these being practically

same band as that which settled in the Isle of

Man, The Rev. W. Basil Jones, in his work on the
"Vestiges of the Gael in Gwynedd," (z>. Wales), comes
the

to the conclusion that the Irish at one time occupied

the whole of Anglesey, Carnarvon, and Monmouthshire,

with a portion at least of Denbigh and Radnorshire.

This inference

is

topography of these

founded largely on the Gaelic

and on the presence of

parts,

unmistakably Gaelic memorial inscriptions, showing

was the language of the inhabitants in

Three possible theories may
early Christian times.
that Gaelic

be invented to account for these

facts.

The

first

is

that Gaelic was the language of the main body of

Britons once, and of these outlying branches so late

as the time of the inscriptions,
fifth,

sixth,

and seventh

of this theory
entertains

Gaelic

it

is

which belong to the

centuries.

The improbability

so evident, that no one seriously

the contrast between the districts of

ogam memorial

stones, in

Wales, and the non-Gaelic

district

old memorial stones generally, in

remarkable to be accounted

for,

North and South

without ogams, or

Mid Wales,

is

too

without the supposi-

ERLV AND ALBA.

some national

tion of

distinction.

37

The second

theory,

favoured by Professor Rhys,* and other Welsh authothat these traces of the Gael are due to an

rities, is

ancient Gaelic occupation, anterior to the true British

settlement, which ultimately confined

corners of the land.

there

some

it

no evidence of actual

is

theory.
tribes

First,

Roman

In

times,

Mid Wales,

of

it

within these

should be noted that

fact in favour of this

does appear that the

it

the Ordovices, were pressing

earlier tribes into the corners, but there

is

no

reason to think that these were Gaelic, or contained

any dominant mixture of Gaelic with the aboriginal

element.

On

Silures of

South Wales were of the so-called Iberian

the contrary, not only the fact that the

type, but the evidence of the distribution of the rude

stone structures, the cromlechs, throughout Europe,

and the

Cornwall and the two extremes of

Wales are conspicuously the cromlech districts of

South

fact that

Britain,

point

to

regions were dominated

the conclusion that these

by the pre-Ar^'an

race well

From

the facts

into the cromlech-building period.

collected

by

is

Ferguson,

it is

at least probable that

extended into post-Roman times.f

this period

evidence

]Mr.

slight,

but

it

The

points in a direction opposite

to the theory.

The

inherent difficulties

however, more
*

serious

of this

objections

Rhys's "Early Britain," ch.

t Fergusson's

hypothesis are,

than

vi. and
" Stone Monuments."

vii.

its

lack of

CELTIC IRELAND.

38
evidence,

which, indeed, would

objection taken

in

itself.

not be a positive

The hypothesis

implies

that Gaelic inscriptions of the seventh and even

later

centuries belong to early settlers of a Celtic race who,

during such long intervals of time, remained distinct,

though contiguous, and were not even amalgamated

with

the

British branch

pressure of foreign

same

of the

and

invasion

race

by the

oppression.

An

event more improbable in the history of Celtic races

it

would not be easy to imagine.

It is

supposed that

the Gael, so far as language goes, had absorbed the

tenacious and unimpressionable non-Aryan, but that

two branches of the most quick-witted and impressionable of all the Aryan races lived side by side for
centuries in the presence of foreign foes, and did not

amalgamate

to the extent of identifying

two not very

long divergent dialects of the same Celtic speech.

The

third theory supplies the solution

difficulties.

Roman
cious,

North and South Wales were,

of these
in early

times, the strongholds of the warlike, tena-

and probably unprogressive

ceded the Britons

in

race,

which pre-

the settlement of Britain, and

mark on Europe by the erection of

cromlechs and similar monuments in all those parts
that were not, at some undefined early period, dominated by the Celts or other Aryans.
In the first
century of the Christian era, the Celt had become permanently dominant in Ireland and afterwards, more
have

left their

especially in

the third and fourth centuries, he began

ERIN AND ALBA.

to be aggressive towards the sister

on the evidence of Cormac's

"

39

We have

isle.

it

Glossary," written in

the ninth century, that Irish kings collected tribute

This

south-west of Britain.*

in the

We

head-quarters.

Hostages was

know,

is

a clear indica-

by aggression from

Irish

too, that Niall of the

Nine

tion of dominion, established

slain in fight

on the Muir n-Icht, the

channel between Britain and France (a.D. 405), so that

he must either have marched across Britain or sailed

round

it

with an armed

fleet.

The Roman

legions

were withdrawn from Britain about the year 410, and

near this time the

was led by
by lightning

last great Irish invasion

who was

Niall's successor, Dathi,

killed

as far south as the foot of the Alps.

Here, then,

we have

the clear existence of a cause

quite sufficient to account for the

Gael

in

Gwynedd,

as a distinct racial entity

linguistically in later times.

century and

earlier,

There was,

marked

in the fourth

an aggressive Ireland seeking and

establishing dominion in Britain.

guage

presence of the

The

Gaelic

lan-

succeeding centuries prevailed, and

for several

we may presume,

therefore, that the Gael

nated, in those parts of

element was strong.

had domi-

Wales where the pre-Aryan

It is

improbable that

this

domi-

nation was pre-Roman, for reasons already assigned.

It is

highly probable that the aggressive Irish should,

* Introduction to O'Curry's

See also reference

evidence.

to

" Manners and Customs," p. xxxix.

of Tristan and Iseult," for further

"Romance

CELTIC IRELAND.

40

the early centuries of the Christian era, settle in

in

West
set

Britain

and dominate the old inhabitants

between two

fires

likely, go, in a fitful

of the
is

Romans

even

if the},

did not, as

thus

is

most

way, much further when the power

This then,

declined.

appears to me,

it

the true explanation of the Gaelic traces in Wales.

These traces are the mark of a Gaelic migration eastisland, under

wards to the southern parts of the larger

inhabitants adopted

the influence of which the old

some of the ideas of the

was not slow to absorb any

the language and imbibed

Gael, while the latter

element that might be useful

may

in his civilization.

be that the black-haired, grey-eyed Celt,

in

It

both

owes something better than the colour of his

islands,

hair to that Silurian persistence of idea

and tenacity

of will which are so aptly complementary to the docile

and rapid impressionability of the

intellect

But

this

is

Celt.

the least interesting aspect of the early

connection between the Welsh and Irish nations, for

Ireland owes to

that

West

represents, a debt of the kind that

bond of national sympathy.

the

sure to be a

is

About

the middle of

century, the Bishop Germanus, of

fifth

in Gaul,

which Wales

Britain,

was summoned

of the British Church,

to their help

who were

the incursions of Scots

by the bishops

suffering

Saxons and

Auxerre

much from

Picts,

and the

interference with study and religion these occasioned.

Germanus organized the

combined

Britons,

forces in a battle near

and defeated the

Mold

in Flintshire,

ERIN AND ALBA.

which

is

known

in history as

These events drew

land,

still

the Hallelujah Victory.

Germanus

the attention of

dangerous

pagan, and therefore

But about the same time

British Church.

to Ire-

the

uo
it

hap-

pened that a certain pious Briton, by name Patrick,

was greatly moved

the Irish race.

undertake the conversion

to

It is

probable that Germanus

ot

fell in

with this Patrick, and consecrated him for the mission.

It is certain that

Patrick went, and the story of his

What

labours shall be presently told.

now

is

for the

concerns us

Several places have disputed

his origin only.

honour of being

his birthplace

but the evi-

dence of his own and other early writings makes

it

probable that he came from a place called Alcluith,

which

is

identified with

Dumbarton.

This

is

now

within the Scotch border, but was then in the region

of

the

Strathclyde Britons, and bordered

narrow part of the sea between the two

on the

islands.

At

the age of sixteen, Patrick was carried into slavery

by the Scots from the opposite shore, and seven
years of slavery were passed in an Antrim glen

which can be identified to-day.

escaped and returned to his
forth his heart

to Christianity

own

At twenty-three he
people.

But hence-

was set on Ireland to win the Scots

became the ambition of his life. The

fulfilment of that

hope

is

the

first

instalment of the

debt which Ireland owes to the race

by Wales.
Most persons know that

in

the

now

represented

Dark Ages learning

CELTIC IRELAND.

42
of

all

kinds found

its

most natural and

safest

home

famous School of the West.

But

before classical and theological learning had a

home

in Ireland, the then

in Ireland,

it

well-known home

less

brought

Patrick

St.

had a

Christian

the

Britain to Ireland, but

in Britain.

religion

from

would not be correct

it

to

say that he brought the scholarship of the British

church

St. Patrick

also.

but he was not a

was something much

fine scholar, like the

the succeeding century

greater,

Irish saints of

the gulf between his Latin

Columbanus is wide indeed.

wake of Christian knowledge,
he brought with him the idea of new learning, and

style

and that of

Nevertheless, in

St.

the

the keen-witted Irish people, prizing knowledge and

literature with

an ardour due to natural disposition

and the national bardic education, needed no more

than the suggestion of such an

idea.

So we

find that,

in the first half of the sixth century, the celebrated

Irish St.

Finnian,

Ireland

in

went

tion,

saints,

famous, and

Wales

to

the monastic school

of the great schools

complete his educa-

Plnnian was

of three eminent

disciple

Under St.
became great and

David, Gildas, and Cadoc.

many were

so that,

Ireland."

first

school of Clonard

Finnian, the

to

and was there the

Welsh

it

who founded

probably the

of Clonard

as

the

the scholars that issued from

Four Masters

tell

us

called " foster-father of the

Twelve of the most eminent

twelve apostles of Ireland

were among

this

saints

saints

St.

of

the

his disciples.

ERhV AND ALBA.

43

Many

were the torches of learning lit from the torch

of Clonard
but the torch of Clonard was lit in
Wales. And this is the second instalment of that
:

debt which Ireland owes to the kindred

spiritual

genius of the gentle Cymric nation.

Not

important was the history that followed

less

the settlement in Northern Alba of the Scots from

who

Dalriada, or Antrim,
(J.e.

region

close

colonized the Airer Goidel

now

of the Gael),

The

called Argyle.

proximity of Scotland to

Antrim

is

fact

which must strike every one who has spent even a

day on the Antrim

Looking out from the

coasts.

deck of the steamer, near the entrance to Belfast

Lough,

it

is

easy to mistake the Scotch coast for

some part of the

coast on the opposite side.

two islands lean towards one another at

and the geographical

several

fact has

probably influenced

On

ways the history of each.

between was made that

The

this point,

alliance, already

the

in

seas

mentioned

more than once, of Scot and Pict, in the Roman days

and the Roman generals showed their sense of the
;

danger

that

Dalriadic

threatened

coasts,

by the

so

constantly

erection,

in

from

the

the

second

century, of a strong fort directly opposite, at Barhill

near Kilpatrick on the Clyde.

In the earliest times,

as already stated, a settlement of

found

established

in

region

Alban
called

Picts

was

Dalaradia,

which corresponds roughly to the present County

Down, and

are referred to in Irish history as Cruith-

CELTIC IRELAND.

44

On

nigh.

the other hand, the Irish Scots migrated

indefinitely

the

to

opposite

shores.

The

definite

kingdom in Argyle
from the year 502, when the Christian
Mac Ere set up his kingdom there, an

settlement, however, of a Scottish

dates strictly
prince P'ergus

outpost of Scottish Christendom on the borders of

the

still

pagan

mining factor
history
it

will

little

This settlement was a deter-

Picts.

in the after

and, although

it

course of Scotch national

is

an anticipation to do

be convenient here to trace

Scottish

community was

in

its

effects.

so,

The

no safe place, the

old alliance between Scots and Picts being practically

and a new alliance of defence between

Scottish and British Christianity having tacitly taken

dissolved,

its

place.

The

danger, be

ism of the Picts

a

special

it

on

claim

their

brother-race for instruction

What worthier

noted, lay in the pagan-

and the Pictswere old

now more
in

the

friends,

with

enlightened

Christian

faith.

object could there be of the missionary

zeal,

then taking possession of Irish imagination and

will,

than the conversion to Christianity of these

pagan neighbours
as self-devotion

great Irish saint

his

monastery

Highland

There was statesmanship, as well

and

charity, in the

Columba planned,

in the

coast, in

work which the

he set up

Vv'hen

Island of lona off the Scotch

the year 563, and prepared for

Having wisely secured the

assistance of two Irish Picts, Comgall and Canice, he
commenced his spiritual campaign by an advance on
his mission in Pictland.

ERIN AND ALBA.

the capital at Inverness

and

in

45

565,

he preached to

the Pictish king Brude himself, and converted

to

This

Christianity.

success

opened

the

him

whole

country, as far north as the Orkneys, to his missionary

efforts

for the king's favour secured a safe-conduct

everywhere.
nished

industrious,

establishments,

I\'Ionastic

the people

to

which

fur-

the example of a peaceful,

and happy community, were established

gradually throughout the land

and, after nine years

of missionary labour, the foundations of Pictish Christianity w^ere laid

on a basis which was broad and

sure.

year later (575) St. Columba was in Ireland

again, pleading at a great national council, held at

Drumceatt near Limavady, the cause of

Rule

" for his

succeeded

"

Home

brethren the Scots of Argyle, and, having

in

his

object,

he reorganized the

little

Scottish kingdom and placed Aidan, a descendant of

the great Irish king Niall of the Nine Hostages, upon

Nearly two centuries

the throne.

later, Pictland,

her kings, had a relapse into pagan ways

or

and, not

only were the Scots driven temporarily from Argyle,

but the Columban monasteries were expelled from

This was not the end, however, but far

to have taken refuge in

the realm.

from

it.

The Scots appear

Galloway, where they formed a settlement

and a

Kenneth Mac Alpine,

laying claim to the Pictish throne by descent on his
mother's side a claim which was sound under Pictish

century later

we

find their king,

law.

The

rival claimant,

however, resisted, and Ken-

CELTIC IRELAND.

46

neth entering Pictland with his followers, reinforced

ahnost certainly by

many

of the Picts themselves,

established his dynasty in the year 842.

it

That dynasty

It

brought back with

to Pictland the blessings of the

Columban monas-

was established permanently.

teries, to

the expulsion of which the Christian party

the nation referred

in

upon the

the

troubles that

had come

And, indeed, the prob-

Pictish dynasty.

seems to be very great that Kenneth owed

victory largely to the effects that had been

ability
his

wrought by Columba nearly three centuries before,

and to the falling off of the Pictish kings from his
teaching while

its

influence

was

still

potent in the

minds of the people. If so, the establishment of the

Scots as the supreme race in Alba was not effected
in any sense by force of arms, but was that much
and mind with the
and moral self-devotion.
Not Kenneth, but Columba, founded the modern

better thing, a conquest of heart

weapons of

intellectual skill

kingdom of Scotland.
Under this name in time it came to be known.
The kingdom of Scone, as it was called in Pictish
times, became presently the kingdom of Alba, and
not

till

two centuries

after

is,

in the tenth century,

to

it

generally.

By

Kenneth's accession,

was the

that time

all

name

that

Scotia applied

the Celtic elements,

and Strathclyde Britons, had become

Pict and
firmly welded with the non-Aryan remnant into one
nation, having the common Saxon enemy on its
Scot,

ERIN AND ALBA.

southern borders

and

47

was Scotland.*

this

In the

course of centuries, as every one knows, the Scottish

succeeded by inheritance

kings

the throne of

to

England, and thus the Queen of Great Britain and

is, through Kenneth Mac Alpine and
Aidan of Columba's time, a lineal descendant of that
Irish King Niall who flourished about 400 A.D.
Aidan was consecrated on a certain sacred stone,
the Stone of Fate, which was presumably brought to
Scone by Kenneth, and is now in Westminster Abbey.

Ireland to-day

This stone

used very

is

fitly as

the coronation stone

monarchs of Great Britain and Ireland. There

stands, a symbol of imperial unity, connecting by a

of the
it

"thread

poetry"

of

not

quite

nationalities of three nations

the

insignificant,

the Irish Stone of Fate

memory of Columba and the Irish line

brought, we may suppose, across the narrow

sacred to the
of kings,

sea where the islands lean over to meet each other, f

But the message of peace which Columba brought
across

the sea was not confined to the Celtic and

earlier tribes

which were

still

pagan

lona became the mother of

island.

settlements, not

only in

Scotland

the larger

in

many

mission

and the distant

islands of the north, but also in the as yet neglected

Saxon
(A.D.

south.
597),

At

there

the

time

* See Skene's " Celtic Scotland," vol.

t

but

The

its

of Columba's

were thirty-two mission

i.

for the history in full.

identity of the stone since the ninth century

earlier history rests

on an estimate of

Stone of Scone," by \V. F. Skene.

death

stations

is

quite certain,

probabilities.

See " The

CELTIC IRELAND.

48

among
Picts

among

the Scots of Alba, and eighteen

and under

the

his third successor the conversion

of the Saxons began.

Oswald of Bernicia had

in his

youth taken refuge,

during certain troubled times, with the

monks

of lona,

and from them he received a Christian education.

When,

in

later years,

Penda of

having overthrown

Mercia, he purposed to establish Christianity in North-

umbria, he turned naturally to his early teachers and

" sent to

the seniors

Scots

of the

"

for

assistance.

Bishop Aidan came from lona to Northumbria

in the

year 634, and a mission station of the usual Irish

type was set up at Lindisfarne, an island close to
"

the coast.

From

that

time,"

from the region of the Scots

says Bede,

came

many

"

daily into Britain,

and with great devotion preached the word of

to those provinces of the

faith

Angles over which King

Lindisfarne, like lona, though

Oswald reigned."
in a minor degree, became the mother of many
Thus good and lasting work was done
monasteries.
in England, although it happened that only thirty

years after the coming of Aidan, the Northumbrian

Church was

separated from

lona

the

king's

acceptance, at a council held in Whitby, of the

Roman

b}^

rather than the Irish tradition.

Across

the

narrow sea came the

Scots,

with

messages of war to their kindred the Britons on

and back they carried, at one time,

the other side

into slavery, Patrick, their future benefactor.

Across

ERIN AND ALBA.

49

that narrow sea came, for the second time, the

British
Patrick, longing to heap Christian coals of fire

on his
Across the sea came Finnian,
David in Wales, that he might sow in

former master's head.

to learn of St.

Erin those seeds of learning which yielded later

such
crop.
And presently the figure of St.

a plentiful

Columba, mightiest of all, is seen, standing as it were

on the Antrim cliffs, looking towards that Pictish
land whither none had dared to take the
message
yet.

So he took

it

and

prevailed, planting the land

with Christian communities, and

outskirts a

kingdom confirmed

as

brave,

well

as

and

free

to

organizing on

in

the

faith,

work out

its

gentle

its

own

Across the narrow sea came one strand

in the ancestry of the royal dynasty
which reigns
without rule over the four nations now, the
destinies.

fitting

symbol

of

an

imperial

unity

which

should

be
founded on national sympathies and the convergence
of national ideas after the Celtic and
Christian style,
not upheld by that weapon of blind and
tactless
force,'

on which the Norman conquerors mainly relied,

though
always in the end it breaks feebly in their hands.

The Normans, who conquered England and Wales,

settled in Ireland,

and fought long for supremacy in'

Their faith was in force. Of Norse descent,
and having imbibed the Roman imperial idea,
they
studied how to use force well. They had
a military
Scotland.

organization

which was possible to them, because

force, and could, therefore, find
it in

they worshipped

CELTIC IRELAND.

so

their hearts to subject all higher

the

demand

human

interests to

for national strength, as nations with a

The Englishman

heart set on other ideas could not.

respected force, but the tenderest spot in his heart

was

Norman

the

was patient

So, though he

after all for freedom.

when crushed by

yoke, his

instincts

were unchanged and, circumstances favouring him,

slowly and

he,

in

own doggedly

his

instinctive

rather than consciously idealizing way, wrought out

the

democratic

coming

for

the

The

herself.

England which
first

time to

ideas.

days

consciousness of

Briton of Wales believed not in force,

and cherished high above

own

full

these

in

is

all

else the

right to his

Violence done to the national ideas he

resented more than restraints on his personal liberty.

He knew

the might of the strong arm, in the experi-

ences of his hard history

he was patient, therefore,

but had an indomitable nationality.

forgiven

the

force,

but

Norman's blindness to

manners
distinct

now from

might have

he could not forgive the

this, his

sentiment other than his own.

herself off even

He

that

want of sympathy

And

so

for

Wales marks

England where Norman

control the national style, as a nationality

still

and contrasted.

The Gael

of Ireland believed so

little in

the

Norman

god of conquest that he did not realize, perhaps

He
ever, what a terrible thing the rod of iron is.
had had experience
though

after

much

in his

loss

wars with the Danes, and,

and

suffering,

had

in

his

ERIN AND ALBA.

own manner broken
let the Norman settle

So the Gael
his midst, as the Danes had
and
after, their submission

the Danish rod.

in

settled before, as well as

it

probably did not seem unreasonable to him that

king

the

England, being the greatest king

of

in

those parts, should claim the over-lordship, especially

Normans

settled in Ireland,

and kept up

his

own ways

the

land, his

of thought and feeling, his love for

instinct

for liberty,

and

By means

reason rather than force.

accomplished a twofold result

nationality

on the stranger races settled

and has imprinted that of

has by his ideas conquered the

which

the

in

sixteenth

centuries overcame his race

in

he has effaced the

own

race,

faith

his

of these he has

idea of his

instinct

their con-

But the Gael kept up

nection with the English king.

He

The

was recommended by the Pope.

as his claim

Irish

in his borders.

Norman

and

force-

seventeenth

and now he

is

in

the

van of the great democratic movement which agitates

the four nations of the United

To

Kingdom.

the Scots of Scotland belongs the honour of

having successfully resisted the

power from

first

to

founded merely on

Norman

military

last.

Their kingdom was not

force,

but they understood the

organization of force for purposes of resistance better

than the people of Erin or of Wales

was

and Scotland

in the military sense a national unity before the

Norman landed on English shores.

But the Norblind
force,
deaf and tactless
man instinct of force

CELTIC IRELAND.

52

which

descended to the kings and oligarchy of

England
passed

that

Norman

genuine

the

after

had

period

kept up, through long

force-instinct

periods, a struggle with Scotland to destroy her in-

dependence which bears

solidation, but in the

fruit

marked

now, not

the con-

in

two

distinction of the

war of independence as Edward

the First forced on the Scottish nation it was impossible that Scotland should be absorbed into Engnations. After such a

land.

union

these

they were

in

and even a union of

crowns

of

parliaments

were possible, brought about as

later times,

by the accident of

cumstance and the consent of both

Scotch sentiment
to

the

so

it

will

as Scottish to-day

is

absorption

when Scots won

nations

of Scotland

into

as

but

averse

England

the battle of Bannockburn.

be always

cir-

as

And

made by Edward

the history

the First can never be unwritten to the end of time.

Forcible

consolidations

among

have been effected

other races than those which peopled Alba and Erin,

and by leading races more gifted with ideas and

sympathy than the Normans were

but the attempt

which the Norman made to weld the four nations of

these islands into one has been defeated

the

line.

opposed

To

all

and the Scotch

while in Ireland the

along

dominance the English

their instinct for political freedom, the

their racial,

idea

his instinct for

their

Norman

Welsh

composite national
instinct has

through

centuries been worsted in the spiritual struggle with

ERIN AND ALBA.

that

most subtle of

devotion to

its

all

national

triumphed, but the Irish idea conquered

ful invaders,

fresh from

presently

the success-

generation after generation, coming out

England when each war was done, became

"

more

Irish than the Irish themselves."

So the four nations are

and the

a people's

ideas,

So the English arms

mother-land.

intact in the islands

political heirs of the

too, laying the

on the nations'

heavy hand of
soul.

still

Norman rule are still there

Feebly

force,

though feebly,

for political

gone over to the peoples, and

power has

faith in self-govern-

ment is an ancient tradition common to them all.

Through faith in such a tradition, is made possible
a union of diverse elements stronger than

made union can

ever be

any

union of self-govern-

ing, self-developing, self-respecting nations,

support each other by every

force-

tie

bound

to

of interest, honour,

and the new-made tradition of a confederate democracy

each

nation bound to assist the other three

against any infringement of popular rights

on the

by each

to rule.

part of the classes deputed freely

Even now the four nations are drawing together as

they never drew before, and the time, it would seem,
is not far off when that Irish Stone of Fate in Westminster

Abbey

will

symbolize at

last a real union,

based on those principles of justice and love

in

which

the great Columba, statesman and missionary, laid

the foundations of the Scottish kingdom.

CELTIC IRELAND.

54

CHAPTER

III.

ERIN AND EUROPE.

The

histon- of early Ireland, in

sister isle,

relation to the

its

shows us external symptoms of a certain

national development which

it

\*-ill

business to study within the island

presently be our

We

itself.

have

seen pagan Ireland aggpressive and even conquering

Then comes

along the British coasts.

mission of Patrick, and presently

all

the British
is

changed.

Ireland abandons the role of the hero for that of the

saint,

though invested

its thirst for

deeds.

still

Her

with the heroic temper and

war-policj* has ceased,

the peace-policj' of missionary labour takes

its

Long

carrj-

after

Columba's time, his followers

their spiritual warfare,

and extend

tracing

their

origin

to

lona

are

throughout Saxon Britain, and at one time

likely that Irish rather than

Roman

on

their conquests

over Northern England and the Midlands.

teries

and

place.

Monasplanted
it

seems

Christianity

is

Columbanus, who
was twent)*-two years younger than Columba, goes

likely to reign in the English land.

ERIN AND EUROPE.

with a mission band to Burgundy, Switzerland and

Northern

Italy, to

combat paganism and immorality

which then were very dark, by establishing,

in places

and saintly com-

after the Irish fashion, industrious

munities,

as

examples and

instruction, in

for

The old passion

which we may imagine

the

people's midst.

for

adventure and

enterprise

to

have possessed

the Milesians on their journey west,

"

moved by an

urging them to great deeds

ancestral spirit
spirit is

found anew in the Irish missionaries.

visit all

the islands on the north-west

"

that
They

British coast,

they go north and discover the Shetlands, they go

further north
A.D. 870,

and make a settlement

when

came

the Norwegians

in Iceland.

were Christians there who departed and

them
it

Irish books, bells,

may

"In

to Iceland, there
left

behind

and other things, from whence

be inferred that these Christians were

Irish.

So says an old text which Zeuss quotes in his

Grammatica Celtica." In all directions they go forth,
some in search of missionary labours, some moved
by a desire for world-knowledge and new fields of
learning.
So the Irish monk travels to Egypt and
'*

measures the pyramids.

He

goes east studying the

customs

and

There

the clearest evidence that, after Christianity

is

was established

scholarship

of

the

in Ireland, there

munication of the

liveliest sort

Syrian

began to be a combetween the Eastern

and the extreme Western Churches.

clastic

Church.

The

icono-

policy of the Greek emperors in the eighth

CELTIC IRELAND.

$6

century drove Eastern ecclesiastics west, bearing their

peculiar heritage of art

they brought

and learning with them.

This

Western Europe, and no other

to

country was so ready at that time as Ireland to

by

benefit

then, but

Celtic art

it.

may

it

well be that

reality long before

found use

it

for the

of the East, with which Irish travel had

artistic ideas

already

was a

made

more or

it

less acquainted,

Greek was certainly studied in the Irish monasteries,

some of them, a century earlier. We find that a
certain monk, Aileran, displays a knowledge both of
this language and of Hebrew as early as about the
or

middle of the seventh century,

But

than 665.

it

is

for

he died no later

probable that the

flight

Greek scholars from Constantinople created

of

fresh

opportunities for the development of Irish Hellenistic

The

studies.
in

Ireland

memory
century.

fact that there

left

till

its

were Greek ecclesiastics

mark on

the

tenacious

Celtic

as late as the troubles of the seventeenth

Probably

Greek became,

in

century, a general subject of study in

ecclesiastical

schools,

before that time.

whereas

it

its

all

eighth

the Irish

was exceptional

The conspicuous

have come down to us of

the

evidences which

existence belong to this

and the succeeding centuries.

The

Irish

scholar,

Sedulius, lived in the eighth century, and wrote

Cormac Mac
Cullinan (831-903), king and bishop of Cashel, compiled a glossary, which is clearly marked by a
Greek

Psalter,

which survives now.

ERIN AND EUROPE.

57

knowledge of Greek, since be occasionally derives,

absurdly enough, the names of places from deek
Tara from the Greek

roots, as

The Book
fact of

of Armagh,

Greek study,

"

deioptlv,

to behold."

too, bears witness to the

as, for instance,

same

by the writing

of the Lord's Prayer in Greek characters.*

But the man who most of

makes Irish scholarship stand out conspicuous in the European world

was Joannes Scotus, also called by his contempoall

raries Erigena, or Eriu-gena, " Irish-born."

was summoned

Ireland

John of

to France, to the court of

Charles the Bald, where he alone was able to translate the

John,

Greek works of the Pseudo-Dionysius.

who appears

This

have been educated at the

to

School of Bangor in County Down, was the one

great philosopher of the

Dark Ages, preceding by

in the width and

two hundred years, and indeed

depth of

his

philosophy

far surpassing, the scholastic

And,

philosophers of the eleventh century.

there

a strong

is

Erigena's

thought,

of his

flavour

an

truly,

Gaelic origin

unmistakable dash

in

of that

Gaelic love of enterprise, fearlessness of consequences,

and joy
and

in conflict

which can

literature as well as in

feats of self-devotion.

As

find a field in

philosophy

deeds of war and

difficult

a thinker he follows with-

out hesitation the lead of reason, not fearing that the

end of philosophy could be other than

* See Stokes's

account.

" Celtic Church

in

tnif/i,

Ireland " for a

though

more complete

CELTIC IRELAND.

58

charges of heresy and the thunders of the Church

The

abound.*

many
make

of

qualities of the race

are yet the qualities which

ditificulties

its

which have made

individual Irishmen,

and which

will

make

yet

the Irish nation great.

In the eighth century, European scholarship was
at low

ebb, but

was about

it

scholarship reached

its

time that Irish

this

high-water mark, just before

the Danes embarked on their pagan crusade dealing

out destruction specially on churches and monasteries

for the

genuine crusade, a retaliation for Charle-

outset a

magne's

"

Christian

"

mission to the Germans,

whom

and sword.

The

he attempted to convert by

Danes

first

though

is

fire

appeared off the Irish coast

Irish scholarship

result in
it

Danish attack on Christian Europe was at the

produced

in 795, and,

finest personal

its

Erigena (810-877) about half a century

later,

manifest that the great struggle of the three

next centuries must have prevented

development at the

outset, while

it

much

further

ended by bringing

very low the school of the West.

The consequent

destruction of books was certainly great, since the

famous monasteries were burned down time

after time.

But enough remains to give us some measure of the

hold which the idea of learning had taken on the
popular mind.

There are

books

in

Irish

giving

accounts of various foreign events, and translations of

*

In

Erigena's case, the Church thunders

Stokes's "Celtic

Church

in Ireland").

abounded

freely

(see

ERIN AND EUROPE.

classical

stories

into

59

These and the Latin

Irish,

texts with elaborate Irish glosses and the

well

as

Latin, theological

show us that

literature,

and theological learning had taken a place

classical

beside the genuine

Irish

literature

culum of an educated Irishman's

the

in

Every bishop and

down

On

priest

They

its

place.

Ireland was a Gaelic

in

to the seventeenth century.*

the Continent and in Great Britain this con-

dition of scholarship

were scholars found

made
in

Not only

Ireland famous.

foreign lands, but students

from abroad flocked to the Irish schools.

great school of
was,

curri-

studies.

never, however, ousted that literature from

scholar

Irish, as

it

students,

Armagh

alone, one third of the city

devoted

said,

is

In the

use

the

to

of

foreign

and the schools of Lismore, Bangor, Clon-

macnoise, and

Kildare

rivalled

Twenty-six of these schools,

foundation, are

known

importance.

in

on an

all

to us

it

ecclesiastical

by name.f

These do

not represent, however, the whole of the provision

made

for

education in Ireland

for a regular

system

of national schools was established in connectiou with

the bardic classes in the year 590.

doubt to the

it

was no

ecclesiastical schools that the

foreign

students came.

mony

of

the

* O'Curry's

On

Anglo-Saxon

"Manners and Customs

p. 84.

t Ibid., vol.

this subject

ii.

p. 76.

But

we have

the testi-

Bede, writing

in

the

of the Ancient Irish," vol.

ii.

6o

CELTIC IRELAND.

who

seventh century,

how

us

tells

certain

of the

nobles of Britain resorted to the Irish schools and

were provided with food and clothes, as well as learnwithout expense to themselves.

ing,

To

understand rightly the significance of the

work which Irish missionary and scholarly enterprise

did for Western Europe in mediaeval times, we must
briefly consider the condition of the West, more

Roman

especially after the decline of the

By

empire.

the middle of the second century, Christianity

had become an element

began to be

generally, in the

empire.

the

in

Roman civilization, and

carried, with the Graeco- Roman culture

wake of the

Before

the

legions throughout the

of

close

this

centur}^

had

it

reached the Rhine and the British coasts, and by the

beginning of the fourth

was flourishing

it

and Britain and along the

Danube.
at

the

In the

fifth

century

same time began

German and Romance

Romans, and

the

was

fast

going to

rivers of the

to

it

in

Gaul

Rhine and

reached Ireland, and

be destroyed

in

the

countries,

where the power of

their influence

founded on power,

ruin.

In the year 406 the Vandals from

the

Upper

Rhine overwhelmed Gaul, the Alemanni and Burgundians settled on the Rhine.

Lower Rhine presently

The Franks from

established

Northern Gaul, and the remains of the

vanished there (481-500).

themselves

in

Roman power

The Germanic

Angles and Saxons were conquering

the

tribes of

Britain, Attila

EKIN AND EUROPE.

and

his

Italy,

further desolation in Gaul and

Huns spread

and the

destruction

touch was put to the work of

last

when

Lombards broke

the

into the valley

of the Po (568) and established their seat of government at Pavia. Thus by the end of the sixth century

Germanic barbarism had overwhelmed Roman

civili-

and Europe awaited a new and

zation like a flood,

more deep-based enlightenment.

About the year 594, when the historian Gregory
of Tours died,"the Franks had become nominally, and
in part, Christians
but the moral and intellectual
condition of the Prankish Merovingian kingdom is
;

described by this historian as truly deplorable.

The

Merovingian records are indeed drawn up

such

in

barbarous Latin that one written more correctly

suspected

Roman

the

we

are

told,

was on a par with the

That culture had declined

Latin.

And

belonging to a later date.

as

Christianity,

world

itself

that Gregory the Great

in

the centre of

we may gather from

knew no Greek.

the fact

In Spain and Ireland only, had learning

home
these

was
in

at the

is

the

still

beginning of the seventh century.

Of

two, Ireland, being enthusiastically Christian,

seized with the desire for missionary enterprise

foreign

lands.

The wandering

instincts

of the

race were not without influence in prompting to this

work, nor was the eagerness of intellect which urges

to

new

fields

of activity.

Enterprise,

as

well

as

religious enthusiasm, characterized the Irish preacher,

CELTIC IRELAND.

62

though he was by no means a wandering missionary

only, but the settled founder of

many famous

monastic

establishments.

590 Columbanus

In

and

his

twelve

They founded

proceeded to the land of the Franks.

first

comrades

the monastery of Chateau Annegray, and later,

number of converts increased, the second

establishment of Luxeuil. These became centres of
influence and the parents of other similar establishas

the

After about ten years' work,' Columbanus,

ments.

having ventured to reprove the regent-queen Brunhilda,

and refusing to conform to the Roman custom

of keeping Easter,

was forced

to leave the country.

Hostile winds prevented his return to Ireland,

a

band of companions, he betook himself

so,

and, having rowed up the river, they settled at

Constance.

Here they

lived

mainly by

preached to the people for some time.

Columbanus went

to the

Lombard

delinda, and founded at the foot of the

Lake

fishing,

But

princess

with

Rhine

to the

and

613
Theo-

in

Apennines the

famous monastery of Bobbio.

Another Irishman, Gallus, had shared the fortunes

of Columbanus up to this last stage, but was prevented

by illness from accompanying him into Lombardy.

So he remained on the north of the Alps, and
presently founded, in the wild Steinach valley, that

monastery of

St. Gall,

became the most

the lona of Germany, which

celebrated, as

quented by Irishmen

later,

of

all

it

was the most

fre-

the Irish monasteries.

EEIN AND EUROPE.

6t,

Numbers of Irishmen, like Columbanus and

comrades, came into the Prankish kingdom in
seventh century,

and estabHshed mission

Thence issued Franks and Germans as

we

much we

are ignorant, but of this

the details

are certain that

at the beginning of the eighth century a

of mission stations, founded either

their disciples,

and

from the mouths of the

and the Alps.

nizable

by

the

after

I\Iaas

Gall,

art

by Irishmen or by
type, stretched

Irish

and Rhine

to the

Rhone

In monastic records. Irishmen, recog-

influence decrease in
St.

broad belt

their names, appear everywhere, as abbots

or distinguished brothers

century

stations.

disciples, to

Of

continue the work of their teachers.

his

the

for a
St.

nor did their distinctive

many

and especially

centres,

couple of centuries.

Gall

became

in

In the ninth

conspicuous for

specially

and learning under the abbotship of the

Irish

Moengal.

The

Irish

advanced beyond the

mission work

Rhine into the eastern settlements of the Franks and

into Bavaria.

According to the testimony of Jonas

of Bobbio, missionaries from

Luxeuil went out to

Bavaria about 620, and towards

century

the

suffered

martyrdom

Irish

Kilian,
at

territory of Thiiringen

end of that

two

companions,

with

the

Wiirzberg,

on the frontier

and the East Franks.

Nor is Ireland altogether unconcerned in the

made late in the seventh century to convert
Frisians
and Saxons. The missionaries Victberct,
the

efforts

CELTIC IRELAND.

64

Wilibrord, and the two Hewalds were Englishmen,

on the authority of Bede that they

but we have

it

had received

their theological education

in

Ireland.

Alcuin says of Wilibrord, the apostle of the Frisians,

had passed twelve years under celebrated

Britain gave him birth, but
teachers in Ireland.
that he

These missions, we may therefore

were conducted on Irish principles, and after

Ireland education.
infer,

the Irish manner.

That manner has been already

described,

and was

as different as possible from that of the emissaries

who about
no

less

this

than

time began to be sent out as organizers,

missionaries,

from

the

Roman

see.

Apparently, neither the Irish missionaries nor their

Germanic

disciples

made any attempt

to receive the

Church by the mere external

Their methods were slower, though

heathen masses into the

of baptism.

rite

infinitely surer.
fred,

under

Roman

But

in

723 the Englishman Wini-

the ecclesiastical

name

of Boniface,

came

and the
more than a century's Irish and
German work he organized and established under
Rome, not scrupling, moreover, to use the secular
arm for the more speedy addition of converts to the
as

legate to the land of the Franks

Christian fruits of

Christian Church.

Not only

Roman

in France,

ideas met,

but elsewhere, the Celtic and

and the opposition between them

gradually developed

itself.

So early

as the sixth

century, Columbanus, at Luxeuil, could see no

suffi-

ERIN AND EUROPE.

reason

cient

why an Irishman
Rome, with

the customs of

65

conform to

should

respect to the time of

keeping Easter, rather than follow the traditions and

customs of

his

appear that

own country
Paschal

this

and, though

does not

it

controversy greatly dis-

Rome

turbed, at a later date, the relations between

and the

on the Continent,

Irish abbots

it

certainly, as

well as the dispute on general questions

of church

government, waxed very hot between the papal see

and the

British

Irish

England the most

and Columban Churches.

definite trial of strength

In

for the

was made, and the Columban

Celtic

idea abroad

monks

w^ere worsted

in

the famous

conference

at

Whitby, by the decision of the English king to follow

the counsels

of the papal legate.

Scottish Churches

Roman system
Ireland

till

still

The

Irish

and

held out at home, and the

of government was not accepted in

Probably

the twelfth century.

long

this

adherence to the native forms, and the national habits

which

it

created

between Church and

of relation

people and non-relation between Church and State,

may

account for peculiarities

licism of Ireland

tants

who happen

now which

in

the

Roman

Catho-

puzzle English Protes-

to observe them.

During the eighth and ninth centuries the scholarship of the Irish schools continued to rise in repute

but from the middle of the seventh century the Irish

quarrel

with

motives

in the

Rome

produced

much

confusion

minds of those who esteemed

at

of

once

CELTIC IRELAND.

66

learning and orthodoxy, the latter being measured,

out of Ireland, by the

no confusion

in the

Roman

There was

standard.

minds of some, and we get a

quaint piece of testimony to Irish scholarship from

the lips of Aldhelm, an earnest

Roman

adherent

who

viewed with orthodox horror the practice of sending

young Anglo-Saxons
a

country, he exclaims, "

Why

from that

returned

should

Ireland

in

crowds, just as

if

pride

England

herself so highly that thither students from

should stream

In

education to Ireland.

who has

Ealfrid,

to

letter

for

Greek and Latin

teachers were not to be found upon England's fruitful

soil,

able to solve the most serious religious problems

and to

train scholars eager for

As

the innovations of

ecclesiastical

dox

to

Rome and

"
?

her claim for

supremacy made Ireland seem hetero-

mechanical

Christian

knowledge

mission

souls, so

to

Europe

Irish influence

the

in

That work

declined.

up by other hands, and carried out

by other methods, of which the religious wars of
Charlemagne were one characteristic sign.
But
field
for
Gaelic
enterprise
was
another
opened up, as

was

taken

the taste for scholarship developed in foreign countries,

and a demand

for Irish teachers as

Charles the Great and

and ninth

centuries,

such sprang up.

his successors, in the

strove to

make

learning in France, and the learned " Scots

ceived with open arms.

So, just as

we

eighth

home

for

"

re-

were

find

Irish

missionaries everywhere in the Merovingian land of

ERIN AND EUROPE.

6/

the Franks during the seventh century, so Irishmen

during the

ninth century under

empire are found

in

the

Carlovingian

abundance, as teachers of

branches of knowledge then cultivated

all

the

in the schools

of the court and the scholastic monasteries.

With

the general spread of culture the pre-emi-

nence of Ireland disappeared

of the evidence,
will

but

this brief

it is,

be sufficient to prove her claim as not only the

home, but the mission-home, of learning

interval

that followed

empire.

Nor should

the

collapse

in the

of the

the mediaeval

dark

Roman

be forgotten that she pro-

it

duced the most profound, as well as the

all

review

condensed and imperfect though

philosophers, and

earliest, of

that he

was a

layman, as none of the others were.*

*

For readers of German, an

mission to Europe
Irish

Element

book, 1887.

is

excellent account of the Irish Christian

given in an article

in the Culture of the

"On

the Significance of the

Middle Ages,"

in the Prussian

Year-

CELTIC IRELAND.

68

CHAPTER

IV.

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

The

age of Irish military enterprise abroad ended

about the middle of the

paganism had received

its

fifth

century,

deathblow

when

at the

Irish

hand of

Patrick and within a single century a new Ireland

was revealing itself to Europe. Let us now inquire
;

into the history of Ireland within her

own borders

corresponding to these different glimpses we have

had of her from an external point of view and, first,

let us try to understand the main social and historical
;

features of

For a

pagan Ireland.

definite historical starting-point our

purpose

will best

be served by taking the time of Cormac

Mac

Art,

who

The

events of Irish history reach

than

this period,

feel sure that

reigned at Tara from A.D. 218 to 260.

the

but in the

much further back

time of Cormac we may

main features of

Irish

pagan society

had developed themselves into the characteristic form

which

shall

be presently described.

Cormac was an

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

active

and

warrior,

customary to

Annals

tell

labours of

In the year 222, as the

the large fleet of

went over the sea

went to ravage the

for the

Cormac Mac Art

space of three years."

British shores.

Cormac have a higher

He

a social

It

But the domestic

He

interest.

the nation with certain settled political and

habits.

then

the war-policy

followed

nation.

his

us, "

69

found
social

organized the customs of the tribes into

and

system.

political

Brehon law revised and,

he secured his labours
national convention

in a

Thus he had the

manner, codified, and

in this direction

at

Tara on

by settling the

regular

basis,

appointing a meeting every third year, for the popular

proclamation and acceptance of the law, and the

administration generally of public

Cormac did not invent the

affairs.

national parliament of

Tara, nor did he invent the Brehon law, but, like a

wise ruler, he did that work of reorganization

confirmation which he

To him

at his time.

the

monuments

also, Dr. Petrie attributes all

now remaining

and

deemed necessary

at Tara,* the vestiges of

Tara

correspond to ancient descriptions.

older than Irish history.

which exactly

The bards

tell

is,

hozuever,

us that the

assembly was instituted and the buildings erected by

the Firbolg king,

Ollamh Fodhla,

"

who was

learned bard and then king of Ireland," and to

also

first

whom

they attribute the general organization of the

country.

But

this

* Petrie's

is

a bardic tale

its

hero

may

"History and Antiquities of Tara Hill."

fitly

CELTIC IRELAND.

JO

be taken to symbolize the

sciously created their

people,

Irish

who uncon-

habits and then invented a

maker of them.

definite

The
clearly

own

purpose of the assembly

political

summed up

a poet of the year 984

Was

by

" The Feis of Temur each third

To preserve laws and rules,

By

very

is

in the following lines written

year,

then convened firmly

the illustrious kings of Erin."

Tara was not the only place where such assemblies

were held.

Two

and
at

had

different lines of Ulster kings

their royal hills of

assembly

at

Aileach * near Derry

Emain Macha, now Armagh and the assembly

St. Columba pleaded successfully the cause

at

which

of Scottish

Home

Drumceatt, near

Carman
fair

too, in

Rule

A.D.

in

590,

Newtown Limavady.

Wexford,

of Tara itself

is

In fact,

was held

The

only, the regular

customs of the

The

tribe

at

of

almost as famous as the

it

would seem that such

assemblies were for every king, provincial

tribal

fair

way

in

or even

which the laws and

were preserved and developed.

kings, nobles, judges, poets

and scholars met

the national assembly to discuss national affairs

in

and

new decisions were proclaimed afterwards to all the

" men of Erin " that might be assembled, at the same
*

There

hill of Aileach a remarkable specimen of

and the marks of the ramparts surrounding the
Every visitor to Derry should see
are evident to this day.
still

the Irish stone

royal seat

Aileach.

stands on the

fort,

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

time, around the royal hill

amusements of

national

of Tara, pursuing their

feasting,

racing,

aLhletic,

musical and literary contests, to say nothing of the

intercourse

social

with

the

realms,

which

corresponding

summoned

and

persons

fit

alwaN^s

Of

more

within

assembly of

the

people from time to time.

the tribal assemblies,

have

Irishmen

minor kings took council

So, likewise, the

prized.

their

all

the

the constitution of

be said

will

in

a later

chapter.

Probably

this

habit of tribal assembly

was the

earliest political habit the Irish tribes had, for their

whole

social

system shows that they could have had

no idea of a source of power other than the popular

will,

though they were peculiarly susceptible to the

notion that the reason of the wise

man

determining motive to that popular

it

was a habit that died hard,

all.

Edmund

Spenser,

in

if it

his

"

should be the
Certainly

will.

ever really died at

View of

Ireland,"

written in Elizabeth's time, tells of the meetings of

the Irish on their ancient accustomed

hills,

where they

debated and settled matters between families and

townships, going in large numbers and armed.

What

did die, and died early, was the habit of meeting as

one nation at Tara

and so thoroughly republican

was the whole elemental structure of Irish society,
that

all

the reality of national unity began to fade

upon Tara in the sixth

This decadence seems to have been closely

with the decadence that

century.

fell

CELTIC IRELAND.

connected with that decHne of the bards which slowly

followed the rise of monastic scholarship.*

Cormac was zealous

orderly legislation

for

discipline

well

as

as

so he organized a national army,

and established a school of military training. This

was the most important step that any king of Ireland,
as king,

development the army

tical

In early stages of social

had hitherto taken.

with

its

of the tribe, or nation,

whole adult manhood, and indeed, in the

too for the Irishwomen, like

womanhood

Irish case,

iden-

is

those of Britain and Germany, were not slow to take

the battle-field.
as

existence

Armies of regular warriors come

differentiation

of function in

into

general

between the members of the society proceeds as the

bulk of the people engaged in other pursuits find
military service an irksome interruption.

were pre-eminently a fighting

The

Irish

race, and, for that

very

reason, they were slow to form for themselves a strong

military organization, or to permit such a formation

by

their kings.

Hence

it

was that the

seldom had any army other than

hence two
king

who

results.

and

never was an Irish

could establish his dynasty, or himself, as a

real ruler over the

no

First, there

Irish kings

their people

minor

Irish kings

and, secondly,

Irish king, small or great, got a right of absolute

power over
Still,

his people.

there were professional warriors in Ireland

* See Sir Samuel Ferguson's poem, "Congall,"

view of the relation between tliese events.

for

an interesting

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

from very early times

73

they appear as the heroes of

There was a system of militar}''

by which the studeift was brought up
The
the foster-son of some eminent warrior.

Irish bardic history.

education, too,
as

teachers of great champions are frequently

and

from_ these references

champions,

we

named

learn that the principal

whether kings or inferior

chiefs,

were

prone to preside over the physical education of the

We

more promising youth.

who were
war

foster-brothers in

learning

hear, too, of

arms

champions

fellow-students

champion-feats together

of

and, though

regular military colleges probably did not exist before

the time of Cormac, schools for the joint military and

literary education of the

upper classes almost certainly

did.

The

nearest approach to a regular

army which we

was the band of valiant Ulster

knights, the Red Branch of Emania, which flourished
in the time of Conor Mac Nessa, king of Ulster at the
find in earlier times,

beginning

of

the

Christian

era.

The

history

of

Ireland was so far affected by the institution of the

Red Branch,
power

in

that Ulster

Ireland,

became

at this

time a great

and a terror consequently to the

other provinces.

More than three centuries later, the High King,

Cormac, carried out a similar conception more com-

The following note is quoted in the Book of

Ballymote from the Book of Navan, which is now lost,
and refers to Cormac. " The monarch of Erin appletely.

CELTIC IRELAND.

74

army over the men of Erin

pointed an

he appointed three times

for the

fifty

and over

it

royal Fenian officers,

purpose of enforcing his laws and maintaining

his sovereign rule

gave the

and preserving

command

Ua

Cumhal)."

game

his

and he

and the

the whole

of

stewardship of Erin to Finn

Mac

Baiscne (that

is,

high-

Finn

This was the famous Feni of Erin,

the Irish militia of the third century

mander was the

more

still

and

its

com-

famous Finn, son

of

Cumhal,* the father of Oisin and other celebrated

most interesting cycle

persons, the central figure of a

of Irish bardic literature, in part of which the Feni

are projected back into distant ages and appear as

demi-gods and mythical heroes, rather than as the

really practical warriors
It

them

from

is

"physical

force"

and hunters that they were.

that

the

party

of

modern
Irish

Fenians,

nationality

the

have

taken their name.

The Feni were quartered on the people from

November to May and from May to November they
lived by hunting.
They acted as a force against
;

internal disorder as well as against foreign invasion,

and thus

down

fulfilled

According

army.

once the duties of police and

to the

accounts that have

come

when viewed in the

marked measure of that

to us, the rules of the force,

most prosaic
*

at

light,

partook

in

"Cumhal "is pronounced "Cool."

descendant

Cumhal.

{i.e.

" Ua," modern

Finn was the grandson or

and the son {i.e. Mac) of

O') of Baiscne

AT HOME.

PAGA^r IRELAND

75

moral strictness which should pertain to the idea of

as guardian of the realm's internal peace.
light,

it

In a poetic

however, they read as rules of chivalry

and as

pagan knights of chivalry we must indeed regard

Finn and

his

Feni

in

this early,

but by no means

Finn, the typical Fenian, was a

uncultivated, age.

poet as well as a warrior, learned in

wisdom of the

the bardic

all

Gael, and gifted with the bards' keen

enjoyment of nature.

Thus

at least

the bards de-

scribe him.
"

The music

that Finn loved

was that which

filled

the heart with joy and gave light to the countenance,

the song of the black bird of Letter Lee, and the

melody of the Dord Fian, the sound of the wind in

Droum-derg, the thunders of Assaroe, the cry of the
hounds let loose through Glen Rah, with their faces
outward from the
shore, the

Suir, the

Tonn Rury

wash of water against the

lashing the

sides of ships,

murmur

of

the blackbird

of

the cry of Braan at Knock-an-awr, the

streams at Slieve-Mish

Derry-Carn.

and

never heard, by

oh,

my soul, sound

sweeter

Were I only beneath his nest " *

Cormac, we are told, made another advance on
previous practice by founding three great colleges at
than

Tara

that.

for the instruction of

the

men

one was a School of the Art of War.

of Erin
In

it,

and

we must

suppose, he intended to have carried out, under the

* See Standish O'Grady's
for this

modern version

" History of Ireland,"

vol.

i.

chap,

of Oisin's description of Fenian delights.

xii.,

CELTIC IRELAND.

^6
control of the

High King

himself, a

system of splendid

physical training, similar to the best that had been

adopted hitherto by scattered teachers up and down

the country.

And

it

remember

well, perhaps, to

is

here that the spirit of mediaeval Christianity, elsewhere

and probably

certainly

in

Ireland too, was not very

to anything like

favourable

physical

that splendid

in which our pagan forefathers delighted,

and which Cormac sought at this time to centralize

education

at Tara.

That old joy

revived in

full force,

and

in

physical ability has

finds its

fit

now

expression in the

modern

Gaelic Athletic Association, the democratic

equivalent of Cormac's school of championship.

But Cormac's attempt

arm"

to

organize the "strong

of Ireland in relation to the high king's throne

went the way of

all

national problem

plenty of

it

in the

later

by

"

attempts to solve the Irish

physical

country

There was

force."

perhaps too

much

corner had the spirit of fight so strong in

it

every

that

it

could not be repressed for more than one generation.

The figJiting force could not

be organized Jinless every

fraction of the popular will was' organised

it

was a

will difficult

to organize in

And

too.

some

respects,

because each considerable unit was affected with a

marked individuality of its own a strong

not uncommonly accompanied by a keen
sensitiveness, apt to

and

is

also

egoistic

resent a supposed insult

than a substantial injury.

self-will,

self-will,

more

Irish history bristles with

marked

at every stage with the

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

individual Irishman's fearlessness of the

than his own.

Force has consolidated

JJ

arm stronger

many

nations,

compromise has consolidated some but the only way

in which Ireland could ever be consolidated was by
;

the

way

to

compensate

this nation for the qualities

which have been her trouble.

She

nevertheless, for they are a power.

Brehon understood
it.

Nor has Nature

of reason and sympathy.

been slow

The bards

Irish nature

prizes

them

rightly,

The Bard and

the

or rather they were

held up before the people the ideas

of Ireland, heroism, gentleness,

and

justice

travelling as they did constantly from

and,

one end

of

the country to the other, they familiarized the inhabitants of every part with the heroes
of every other, telling of the

and associations

Red Branch champions

of Ulster in the South, and of Finn and his heroes

and the great King Cormac

in the

North.

The bards

were a national brotherhood, with their hands on the

strings of the

popular heart, their minds in close

Through their
mind and heart Ireland was united while
Tara was their great festival,
their order prevailed.
and Tara was the political link of the provinces.
touch with the popular imagination.
unity of

And

as for the Brehon, he set

tion in

all

up

his court of arbitra-

quarrels that might occur

among

this self-

willed and fight-loving people, trusting in the

of reason alone.

keen of wit no
were

and

And

less

in the

the disputants

came

might

to him,

than rapid of imagination as they

might of reason he made the law

CELTIC IRELAND.

78

No

prevail.

more

fact strikes

the Irish social system than

forcibly a student of

this, that, side

by

side

with careful provisions for the administration of an

elaborately developed law,

means

for carrying

physical
called

force

upon

Davies,

do

so.

who wrote

in

passage from

Sir

the time of James

is

I.,

John

throws,

quite sufficient on this point.

Irish people at his time had been going through

terrible struggles,

fighting

all their
is

visible

whole community might be

however, a light which

The

no

exists

out, except, indeed, so far as the

it

of the

to

there

which must have roused

and non-rational

to the full

instincts.

Yet

this

what he, an observer of the opposite camp, tells us,

soon after the Ulster plantation

" I

dare affirm that for the space of

past there has not been found so

worthy of death
(thirty-two

as

namely, the western

truth

is,

fearful

to

that in

years

malefactors

the six circuits of this realm

in all

shires)

many

five

in

one

circuit,

circuit
in

of six shires,

England.

For the

time of peace the Irish are more

offend the

nation whatsoever.

law than the English or any other

.

There

is

no nation under the

sun that doth love equal or indifferent justice better

than the Irish

or will rest better satisfied with the

execution thereof, although

Hence
either

the

it is

it

be against themselves."

evident that in Sir John Davies's time,

fact

of

the

Brehon's constant reliance

on popular reason had developed popular reason, or

the

fact

that

Irish

popular reason was peculiarly

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

accessible,

had enabled the Brehon

jg

upon

to rely

it.

by

And, indeed, it is a truth open

any one to-day, that the Irish peasant is peculiarly
ready to see any matter from the universal or rational
Now, as in olden times, he despises
point of view.
to easy observation

force

and loves

his personal will, but reverences law,

and

respects other wills,

is

capable of

much

self-

devotion.

Cormac's attempt to organize the

army

of the

Finn and the Feni quarrelled with

high king

failed.

the king

and the people, weary perhaps of having

the Feni quartered on them, put themselves behind

the king and defeated the army, enfeebled too, as

was,

by

Of
king,

failed.

the other parts

succeeded

So one part of Cor-

dissensions.*

internal

mac's ideal

we

are left to suppose that they

a scholar

and judge as well

warrior, reorganized the learned classes, and

lished, besides the

the Saltair of Tara,

portion

is

Book

oUamhs, and kings around him

One

drawn

Law
lost,

ascribed to his authorship, as

of the

said to have ordered a

estab-

now

manuscript,

new code

up, to

which

of Aicill,

part of one of the Brehon law tracts.

as

School of War, a School of

and another of Literature.

tions to be

The

the element of success was in them.

who was

well as a

it

With

at Tara,

is

his nobles,

Cormac

is

of laws and regula-

have revived obsolete

of the most beautiful of the Irish romances,

i.e.

tests

the story of

Diarmait (Dermat) and Grania, is connected with the Fenian dissenSee Joyce's "Celtic Romances."

sions.

80

CELTIC IRELAND.

and ordeals, and

new

instituted

the law of evidence as perfect as

times.

of

full

"
all

The

goodness

and

There were no

time

in his

ease

and

happiness

sea,

time.

his

in

killings nor plunderings in his time,

in

that Cormac's reign

pression on the national

all

was

there were fruit and

and abundant produce of the

but every one occupied his lands

It is clear

making

could be in those

world," says an old manuscript, "

fatness of the land,

with peace

ones, thus
it

mind

happiness."

made

a deep im-

as the time in which

the wise laws and customs of the nation flourished,

standing out specially from the reign of his prede-

For

cessor.

this reason, I

central point in Irish

pagan

have taken
history, to

it

as a fixed

may

which we

refer the flourishing existence of that social condition

to be presently described, or the elements in

are not clearly due to Christian influence

form the main portion.

it

that

and which

It is believed, indeed, that

Cormac was not himself a pagan, but had imbibed

some Christian ideas during his wars with Britain,
which found expression in a request, made at his
death, not to be buried with his fathers in the pagan

cemetery of the kings of Tara on the Boyne.

though Cormac may have been Christian,

certain

were

that

the

institutions

it

is

But,
quite

which he reorganized

not.

Before proceeding to consider the nature of Irish

paganism as a

religion, let us

glance more particularly

at the organization of the learned classes.

Of

these

PAGAM IRELAND AT HOME.

gj

Again, the most conspicuous fact about Irish moral

character

and the

We

warmth of

the

is

affections for kindred

its

Irish foster-kindred of friends

and neighbours.

might expect, therefore, beforehand, that pagan

developed by the Irish, would be marked

somewhat emphatically by the presence of the two
religion, as

great ideas in an Irish form

Ireland

for

And

so

for Nature, the

Humanity, the

it

turns out.

Irish race.

Perhaps there

so natural as the

no belief more
live after

memory

real

We

death.

the ancient Irish had

of

All the available evidence

somewhat

points to the conclusion here expressed in

abstract form.

spirits

no object of worship

is

of ancestral heroes, and

than that the great and good

have no evidence to show that

any form of worship

for their

dead kindred, but we know that funeral games were

held in their honour, that the cemeteries were

deemed

be sacred places, and that they believed

possible

to

dead heroes

for their

One example

to help in battle or

will suffice.

Mac Ere

the king of the Firbolgs, a hero

in

is

distress.

tradition

but he appears as a

deity in the following lines, discovered

Sullivan

it

by Professor

" Twice during the Treena of Taillten

Each day at sunrise / invoked Mac Ere
To remove from me the pestilence.

This

is

a case of prayer to a hero.

wife affords us a

monies held

in

good example of

her honour.

The same hero's

games and cere-

manuscript quoted by

CELTIC IRELAND.

98

Professor O'Curry,* gives an account of the sports,

games, ceremonies and lighting of

(now Telltown,

fires

at Taillten

to the north of Tara), for

which that

ancient place was celebrated, and which took place in

the beginning of August.

These were said

to

been instituted more than a thousand years

have

earlier

than the time of which the writer wrote (a.D. 405), by

Lug, the king of the Tuatha De Danann, in honour of
Taillte, the wife of

been fostered

and
it

Mac

At her

Ere.

court he had

so he raised over her a mighty

games

instituted

in her honour.

mound,

In this example,

should be noticed as very characteristic that the

person honoured
race as those

is

reputed to be not of the same

who honour

her.

The

idea of a

common

country has prevailed over the idea of common kindred,

some measure by the fact, or

The tomb of a Firbolg
queen is, according to the story, made a sacred place
by the Tuatha De Danann, and accepted as such
by the Milesians later. It does not greatly matter
whether the story be true. The important point is
that it should be believed to be true by the Milesians.
but

is

related to

it

in

presumed fact, of fosterage.

It illustrates

taken

effect

a tendency, which

may

very well have

throughout the whole island, to accept the

sacred places of the earlier races as sacred, and pay

honour to their heroes as national heroes.

It

would appear, indeed, that the Tuatha De

Danann made
*

a deep impression on the imagination

" Manuscript Materials of Ancient

Irish History," p. 287.

PAGAN mi: LA. YD AT HOME.

of their successors.
selves

Of

99

the historical people them-

we hear

magic and

that they were noted for their skill in

druidical arts.
More important is it that

the heroes and heroines of the

Tuatha De Danann, Lir,

Mananan, the Dagda Mor, Angus his beautiful son,
and the three fair sisters Eire and Fohla and Banba,
"

from each of

whom

and others appear

at least the

immortal

spirits

foster the children of Erin.

aspect of

it,

an immortal

name "

the island has a

in the literature as, if

these

not the gods,

who love, and sometimes

Nor is this all in one
;

tradition assigns to the

life in

Tuatha generally
the midst of the hills and beneath

the seas.

Thence they issue to mingle freely with the

mortal sons of men, practising those druidical
arts in
which they were great of yore, when they
won Erin
from the Firbolgs by "science," and
when the
Milesians

won Erin from them by

valour.
That
was a people whom the legend of the
Tuatha shadows forth is probable, but it is
almost

there really

certain

that

myth.

The

the tales about them are poetical

idea of them, however, as a wise and
all

mighty race which preceded the Milesians

in the
possession of the island, and who dwell
there still,
in that invisible land, within
the visible land, of everlasting youth, strong in the
possession of a druidism
that could bend
spirits to

whom

all

nature to their

the

soil

of Erin

will,
is

the immortal

sacred, foster-

kindred oft to the sons of Miledh and intermarrying

with them this idea is rooted firmly in
the
bardic

CELTIC IRELAND.

lOO
imagination, and

we must take

sentiment tended

hymn

In the
St.

we

Patrick,

it

as a fair expression

which the popular religious

of the ideas towards

in their time.

by

written

St.

plainly

are

coming of Patrick the

Fiech

in

that

told

honour
before

of

the

Irish worsliipped the Sidhe,*

and the bards identify the Sidhe with the Tuatha De

Danann, or rather with the palaces in which these

mighty beings dwelt.
For instance, there is an

poem

ancient

in

the

Book

of

Ballymote on the

wonders of that Brugh-na-Boinne, which

in

the

literature as

the Tuatha
ciated

also

is

familiar

the hall of the great

king of

De Danann,

Dagda Mor, and is

with Angus, who carried thither
the

assoafter

death one of the famous Fenian champions, Diarmid,

his foster-son.f

This

is

the second stanza of the

poem.
'
'

Behold the Sidhe before your eyes

manifest to you that it is a king's mansion,
Which was built by the firm DagJa.
It was a wonder, a court, an admirable hill."
;

It is

The same

place

is

spoken of as the

fairy

mansion

of Brugh on the Boyne, in a tale relating

how

certain poetic lover, finding that the only condition

on which the lady of

his suit

his affections

would accept

was the composition of a poem describing

unknown to him, goes to

mansion on the Boyne to see his nmse

her possessions, then

fairy
*

Pronounced "Shee."

f Joyce's "Celtic

the
evi-

Romances."

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

lOI

and with her aid m?kes

dently a fairy foster-mother

the required poem.

The

Tuatha De Danann with the

identity of the

degenerate fairy of Christian times appears

while the Sidhe are the halls of the

in the fact that

Tuatha, the

sometimes

fairies are the

people of the Sidhe, and

called the Sidhe simply, just as St. Fiech

the Tuatha.

calls

plainly

In

bardic

times,

however, the

people of the fairy mansions are frequently called by

a

name

indicating, as a primary characteristic, their

We

connection with the places reverenced as Sidhe.

hear of the ben-sidhe and the fer-sidhe, literally the

woman and

the

man

The

of the fairy mansions.

ben-sidhe, pronounced

baiisJiee,

has descended to our

times, as the guardian spirit of certain Irish families,

which manifests

itself in

Here, again,

hand.

is

some way when a death

a curious fact

is

the ban-shee

at
is

an immortal being mysteriously connected with the

destiny of a particular group of kindred, and associated in

The

modern times

solely with the idea of death.

inference seems probable, to say the least, that

the Sidhe,

whence these

racial spirits

were supposed

to come, were within those great sepulchral

which the ancient

dead.

Irish raised

What more natural

should be laid

in

the race's destiny

those

mounds,

above their honoured

than that the ancestral dead

spots where the spirits

of

dwelt immortal, and would care

for the heroes in the ghostly

life

after death

more natural than that reverent hands should

What
build

CELTIC IRELAND.

I02
the

mound broad and high and

fort of the

spirits that

round, for the com-

dwelt therein

What more

natural, too, than that the spirit of the race as in

modern superstition the foster- parent of divine

some of the bardic tales should draw
nigh at the time of death, and bear the immortal

the

race as in

its fairy home

The similar ideas that the fairies carry off the
young men and women who die, and that the dead
come forth on November Eve to dance with the

soul to

these

fairies

on the

Irish

peasantry now, and

hill

people's share

in

linger in the

represent

minds of the
the

death to the invisible Irish nation whose

the centre of the
folk, a

hills,

which

in

fairyland

was

home

and

in the hills

is now
Whether

reflected itself in

the sidhe and ben-sidhe of the tombs, or was

ancestral

in

the tombs,

and honoured

it,

ever,

it

and then

the

latter supposition

itself into

reflected

would not be easy to

the fairy

first

where the Milesians found

nature-spirits that populate the

land,

in

but this

the sacred family mounds.

first

is

yields, for the aristocratic

family ban-shee, dwelling once

forgotten

common

that idea of a relationship after

is

myth would have

hidden
say.

the

districts of the

Probably, how-

nearer the truth, for

required a certain

de-

velopment of imagination such as no race, and certainly not a race with strong family affections,

would

be likely to attain, without having previously imagined

the continued existence of

its

heroes after death.

It

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

may
of

IO3

be that the choice of the ancestral sacred places

predecessors

their

as

cemeteries by the

their

and the double tribute of respect hence-

Milesians,

forward paid to them, occasioned the peculiar form of

The

the Irish fairy myth.

Milesian tombs were the

abode of the aristocratic Tuatha, but their

common

people were gradually connected with the underground

So

world of the island generally.

all

Nature came

to have a sacred meaning, instinct with the feeling of

kindred through the idea of fairy fosterage on Irish

soil,

fosterage by the

elder race to which the soil of

Eire, sweet daughter of the

Dagda,*

is

sacred.

And

is

easy to see how, as developed and refined

by bardic

influence, Irish religious sentiment contri-

thus

it

buted to that

effect of

merging the feeling of kindred

in the feeling of Ireland,

ing from
Irish

force,

its

in the least detract-

which so characterized the early

people that they have infected

among them with

since settled

To

without

the

every settler in Ireland, sooner or

places of Ireland

become sacred

all

other races

same tendency.
later,

the sacred

and every place

in

Ireland has a poetic sacredness.

Respect

Tuatha of

for

the

dead,

periodical celebration of
(of

and

reverence for

the

Erin, observance of the great feasts, the

games

in

the sacred places

which Tara must certainly have been one), and

such superstitions as
the peasantry

This

is

these

we

still

find

dying out among

are the chief positive elements

the bardic derivation of the countrv's

name.

CELTIC IRELAND.

I04

can

that

be

sacrificial

discovered
or

rites

of

paganism.

Irish

Of

any elaborate ceremonial not a

Whatever they
is to be found.

trace in bardic times

may have been elsewhere, or in times of which even

Irish memory holds no hinted record, Ireland of the
bards knew its druids simply as men skilled in all
magical

having no marked relation either to a

arts,

system of mythology or to a scheme of ceremonial

The head

practice.

to

do with the sidhe than

who

more
and the king it was

of the kindred would have

he,

presided over the periodical

festivals.

Hence,

perhaps, their natural association with politics.

It

was

idolatrous

not,

therefore,

a land

to

where superstition was organized

to a

of obstinate

paganism that Patrick came, nor

priestly caste.

to a land

definitely in relation

imagination could well

Celtic

dispense with idols,* and Celtic freedom was averse

both to hard and

definition of doctrines to

land was

full

and

ceremonial

fast

be believed.

to

precise

Moreover, the

of active intellects, in want of more

thought-material on which to spend themselves, of

eager souls touched by a tender sympathy for the

poetic beauty of a noble
*
idols

The "

and of vivid imaginations

Tripartite Life of St. Patrick "

which stood

by the

life,

saint.

in the plain of

The "Tripartite

Magh

makes mention of a group of

and were there destroyed

Slecht,

Life," however,

is

very mediaeval, and,

no hint anywhere of a systematic worship connected with

these, the suspicion arises that they may have been, if they existed at all,
mere memorial stones, raised to the dignity of idols by the iconoclastic
as there

is

imagination of the mediaeval Christians.

do not mention them.

The

earlier lives of St. Patrick

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

ready to be

had been
poetry

in

stirred.

10$

Before Patrick, the sacred bard

the land

superstition

had paled before

the noble deeds of self-devoted heroes had

been sung and heard

the gentle, ever-open nature

of the Gael was ready to take a higher

Isle of Sonsf

was soon

to

become

flight.

The

the Isle of Saints,

io6

CHAPTER

V.

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
St. Patrick's Christian mission to Ireland

the

first,

but

vast
on,

it

was the

For the

results.

facts

first

was not

produce any important

to

connected with

it

we have

mass of later information that cannot be relied

and a few sources of knowledge that cannot

reasonably

be

these are two

himself, his

The most important

doubted.

acknowledged works of

St.

Confession," and his epistle to a British

"

prince Coroticus.

There are

of his

Book of Armagh, both

in

life

of

Patrick

the

two early

also

histories

of

them

belonging to the latter half of the seventh century,

about two hundred years after

From

"History of the Celtic Church

rived,

St.

Patrick's

time.

these sources the account given in Dr. Stokes's

and they are

on by Dr. Todd
history

in

his

older

of the great Irish

Ireland"

is

de-

to enable us to form

Patrick's

character,

the

its effects.

and more elaborate

They

saint.

sufficient

method and

in

also the staple material relied

nature

are

quite

a clear idea of St.

of

his

missionary

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
St. Patrick

lOJ

was probably a native of Strathclyde,

is now Dumbarton,

born at Alcluith which

in Britain,

seem that his family was derived

The interesting
originally from Armoric Brittany.
point to notice about his origin is that it was conbut

it

would

nected with British Christianity, and that, therefore,

Armoric Brittany being

Celtic also,

it

was a

Celtic

form of Christian thought and organization that he

At

brought to Ireland.

the early age of sixteen he

was taken prisoner, and became slave to an

chief Milchu in

The scene
It

is

in

North Dalaradia,

in

Irish

County Antrim.

of his slavery has been carefully identified.

the valley of Braid, near Broughshane, five

There, near the

miles from Ballymena.

hill

of Slemish,

Patrick spent six years tending his master's cattle,

and

there, as

he

tells

us himself, his

mind awakened

to

a genuine realization of the Christian doctrine he had

learned as a child.

At

the end of that time, he

made

means having been, as he believed,

him in a dream. Thus he returned to

his escape, the

revealed to
his family,

then probably

in

Brittany, having gained

the threefold requirement needed for his after-work.

He had

developed the missionary temperament,

and

spiritual aspirations

had learned to love the

its

human

Irish people,

knew

their

customs and their character.

And

with

felt

in

them

and

himself greatly

he

moved towards

spiritual darkness

tenderness

his sleep

and be

language,

at

its

he

one

their

so,

ere long, he

this

people lying

was troubled with

I08

CELTIC IRELAND.
and he heard voices

visions,

calling

to

him from

Ireland for help.

The

question has been

much

who

discussed as to

was that sent Patrick on his mission to the Irish,

and especially whether he was sent by the Pope or
not.
All that he himself tells us is that he was
it

moved

to

which he

go by the visions he had and the constraint

upon him

to be laid

felt

to be a direct call to his

he nor the ancient

Rome, such
since

it

and these he took

As

work from God.

lives

a mission

is

neither

mention a mission from

extremely improbable

but

would be necessary that Patrick should be

by some bishop for the work, and since

we know that the events connected with the mission
of Germanus of Auxerre to Britain had drawn his

consecrated

attention to Ireland about this time,

it is

antecedently

probable that this Germanus was the person technically

responsible

for

that

Irish

mission

of

which

Patrick himself was the real originator.

About the year

little

432,

or,

according to Dr. Todd,* a

Patrick landed for the second

later,

Ireland at the spot where the town of

stands.

He

time

in

Wicklow now

did not remain here, however, but sailed

north towards Dalaradia, on which his heart was

set,

landing as he passed at Inis Patrick off the Skerries,

and

at the

mouth

of the Boyne.

Finally he halted at

Strangford Lough, and proceeded into the country

from that point, speedily to make a convert of a

*

" Life of

St. Patrick," p. 391, et suj.

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
certain chieftain, Dichu,

who was "the

Op

of the

first

Scots to confess the faith under Patrick's ministry."

made

Dichu

the

established
Saul,

on which

of land,

grant

Patrick

Irish church, at a place called

first

Thence, he continued

where he afterwards died.

way

his

towards the scene of his servitude, bent on

the conversion of his old master Milchu

but legend

relates that Milchu, hearing of the

approach of Patrick

and the triumphs that attended

his progress, feared

lest

the magical powers of his fugitive slave should

reduce him
his

he set

in his turn to servitude, so

house and perished

in the flames,

possibility of such a result.

returned to his

new

friend

And

fire

to

avert the

to

Patrick, grieved,

and convert Dichu.

Soon, however, he determined to take the decisive

making a Christian attack on the centre of

Irish nationality
Tara itself.
Like a good general, he saw that success to his mission

step of
Irish

at

paganism and

Tara would mean,

victory

which

imagination,

in

the

first

place, a great

must powerfully

and,

in

the

second

afifect

place,

moral

the

popular

political

achievement, which would open up the whole country

to his missionary efforts.

Accompanied by a party of followers, he landed

mouth of the Boyne, and, following the course of
the river, encamped at Slane, close by the great pagan
at the

cemetery,

"

the grave of the sons of Fen'i," where the

kings of Tara were buried.

are told, on the

hill

Pie pitched his tent,

of Slane, which

is

we

plainly visible

no

CELTIC IRELAND.

from Tara, where

was being

Beltine

Patrick

lit

very time the

at that

celebrated.

the Easter

It

was Easter Eve, and

on the

fires

festival of

hill,

thus, wittingly

or unwittingly, contravening the immemorial custom,

which forbade that any

on

all

Tara.

the plain

Hence

came

it

fire

to pass that

especially attracted to the

Laoghaire, with
attendants, went

his
in

should be

lit

that night

the royal beacon shone out from

till

was

attention

of Slane, and the king

hill

druids

principal

and various

man

anger to see and punish the

bold enough to offend against the sacred customs of

the

land.

After various

conflicts

into the account of which

with the druids,

miraculous element

the

enters largely, the king yields, though rather through

fear of Patrick's

Tolerance

for

power than

Christianity

for

any higher motive.

thus obtained, and a

is

safe-conduct through Ireland granted

by the

king.

Laoghaire, himself, however, remained to the end a

pagan

at heart,

his ancestors

and was buried

upright, with

his

after the

arms by

manner of

his side

and

his face towards Leinster, with the king of which the

kings of Tara had a constant feud.

But Patrick made converts

at Laoghaire's court

notably one Ere, a Brehon lawyer.

Thence he made

a tour through Meath, founded churches at Trim,

and elsewhere, and made an important

at

Donagh

ghaire,

real convert

Patrick, in Conall, the brother of

and the ancestor of

From Meath

St.

St.

Patrick

Lao-

Columba.

made

his

way

to

Con-

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.

I T I

naught, with which place he had specially connected

the visions that

Pursuing

his

drew

first

his

mind towards

Ireland.

and

missionary labours as he went,

appointing bishops where he established churches, he

along the great western road that led to

passed

Connaught, and crossed the Shannon near Clonmac-

Thence he proceeded
Connemara, and remained in Connaught for

moise
into

King's County.

in the

The

the space altogether of seven years.

had pursued

at

Tara

pursued elsewhere

to

king or chief
and,

if

the

step was

first

make him

win the

to

a real convert

not, to gain at least his tolerance

policy he
policy he

typical of the

is

if

possible,

and approval

so far as obtaining a grant of land to build a church

upon and make the formation of a

munity

The

possible.

communities, scattered

in all sorts of

out the land, was in fact Patrick's

afterwards that

abroad
tian

faith.

often

com-

religious

places through-

way

as

it

was

followed by the Irish missionaries

Sometimes, a converted chief would be

enough

to

hand over

tribal rights to the religious

lished

of

of converting the whole country to the Chris-

enthusiastic

and

religious

establishment

among

his people

and

all

his possessions

community

estab-

such case

it would
happen that he himself became abbot of the
;

in

monastery thus endowed, with bishops under him

though

ecclesiastically

object was to plant

superior to

centres

him.

of Christian

throughout the land, and he used the

Patrick's

influence

tribal

system

CELTIC IRELAND.

112
as he found

it,

to carry out this purpose

As

available means.

by every

a stranger having no status in

way

the tribe, Patrick's only

of getting immediately a

material footing on the tribe lands was through the

who

person

chief or other powerful

held demesne

These he could either plant with

stranger tenants or grant for purposes which he
A converted chief would deem
thought desirable.
lands of his own.

such a grant from him to the church as a pressing

duty

and the

religious centre once established, with

new

a staff of Irish Christians, generally

manage

it,

converts, to

the essential work of organization was,

The

according to Patrick's Celtic ideal, done.

centre

grow by its own vitality and to make

the Christian idea dominant in its vicinity.
From Connaught Patrick went to Ulster, where
was expected

to

he specially visited Donegal, Antrim, and Armagh.

And

there in the old city of

Ard-Macha, he estab-

lished (445) the primatial see of

Armagh, having, as
him

the story goes, induced the king, Daire, to grant

the high ground on which the cathedral

by miraculous deeds which

at

last

now

stands,

overcame

his

reluctance to give so strong a position to a stranger.

The king
and

of

Leinster's

thither Patrick next

labours

in

the

eastern

Munster we are also

palace

was

at

Naas,

proceeded, to pursue his

province.

told,

account of his doings there.

That he

visited

but have no authentic

Last of

all,

as old age

overtook him, he returned once more to the favoured

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.

pr jvince of Ulster, and to the scene of his earliest

There, among- the brothers of his

labours at Saul.
first

church, he died.

After

death

his

arose

contest

Armagh
To settle

churches of Saul and

his body.

interring

between the

for the

the

honour of

matter,

it

was

determined to yoke two untamed oxen to the cart

that bore his remains, and to leave

them free to go
So runs the story. The
oxen stopped at the spot where now stands the
church of Downpatrick, and there, accordingly, the
great saint was buried.
This much, at least, is
which way they would.

certain, that since the year 700,

it

has been positively

believed that the bones of St. Patrick

lie

under the

of the Downpatrick cathedral.

site

But before Patrick

had planted

was good

in

soil,

seed was sown

died, the

church which he

Ireland had taken root.

The

well prepared for the seed,

by a

skilful

hand.

The

soil

and the

bardic age

had developed to a high point the heroic spirit of

enterprise and self-devotion, and had developed also
that

still

characteristic feature in Irish character

accessibility to ideas

to the

its

and readiness to submit action

To

sway of thought.

a people of enthusiastic

temperament, vivid imagination and idealizing tendencies, Patrick preached a practical doctrine of
self-devotion.

To

people

affectionate

towards

kindred, and, notwithstanding their warlike fierceness,

sympathetic towards

all

men, he preached a prac-

CELTIC IRELAND.

114
tical

doctrine of love.

intellect

To

people of awakened

and quickened sense of the beautiful

in

things and thought, he brought a theory of nature

life fuller and more thought-satisfying, as well as
more sublime, than any they had been able to forge
for themselves.
Irishmen had their faults, and

and

were

them-

faults

that

selves,

but they were peculiarly susceptible then, as

troublesome,

especially

to

they are now, to the influence of a noble ideal that

asks for self-devotion.

And

then a land of song, and the

this

is

why

Ireland was

of song has never

spirit

died out in the hearts of her people.

The

soil

was well prepared

plots
land.

and Patrick sowed

He sowed

the seed with skilful hand.

throughout the length and

When

it

in

breadth

compact
of

the

the chief of a sept was converted, he

would sometimes confer

his

house and lands on the

church, transferring also his right as chief; and thus

a.

religious sept

would be formed, consisting of the

whom

religious persons to

the grant was made, and

of the vassals connected with the land besides.

head was called the

"

comarba

"

The

or co-heir, inheritor of

both the spiritual and temporal rights of the founder,

and thus having the

right of chieftaincy in relation to

the freemen of the tribe, as well as other larger rights

over the vassals

settled

on the monastic demesne

which had been the private demesne of the chief

In

other cases, the chief would simply grant a

piece of land for the establishment of a church and

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
community.

religious

Into that

T I

community wonld

come, as volunteers, the surrounding tribesmen and

others from a distance, and thus, on the type of the

corresponding secular institutions, a voluntary family

would be founded, with an abbot as head, and a

bishop

usually

attached

for

conve-

ecclesiastical

Similar voluntary families were frequently

nience.

formed, not only by the professional classes for the

sake of learning, but also by the people in general for

agricultural

and other industrial purposes

same

the

tribe, as

we

relation to his

and the

community held much

bruighfer of the agricultural

community, and

in

the whole

the abbot of the monastery held in the case

are considering.

From

the

first,

method of
being

b\^

his

keeping with the Irish

political organization.
tribal,

made

Patrick seems to have

ideal of church organization in

and developed

The

nation began

slowly towards a

national unity which, as a uniform, centralized, executive

administration,

forms were prevalent

in

it

The

never realized.

in Patrick's time, so the

Ireland naturally began

by being

tribal

Church

tribal too,

and

developed slowly, though not nearly so slowly as the

State, towards such a centralized unity as

Roman empire it assumed

Rome was often shocked
Irish Christianity, with

and

its

Yet

it

somewhat
is

its

at the first start.

under the
Medieval

at this tribal character of

indefinite

number

fiery spirit of local

evident enough

that

the

of bishops

independence.

extraordmary

CELTIC IRELAND.

Il6

vitality of Irish Christianity,

its

influence on the national

with the peculiarity of

and the vivid reahty of

was largely bound up

life,

growth

in

way which

is

Christianity estab-

form.

its

manner

lished itself in Ireland after the

fact suggests that missionary societies

do well

to study

of a natural

quite exceptional

detail

in

little

and the

might perhaps

method of

the

Patrick and of the great Irish missionaries who, after

him, laboured in Great Britain and

family settled

religious

in

Europe.

midst of a pagan

the

in

people, pursuing the ordinary labours of agriculture

and handicraft
bours on

for

support, exhorting

its

to lead better lives, teaching

would
of

all

all

listen,

this

sides

its

neigh-

useful occasions, but without bitterness,

all

and constant

is

and

its

in

prayer for the M^elfare

what Patrick aimed

it

is

who

doctrine to those

at

establishing on

easy to imagine the effectiveness

of his method.
It is evident, too, that

the tribal church organiza-

tion, though it must surely have given occasion for

argument and even fighting, was highly favourable
to the growth of a tolerant spirit.
With a felt sense

of unity underlying
for

much

diversity,

it

all,

and

education in tolerance.

Irish Christianity left

it

an

Moreover, the Church was

national just in proportion as

and

room

this implied necessarily

it

was not established,

never at anytime approximated to the position

of a State institution.

Thus, not only was the sword

of the State never actually invoked to defend

the

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
Church against pagan or

heretic,

for that sort of thing did not exist.

was centralized and brought

but the machinery

When

at last to

the Church

acknowledge

Rome, no earlier than the

year 1 152, Armagh was made the seat of the primacy,
the seat of political supremacy being not there but in
This was done in accordance with Irish
the south.
definitely the authority of

tradition,

which had always assigned the place of

honour to that
see

see, as

Armagh had

self

and

Indeed,

Armagh
It

Kells,

final

St.

Patrick him-

court of appeal for the Irish churches.

we have

positive evidence from the

that this view

was not

being sacred to

long been regarded as the chief

till

this

held in the

was held
year

month

in the

Book of

eighth century.

152 that, at the synod of

of March, the

diocesan

system was established which has existed ever

since,

the pope having despatched a supreme legate to Ire-

land for the purpose, at the request of a synod held

four years earlier at Holmpatrick.

Cashel,

Tuam, and

Dublin were made archbishoprics, as well as

Armagh

and the wise concession of the primatial dignity to

Arm.agh transformed that powerful

see,

which had

been hitherto the centre of opposition to Rome, into

Not even thus, however, was the

spirit of Irish Church Home Rule destroyed.
The
monastic schools still held on their own way. So
a faithful subject.

the primate Gelasius held a synod in

1162, at the

abbey of Clane, on the banks of the Lififey, when it

was decreed that no one should be admitted a reader

CELTIC IRELAND.

Il8
or

professor

of

divinity

who had

not studied

at

Armagh, or taken an ad enudctn degree in that college.

And thus it was intended to bring into subjection to Armagh, all the colleges, as well as all the
bishops now no longer to be indefinite in number
while Armagh itself held authority direct from Rome.
Thus after seven centuries the Irish Church, with

its

fiery

whole

to fall

Europe

of independence, consented

spirit

into

though

line

it is

with

all

other churches

success of Gelasius, and probably there

even now.

in

certain that the old spirit which

died so hard was not quite dead even

it left

on the

It is interesting,

is

after

the

little

of

however, to note

that the process of centralization after the

Roman

manner was brought about by the action of forces

within the Irish Church itself, and not, as some
persons imagine, by Henry II. and his Papal Bull.
The process had been a long struggle between two
sets of ideas, the

one set national and

set cosmopolitan,

and national too

tribal,

the other

in a sense, since

the loss of idiosyncrasies was accompanied by the

gain of unity in organization.

The

struggle began

with the controversy about the proper time of keeping Easter, as to which the Irish Church held out for
its

old customs with characteristic persistency, long

after the rest of the Christian world

to

uniformity.

general struggle
controversialists

had been reduced

The cosmopolitan element in the

is well expressed by one of the Irish
in the eighth century, St. Cummian,

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
of Durrow,

who sums up

Roman

of the

a long argument in favour

custom, addressed to the

lona, in these words:

19

"What

Abbot

of

can be thought worse

concerning the Church, our mother, than that we

should say, Rome errs, Jerusalem errs, Alexandria

Antioch

errs,

errs,

the whole world errs

the Scots

and Britons alone know what is right."

But we must return to the fifth century, and the
system of missionary centres which Patrick set on
foot,

and which soon became centres of learning as

well as of spiritual influence.

shown that we have reason

tic

of

learning

Ireland

It

has already been

monas-

to associate the

in

its

corresponding learning of Wales.

inception

The

first

with

the

name

to

stand out as that of a learned monk, founder of a

monastic school,

is

the

said to have studied

name

Bay

ally associated

himself as

Welsh

saints,

Trim and

first at

Dair-inis in the

of St. Finnian,

who

is

afterwards at

of Wexford, but to have specipupil with

the eminent

David, Cathmael, arid Gildas.

that he returned to Ireland

After

and became Abbot of

Clonard, the earliest of the monastic communities

known

to

father

develop into a college or school.

is

called

therefore that
rise

St.

by the Four Masters the " fosterof the saints of Ireland," and we may infer

Finnian

many

other of the schools took their

from the inspiration of saints who had been

pupils at Clonard.

The monastic communities were

there already, and so was the old Irish zeal for

know-

CELTIC IRELAND.

I20
ledge

a learned abbot was quite enough to turn a

community

Clonmacmoise,

into a college.

Glasnevin,

Devenish,

besides

mac-saint on
to Clonard.

Another of the

was established by a

Moville on the banks of

Since the

Inis-

Lough Erne, owed such a learned abbot

The great Columba of lona was also a

pupil of the college there.

schools

Cloiifert,

and

Cluain-inis

first

St.

different St. Finnian, at

Lough

Foyle.

Finnian died in 549, at which

time Columba was a young

see that the scholarly

earliest

man

we
way
as we

of twenty-eight,

movement was

well under

in the first half of the sixth century.

This,

have already seen, was the age when

Irish enterprise

took on the missionary form, and

it

name

associated with the

of the

Picts

and

of St.

Northern

is

specially

Columba the

apostle

England, and of

St.

Columbanus famous for labour in France, Switzerland, and North Italy.

These are the two conspicuous men, but each of them was surrounded and
succeeded by a number of less well-known workers,
and

their missions

But

it

is

were the parents of

Ireland at

home

many

others.

that occupies us now,

and

the facilities which she then afforded for the training

of

men
St.

like these.

Columba, a descendant of the great King

was born

in

baptized at

Niall,

521, at Gartan in Donegal, and was

Temple Douglas, which is not far oft".

made the round of

After his education at Clonard, he

he leading

Irish

colleges,

according to

the

later

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.

Then commenced

schoolmen.

fashion^ of the

his

work in Ireland, no less than the foundaof three hundred churches being attributed to

evarigeHstic
tion

him,

among which

the

Donegal

Raphoe,
St.

are Derry, Kells,

coast,

Lambay

Drumcliffe

Tory Island
Sligo,

in

off

Swords,

near Malahide, and Durrow.

Columba was a

as an artistic

poet, as well

He had

scribe, a teacher,

and a missionary.

something

him of the warlike nature of his

and so it fell out that he had a

left

in

also

aristocratic ancestry,

who claimed

quarrel with St. Finnian of Moville,

copy which Columba had made, without

When

of his Latin Psalter.

to the king of
ciples of the

Meath, he decided

Brehon

he

law, the

summoned

said, of the

in

referred

on the prin-

less

Meathmen were

Columba took

and a great

Columba and

were triumphant and no

his consent,

was

copy properly belonged

his tribesmen,

ensued, in which at last

is

that,

Thereupon the Scot

to St. Finnian.
fire

the quarrel

his

conflict

Ulstermen

than three thousand,

slain.

it

Then Columba,

repentant, retired to the monastery of Inismurray off

the coast of Sligo, to consult his friend jMolassius

Avas

abbot there.

who

Molassius advised submission, and

prescribed, as a penance

and compensation

for the

Columba should underPictland with which his name is

great evil he had done, that

take that mission to

so honourably associated.

After that, the story of Columba's

life

belongs

mainly to the history of Scotland and indirectly to

CELTIC IRELAND.

122
that of England.

It

has been already told

does appear again on the

Nevertheless, he

pages.

Irish scene, as

in these

an honoured guest and ambassador at

the national assembly of Drumceatt, in 590, which

settled other affairs besides those pertaining to the

The

Scottish colony in Alba.

in

danger.

against

They had roused popular indignation

their exactions, and now they were

them by

threatened with expulsion.

saint,

poets of Ireland were

was

still

But Columba, though a

came

a bard, and he

to

Drumceatt

plead their cause as well as that of the

little

to

colony

across the seas.

The memory
lasted

till

of the great meeting at Drumceatt

the seventeenth century

great writer of that age,

for Colgan, the

us that the site of the

tells

assembly was even then frequented by numerous

pilgrims.

The

Irish lords

arms during the

months, so we
tion

and clergy encamped under

entire session.

may

This lasted fourteen

much

infer that

were satisfactorily disposed of

piece of legislation
told that

is

arrears of legisla-

in that time.

strikingly curious,

Columba was

its

One

and we are

principle promoter.

It

was decreed that women should henceforth be exempted from military service, whence it may be
inferred that they

still

retained their military habits

some extent. And, indeed, it was found desirable

by Adamnan, Columba's successor, to secure the
to

exactment of a similar law a century

synod of

Birr, in the

year 697.

later, at

the

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.

The most important domestic

23

the

business of

occasion, however, concerned the poets and the profession of teaching.

It

was solemnly resolved that

the general system of education should be revised,

and the following scheme was adopted.

1. Each king, chief, and lord was to have a

special

ollamh, or doctor, in literature attached to his court,

to

whom

free lands

and a grant of

were to be assigned by his

inviolability to his person

chief,

and sanctuary

by the monarch and men of Erin

to his lands

at

large.
2.

Free

common

lands,

or

endowments, were

ordered to be given to the ollamh for the purposes of

education after the manner of a university, in which

free

education should be given to such of the

men

of

Erin as desired knowledge.

Thus was

established a system of free national

secular colleges quite distinct from the ecclesiastical

schools,

and naturally founded on the older

institution of a State-supported

academic

freely

on the people and

their

mental store to the people.

working of the older

achieved

much

for

in

Irish

class, living

general giving freely of

institution,

Abuses

which had

in

in its

the

time

popular education, led to reform

and the reform amounted

to the establishment of the

same academic class as heads of schools with definite

endowment as well as definite privileges. After that
the days of the wandering poet, with his pupils around

him, began probably to be over.

CELTIC IRELAND.

124

That the material which used

to breed poets

was

gradually used up for breeding scholars in their stead

is

know

although we

likely;

that

Irish

literature

never was neglected in any of the Irish schools, and

it is

ever,

we owe the preservation of

The next great Irishman, howas we know, an Irish poet, while

to those schools that

the bardic traditions.

was

not, so far

he was a remarkably elegant

writings are

This was Columbanus,

twenty-two years
543.

He

native

than

later

was educated

at

of Leinster, born

Columba,

in

the year

one of the schools

Lough Erne and

islands of

whose

classical scholar,

extant to testify to his scholarship.

still

in

the

Bangor,

afterwards at

then becoming famous as a place where the greatest

attainments
possible.

learning,

in

as

well

as

sanctity

After forty-two years of a quiet

missionary zeal came upon Columbanus, and,

he, with a

band of companions, including

were

life,

the

in 585,

St. Gall,

turned their steps to France, then in a state of more

than pagan immorality.

His labours there and

else-

where have been already mentioned, and space forbids

we should dwell on them further. But in general

we may connect with the missionary band of which

that

he

is

the central figure, those remains of Irish art and

Irish literature

which are

still

to

be found scattered

here and there on the continent of Europe.

During the

sixth,

the School of the

we have already

seventh and eighth centuries

West grew and

seen,

it

produced

flourished, and, as
its

highest result in

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.

12$

the philosopher Erigena so late as the ninth century.

But the eighth century was marked by an event

fraught with

much

evil

the

for

and the

Church

This was the pagan crusade of the Danes.

schools.

In 795, the Danes were

seen cruising off the

first

when they descended

coasts of Ireland, and

it

was on

churches and monasteries that their heavy hand

The

heaviest.
scripts

of

spii'it

destruction to art-treasures

must have been great

learning

is

hard

but, fortunately, the

destroy,

to

The

acquired, not hard to revive.

it is

once

and,

struggle lasted,

however, for more than two centuries on and

so

fell

and manu-

off,

and

probable that the energies of learning were to

some extent paralyzed by the generally disordered

state of society.

At
the

first

the

Danes came

middle of the ninth

as plunderers, but about

century their

assumed the purpose of settlement

for

movement
they were

then seeking to escape the tyranny of their princes

by finding homes

in other lands.

parts of Europe, they

commenced

still,

in other

work of

political

Later
the

conquest from which Ireland was saved, by the great

effort

made under Brian Boru

to bring the

Danes

into

That effort, 1014,

was successful, and henceforth the Danes were settlers
in the land, living by their own customs in their own
subjection

to the Irish crown.

towns, but destined soon to be absorbed, like later-

coming

The

strangers, into the Irish nation.

struggle with the

Norsemen must have

inter-

CELTIC IRELAND.

126

fered seriously with the

artistic

production

but

work of

Irish literary

would be

far

it

to suppose that anything like a collapse

As

of

societies

learned

and

in

art,

the land.

in

to

which most of the monu-

settler,

seems

It

destroy earlier treasures

become a

artistic

our possession belong, was between

Dane had

the tenth and twelfth centuries, after the

settled

result.

a matter of fact, the blossoming period

of Irish Christian

ments now

was the

was probably much more seriously

Political society

shaken than the

monks.

and

from the truth

likely that

he did

but by this time, having

he had ceased to be a destroyer,

and, baffled in his purposes of conquest, was tending

towards

his

ultimate

fate

of absorption

individuality of the Irish nation.

into

the

Cormac's chapel

on the Rock of Cashel belongs to the end of the

tenth century, during the interval between the

first

and second attack of the Danes.

The

ninth century was the

Danish

of

period

plunder, and of settlement along the coasts and in

convenient places for purposes of plunder.

Towards

the latter end of this century the Irish in Ireland,

like

the English in England, succeeded in driving

out the enemy, and there was peace for forty years.

Then

came

the

Danes

definitely than before

their

again,

but

bent

on permanent settlement

more
and

most notable work was the establishment of

kingdom of Dublin, with its centre at

one of their old haunts, Ath Cliath on the Lififey,
the Danish

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
where the

city of

2/

The

Dublin was built by them.

establishment of this kingdom dates from the year

919,

and

extent

its

may

be traced to-day as conter-

minous with the diocese of Dublin, extending from

Holmpatrick and Skerries on the north, to Arklow
and Wicklow on the south, and inland no farther
Until quite

than seven or eight miles to Leixlip.

recently this was also the district over which extended

of the

the jurisdiction

Lord Mayor of Dublin as

Admiral of the Port of Dublin.

On

College Green

used to be held the assembly of the freemen of the

kingdom of Dublin, while the

on the steep

hill

chiefs took their seats

that once stood where St. Andrew's

Church now stands, opposite to

College Green " which
the

is

so

-"

the old house on

dear to the national

modern Irishmen.

aspirations

of

Danes held

their parliaments, agreeing

senting to judgments

making merry,
ments

at

There the
on laws, con-

and contracts, feasting and

just as the old Irish held their parlia-

Tara, Carman,

Nor was Dublin

Armagh, and elsewhere.

the only Danish city.

Limerick,

became the centres of

petty Danish kingdoms, active in commerce, skilful,
Cork, Waterford, Wexford,

for those

political

times, in

and

all

domestic architecture, and with

legislative

ideas

essence with those of the people

identical

in

their

among whom they

settled.

In the course

nominally became,

of the tenth century the

for

the

most

Danes

part, converts

to

CELTIC IRELAND.

128

But

Christianity.

it

appears that they derived their

Christianity mainly from English sources

;.

and when

they began to organize their Church, they did so

Roman manner, and

after the

see of Canterbury.

the wars

became

It

was

in

connection with the

not,

however,

till

after

Boru that Danish Christianity

of Brian

either very real or

The

at all organized.

forces arrayed against Brian at Clontarf represented

mainly a pagan confederacy, although the king of

Dublin was nominally a Christian.

The importance

of Brian's work can hardly be

Danes of the South

In his youth the

overrated.

were a sore trouble to Munster, the province of which

Brian became king, after the murder, by their joint
enemies, of his brother

agent

middle
over

achieving

in

life,

all

Mahon

conquest

and he was the chief

over them.

In

his

he established himself as supreme king

Ireland.

And

in his old

age he smote the

Danes of Dublin, destroyed the pagan confederacy,

and reduced that kingdom to a position of subordination to the Irish High King.
This was

in

1014,

and the memory of the old

feuds lingered for a century or so.

first

time,

Dublin had a bishop.

In 1038, for the

Sitric,

Dublin, returned from a pilgrimage to

king of

Rome, much

impressed with the power, magnificence, and organization, of the

Roman Church

earliest Peter's
Sitric,

pence paid

the Danish king.

in

Sitric

and we

find that the

Ireland, were those of

determined to estab-

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
lish

a see in strict

communion with Rome,

ordinary Celtic ones

and the

first

jog
unlike the

bishop was called

Donatus, probably a Latinized

nam.e Doonan.

mark on
known as

the

Sitric
city,

form of the Irish

and Donatus have left their

by erecting the cathedral now

Christ Church, after the model of those

they had seen on the Continent.

Donatus died

in 1074, and then Dublin attached

Canterbury as the nearest ecclesiastical centre

itself to

of the

Roman

type.
This was an important step,
but a perfectly natural one. Dublin was
separated

from
its

Armagh by

the fact that Dublin had started

ecclesiastical life after a different

of which

Armagh was

the centre.

type from that

The

other Danish

communities followed the example of Dublin.

ford did not get a bishop

till

1096,

Water-

when the king

wrote to Anselm at Canterbur}^ asking that he

would
consecrate

that office Malchus of Winchester.

Thus an ecclesiastical union of the Irish Danes with
England seemed to be setting in.
to

But the Irish tendency to local independence

seems to overtake, like a fate. Irishmen of all races.

So we

find the fourth bishop of

Dublin beginning to
and to assume the

assert himself against Canterbury,

style and manners of an archbishop.

And forces
were about this time also at work to
remove the
difficulties that lay in

the

way

of Irish Church unity

on the side of the Celtic Church.

In

1 1

17,

the Archbishop of

Armagh was legally

K

CELTIC IRELAND.

130

Usnagh

recognized at the synod of

as primate of

all

Ireland except Dublin, and in 1121, the then bishop

The

of Dublin died.

primate, thinking the oppor-

tunity favourable to strike a blow at English intrusion,

attempted to seize on the cathedral and see of Dublin.

But the burgesses rose

to a

man, drove him

out,

and

elected a layman, Gregory, one of themselves, to be

consecrated at Canterbury as their bishop.

In their

wrath, they desired that even his lower orders should

be Norman, not

Gregory's predecessors seem,

Irish.

from their names, to have been Irishmen, but Gregory

was a Dane, and

cities,

all

round

Ireland, in the

Roman and

were bishops of the

Danish

Canterbury

party.

Yet,

Gregory's

during

Canterbury was

shaken

episcopate,
off

and

Armagh acknowledged, Dublin

the

the yoke

of

primacy of

being raised to the

dignity of an archbishopric, and the supremacy of

the pope acknowledged

by

the centre of resistance to

the head of

all

Armagh had been

Rome Armagh became
all.

the Irish churches.

This result was mainly brought about by the

labours of an Irishman, Malachy O'Morgair, whose
character recalls those of the missionary Irish saints
in earlier days.

It

was due

Holmpatrick was held

in

him that the synod at

148, when a petition was
to

sent to the pope asking for the archiepiscopal palls

for

Cashel,

Tuam, and Armagh.

The synod

Kells in 11 52 was a direct consequence of

this,

of

and

CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND.
at

it

the

the diocesan system was established, in which,

all

Danish sees were included, while Dublin was

made an

Thus

archbishopric.

reconciled,

Celt and

each making an approximation to the

ideal of the

other

and the second archbishop of

Dublin was that very genuine and

Laurence O'Toole, who has

honoured
times.

Dane were

for

good service

The danger

left

faithful Irishman,

behind him a name

to the country in

of the

Norman

Danish settlement was

completely passed, and the country seemed ready for

a fresh outburst, with
literary,

later the

and

artistic

renewed vigour,

development.

Norman was

in the land.

in political,

Not many years

CELTIC IRELAND.

^3^

CHAPTER
AND POLITICAL

SOCIAL

Even

this brief

VI.

INSTITUTIONS.

account of early Ireland would be

incomplete without more careful examination of the

social

and

political institutions

people lived a

which

life

history are

in

under which the

the external
so, full

Irish

manifestations

In their

of interest.

early stages of development there can be

of

little

doubt

that the Irish institutions were practically identical

with those of the other European peoples

position

isolated

people

to

develop

those

all

but the

that

from

apart

was exceptional,

question of the peculiar individual

genius of the nation

it is

institutions,

way

external influences, in a
setting aside

country enabled the Irish

of the

itself

regarded

racially.

Hence

that the record of Irish laws and social customs

has a

special

instructive

Northern European

many a
The
came

significance,

nations, while

it

for

all

the

sheds light on

sociological inquiry.

to

Irish nation, like all

their

country,

nations in early days,

not as

individuals, but

in

SOCIAL
tribes

AND POLITICAL

and the

had

down upon

chief or king,

its

common

reference to the

men

and courts of

or druids,

only,

in

assembly, and

the

In this tribal

origin of parliaments

The druid foreshadows

justice.

and

sense and will of the tribe

common

judge and the legislator

advice

tribe

doubtful matters by

all

as expressed in the tribal assembly.

assembly we see the

33

after

Each

the land.

wise

its

custom of determining

its

organization continued

tribal

they had settled

INSTITUTIONS.

persons with

first

depending

instance,
for

to give

the

tribal

to

power on the

their

The king

popular wisdom they display.

the

power

is

the chief

of kindred, the political head, the leader in battle, the

convener of the assembly, but he derives his authority

from the

The

probably
to

will of the tribe

peculiarity

of

in the large

expressed

the

Celtic

in the

tribal

assembly.

system was

proportion of influence ascribed

the druid or wise

man

as

compared with the

king,

and the very early

same

time, of the general idea attached to druids.

This

is

shown

in the

intellectualisation, at

the

development of several learned

classes dealing with different kinds of

wisdom, and

in

the consequent check given to the growth of anything

like

a priestly caste-influence.

were

These learned

classes

besides the druids the brehons and the bards,

with their several varieties.

Each
it

lived.

owned the land on which

tribe, as

a whole,

At

no question would

first,

quantity that each tribesman

arise as to the

had a

right

to use,

CELTIC IRELAND.

134

because land was unlimited

for

which

in

was required.

it

proportion to the uses

But, as population in-

theory developed that each tribesman

creased, the

much

was, in general, entitled to use as

of the

common

pasture land as he required for his stock, and to use

tillage land in proportion to his status in the tribe.

Originally,

no individual tribesman

^rcw^.:/

any portion

of the land, but each head of a family was entitled to

To

claim the family's share.

certain portion

was

allotted,

the chief, as chief, a

which he appears to have

held in addition to the share that

him

to

fell

as

head

of his family.

The Irish law

known as that of

of succession

sequence of the theory of

member

tribal

landed property

was a

logical con-

ownership.

If

of the tribe died, his piece of land did not

descend by right to
children equally.

a right to

its

was

his eldest son, or

Originally,

absolute owner, the

This

in

Irish gavelkind,

tribe,

it

every

even to

reverted to

member

all his
its

sole

of which had

use proportionate to his tribal status.

undoubtedly the essential

principle

of

by gavelkind, and the logically complete

application of it would clearly require that at the

inheritance

death of each tribesman the lands of the tribe should

be redivided among
however,

that

all

the tribesmen.

such a procedure

It is manifest,

would be highly

inconvenient, and never in fact likely to be carried

out.

Various customs would be developed

for apply-

ing the principle to the various cases that might arise

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

35

and these customs, considered as laws of inheritance

which strictly they were not would present the idea

that a man's distant relations were equally with his

owai children his natural heirs to property in land.

And
in,

as the

the

custom of private ownership

law

would

of succession

principle that the land which a

in usufruct only,

his death

man

and the reversion of

would therefore be to

land crept

in

reflect

still

held he

the

owned

this usufruct at

his family as a whole,

not to his merely personal heirs.

It is

easy to see

that such a law of succession would be sure to

very perplexing and anomalous, as indeed

it

seem

did, to

the historical ignorance of the Elizabethan observers.*

In two ways,

was possible that private owner-

it

ship should creep

in.

It

would be convenient and

natural that families should continue to use the

holding for generations

same

and, thus, approach to the

custom of family, rather than

tribal, ownership would

And, again, powerful and crafty persons,
especially the chiefs, would be likely, unchecked and

be made.

gradually, to appropriate to their sole use portions of

the

common

herds, they

waste land,

being rich

in flocks

and

had uses to which these lands could con-

veniently be put.

become

as,

Estates in severalty did gradually

established,

and

in later centuries

the chief

is

found to have a private estate as well as the lands

pertaining to his chieftainry.
fact that at
* Sir

no time

Nevertheless,

it

is

in old Irish history did the tribes-

Henry Maine's " Early

Histor}' of Institutions," Lecture

vii.

CELTIC IRELAND.

136

man

lose his inherent right of free access to the tribal

land, or the chief acquire general rights of ownership

in

He

it.

acquired a private demesne and no more,

a decision of the English King's Bench, early in

till

the seventeenth century,

made him

the owner of his

people's land in the eye of the English law.

Rents

had come into existence before that time, but not

payment by the tribesman

as

for

the use of the

land.

The customs
ever,

regulating inheritance cannot, how-

be properly understood without considering the

The

structure of the Irish family.*

unit

was undoubtedly the

Irish,

was probably not divided

In

tribe.

beyond the reach of

European traditions the simple

periods

primitive social

very early

though not of

all

group of kindred

into families at

all.

The

establishment of definite marriage relations, and the

rise

of the family institution

with the father at

authority

its

these two events

poraneous.

The

we understand

as

tribal

must have been contem-

group of kindred became a

group of families, and the families ramified, the

viduals within
relationship
individual,

the

to

relation to the
* Sir

them standing

after

he

head.
is

in

In modern

of age,

whole community,

Henry Maine's " Early History of

indi-

various degrees of
society, the

stands in a direct
is

responsible solely

Institutions," Lecture vii.,

p. 208,^/ seq. ; Skene's "Celtic Scotland," vol.

ci scij ;

it,

head exercising acknowledged

iii.

chap. v. p. 176,

Sullivan's Introduction to O'Curry, pp. clxii.-clxviii.

SOCIAL

own

for his

property,

and

AND POLITICAL

deeds, and

all

Irish tribe, its

:

the owner solely of his

37

own

partnerships being matters of contract

In such a society as that of the early

definition.

viduals

is

INSTITUTIONS.

constituents were

families, not indi-

the family was responsible to the State for

crime, the family

land in use

owned property and

especially held

and, in the case of the Irish kings,

was

it

to the royal family, not to the royal person, that the

Evidently, there-

sentiment of reverence attached.

fore, it

was

limits

which separated the family proper from

ver}'

necessary to define quite clearly the

ramifications outside those limits.

sary,

and was done

in Ireland,

family ownership and

because the idea of

responsibility

was preserved

and developed as the general characters of social

became more complex, not allowed simply

as

it

its

This was neces-

to

life

decay

did in other countries.

The
Brehon

Irish family, as

we find it represented in the

when complete, of seventeen

tracts, consisted,

men, and was distributed into four sub-families, the

names of which may be translated as the hand family

(geilfine), the true, the after, and the end families.
The hand-family included the head or geilfine chief,
and four other members
and each of the other
;

divisions contained

once the

primitive

sprang, and

When any
its

number

four also.

The

geilfine

was

at

family from which the others

consisted of the

person was

members

latest born.

born into the geilfine after

of five was complete,

its

eldest

member

CELTIC IRELAND.
was promoted into the true family, the

mem-

eldest

ber of the true family passed into the after family,

the eldest of the after family passed into the end
family,

and the eldest of the end family went out of

Henceforth

the organization altogether.

it

appears

that he belonged to the kindred of that family onl}^

the

became afterwards the Highland

clan and probably he became the geilfine chief of
a new and less dignified family.
sept which

It is

exceedingly

difficult to see

how

this

system

of promotion out of the range of family duties and

rights

worked

doubt as to

in detail,

but there appears to be no

Every change de-

general principle.

its

pended, not on the death of seniors, but on the birth

of juniors,

who

birthright at

children

who

thus

acquired the benefit of their

their birth.

Again,

geilfine share of the family holding,

servient to his authority.

their

is

it

the younger

are left with the father, to enjoy the

The

and to be sub-

elder

members

lose

claim on that share by the birth of juniors,

but they also gain the advantages of independence.

These may have been very substantial

,

time, while the

abundance of

tribal

at

some

earl)-

land would secure

them an ample allowance in their new position. Sir

Henry Maine suggests that the organization is founded

to

originally on the idea of gradually emancipating the

seniors of the family from paternal control
after this idea

had ceased

to

and that

be very apparent

in

the system continued to affect inheritance in a

it,

way

SOCIAL
that

AND

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

39

seems to turn upside down our modern ideas

founded on primogeniture.*

At

the time to which the

Book of

Aicill refers,

each division of the family appears to have held

separately a share of the land allotted to the family
as a

whole of seventeen men.

Inheritance to this

share proceeded within each division so long as there

were any members to represent

of

became

the divisions

divided

among

it.

If,

extinct, its

the other groups,

however, any
holding was

not equally, but

according to an elaborate system of distribution carefully laid

As

down.

for the persons

who had been

promoted out of the complex group of seventeen,

they must have had recognized claims on the unused
lands of the tribe
it

and so long as land was

seems clear that

artificially

for

worked very

well,

purposes of land-tenure this

family

limited

arrangement

keeping up

once fixity of tenure

in

fairly, as

how

the principle

have worked generally by

stant

probably
would, at

it

the families and a

tribution of land according to

to see

plentiful,

members.

of Irish
its

redistribution of land

fair dis-

It is

easy

gavelkind w^ould

means without the conwhich gavelkind seems,

at first to imply.f
* Sir

Henry Maine

points out that in the practice of

English by which the younger son inherits,

of the same idea.

we have probably

Borough
a sur\-ival

t While the holding remained fixed in the possession of the group

members might be provided for by the
opening up of new lands, or in some way, for the finding of which the
tribe was responsible.
of seventeen, the outgoing

CELTIC IRELAND.

140

Joint ownership or tenure implies joint responsibility

and we

find accordingly that each division of

not the whole

the family, and

instance,

is

members.

the

family in

first

held responsible for the misdeeds of

The

social

its

convenience of this arrange-

ment was probably very

great, but there will

be more

to say on this subject presently.

The

geilfine chief

was the head of the family, and

members was higher or lower accordmore or less near to him in the

group.
As a body of kindred grew up outside,
descended from those who had passed through the

the rank of

its

ing as they stood

whole process of emancipation, these probably formed

And

the outer and less dignified portion of the sept.

thus

we see how

having divided

the very barbarous and primitive tribe,

itself into families,

became

in course of

time a group of septs or real kindred, each of which

was a group of

families, the tie of kinship in the tribe

having become by that time imaginary, though

still

highly effective on the imagination as a social influence.

The law
that known

of succession to the chieftainship

as tanistry

the

member

was

of the royal

by the tribe succeeded to

Originally, and in theory always, the
the dignity.
tribe consisted of kinsfolk only, and the tanist was
family chosen as most

fit

selected from the leading family, or family of traditionally the purest blood,* to lead all his kin.
*

Probably

this

was

direct through geilfines

originally the family supposed to

from the original

geilfine.

When

be descended

AND

SOCIAL

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

I4I

a chief died, an assembly of the tribe was convened,

apparently by the bruighfer, or borough magistrate,

since

it

was held

in his house.*

The new

chief

was

accepted by this assembly, and thus formally installed

in office, while, at the

same

and known henceforth as the

succession and election

was elected

time, the heir

This mode of

tanist.

was manifestly intended

by

secure the political safety of the tribe

leadership,

to

efficient

and to maintain the popular control of the

minimum risk of war between

by the choice of an heir-apparent at
possible moment.
And it would appear

chieftainry, with the

rival claimants,

the earliest

from the annals of Ireland,

they

be, that tanistry

primogeniture

in

Within the

was

full

of war-tales though

at least

as successful as

preventing wars of this kind.

was developed

tribe there

at

some

period an elaborate system of classes, founded partly

on distinctions of birth and partly on those of wealth.

This

is

the time of

and
is

Book

described in the

Cormac Mac

in part to the

dence

it

is

Art, ia the third century,

hand of that monarch himself

possible that the writer

in his description

of Aicill, ascribed to

may have been

It

over-subtle

but the general tenor of his evi-

impossible to set aside, the more so as

it

throws a singular light on the natural process by

which an aristocracy

is

differentiated from a

demo-

cracy in the primitive society.

* Sullivan's Introduction, ccxxxiii.
t

good account of the system

duction, p. c, et seq.

is

to

be found

in

Sullivan

Intro-

CELTIC IRELAND.

142

Highest

rank are the noblemen or

in

aires,

heads of famiHes that liave a certain dignity of

and that have possessed

position for

many

Of

State, of

which more hereafter.

we

the aire in

Next

form of wealth
family has
desa, the
for

in

those times.

acquired

common

in flocks

Thus wealth

is

grade

is

simply a

and herds, the usual

When

the bo-aire's
of an

aire

kind of nobleman, and has held

he

becomes

an

aire

At any

rate,

it

this

very

is

it

desa.

a cause of rank, and, as industry

presumably the cause of wealth,

factory.

who

twice the wealth

generations,

three

in social

of manufacture,

actual process

tribesman rich

position in the

official

as the bo-aire, or cow-nobleman,

common

these the writer

but the higlier grades are

mainly distinguished by their

find

birth,

wealtli appropriate to their

generations.

mentions seven grades

the

is

satis-

helps us to understand the

absolute obliteration in Irish society of those racial

distinctions in

which aristocracies so often take their

Each grade of aires is distinguished from the

others by the amount of wealth held on an average
by one of its members, his consequent claim on the
use of the tribal lands for his stock, his power of
making contracts with his tribe, which was limited
by law, the weight attached to his evidence in the
rise.

courts,

and

damages

his

honour-price and

eric,

the special

to be paid for insulting or injuring him.

The king had

the highest honour-price and

eric.

His

testimony carried most weight, his power of making

SOCIAL

AND

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

all

43

Thus he vas

contracts with his tribe was greatest.

measurably, but not at

immeasurably, the most

Short of the kingship,

privileged person of his tribe.

each aire family of lower rank could win for

itself

higher and more privileged status by the acquisition

of wealth and

Next

its

retention through generations.

to the aires in dignity

tribesman, the peasant head

use of the

freely the

might,

if

was the common

of a family enjoying
land.

tribal

The tribesman

he could, acquire wealth to any extent, and

thus raise himself to the position of a bo-aire

lack of wealth, he might

into debt,

fall

or,

make

a con-

an aire or bo-aire, or the chief of his

tract with

by which he borrowed

by

tribe,

cattle for his use in agriculture

and undertook to pay

interest in service

and material goods.

This

is

Ireland,

and doubtless was the origin

parts of

Europe as

well.

To

and homage

the origin of rent in

this origin

in

all

we can

other
trace

the inception of feudalism in the tribal organization.

The

peculiarity of

that the

Ireland

lies

simply

in

Brehon land law was developed,

the fact

parallel to

the development of the feudal tendency, to check and

regulate

The

it

at every turn.

chief of the tribe, from his position as leader

in war, as well as for

other reasons, became possessed

of large wealth in cattle or " stock."

required

The peasant

more stock than he had, and

wanted to dispose of
with advantage.

the

his stock for convenience

So the needy peasant had

chief

and

to " take

CELTIC IRELAND.

144
stock

"

from his

chief, or

some other

thus became a tenant to a lord or

rich

man, and

The

flath.

tenant

or ceile paid rent, rendered homage, and lost social

status in proportion

Thus

and

into daer, or free,

At
steps

to the

of stock taken.
its

subdivision

saer, or unfree.

this point the law-loving intellect of the Celt

and makes the

in,

day between the

this

amount

there arose the class of ceiles and

the idea in

lordism

which obtains to

and

Irish idea of land tenure

other European countries where land-

all

still

distinction

exists.

The Brehon law

regulated with

the utmost exactness the rents which tenants were to

pay

The

their lords.

idea of a judicial rent

is

as old

certain

small

in Ireland as the institution of rent.

The

saer stock tenant

received a

portion of stock from his lord, and retained his tribal

The normal

rights in their integrity.

period of his

tenancy was seven years, and at the end of that time

he became entitled to the cattle which had been
possession.

Meanwhile, he employed them

and paid rent

the
to

" increase,"

him

also

his harvest

to his lord
i.e.

in his

in tillage,

by handing over

him

to

the calves and the milk, rendering

homage and
and building

service,

such as aid

his castle or dun.

in

reaping

The daer

stock tenant, on the other hand, having received a

large portion of stock from his lord, parted with

of his tribal rights, and accepted a heavy duty

sequence.
into

The

in

some
con-

stock was to be considered as divided

two portions, one proportional to the rent

in-

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

145

curred and the other to the tenant's loss of tribal

rank, the technical measure of which

was

price" and his value as witness or

bail.

and homage had been rendered

After rent

the chief died,

if

the tenant died, his heirs were partially, though

if

not wholly, relieved from their obligation.

Brehon law aimed, not only

permanency

in the servile

at the prevention of

This tendency

relation.

to conserve the ancient tribal idea of a

freemen by

limiting the

weak

contracts with the

evident that herein

Thus the

at regulating the relations

between landlord and tenant, but

is

honour-

seven years, the

for

tenant became entitled to the stock

and,

his "

community of

power of the strong

is

lies

to

very characteristic

make
and

it

the explanation of the fact

that Ireland never developed feudalism, as the rest of

Europe, starting from a similar basis, did.

Never-

shadow of feudalism came very

close to

theless, the

the Irish tribesman

in

this

respect, that,

while he

could refuse to "take stock" from any other man,

it

was not lawful

king.

The

to refuse to " take stock "

from his

law, however, regulated the king's rents

as well as all others.

Free or unfree, the

the

full

tribe.
in

ceile

was

still

a tribesman in

sense of having a claim on the lands of the

Although a tenant, he was

still

a co-owner

the tribe, and, as such, had absolute rights in the

land he cultivated.

Outside the tribe proper, there

existed several other classes of inferior order, with

definite relations to the lord rather than to the tribe,

CELTIC IRELAND.

146

and having

We

the land.

and

daer,

him and his

by the laws and customs of

definite rights, relative to

estate, ah'eady recognized

who

are told of the

bothachs, both saer

served the lord, either freely for reward,

or servilely as his permanent farm-labourers, and

possessed tenements on his estate.

And we

who

hear, too,

of the sencleiths, or poor adherents of the lord, a

lower

class,

who had no

tribal status

except that of a

no mean one, many Irish tenants would think

now to shelter and to irremovability from the estate.
right

These persons were not tribesmen, but they had

rights
the duties which the lord owed them were
recognized by the law. They were not outcasts and
:

strangers in the land

and

it

cleith family, after a fixed

become bothach, and

for a

was possible

term spent

for a sen-

in service, to

bothach family likewise

to attain full tribal rights.

It

would seem, indeed, that these

classes represent

the transition stage of stranger families becoming

slowly adopted into the tribe by a process dependent

on their good behaviour and industry.

with them, and

much more

prominently,

Side by side

we

find the

and outcast class, the waifs and strays

lands, runaways from other tribes,
prisoners of war, and broken men of all sorts who,
having lost hold on the tribal life, had to begin afresh

true stranger

from

distant

as individuals to build

themselves once more into

the social structure somewhere and somehow.

Out

of such materials, of which there would probably be

AND POLITICAL

SOCIAL

no

lack, the class

was made
naturally

known

47

in Ireland as that of fuidirs

two

up, with the

falls,

INSTITUTIONS.

which

divisions into

of free fuidirs

and base

it

or

fuidirs

slaves.

The

origin of the base or daer fuidir class

probably

and

very old,

members,

its

the

in

instance at least, were prisoners taken in war.

class,

lowest

the

nor

liabilities

the society,

in

whom

the lord to

was bound to protect

women

the

in general for the

The
dent,

origin

and

feudal

ill

the

of

him we

in

tenant,

the

tribesman.

and to avenge

and

for the

was responsible, just

his fuidir, the lord

was

had neither the

ordinary

a base fuidir was attached

his life

family

of his

the

This

times to which the law-tracts

Nevertheless, in the
refer,

of

rights

was
first

ill

insult

on

deeds of

as the family

deeds of its members.

saer fuidir

find the

is

no

less

evi-

type of the genuine

type into which the European

tribesmen generally were absorbed, as the tribal idea

stagnated and decayed.

The

chief

had no doubt,

in

very early times, access to the waste or spare lands

of the tribe

and

largely absorbed

other wealthy

in

course of time these lands were

into

nobles,

private
lords

landlords, so far as their

cerned.

Here was one

estates

probably,

by him and
though

own tribesmen were

factor of genuine landlordism,

control over land, vague but unquestioned.

factor

was the stranger,

not
con-

tribeless

The

other

and homeless, need-

ing not only land to settle upon and, perhaps, a

little

CELTIC IRELAND.

148

help to

but also needing the protection of a

start,

The

claim on some society.

was not open

tribe

him, unless he were a person of such

skill,

to

learning or

other advantages that the tribe would be disposed to

adopt him by public proclamation, as the tribes some-

For a common man, the only refuge open

times did.

was the manor of the

to settle

might enter into a

by which he obtained leave

on the land, and was secured

who

tion of the lord,

was

i.e.

the tribal courts.

On

pay the

in the protec-

thenceforth stood to him in the

relation of family,

to

He

lord.

free contract with a lord,

bail

and witness

for

him

in

the other hand, he would agree

lord a rent,

and the law

left

him and the

lord perfectly free to agree on that rent as best they

might.

The

him go

offer or let
It is

might accept the

lord
;

distinguished

the Senchus

in

tribe,

as a

definitely

rack-rent

and to be a

fuidir

later times,

we

own

to

be

demand

Thus, looking on to

see that the effect of English law in

Ireland was exactly the

Irish people

from a

was

the lord's goodwill, the natural laws of

and supply, and public opinion.

their

"

is

the fair rent

be a tribesman was to have the pro-

tection of the land-law,

left to

Mor from

So, from this point of view,

person of stranger tribe."

clear that to

tenant's

the tenant was free to pay or go.

noticeable that the rent of a fuidir

paid by one of the

it is

fuidir

same

as that of turning the

under the Brehon law into strangers

land.

into prisoners of

It

only

fell

war as daer

short of turning

fuidirs

in

them

and, by destroy-

SOCIAL

AND

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

149

ing at one blow the whole class of peasants with

in the soil,

it

ights

took away the wholesome check of their

public opinion on the Irish landlords of olden times,

and the

ideal of peasantry

For the

towards which the whole

Irish land-law tended.

system of the old

fuidir

was markedly better

off than the

modern Irish tenant in this respect, that his position

In time, every
was probationary under the law.
and
fuidir family might be adopted into the tribe
;

here

we

see one source of the

Irish

tenant's fixed

idea that continuance in a holding for several generations constitutes rights.

unfree

fuidir

After two generations, the

family became

free,

a bothach, and after another, a

after

one more,
In the

sencleith.

ninth generation, the stranger family was admitted to

full tribal

Thus

rights.

it

was provided that every

stranger family, however alien in race or even discreditable in origin, should be gradually adopted into

the tribe, and

this

although the idea of the tribe

centred with such intensity in the sentiment of kinship.

The way

in

which

this

sentiment of kinship

was supplemented by the related sentiment of

kinship

is

a subject on which there will be

say hereafter.

foster-

more

to

Both must be realized together before

one can understand the extraordinary fusion of races

in Ireland into

one nation with a

common racial
common

senti-

are not of the

same

ment, a deep and abiding sense of a

character between persons
race.

who

racial

CELTIC IRELAND.

ISO
It is

vision

not to be supposed that this elaborate pro-

slow absorption of

the

for

existed just as

times

alien

elements

has been detailed from very early

it

but no supposition could be more improbable

than that

came

either

it

into existence suddenly or

was a pure invention of the law-tract writers.

It
must have tended to exist from the very first occasion
for its existence,

and been gradually developed as the

occasion for

use developed

its

and the law-writer

cannot be reasonably suspected of more than a ten-

dency

to

make

explicit,

and perhaps

notions of the customary law.

have been only

number

his

might, for instance,

It

judgment that

allotted the exact

of nine generations as the most reasonable

and usual time

for the process of absorption to last.

But the matter of

importance

real

absorption, not the time required

notable fact

is

that the

temporary stage

in

is
;

the nature of the

and, above

all,

the

Brehon law, by the provisions

making

considered, aimed at

feudal tenure a

mere

the history of each family and

therefore of the nation.

chief

idealize, the

The

fuidir tenants

and other lords represented the

tribal

of the

means of

growth from the outside, and their absorption into

the tribe implied the resumption

lands which had

been

by the

alienated

as

tribe of those

the

manorial

estate.

As a matter of fact,
men and the wealth of

the poverty of the poor tribes-

the nobles must always have

been operative to convert the former into tenants of

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

the latter in the hmited tribal sense.

151

So, although

the law provided for the termination of every tenancy,

fuidir or ceile,

it is

probable that the poorer tenants,

by reason of their poverty, were forced to renew their

tenancies again and again, and thus they may have
become practically permanent in many cases. The
Danish wars, and the consequent displacement of
tribes in

some

parts of the country, probably increased

the class of fuidirs, and thus perpetuated feudal tenure.

After the

Norman

invasion, the causes tending to pro-

duce homeless wandering men,

protection, greatly increased.

need of shelter and

in

The

Irish internal

wars

did not break up tribes and scatter them, but with the
coming of the Normans the process of pulverization
began and every broken tribe meant a batch of
;

feudal tenants

for

the

Irish

lords, to

those displaced from their ancient lands.

whom came
So, despite

the Brehon law and the tribal idea of rights in land

for

the

all,

relations

between landlord and tenant,

and those between chief and tribesmen, had inevitably

degenerated when they came under the observation of
the Elizabethan statesmen, even before the last blow

had been dealt to the Brehon

James

I.

ideal in

by converting the chief

the reign of

into the lord of the

tribesmen's lands (1605).

The whole

structure of this tribal society, with

careful provision for

cannot but strike us as likely to be very stable

its

its

promotion from rank to rank,

hold on the minds of the people.

in

Intensely aris-

CELTIC IRELAND.

152
tocratic as

it

is,

in its unqualified recognition

claims of birth and rank,

too, in so zealously

it

of the

peculiarly democratic

guarding the interests and

Directed as

of each rank.

\z

it is

liberties

against the unlimited

concentration of wealth and power in the hands of

any

class,

it

is

clearly conducive in a high degree to

the production of national wealth by

all.

In fact, as

natural causes tended to evolve the great social inequalities of feudalism

humanity

in to give other

The

developments to these natural causes.

and the

lord

and capitalism, the ideas of

as expressed in Irish law continually stepped

into existence.

fuidir in contact bring feudal tenure

The law makes

it

a means by which

the stranger can slowly and safely be incorporated in

the tribe, and the manorial lands appropriated

by the

tribe.

By

this counteraction of the feudal tendency, the

Irish nation lost,

no doubt, the

political

advantage

which, in conflict with other nations, comes from concentration of strength in the hands of the few strong

The cause

men.

may

be,

of her early weakness in this respect

however, the sign of her high

She did not part with her

political strength.

It

final destiny.

social ideas for the sake of

remains for her to show

how

power greater than the strength of armies can be

attained by a nation that will labour faithfully for the
perfect development of her social ideas.
ever,

it is

So

far

for the future to

This, how-

bring forth.

we have considered

the order of ranks in

AND

SOCIAL

the tribal society as

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.
it

53

developed directly on the lines

The next

of the great agrarian industry.

point to

interest us is the method by which the special

enterprise, skill, learning and energy of individuals

asserted itself within this apparently almost cast-iron

and created the varied display of industry and

talent which was so marked a feature of the national
The tribe was originally a sum of natural
life.
families, each with common rights and responsibilities
order,

represented by

its

the family

and

Arts, industries

head.

ture were, no doubt,

first

these,

created

by

and

litera-

individuals within

being appreciated by the

tribe,

were honoured by treatment as separate units with

personal duties and rights pertaining to their per-

The treatment awarded

sonality.

such

is

the familiar case in point.

the

to

He

poet as

seems to have

been treated always as a privileged servant of the

State

and there

is

abundant evidence

to

show that

the skilled metal-workers were dealt with in a similar

Humbler workers, however, while probably

spirit.

able to drive a good enough trade in their personal

capacity,

would come

to

feel

that their

individual

was a source of inconvenience. And the humbler tribesmen, too, measuring

their strength against that of the aires, would natuinsignificance

rally

the

tribe

be struck with the idea that numerical strength

in their

ranks ought to have

advantage.

and

in

political

its

equivalent in social

family of high rank had definite social

privileges.

Might not half a dozen

CELTIC IRELAND.

154

and acquire tribal privibody equal to the sum of those

families of low rank associate

leges for the joint

pertaining to

And we

its

constituents?

find that this

and the peasants

far as Ireland

tion

is

The voluntary

concerned.*

was regarded,

in the

what the craftsmen

more particularly, so

just

is

did, the latter

eye of the law, as an

associaartificial

group of kindred, with rights and responsibilities equal

to the

sum of

An

its

constituents and centred in an elected

was exactly the same thing

as a mediaeval crafts-guild, and the agricultural sept,
head.

artisan sept

or Bruigh,

germ of

rechta
trate,

village,

the

The

Bruigh plays no small part

story.
;

Saxon

and every other form of town com-

munities.
Irish

identical with the

is

city guilds,

and

Irish

had

It

its

own

head, the Bruighfer, acted as magis-

its

administering the law.

having rights

in

by-laws, the Bruigh-

in

The head

of a guild,

the tribe corresponding to the joint

rank and wealth of the whole guild, was practically an

elected

aire.

The weight

and the amount of

of his bail and witness,

became by cumuThese
rights he exercised on behalf of his fellows, whose
rights were literally the constituents of his.
He was
their pledge and witness in the tribal courts, and their
his honour-price,

lation equal to those pertaining to noble rank.

representative in the tribal councils, just as the noble

heads of septs were

*

for the septs,

and the

flath,

or

Introduction to O'Curry's " Manners and Customs of the Ancient

Irish," p. civiii., et scq.

SOCIAL

AND

lord, for his vassals

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

55

Thus, while on

and dependents.

the one side of the tribal organization there grew up

the feudal manor, with the Flath, as distinguished

tribal Aire, at its head,

from the

on the other hand

to the
a
the Bruigh, or voluntary-

there grew up, in Ireland as elsewhere

Aire as well as to the Flath

rival

some of whom probably saved

by this
The Bruigh, with its Bruighfer and Bruigh-

association of freemen,

themselves from

means.

presents

rechta,

the fate of ceile tenants

us with

the elements

magistracy and borough government

of

a local

and

in

the

law's recognition of the Bruighfer's cumulative tribal

rights

we

see unmistakably the

parliamentary system,

elective

indirectly representative

germs of a
in

directly

addition

to

the

system by which the noble

heads of septs met in the tribal assemblies to settle

the affairs of the tribe.*
fer

As

time went on, the Bruigh-

seems to have become an important

since

we

official

lation of the chief

person,

and

instal-

appear to have taken place

in the

find that the election of the tanist

house of the Bruighfer of the royal Bruigh, which

makes

it

seem probable, though we have no

information, that the Bruighfer

certain

may have been

the

proper convener of the assembly on this occasion.

The whole body

bo-aires,

of nobles, including probably the

and more probably the

electiv^e aires,

chose

the chief or king of the tribe, who, as already stated,

" Manners and Customs of the Ancient
development of this idea.

* Introduction to O'Curry's
Irish," p. cxcvii., et seq., for

CELTIC IRELAND.

15^

was a strictly limited monarch, with rights, privileges,

and duties accurately defined by law, and differing
from those of other nobles only
king held

tribal

in the

?n

degree.

The

confederacy of tribes a some-

what similar position to that which the aires held

within the tribe. We hear of the Rig Mor Tuatha,
the king of the great tribe or confederacy of tribes

and

all

such kings were partially subject to the Rig

Ruradh, or king of the province to which the tribes

Of

belonged.

these there were

central province of Meath,

A.D.

400 by the great

five,

including the

which was founded about

Niall,

who sought

to connect

permanently with the provincial kingdom of Meath

the Ard-Rigship of Ireland.

The

however,

was a

in the sixth century,

decline of Tara,
sign,

a cause, of the failure of this attempt.

ship remained, on the whole, what

it

and partly

The Ard-Rig-

was

originally

a royal office nominally elective, to which the high

kings not infrequently

sword.

Danes

by the

their claim

by the

During the eleventh century, the O'Briens of

Munster prevailed.
the

made good

They were

successful in welding

into the national unity,

great Brian's victories over

and that not only

them

in the field.

In the twelfth century, the O'Conors of Connaught

came to the head

the Normans out.

but they did not succeed

Particulars respecting the executive

in driving

government

of the country must be sought in the constitution of

the

tribes

thus

federated

together,

and

may

be

AND POLITICAL

SOCIAL

INSTITUTIONS.

57

in the constitution

understood to repeat themselves

of the federation.

has already been stated that

It

the Irish law tracts distinguish seven grades of Aires,

but the three highest appear to be simply distin-

guished as

officials

The Aire

of State.

the king's chancellor,

jurisdiction over the

who

Forgaill

was

held the king's court, had

common

lands of the tribe, and

The
commander

determined the rights of each family therein.

Aire Tuisi seems to have been the
of the levy of the

And,

tribe.

whom

Aire Ard, or high noble, of

jectures that the

official

lastly,

there

is

the

Dr. Sullivan con-

Lord High Steward of Scotland

the logical descendant.

It

was

is

his business to levy

the tolls and dues of the king, and to hold the high

court in which cases

be

tried,

coming under

statute law

had

to

while the lower courts tried cases coming

under customary law only.

These

officials

The

were the king's ministers.

Aire Cosraing, on the other hand, was elected by

the families of the tribe, and probably corresponds
to the

modern

Sheriff,

who

is

descended from the

similar popular official of the Teutonic tribes.

It

was

his business to carry out the decisions of the king's

courts about

tolls,

dues, tributes,

Aire Forgaill and the Aire

etc.,

Ard had

with which the

to do,

and thus

to act practically as their executive officer.

had

to distribute honour-prices

He

also

and injury-prices

to

the families to which these were due.

Each family was of course responsible

for the

CELTIC IRELAND.

158

own

and appear

maintenance of

its

a special

charged with, this duty.

officer

was also responsible

members.

If

atone.

that

the

to

It

its

that the

by

its

some equivafamily must

restitution in

the

for the family, therefore, to see to

Hence,

it

officer called the

not surprising to find

it is

power of

coercive

represented by the

law was mainly

the

presence in each family of an

Dae, whose business

out judicial decisions against resisting

family had, in
If the

fact, its

was to carry
members. Each
it

own policeman.

family resisted, the physical force of the

tribe appears to

have been the remedy

the reason

why

probably

this

Edmund

Spenser describes them

is

their organization

must have

fallen

assembled on their accustomed

may be

and

the Irish tribes, as

in

a time

much
hills

arms

receive judgment, always with

It

family-

criminals were forthcoming and submissive to

their punishment.

whole

have had

an offender failed to atone for his

injured person, then

was

to

Each

good behaviour of

for the

offence before the law,

lent

poor,

to

give

and

their hands.

in

that the duty of leading

when

into decay,

the

military

force of the tribe to carry out the decrees of the

courts was the special duty of the official called the

Aire Echtai, as distinguished from the Aire Tuisi,

who was military commander in

The next subject to concern

war.

us

is

the

means

existed for the administration of the law.

has more than once been

made

that

Mention

of the tribal assembly.

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

59

and originally there can be no doubt

as elsewhere, this

and the court of

development of

body was
justice.

at

that, in Ireland

once the parliament

With time comes the

distinct bodies

having the separate

functions of legislation and administration, the

ganization

of

the latter being

In the Irish system of courts

complex of the two.

the idea expressed
later date w^as

parison

is

is

or-

more

naturally the

very similar to that which at a

The com-

elaborated in England.

fully discussed

by Dr.

Sullivan, keeping

the corresponding institutions of the Germanic tribes

in view.*

The high persons

of the tribe would naturally be

regarded as those whose duty and privilege

it

preside over a court of justice, and this idea

embodied

in the Irish

name Airecht

was to

is

for a court.

aptly

The

lowest kind of court was the Airecht Foleith (similar

to the

Court Leet), presided over by an

minor cases under

common law could

aire, in

be

tried.

which

Next

was the Airecht Urnaidi, or Court of Pleas, in

which cases concerning property and others involving

to this

technical law were tried.

by a

These were presided over

and cases were

them by the lowest order of brehons, or
Irish judges.
The Court of King's Bench was represented by the Airecht Fodeisin or chief court of the

heard

special magistrate, the Neimid,

in

king, in w-hich justice

brehon or chief judge.

was administered by his ollamh

The Rig Mor Tuatha held the

* Introduction to O'Curry, p. cclxiii., et seq.

CELTIC IRELAND.

l60

Taeb

Airecht, a court for dealing with cases arising

between different

territories

and, since this court,

dealt with matters of fact as to traditional boundaries

and

tribal contracts, the

king was supported

seanchies or historians, whose business

it

was

by

in

it

to

know

by judges whose business it was to

Above all inferior courts, was the Cul
Airecht (rear-court) or High Court of Appeal, one for
each province, including the Cul Airecht of the High
King of Erin, that used to be held in Tara while
rather than

facts,

know

law.

Tara was the centre of the

nation's

life.

In these

courts the judgments of the king and ollamh brehons

were supported by the bishops and the state

officials,

and cases were stated by professional pleaders,

in

Irish generally " arguers "

called

and sometimes, more

quaintly, " polishers," in reference to

their

duty of

up and brightening their clients' cases.

For the Irishman who had a cause against another
there w^as, then, no lack of courts to award him his
polishing

rights
and by Irish law every wrong done was a
wrong done to some person who ought, in right and
reason, to be compensated for the injury, by the
offender.
The business of the court was to decree,
according to law, what the compensation should be
and it was the business of the state officers of the
;

tribe

to

family

if

enforce

he were

the

decree against the offender's

in default.

law, then the tribe

was

If the family defied the

called to

arms by the execu-

tive to enforce the decree against the family.

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

l6r

following passage from Chief Baron Gilbert

The

on the state of Britain before murder became punishable by death under the later law of Canute, is quoted

by the writer of the

article

Law

on Brehon

in the "

En-

cyclopaedia Britannica" as illustrative of the Irish as

well as the English system of family responsibility.
" If

any offence was committed

Decennaries (tythings),

if

any of the

in

the party was brought to

answer, he was obliged to pay his fine for his offence,

was imprisoned

or he

for ever

Decenna was answerable

So that by
necessity
fine,

if

he

fled,

the

for his offence to the king.

discipline

men were

put under a

of being innocent, or paying a grievous

or being totally deprived of the conversation of

mankind.
in case

man

this

and

And

the offender fled,

to

made

bring the offender

exceedingly

The

the laying of this fine on the tything,

it

the interest of every

to

light,

and made

it

conceal a theft or a murder."

difficult to

general character of the Irish criminal law

cannot be better described than

passage from the same

"The law

in

the

following

article.

of torts regarded

all

offences, with the

nominal exception of murder, as condonable by

until the offender and those liable
no more, when the defaulter lost

for

fines

him could pay

and fell

his status

For some of the offences of

into the servile class.

the individual the family were responsible, for others

particular sureties.

several

sorts

of

The

scale of mulcts for the

homicides,

wounds, and personal

CELTIC IRELAND.

62

hurts

is

in outline the

same with those of the other

Western European nations

definite fine of so
it

much

for

but

addition to their

in

such a lesion or bruise,

provides by rateable deductions for excusatory

cir-

cumstances of intention, knowledge, contributory negligence, accident,

and

of wJiich are con-

necessity, all

siderable refinements on the contemporaneous systems of

the continent^

In

essence the principle of

its

trial

by jury was

present in the Irish method of administering justice.

men and

\{ twelve ^oodi

true could be found to

forward and declare their belief

come

the innocence of

in

the accused, they were admitted as his compurgators

in the

eye of the law and his innocence allowed,

while they were held responsible

if it

should turn out

him had been contrary to the

truth.
In form, compurgation was a witness to
innocence and a surety for good behaviour but its
that their witness for

effects

were so precisely those of the modern

trial

by

we must regard it as a primitive form of the

institution.
The fact that its practice was common

jury that

to Britain
wa)'^

and Ireland

the truth of the remark

quoted that

may

illustrates

"

made by

an interesting

the writer above

whencesoever derived, the

to so great an extent

tially a

in

common

now organized

common

inheritance of

into the United

all

the populations

Kingdom."

Passing from the law of criminal to that of

offences, the

law

be recognized as substan-

most striking point

in the Irish

civil

system

SOCIAL
is

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

63

the very elaborate development of the law of dis-

The

tress.

court

and creditor

ready to judge between debtor

is

the problem for the debtor

The

get the creditor into court.

by summons, and, if
traint on his goods. The
first

to India

and

dis-

We find,

between the extreme

Eastern and the extreme Western Aryan

common

by

peculiarity of Ireland lay in

the greater complexity of the whole process.*

for a certain

to

general means are

this fails, eventually

too, curious evidence of the link

tice,

how

is

in the prac-

to ancient Ireland, of fasting

time at the door of a creditor belonging

to the privileged

classes, before

him by way of distress.

Fines,

proceeding against

awarded by the

were also exacted by process of

courts,

distraint.

Coming now to consider the question. Who made

new laws in ancient Ireland it strikes us as at once
evident that some kind of popular legislature is im.''

plied in the

whole structure of the society so

we have already considered

left to theorize, by lack of
of the people f

ways

is

it.

We

evidence.

The assembly

a frequent event, occurring in various

whatever has to be done

meeting of those concerned.

taking action in assembly
self-government.

far as

are not, however,

Add

in part implies, the

to

is
it,

is

done by

The

calling a

habit of jointly

of the very essence of

what indeed

it

already

vigorous self-will of a freedom-

loving people, the intellectual capacity for complex

* Sir

Henry Maine's " Early History of

Institutions," p. 279,

t "Introduction to O'Curry," p. cclii., et seq.

el seq.

CELTIC IRELAND.

164

organization, and the moral capacity for self-control,

and the self-governing nation begins

the mass of self-governing tribes.
If the lord

to develop

wanted anything done by

from

his tenants

some

special

levy,

he called a Mithal Flatha, or meeting of his

tenants,

or provision for an extraordinary

and they agreed

venient, but

them

work

it

was

also

to

do

This was con-

it.

wholesome

for

him and

tyranny never begins while the people are

dealt with in masses, unless, indeed, there

force behind the tyrant.
tribe

for

Similarly,

had any purpose to

meeting of the

serve,

if

is

an armed

the head of the

he naturally called a

free householders

of the tribe, the

Mithal Tuatha, to set his requirements before them or

to take counsel with them.

These assemblies, however, had no

special signifi-

cance as germs of a definite political constitution

course of development.

Much more

the Mathluagh, the assembly of

of a

sept,

all

in

important was

the householders

which was summoned by the chief of

kindred, the Aire-Fine, to consider matters in which

the kindred were interested.

These might be

acts of

the king, decisions of the courts, measures of defence,

and so

on.

Here we have an assembly of a very

significant kind, capable of becoming, in proportion

to the size

and strength of the group, an organ of

resistance to arbitrary

outside the sept.

its

own

power or to the popular

will

The Mathluagh was convened by

natural head, the representative of the kindred

SOCIAL

AND

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

in the tribal or national councils,

meeting of

his constituents,

tion, for counsel,

of the
extent,
rights

and

summoned

for support.

Mathluagh were used

it

and was

to

65

in fact the

for informa-

If the institution

any considerable

must have made contravention of popular

by the kings and

tribal chiefs

very

difficult

by its decentralizing tendencies, it may have

added to the difficulties of such concentration of
and,

power

in

kingly hands as was required for the

mate safety of the national

ulti-

life.

The Mathluagh corresponds most

nearly to the

modern public meeting of the constituents of a parliamentary division. It had no definite functions, no
recognized powers to
in affairs

of state.

even as a local authority,

act,

The germs

of local government

are to be found, not in the tribal Mathluagh, but in

the analogous

institution

Bruighfer and

Bruigh-rechta.

of

the Bruigh, with

its

This was analogous

because instituted as a group of voluntary kindred

an

artificial

sept

but

its

outcome was very

just because of that voluntary principle,

sequent institution of elected

officials

different,

and the con-

and deliberately

adopted laws instead of the customary

tribal rules.

We
as

must look, however, beyond the Bruigh, as well

beyond the Mathluagh for the parliament of the

nation in

original form.

its

Such a parliament was the Dal, the assembly of

all

the Aires

heads of kindred, including probably

of the
who met in the Dal

the elected heads

tribe,

166

CELTIC IRELAND.

to assess fines, levy taxes,

and carry on the

business of the tribe generally.

The meeting

fiscal

of the

heads of kindred was no doubt an institution as old

as the existence of the tribe,

and

its

functions as

multifarious as the needs of the tribe, including certainly the administration of laws as well as legisla-

But

tive decisions.

it

division of functions

kinds of business to
the

assembly of

full

the transaction

of

all

first

hands of

Aires was that of the Dal,

that

is

concerned with the

in

matters of taxation

is

and the passing of money-bills

primitive parliaments was probably an earlier

event than the passing of

amend
has as

the

bills to

common customary

much tendency

enlarge or control or
law,

which naturally

to develop from precedent to

precedent by the decisions of wise

by

of the

Indeed, the practical necessity of

sufficiently evident
in

tribal

assent

tribal

full

about, one

definitely into the

fall

all

.power of the purse.

having

seems probable that when the

came

men

or judges as

definite legislative enactment.

We

find,

however, that necessities for

definite

and

that, as

legislation did arise in ancient Ireland,

we should

expect, the

same persons who

in a

Dal

controlled the purse, formed also a true legislative

assembly by which
adopted.

all

new laws must be solemnly

This assembly was called the Tocomrach, the

distinction of the

two parliamentary functions being

thus emphasized by the use of different names for the

same body

as discharging them.

No

law was valid

SOCIAL
till it

body

AND POLITICAL

INSTITUTIONS.

6/

had received the assent of the Tocomrach, whicii

also elected the king and, since it met in the
;

house of the Bruighfer

for that

election,

is

it

not

improbable that the Bruighfer of the royal Bruigh,

was

rather than the king himself,

its

Before a law could be adopted,

and proposed.
Cuirimtigi

men

to

be drafted

in the tribe, province, or nation, as

the case might be, and

At

this

was

council

the king's privy

in fact

measures were discussed

and decisions on them taken,

employed

had

This was the work of the Sabaid

council of the alehouse which consisted

of the chief

council.

it

convener.*

skilled lawyers being

in the actual drafting

prepared for the Tocomrach,

and thus they were

much

as measures are

prepared for Parliament by the Cabinet

in

our

own

time.
It

has been already said that the Mathluagh had

no actual power, but

influence,

it

is

clear that

however much or

Fine, or head of the sept,

little

had means of

it

used.

The Aire-

was a true representative of

and might well report the result

Mathluagh to the Dal or Tocom-

his sept traditionally,

of discussions in his
rach, and,

on the other hand, might report the decisions

of the latter to the former, with the result probably of

gaining for them a voluntary adhesion.

It is

indeed

true that, being an hereditary, not elected, representative,

he might very easily neglect

* Introduction to O'Curry's "

Irish," p, cclvii.

this

duty

but the

Manners and Customs of the Ancient

CELTIC IRELAND.

68

solidarity of his kindred or constituents being,

clear,

a matter of practical as well as

concern to him, motives for promoting

is

sentimental
it

means were not lacking

the customary

it

by use

of

and the

extraordinary vitality of the sentiment binding kith

and kin of
is itself

classes into solid local political entities

all

a sign that heads of kindred generally were

prone to observe,
national

in the spirit if

institutions as

not in the

letter,

such

tended to promote, by the

maintenance of mutual confidence between head and

trunk, the solidarity of the kindred.

There were, however, other means by which

was secured that popular consent

classes should

the privileged

Aenach, or
all

Fair,

the people,

it

to the decisions of

not be lacking.

The

which was the general assembly of

a

is

much more conspicuous

fact in

the Irish annals and stories than any of these later

developments of the primitive folk-meeting which we

have been considering, though without them
tions in

later times

would not be very

its

func-

intelligible.

The Aenach took place periodically, and was summoned by the king himself, generally, so far as we
know, at certain places such as Tara and Teltown
Meath, Carman
in Ulster,

to

the

in

memory

at the fair in

old

at

some time

and

religiously

which were probably sacred

of

venerated persons.

in

Wexford, Aileach and Ard-macha

ancient

All

heroic

new laws were promulgated

the hearing of the people, while also

laws were rehearsed, proclamations

made, and

SOCIAL
genealogies

4yD POLITICAL

recited,

INSTITUTIONS.
being

people

the

69

kept

thus

acquainted with the institutions and traditions under

which they
;

and

it

was also an occasion of literary, artistic,

enjoyment, and an opportunity for the

social

selling

This was the political side of the

lived.

Aenach but

and buying of wares.

Recitation of poetry,

music, dancing, feats at arms, horse-racing, athletic

sports

by the

these took place; and prizes were awarded

all

competitor
to the

who had charge

king,

of the

each accomplishment.

in

Aenach, and used

fair,

to the best

The

bards came

not only as a literary

it,

stimulus, but also as an occasion for the interchange

and comparison of

ideas,

pure

traditions

historic

The smiths and

skilful

thus helping to keep the

by the

of agreement.

test

artificers,

the

weavers

of

woollen goods and others, came to show their wares

The young people came

and

sell.

and

to enjoy

one another's society

marrying and giving

in marriage.

to hear the latest politics.

All

and hear,
was a time for

to see
it

The serious came

came to enjoy the

music and poetry, the sports and the competitions.

And

so important a feature in the national

the Aenach, that

it

was regulated by the

laws, the breach of

able

life

strictest

was
bye-

some of which was even punish-

by death.

The only fragment

selling

of the

Aenach

and buying of wares and the

of an Irish

enough, of

fair

left

social

but, with the exception,

this fragment, the

is

in the

enjoyment
curiously

whole non-political part

^/O

CELTIC IRELAND.

of the institution

is

its main idea as the

That the custom was

preserved in

National Eisteddfod of Wales.

a general Celtic custom, and indeed not

the Germanic peoples
theless, evidence to
1 1

80,

by

Griffith

observation

of

certain.

is

show

that

its

unknown

But there
revival in

is,

Wales

ap Conan, was directly due to

the

practice

in

his

neighbouring

the

in

to

never-

country of Ireland, and thus that the Eisteddfod of

Wales

historically continuous with the Irish Fair.

is

Each kind

of assembly might

be held

for the

transaction of tribal, provincial, or national business.

The

celebrated Feast of Tara was the meeting of the

High King of Erin, followed by the

Tocomrach, which was its natural sequel, and accompanied no doubt by the popular fair of which
council of the

we have accounts reaching back to a very early

period in Irish history.
The Fair of Tara, occurring
triennially, represented indeed, as has already

been

pointed out, the traditional unity of the Irish nation,

and the High King was High King because he was

chosen to convene and preside over that National Fair.

To

the Feast of

Tara came the kings and the ollamhs

of Ireland, and to the Fair

came the people from

all

quarters.
It

is

not unlikely that the

fall

of Tara in the

sixth and seventh centuries had an evil effect on the

development of
the

country

centre

Irish

political

henceforth

and that

fall

unity,

without a

itself

may have

since

fixed

it

left

political

been due to the

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

I7I

INSTITUTIONS.

change that had come over the religious traditions

and associations of the people

after the conversion to

Christianity.

This account of early Irish institutions would be

incomplete without further remark on the widespread

custom of fosterage, and

fosterage

into

development as

its

an educational

system.

literary

Fosterage

pure and simple, the giving and taking of children for

nurture, existed in

the early

all

Aryan communities

but in Ireland the practice became extraordinarily

prevalent,
It

and was carefully regulated by the

was quite

usual,

law.

very late times, that children

till

of noble birth should

be fostered by the

dependents of their families, and

this

lowlier

custom has no

doubt contributed to intensify the sentiment of

affec-

between the different ranks of the sept or

clan.

tion
It

has supplied the idea of foster-kindred when that

of kindred was obscure.

But

it is

with the use of the

fosterage idea in spiritual, intellectual, and industrial

relationships that

we

are

more specially concerned.

In a society organized under the idea of kindred,

it is

natural that every relationship should be assimilated

to the family relationship.

So we

find in Ireland the

family of the saint and spiritual fosterage or gossipred,

the fraternity of the craftsmen and industrial fosterage, the family of the teacher,

and

literary

fosterage,

whether bard or brehon,

besides the

children of the great warriors.

fosterage that

we read most

It

in the

military
is

foster-

about literary

Brehon law

tracts,

CELTIC IRELAND.

\J2

which give under

this

between teacher and

Senchus Mor

and

is

title

entire subtract in the

devoted to the subject of fosterage,

utmost minuteness the rights

sets out with the

and duties attaching

it is

the law of the relation

An

pupil.

And

to all parties concerned.

plain that the brehon's conception of the relation

and

between foster-child

foster-family

a slight

is

variation of that which regulates the relation between

and

the child

natural family,

its

certain duties to the family,

the

owing

child

and the family bearing

certain responsibilities for the child.

Out of

this

regulating

the

conception of fosterage grew the law

Henry Maine,

pupil

However

"

literary foster-father.

says Sir

of

relation

"

it

teacher

to

may

the

surprise us,"

that the connection between

pupil and teacher was regarded as peculiarly sacred

by the ancient

Irish,

and as closely resembling natural

fatherhood, the Brehon tracts leave no

on the point.
the

same

It is

expressly laid

Patria Potestas

literary foster-father,

has a claim through

room

down

that

as actual paternity

for

doubt

it

created

and the

though he teaches gratuitously,

life

upon portions of the property

of the literary foster-son.

Thus

the brehon, with his

pupils constituted not a school in our sense, but a true

family.

While the ordinary

by the law

foster-father

to give education of

foster-children

to

was bound

some kind

to his

the sons of chiefs instruction

in

riding, shooting with the bow, swimming, and chess-

playing, and instruction to their daughters in sewing,

SOCIAL

AND POLITICAL

cutting out, and embroidery

INSTITUTIONS.

the

73

brehon trained his

foster-sons in learning of the highest dignity, the lore

He

of the chief literary profession.

but

was the law which

it

settled

took payment,

for him.

it

was

It

part of his status, and not the result of a bargain." *

Remembering

that

measure responsible

we look

for

some

the natural

definition of the tutor's

The

responsibility for his pupils.

from the laws makes

the

same

family was in a

for the ill-deeds of its

members,

more limited

following passage

this point clear,

and gives

us, at

time, a pleasant picture of the educational

system at work.

The poet (or

man from whom
"

tutor)

the crimes of his pupils

natives,

commands

education
if

is

his pupils.

received

is

free

The
from

they be the children of

even though he feeds and clothes them and

He

that they

pay him

though

be a stranger he instructs, feeds, and clothes,

it

provided
If

he

it is

for their learning.

not for pay but for

God

is free,

that he does

he feeds and instructs a stranger /i^r/^j,

is

accountable for his crimes."

The dual play

the one hand, there

* Sir

it is

it.

then

of ideas in this passage gives us a

sudden insight into the ideal

strict

even

is

life

On

of the times.

the tribal idea of the citizen's

responsibility to the State for those he

Henry Maine's " Early History

may

of Institutions/' Lecture

viii.

p. 242.

t O'Curry's
P- 79.

"Manners and Customs

of the Ancient Irish," vol.

ii.

CELTIC IRELAND.

174
introduce into
this idea

the other hand,

annulled by the permission to exercise free

is

We

hospitality without limit.

customary

On

community.

tlie

for the

know,

too, that

it

was

neighbours of the mediaeval schools

to exercise their hospitality for the support of the

strangers

who

flocked as

students

the schools.

to

The "poor scholar," dependent on the charity of the

neighbours for his

living, as

on the kindness of the

teachers for his learning, was as familiar a feature of

Irish society as the

bard and the brehon themselves.

The entertainment

of strange students was in fact

regarded by the people and by the law as a duty of

national hospitality.

The

children of the Irish upper classes paid for

their education in the ordinary way,

poorer classes

were provided

who were educated

for

at the

by an arrangement

of the modern though

They

and the sons of the

now

same

old-fashioned sizarship.

waited on the wealthier students, and received

educational

benefits

in

return.

The

belonged to the neighbourhood lived

and those who were pensioners

scholars

lived in the

in

coming from remote or foreign

their

supplied

own

who

homes

in their

humble-

looking group of dwellings called the college

others

college

similar to that

while

districts lived

huts adjoining the college and were

with

provisions

living doubtless

was

by the neighbours.

The

plain indeed, but of high thinking

there was no lack.

The whole

educational system was a spontaneous

AND POLITICAL

SOCIAL

growth over which

authority as

it

INSTITUTIONS.

law threw

the

grew, regulating

it

by

75

mantle of

its

careful definition

of those ideas of the right and, desirable which were

already

more than half expressed

Thus the aspiration

and

which

intellectual activity

is

the national

in

consciousness.

knowledge

after

of the very essence

of Irish character, fulfilled itself at an early period

of political development by institutions which

embody

the

idea of

the

essential idea of Irish

social

life

kinship natural and voluntary as the source of mutual

duties

and

joint responsibilities

which

it is

the business

of the law to define rather than to enforce.

Since then, the Dark Ages have been in Ireland,

times

when

the education of

dant class was

made

period during which

all

save a small ascen-

penal by law, followed by a

was subject

it

to serious dis-

couragement only.

But ideas that have once had a

long and vigorous spell of practice seldom die, and so
the old habit of spontaneous educational activity

never in the darkest times

ancient Isle

suspended

(^uite

in

was
the

So betwieen the national

of Saints.

schoolmaster of to-day and the bardic tutor of the

distant past,

we

see the

gap partly

pedagogue of the hedge school

who taught
law,

his scholars,

though

and was paid by odd

little

filled

in
it

by the quaint

the penal times,

was against the

miscellaneous offer-

ings of potatoes, turf-sods, and occasional eggs.

in

these better days, the old impulse

itself to its full activity,

is

Now,

fast restoring

and has made the Intermediate

CELTIC IRELAND.

1/6

Education Act and the Royal University such successes

as

without

it

they could not possibly have been.

Learning grows up

in

remote out-of-the-way places

in Ireland

without any appropriate educational appli-

ances

it

as

modern

grows up nowhere

Irish Catholic

given, for the zeal

up

its

Church

all

else.

and energy with which

own system

to the

it

has built

of higher schools and colleges,

without recognition

much

and without

endowment even now.

direct

And

honour should be

less

endowments

at

first,

177

CHAPTER

VII.

THE ARTS IN

Some

last

ERIN.

words are due to the subject of

The history

of early Ireland, in

all its

Irish Art.

aspects, presents

us with a picture of social development, under the

influence of noble

people

brave,

and high

instincts

affectionate,

faithful,

ideals,

with

in

keen

logical wit, a quick artistic sense,

and a tendency to

take the poetic view of Nature

and of

The

life.

history of later Ireland shows us, as plainly as history

can show, the arrest of

the whole,

it

causes of this arrest.

her

after

came

development

all this

leaves us

little

in the

Ireland was highly organized,

own manner, when

but she was not at

herself from such

and, on

dark as to the

all

the

Norman

invasion

organized to protect

Nor could

an invasion.

she,

by

as the Greeks
conquest and afterwards

her temperament, submit to the result

submitted to the

Roman

teach the lessons she had learned to her conquerors.

So the long

conflict

began that

between the

evils of

perpetual war

is

not over yet

and,

war very different

from that which used to be waged among the Irish

CELTIC IRELAND.

178
tribes

and

it

still

the greater evil of English legislation,

came apparently

to a social standstill.

remains

future to

Ireland

for the

added

lessons she has

Yet

show what noble

to the lessons of olden times for

the development of the nation in the times that are to

There can be no

come.

for a nation that

storms

ward

keeps

amid desolating

vitality

but the development

development

real arrest of

its

is

inward, not out-

development of the human

spirit,

though

unexpressed, as the individual genius of that nation

determines

it.

nothing,

In

however,

is

the

arrest

development more apparent than

Irish

art.

Here the evidence

in

of outward

the matter of

not in historical

is

records, but in the things themselves

the remains of

have come down to us through the

Irish art that

centuries, the exquisite metal-work, the illuminated

manuscripts, the sculptured monuments, the architecture just achieving

Irish

Romanesque

twelfth

work of

development into the beautiful

its

century there
rare

almost ceases

beauty.
;

Up

style.
is

development, resulting

in

Soon afterwards, production

the land

beautiful things to be

to the middle of the

made

is

in

no longer a place

for

it.

Metal Work.

The
"

Irish bardic tales are full of allusions to the

smiths of Erin," and to their work

silver

and gold even more than

to

in

ornaments of
their

work

in

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

Some specimens

weapons of war.

forging

pagan metal-work remain, and

tities

of

1/9

must have been destroyed or

it

of this

evident that quan-

it is

Danish, even more than in the Norman,

lost in the

There

w^ars.

are some fragments of a pagan horned or radiated

crown in the Petrie Museum, which may be taken as

work

typical of this early

and these are said by

experts to show in a very marked degree the two

important characteristics of

complete mastery over

(i)

the arts of tempering, stamping, and engraving, and

The most

design and execution.

(2) exquisite skill in

famous example, perhaps, of

metal-work

Irish

the

is

brooch known as the Tara brooch, which was picked

up on the seashore

in

the year 1850.

We

means of ascertaining the date of

this fine

but the nature of the patterns on

it

denote consider-

able antiquity no less than extraordinary

as

we know

that the royal brooch

part of the

High King's

that this

really a

is

Some

times.

regalia,

skill,

of the

work

it

may

very well be

so fine that

is

pagan

to
it

cannot

glass.

In Christian times, the art of the smith was

ployed to
besides

make

crosiers

costly shrines for books

and

these shrines and

little
*

bit

of

chalices.

crosiers,

Irish

we

sentiment.

" Early Christian Art

ct scij., for full description.

and,

was an important

Tara brooch, belonging

be seen without a magnifying

have no

specimen,

in Ireland,"

and

embells,

In

connection with

find

a characteristic

In

other countries

by Margaret Stokes,

p.

53,

CELTIC IRELAND.

l8o

them

had costly bindings bestowed

books

valuable

on

Shrines, too, for the rude bells

as art developed.

of the early missionaries are

unknown out

with the exception of two

Scotland.

in

of Ireland,

But

Irish sen-

timent seemed to have regarded the book

itself as

something too sacred to be re-bound, and so made

for

it

a shrine, adorned

gems, and the

with gold,

silver,

enshrined the bell

the shrine of St. Patrick's

bell,

made

we know

a special keeper, and

for these eight centuries.

the year 109 1,

in

has never been lost sight of since.

been

It

always had

exactly where

now

It is

it

has

in the Irish

Royal Academy. Again, when we turn to the

we

enamel,

work of the smith. So also it

and it is an interesting fact that

finest

crosiers,

find that they are really shrines, containing the

old'walking-stick, with

been preserved

in

memory

object of poetic value

the good

man

its

is

crooked handle, which has

of

some

in his declining

years

material splendour of the shrine has

interest as

early saint.

The

the old stick which supported

its

all

the lavish

special spiritual

an expression of the zeal with which the

relic is preserved.

"It would appear," says Dr. Petrie, "from

number

the

of references to shrines in the Irish annals,

Northmen in
were few if any

that previously to the irruption of the

the eighth and ninth centuries, there

of the distinguished churches in Ireland which had

not costly shrines."

costly shrines

It

is clear,

however, that such

would be the most appropriate prey

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

l8l

that Irish art could offer to the barbarian invader

and

makes it easy to understand the

though the work of the smith was more

this reflection

fact that,

ancient in Ireland than that of the scribe, the

amples
articles

us of the smith's

left to

in

ecclesiastical

belong to a later date than that of the

illuminated manuscripts.
teries

work

ex-

fine

The churches and monas-

were special objects of the Danish attack; none

of any considerable importance escaped.

The

first

pagan attack came

and the peace that ensued

till

to an

end about 875

916 appears to have

been used as a time of architectural restoration, and

equipment to meet future troubles with greater powers

of defence.

the

to

Round towers were

monasteries,

but they were

as places of safety for

for

made

belfries

of such

them to be used
the monks and their treasure

dimensions and strength as

in

built

fitted

In the entries of the annalists

case of attack.

regarding the earliest Norse attacks, from 789 to 845,

it

recorded that the clergy fled to the woods for

is

safety

and

it

may

be that on one of these occasions

the beautiful chalice of

in

the place where

it

Ardagh was buried

for safety

was afterwards found, the place

having been missed by the monks who concealed

there.

From 950

on, however,

we

it

read of the " tower

of a bell" as being the special object of Danish attack,

and

it

is

very easy to imagine the

much

greater

security for works of art brought about

by the

tion of these solid monasterial keeps.

The

erec-

earliest

CELTIC IRELAND.

82

reference to a round tower states that the

literary

bell-tower at Slane was burnt in the year 951.

impossible not to connect these events with

It is

the fact that no fine specimen of Christian

art

metal-work has been found to which a date

earlier

in

than the tenth century can be definitely assigned.

The

earliest

we have

is

the bell shrine of Maelbridge,

which may be referred to the year 954, applying the

usual and certain test of observing the names inscribed on the shrine

and noting the dates under

which any of the persons so named are mentioned

the annals.

On

name

find the

most of the Irish works of art

whom

of the king, abbot, or bishop, by

the work was ordered, and also that of the artist

carried

it

out

it

who

while not unseldom the request of a

prayer for their souls

makes

in

we

is

quaintly added.

This practice

many

possible to fix dates with precision in

cases.

much

earlier

dated

example of

work, in the easily identified Irish

chalice

of Kremmiinster in

fine

style, is

metal-

the silver

The

Lower Austria.

is as early as between 757 and 781.

should be noticed, however, that in Ireland itself

date of this
It

the metal chalice appears to have been less essential

than the

bell, crosier

and book.

Glass chalices were

very often used, the one famous example of the en-

graved metallic chalice being the undated chalice of

Ardagh, which

is

one of the most exquisite of

memorials of early

Irish art.

all

our

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

83

The first book- shrine of which we Iiear is that of'

Book of Durrow, made between 877 and 916.
The earliest we liave is that of Molaise's Gospels, the

the

date of which

lies

between looi and 1025, and

about the second period of cessation

with the Danes,

when

the genius and valour of Brian

Boru had restored peace

that

last

earliest

dated crosier

is

kind,

that of Kells (967), which

and shows no

artistic fitness

tion.
all

The

it

Clontarf (1014).

at

when the

means of defence had decidedly improved.

On shrines and crosiers alike the work
finest

by
The

to Ireland, confirming

great struggle

within the second period of struggle

falls

falls

in the struggle

than perfect

less

is

of the

a delicate sense of

design and execu-

skill in

characteristic of Irish design in this, as in

other departments of Irish

art, lies in

the conser-

vatism with which the artist clings to the fundamental

forms of the old native patterns, and weaves in with

them, as

if

growing out of them,

all

to native invention

In

art,

working out

as in politics

and

new designs

may have

have been found elsewhere or that

its

that

occurred

primary ideas.

religion, Ireland

seems to

have been a land where ideas, once planted, live and

grow on

for ever, or, if

they

die, die hard.

has, there can be little doubt, as

geography as

One

to

The

fact

do with

has with race.

of the best

cross of Cong,
for the

it

much

known

pieces of metal-work

which was made

in

is

the

the twelfth century,

purpose of enshrining a supposed portion of

CELTIC IRELAND.

184
the true cross.
six inches
for the

of

king

Tuam

It is

high,

who caused

whom

for

who made

a processional cross, two feet

and the inscription asks a prayer

There

it.

by these names,

to be

it

made,

was made, and

it

no

is

for the

Bishop

for the artist

difficulty in assigning

to the year 1123, in the

it,

quarter-

first

of that fatal twelfth century after which Irish art-

The

production came suddenly to an end.

its

products

is

the shrine of St. Manchan, dated the

Norman

year ii66, three years before the

his foot

latest of

first

set

on Irish shores.
Illumination.

Let us turn now to that

of which

manuscripts,

illuminated

later birth of art,

we have

the

earlier

These are judged to

belong to a period extending from 460 to 1390;*
but the earlier date is very uncertain, and the books
examples

Christian

in

art.

approaching the later date are not to be compared

with those of earlier centuries as works of
scripts

are

sculpture

not

so easy

and architecture

date

to
;

but,

as

art.

Manu-

metal-work,

by observing the

version of Scripture used, the orthography, the style

of writing, the nature of the vellum, and the kind of

ink,

very close approximation

to accuracy

may be

made, and other tests occasionally present themselves.

For example, the Book of Durrow, which for beauty
*

For discussion of these dates, see " Early Christian Art

Ireland," chap.

ii.

in

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

is

only surpassed by the famous

Book

of Kells,

Roman

ably earlier than 718, because the

is

85

prob-

tonsure in

the shape of a crown was then introduced, and the book

has an illustration of a priest with the Irish tonsure

across the top of the head from ear to ear, after the

manner of

The Book

St. Patrick.

of Kells

to an earlier date, between the years

The

art of illumination

extent

in

times,

fell

referred

spread from Ireland to the

Irish foundations of lona, Melrose,

Thus, the style coming

is

650 and 690.

and Lindisfarne.

be practised to some

to

England, Englishmen and others,

into the error of calling

it

in later

Anglo-Saxon.

Ireland and progress through the Irish

Its genesis in

mission-stations can, however, be quite clearly traced.

Nor was

to

it

Britain

illumination spread.

with the

life

only that the

Bound up

of the Irish

Irish

art of

as fine writing

monk, he carried

his

was
art

with him wherever he went, and manuscripts illumi-

nated in the Irish style are scattered

Europe

in the tracks of his footsteps.*

manuscripts

Irish

now

in

Milan, Turin, and Naples,

Italy,
all

in

throughout

There are

the libraries of

of which are said to

have been brought from Bobbio, the monastery founded

by

St.

too,

Columbanus

that

in the sixth century.

been strong

at

know,

Reichenau, from the prevalence of the

Irish style of writing in the

The

We

the Irish missionary influence must have

manuscripts there.

general character of the illuminated designs

" Early Christian Art

in Ireland,"

by Margaret Stokes, chap.

iii.

CELTIC IRELAND.

86

is

similar to that of those on the metal-work.

earliest

The

forms are to be found on the pagan bronzes,

and on the walls of the stone tumuli on the Boyne.

These are decorated with spirals, zigzags, lozenges,
circles, dots,

and with a peculiar

spiral

that diverge and twist again

lines

form of double

and again, and

of which no traces, or scarcely any, can be found on

the

Continent.

The

uses

which the monastic

to

scribes put this divergent spiral

to

they added, with a

it

skill

is

extraordinary, and

and variety

all

their

own, the interlacings and conventional forms found

also in other countries

though differently used.

Sculpture.

The main

result of Irish sculpture

forty-five high crosses of the

shape

like a

is

embodied

Greek cross with the arms projecting

which combines the Greek and the Latin forms.

Irish crosses are covered richly with

and

it

is

in

well-known characteristic

The

fine sculpture,

noticeable that in the artistic treatment of

the scriptural subjects sculptured on them, the same

combination of Byzantine with Latin influences

shown

as in their shape.

These crosses

is

date, speak-

ing generally, from 914 to 1123.

The

Christian stones of Ireland include, besides

the high crosses, two hundred

ogam

characters,

stones

two hundred and

fifty

inscribed in

tombstones,

seven pillar-stones, and four altar-stones,* the greater

* " Early Christian Art in Ireland," p. 117,

ft scq.

THE ARTS IN
number of the
Latin, as

ERIN.

inscriptions being in Gaelic

not

8/
in

About the tenth

was customary elsewhere.

century the Irish cross becomes characteristic of the

country, the old divergent spiral pattern reappears to

decorate

down

and the formula of inscription settles

do,'' that request to pray for the soul

it,

to " Oroit

of the dead which,

is

among

early Christian inscriptions,

almost peculiar to Ireland.

In Scotland, Wales, and the Isle of

Man,

similar

early Christian memorial stones are to be found

and

the ideas of ornamentation used in the sculpture of

them

are

quite

belonging,

it

similar to those found in

a style which overspread

to

clear,

is

Ireland,

the three countries in the ninth and tenth centuries.

But

made

the use

in

of these ideas

the

difference

between the Irish and British sculptured stones

mainly

great, a difference that lies

keener sense of
as well as in

quote

]\Iiss

in

fitness in abstinence

its

The same

use

Stokes, " a

more

is

the Irish artist's

from ornament

ideas " attained," to

beautiful result in Ire-

land because in the hands of a people possessed of

a fine artistic instinct." *

Perhaps

this fine artistic

is little more than a reverential attitude of

mind towards the thing decorated, and to the idea

instinct

of which therefore
subservience.

all its

Perhaps

found another outlet

decorations should express

it

in the

is

the

same

instinct

rather than costly book bindings.

*

that

production of book shrines

" Early Christian Art

in Ireland," p.

142.

CELTIC IRELAND.

A rchitecture.
The remains

of early Irish architecture derive a

special interest from the fact that they supply material

for the

continuous illustration of the development of

the art in a

way which

is

almost peculiar to the

In Ireland, less than elsewhere, has the

country.

old been pulled

are, therefore,

down

to build

up the new

and we

the better enabled to observe the Irish

work engrafting new ideas

on old, till at last there was developed the style of
The
architecture known as the Irish Romanesque.
conservative instinct

history

at

of that style was

days, with

its

cut

short

in

promise of nobler things

but in one century

it

beautiful character,

and

which

Tuam

Clonfert (1167),

Clonmacnoise

in

(i 167),

accomplished results of a very

may now

be studied

Cormac's chapel on the Rock of Cashel,

Killaloe

very early

all unfulfilled

the

Abbey

of

Dervorgila's

church

at

cathedrals,

Queen

in

in parts of

in

and elsewhere.

Two

years only

before the landing of Fitzstephen in Wexford, the two

last

of these churches were

built,

and they are almost

the last examples of pure native Irish architecture

that have been produced in Ireland.

The
or other

earliest stone buildings of Ireland are

monuments

to the dead.

Of

tombs

these there are

two kinds, the cromlech or dolmen, and the tumuli.

The first of these show in Ireland signs of greater
antiquity than the finest specimens of the latter, as

THE ARTS
in

the entire

ERIN.

/A'

89

absence of any attempt at sculptural

decoration, however rude, while in the tumuli such

decorations

are

plentiful.

cromlech

consists of

several large upright stones, with another large stone

placed on the top of them like a roof; and sometimes

it

surrounded by upright stones placed

is

The

in

circle.

largest cromlechs of Ireland are in the east

and

north,

and they decrease steadily

west

so that, whereas the average length of a roofing

stone in Ulster

is

twenty-five

from east to

in size

feet, in

Connaught

it

runs from eight to ten feet only.

tumulus

is

dome-shaped building, constructed

without cement, and with a passage leading to the

interior

The most

chamber.

noticeable examples are

pagan royal cemeteries of

Grange, Dowth, Teltown, and Rathkenny and

to be found in the

on the walls and roofs of these that we

earliest

hitherto

attempts

at

In

carving.

examined urns are

to

the custom of cremation, and the

to

the chambered

cairns

New
it

is

find the

the tumuli

all

be found, indicating

same remark applies

or barrows

whether round or long and horned

of

Scotland,

while in South

If the ethnological

more commonly
argument in Chapter I.

correct, the royal cemeteries

on the Boyne began to

Britain the barrows contain bones

than ashes.

be

be built by that race which

identify with the

we have

Tuatha De Danann, and

vaguely with the Caledonian Picts

red-haired

men

seen reason to

the

to associate

large-limbed

described by Tacitus, and thought by

CELTIC IRELAND.

go

him

more

to be

And

of Gaul.

Germans than were the

like the

Celts

Irish tradition bears this idea out

the

De

Bruigh on the Boyne

is

Danann, although

there that the Milesian kings

were

laid to rest.

it

is

sacred to the Tuatha

It is interesting to note, in connec--

tion with the decoration of the walls

and roofs of these

great sepulchres, that superior knowledge of the arts

is,

by the

legend, ascribed to the mysterious

Irish

Tuatha,

On

the race that built the dolmens less light has

as yet been shed.

Twenty-three of these have been

excavated, and while bones have been found in

They were

urns have been found in four only.

therefore, built

and Scotland,
them, and
is

all

all,

not,

by the cremating tribes of Ireland

There are no literary traditions about

that the folk-lore of the people reveals

that in Ireland, as elsewhere, they are associated

Thus

with the idea of giants' graves.

that the race which built

on the
were

them has

literature of the Gael.

necessary,

strictly Gaelic

that

is

appears

no impression
evidence,

if it

they cannot be regarded as

monuments.

might have been

left

This

it

The

traditional Firbolg

their builder, and,

if so,

his identity

with the dolmen-building people of Cornwall and

Wales would become highly probable.

subject enough has been already said.

The
to

But on

this

dwelling-houses of the ancient Irish appear

have been mainly of two primitive kinds.*

* O'Currv's Lectures

on " Manners and Customs."

Either

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

I9I

they built for themselves quadrilateral houses of clay

or of logs set on end close together, or they built
cylindrical houses of

The

roof.

latter

wickerwork with a cup-shaped

form appears to have been more

and a homestead would consist of a

group of such houses. The dwelling of a chief might

generally used

be a considerable group, including the house for the

women
the

set apart

grianan

or

and protected by a stake

sun-house,

placed

on

fence,

and

pleasant

eminence to serve as a sort of Arcadian drawingroom.

Lime appears

to

have been much used

whitening the walls of the houses, as

among the ancient Germans.

The smaller homesteads were

it

was

for

also

generally surrounded

bank with a quickset hedge but

the chiefs dwelling would need a more effective

by a fence
protection,

or a

and

it is

in the construction of the protect-

ing wall of earth or of stone that the character of the

A circular

dwelling as a dun or a cathair consisted.

wall of earth, whether single, double, or treble,

made

the dwelling a rath, and a deep trench of water be-

tween the walls made

it

a dun, as defined in one of the

But the word

"

dun

law

tracts.

in a

very general sense to include

places.

The

consisted

of

" is
all

ordinarily used

kinds of fortified

city of Tara, for instance,

seven duns, with

is

said to have

large

houses inside each, besides the foradh or

Tara, round which the

fair

was

held,

group of

mound

of

and on which,

no doubt, the Tocomrach of the High King met.

CELTIC IRELAND.

192

Cathairs and cashels were stone raths

building of cathairs
rally called in the

stone

and the

duns, as they are gene-

west of Ireland

was the

first

step

taken towards architecture proper unconnected with

These stone

tonibs.

forts are

thought to belong to

the last two hundred years before Christ, and they

are found

on the western shores of Kerry, Clare,

Galway, and

Sligo, with occasional examples in

Mayo, Donegal, and Antrim. The most important
are in Kerry, and in the islands of Arran off the

coast of Galway.

Twenty-four of these

forts

were

examined by Lord Dunraven, and descriptions of

these, with photographs, are given in his "
Irish Architecture,"

are

edited

by Miss

large amphitheatres, encircled

all

some of which
feet high.

Notes on

Stokes.

They

by outer

walls,

are eighteen feet thick and twenty

The

walls are built without mortar, and

with undressed stones, which are nevertheless

together with
is

much

skill

and accuracy.

of rubble, faced on either side

structure

and chambers,

in these walls,

by

The

fitted

centre

a thick stone

as well as passages, occur

which are also marked by the existence

of real doorways, very different from the gaps in the

bank which do duty for doors in the British

Within the amphitheatre are sometimes found,
tered

together,

elongated huts

the

the

remains of
first

little

circular

forts.

clus-

and

stone dwelling-houses

in

Ireland.

The word

"cathair,"

Dr.

Sullivan

tells

us,

is

THE ARTS IN

ERIN.

93

almost exclusively confined to the south and west

of Ireland

and

it is

in the

south-west also that these

stone forts are at their best, while their extent

limited

practically

and west

the south

to

is

coasts,

with the single notable exception of Aileach, near

The same observer

Derry.

the south-west are found

ogam

inscriptions

only two

in Leinster.

have been

for

also points out that in

number of
and

the greatest

none

there are

Ogams

cut on

in

Ulster,

wood

there

may

only the stone ogams would have

been likely to be preserved.

The

stone forts

peculiar to
certainly

of Western

Ireland

within these islands

it

is

fact

is

They appear

in

most accessible

to

very significant one.

that part of the country which

quite

are

and the

Southern Europe, and open to influences, as well as

immigrations, coming thence.
part to which

tradition

That part

refers

the

Milesian immigrants from the south.

fort

is

a sign

strong fort

is

of conflict in

a help to secure his footing,

in

this

The strong

the region where the

by the invader as
or by the defender to

found, whether built

prevent the same.

likely

also the

is

landing of the

The

case, as

last

supposition

is

not so

such huge structures could

hardly have been thrown up by builders quite new to

the work while the

enemy was even upon them.

It is

impossible, therefore, to avoid suggesting the inference, uncertain though

the

it

be, that the cathairs

work of the invading Milesians, or

were

Scots,

of

CELTIC IRELAND.

194

and that

tradition,

one more Hnk

their existence

where they are

There

the accuracy of that tradition.

legend to the effect that the same

those on the Arran

by subject
to find an

is

the chain of evidence corroborating

in

Isles,

is,

indeed, a

forts,

especially

were built as a

last

defence

who, hunted out of Britain, failed

tribes

asylum

and were driven

in Ireland,

But

to this uttermost western coast.

it

finally

seems im-

possible to overcome the inherent improbability of

explanation

this

for

why

should not a race with

such exceptional architectural

skill

have entrenched

themselves similarly amid the mountain heights and

passes of North Wales, where there

dearth of stone for building

From

the cathair

circular wall within

beehive

to the cashel, a similar

which the early monks

towers.

built their

oratories, and,

Cashels, with their primitive

belongings, are to be found in

all

parts of the country,

reaching back to the sixth and

The

certainly no

we come

cells or clochans, their little

later, their belfry

is

seventh centuries.

picturesque situations in which

many

of these

are to be found, especially in the islands on the west

coast,

upon them a singular beauty, and

reflects

an interest somewhat more than that of archaeological

inquiry.

tery

on

The most remarkable perhaps

St.

Michael's

is

the monas-

Rock, twelve miles

off the

coast of Kerry, in the stormy Atlantic ocean, where

the monastic wall runs along a great precipice overlookincr the sea.

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

We

195

have already considered the practical motive

which led to the almost universal addition of a round

The

tower to the monastic group of buildings.

idea

of the round tower, and of church towers in general,

can be shown very clearly

Syria

to

have originated

in

and recent investigators have been able to

its entrance into the Western

trace the type, from

The

world at Ravenna, across Europe to Ireland.*

Irish Celt, with his preference for

round forms, and

under the impulse communicated

attacks,!

made much

by the

Danish

of the cylindrical tower, and

preserved more carefully than other peoples his build-

And

ings generally.

so

it

is

we

not surprising that

should find one hundred and eighteen of these towers

now

in

Ireland,

can be found abroad.

The

over,

respect,

peculiar

in

this

Irish towers are,

they

that

attached to the churches, but stand alone

can be no doubt that they owe

much

bear them

built before churches

came

into existence.

morenot

are

and there

of their solemn

picturesque effect to this circumstance.

began to be

examples

while only twenty-two

In

large

fact,

they

enough

to

And, indeed, the

preference for small churches persisted long in the

country, having behind

it

the support of a tradition

referred to St. Patrick.

The towers

are assigned

by competent judges

* Dunraven's "Notes on Irish Architecture," vol. ii.

and Stokes's " Early Christian Art in Ireland," p. 176.
t See Map at end of Dunraven's "Notes, etc."

to

p. i8o, et seq.,

CELTIC IRELAND.

196

three periods (i) from 890 to 927

1013

and

(3)

from 1170 to 1238.

sary to point out that the

first

from 973 to

(2)

It is

hardly neces-

two were periods of

The

cessation in the struggle with the Danes.

three

types of towers belonging to these periods mark distinctly three stages in the progress of architecture

from

the primitive form of the entablature, shown in the

horizontal lines of the doorways and windows, to that

Romanesque arch. In the later

beauty and number of the arched windows

of the decorated

towers the
increase,

and the signs are manifest of an approaching

development from the solemn monotony of strong

grey walls, suitable to the monastic keep of troubled
times, into the storied variety of a fine church tovv^er

standing in a land of peace.

of the round tower

still

is

That promised future

unfulfilled

but, with the

recent spread in Ireland of knowledge about things

Irish,

and enthusiasm

long delayed, and

may

bell-house

for

form

is

excessive

it

may

not

now be

once more the Irish cylindrical

majestic

rise,

olden times, but with

its

them,

all

and

apart, as in the

the added beauty of which

susceptible, while free from that vice of

decoration of which Irish art was never

guilty.

The

earliest Irish

are

still

churches were the

little

oratories

cement and with rounded

roof,

which

found standing, with the beehive

cells,

within

built without

the monastic cashel.

oratories, stand alone

Churches, as distinguished from

;

but the

first

churches are of

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

the very simplest kind
tion of nave

mere

97

barns, with no distinc-

and chancel, and no attempt, however

rudimentary, to construct an arch.

ever, decoration begins, while

are

horizontal.

The

artist

still

Presently,

how-

the doorways

all

bethinks him to repeat

in stone the designs of the illuminated

manuscripts

Then comes

the addition

and the early metal-work.

of the chancel and the chancel arch

and the

arch,

once found, takes gradually more and more hold of

the artistic consciousness,

windows become the

horizontal extension
Irish vitality.

uniting the

We
tops

rule.

it

in the

of the

arched doorways and

Nevertheless, the idea of

holds

still

see

till

its

own with

a truly

long level entablature

columns, in

place

separate capitals which belong to the

of the

Romanesque

style elsewhere.

This horizontal entablature

is

the most charac-

the Irish Romanesque style, which

marked by blending in a thoroughly
artistic harmony the two great architectural styles of
the entablature and the arch. The development from
simple entablature to the mixed type is well seen in
the doorways of Maghera and Banagher, in Londonderry.
As presenting examples of decorated pure
teristic detail of

is

in

general

entablature these doorways are almost unique.

The

native character of their ornamentation and

rich

its

delicacy mark, indeed, the second characteristic of

church architecture

in

the Irish style.

Another important point remains

to be noticed.

CELTIC IRELAND.

198

The

high, steep roof of such buildings as Cormac's

chapel at Cashel, and others of the twelfth century,

can hardly escape the eye of the most ordinary

These roofs are of

observer.

stone,

and so steep as

to include an angle of about sixty-five degrees onl}-.

This result

is

obtained by the invention on the part

of Irish architects of a double vault, the lower arch

and the other pointed,

circular, like a barrel,

being

The pointed

as seen from the inside.

roofed over with

flat

arch

inclined plane, the spaces between the arch

plane being

filled

up by rubble.

the steep stone roof

climate

but,

may

however that

its

The

would,

found

it

in
its

and the

desirability of

may

be,

it

gives to the

their appearance, and,

construction was an invention which

yet have a future as well as a past in the

roofs,*

then

have been suggested by

churches one characteristic of

while

is

stones in the shape of a double

may

way

the natural course of things, soon have

way

into the

body of

later Irish churches.

The church of St. Caimin at Iniscaltra, erected

1016,

of

implied a use of the pointed arch which

two years

in

after the battle of Clontarf, mai'ks the

transition from the horizontal to the enriched round-

This was

arch style of Ireland,

fifty

years before

Romanesque appeared in England, on the building of

Westminster Abbey by Edward the Confessor, in
From that date there was no halt in the pro1066.
gress of architecture
*

The

question

is,

how

far

till
it

the end of the next century,

could have been used for larger buildings.

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

99

and a considerable number of churches were erected.

The

finest

examples belong naturally to the twelfth

Such are the tomb of Murlough O'Brien in

Killaloe cathedral, the present chancel arch and east
window of the cathedral at Tuam (11 28-1 150)

century.

the interlaced patterns on the mouldings of which

are very fine

abbey

the

doorway and

window

east

at Clonfert (1167), the nun's

in the

church at Clon-

macnoise (1167), and Cormac's chapel on the Rock of

Cashel (1127).*
But,

while

existent.

That

churches
fact

abound,

may have

castles

are

non-

been significant

in

the twelfth century, both as expressing the Irish past

and

as a sign of the near future.

old Irish were, they had as

little

Warlike as the

idea of entrenching

themselves behind strong walls as they had of covering their bodies with armour.

Nevertheless, they had

been successful in their struggle with the

Norsemen, and had won peace

neighbours, as well as

for

their

mailed
Scottish

themselves, by that success.

Now, however, they were

to encounter another less

much more dangerous enemy.

The Norman was not only a mailed and fort-building
foe
he was a foe that had made everything else in

terrible-seeming but

his social organization subservient to his

to

urgent desire

win lands and to rule over others by the sword.

To do
*

this

had been

his

See " Early Christian Art

excellent accounts of all these.

work

in history,

in Ireland,"

and he had

M. Stokes, chap,

vi., for

CELTIC IRELAND.

200
learned to do

it

Capable nations, or persons,

well.

always learn to do well that which their souls are

most
"

prentice

struggle
far

on

bent

hand

once,

and

military genius

and with

all

and

it

out

settled eventually as a colony subject to

When

the

Norman, he was educated

Norseman came again

in

the art of conquest as

He had

well as in the art of war.

conquered two

countries before he took this one in hand.

three centuries he failed to conquer

while

Yet

in

it

failed

him out or subjugate him. The

of England
in itself a harmless thing

suze-

it,

also to drive

rainty

was

Norse

his true

sword, he was driven

the naked

for

the Irish king.

as

all his

from contemptible

worship

his

tried

on Ireland in the days of Danish

but with

The Norseman

doing.
"

was

used amiss, merely for the benefit of fresh immigrants,

whose sympathies were naturally supposed to be

keenest for the English government

and so the true

government of the country was disordered more and

more, the people's peace of mind gone, development
arrested at every point.

No words

could describe

that arrest of development so eloquently or so lucidly

as the facts of Irish art-history.

"

Since then," says

Miss Stokes, "the native character of Ireland has

best found expression in her music.

purely Celtic

art,

whether

in

No work

illumination

of

of
the

sacred writings, or in gold, or bronze, or stone was

wrought by

Irish

hands

after that century."

THE ARTS IN

20I

ERIN.

Music.

The

Music survived.
were so wrought

in

habits of musical expression

upon the popular mind by the

beyond the reach of

and so bound up with

practice of the art from times

the historian's longest vision,

the poetry in which the popular traditions were enshrined,

by

and music

so easily and naturally preserved

a people as far advanced in musical appreciation

as the Irish

must have been, that no matter of surprise

can be found
Irish
is

is

the undoubted fact that very old

music has been preserved to our own times, and

now

not

in

all

down and

written

thus

made

though

safe,

Nevertheless,

generally accessible.

would

it

hardly be correct to say that music had survived

the sense of continuing to develop towards
future.

As

with other

so with this

arts,

art, it is

than probable that a future was dawning for

centuries ago, which
in a sense before

it.

it

was then postponed, and

There

can, however, be

in

natural

its

more
seven

is still

no doubt

by no means barren of

that the seven centuries were

true native production in music as they were barren

in

other arts

and so the

Irish

classed with their kindred, the

as

a nation

music.

with unmistakable popular genius in

lyrical genius

the circumstances of the

strictly lyrical

have always been

Welsh and the Scotch,

work

in

it

was, however, as fitted

seven centuries

music and poetry

it

and

for

must be

admitted that the character of those centuries was

CELTIC IRELAND.

202

not altogether unfavourable.

work on a

able to

It

has not been favour-

larger scale

and so the pro-

duction of great Irish opera and cantata belongs to

when the ancient

the future of that Irish Renaissance

epics will be sung once

more by

Irish poets, while

modern
a more complex

the minstrels of Ireland will live again in her

composers to weave round the epics

structure of music

structure that shall be Irish as

well as modern.

The

and

Irish annals

these the harp

is

by

show

stories

musical instruments were used

far the

in

that several

old times; but of

most important.

It

all

was

customary for the bards to recite their poems to the

accompaniment of the harp, and this custom continued

down

to the eighteenth century.

the popular Irish harpers

Bunting,

in

Ireland," written in

of harpers at
v/hich
rules

is

now

work on the

his

"

The

extinct

race of

but Mr.

Ancient Music of

1840, describes a great meeting

Belfast in

1792, the performance

at

was conducted according to the traditional

of Irish harp-playing, the music being played

with rapidity,

spirit,

and

liveliness,

from the slow manner which

suitable to the Irish

airs.

many

It is

quite

different

persons imagine

interesting to notice

the agreement of these facts with the observation of

Cambrensis

The

at

the

time of the

Norman

invasion.

slanders of Cambrensis, looking through

hostile spectacles,

his

on the Irish people, are proverbial,

and can now be read very conveniently

in

Strong-

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

bow's

"

in the series of "

Conquest of Ireland,"

only

" It

something pleasant to say.

finds

instrumental music that

in

English

Once, and once

History from Contemporary Writers."

only, he

203

able diligence in this nation

find

but

in that

art

incomparably excel every other nation that

For

met.

is

any commend-

they

have

which we

their execution is not, like that

hear in Britain, slow and laboured, but adroit and

sprightly

while their tone

full,

is

and the

And

their melodies sweet and gay."

place he

movement

in so delicate a

"

strings, enlivening

cating a deeper

the

They

so sportively, and conclude

manner, and

under

sportively

another

us something of their manner.

tells

enter into a

refrain of

in

it

pla.y the little notes so

blunter sounds

of the bass

with wanton levity, or communisensation

internal

of pleasure, so

that the perfection of their art appears in the conceal-

ment of

it."

This reference to the bass and the

makes

it

clear that the old Irish

the principles of

harmony

little

made some

and there

is

notes
use of

good reason

also to think that singing in parts

was practised

some

Jerome

of the Irish monasteries.

service of the Scots at

the choral

Down,

in

St.

Bangor, count}'

the seventh century, and both

Cambrensis

refer

Northumbrian
with Bangor.

part

to

singing

monasteries

There

singing in lona

is

some

which

in

refers to

in

was

Bede and

one of the
connected

indication, too, of part-

and, as another piece of evidence,

CELTIC IRELAND.

204

"

occurs

reference

harmony

the

in

Book

of strings," which,

if

Leccan to the

of

word

the

used

is

would certainly show that some

polyphonal music was made at the time to which the

use of

accurately,

harmony.

certainly sung in

Nevertheless,

would be absurd

it

harmony

of harmonious

to claim for old

knowledge or practice of the

The real development

Irish musicians either

sixteenth

burdoon," or

end of each verse of a song, was almost

refrain at the

principles of

"

Moreover, the Irish

reference occurs.

proper.

music belongs to the fifteenth and

centuries

and

these

darkness in Ireland, centuries

tions necessary for the

were centuries of
which the condi-

in

growth of harmonious music

were absolutely non-existent.

Moreover, the charac-

music were such as to favour highly

teristics of Irish

melodic combinations, while they placed

in the

way

more evident

Down
is

to

musical

was

vocabulary

given by Mr. Bunting, and

is

of

to

the

first,

second, and

much

in

of the scale

fifth

harp-strings, are " sisters "

strings lying together for the

first

"

two

servant to the

sisters,"

and "the string of the leading

" string

of melody," while

all

use.

interest

For instance,

from the picturesqueness of the terms.

applied

become

end of the eighteenth century a

the

the names of the

as

difficulties

will

presently.

complete native
This

This

of choral composition.

sirens," or

the octaves upwards

and downwards are called by two

Irish

names which

THE ARTS IN ERIN:

he translates as

"

"

answering

and

Then

kind.

"

respec-

names of a

similar

"

All the other strings have

tively.

205

response

again, for the rates of execution indi-

cated by the Italian words adagio, larghetto, andante,

we have

allegro,

equivalents,

the beautiful and very racy Irish

dirge time," " lamentation time,"

"

time," " lesson time," while a quicker pace

"

heroic

indicated

is

as " trebly rapid," or jig time.

On

the characteristics of old Irish musical com-

position a few words

must

doubt that one characteristic

many

five

lies

sing

forcibly,

The

the fact that

One has only

quinquegrade scale to

this

though vaguely, of

Irish

and Scotch music.

antiquity of Irish ideas, and their persistence

illustrated

by

and natural as

The

the tetrachord

have been

to see

how

first

1358,
at

knowledge of which appears

an early time universal.

this

for the fifth

123568,

easy
scale

of the

Again, the

of the second gives similarly the sixth.

quinquegrade scale emerges

It is

common

the second note of the

may

well

which

seems to us curious

it

gives the octave of the second.

of which

is

musical scale was, no doubt,

would be discovered from

fifth

this characteristic use of a scale

as antique

and quaint.
to

to play

be reminded

though not to the exclusion of new ones

is

in a

notes only, the fourth and seventh of the

diatonic scale being omitted.

or

in

decided antiquity are composed

Irish airs of

key of

There can be no

suffice.

fifth

Thus the

the conception

be readily formed by playing a scale

CELTIC IRELAND.

206

on the piano with omission of the fourth and seventh.

This was almost certainly the
all
still

musical scale for

first

ancient Asiatic and European peoples, and

old

diatonic

was completed by the

scale

discovery of the fourth as the

seventh as the

is

China and elsewhere.

to be found in

The

it

fifth

below, and of the

The whole can be

thus

of the third.

fifth

exhibited as a series of

fifths

4152637,
the dot below the

number

indicating the lower, and

The complete

dots above, the higher octaves.

scale,

obtained in this way, was that used for the church

music of the Middle Ages

and

differs

it

from the

modern diatonic

scale, to

of the fifteenth

and sixteenth centuries bound

which the great composers

all

future music, in the exact values of the third, fourth,

and sixth notes of the

In the old scale the

scale.

value of the notes are as follows

^

while

in

the

64'

8'

modern
1

3'

16'

128'

"'

scale they run thus

4'

3'

2>

'

-''

and the scale cannot be exhibited as a chain of

The true antique quinquegrade scale is exactly
fifths.
the

same

left out,

as the old scale with the fourth

and

differs, therefore,

on a modern piano

from

its

and seventh
reproduction

in this respect, that its third

and

sixth are both slightly sharpened.

The

old diatonic scale

was inevitably introduced

into Ireland with the church music of the monasteries,

THE ARTS
and was

-not without

IiV

ERIN.

on the secular music

effects

its

20/

So, while the genuine old Irish and Scotch

outside.

airs are in the

quinquegrade

scale, later

music had no

be without the additional notes of the

reason to

But by that time

septigrade scale.

music had

Irish

acquired a character, and Irish taste a habit, which

affected

of the

later production

all

and made

seem racy

it

soil.

Irish music,

naturalized

in

and the old church music, whether

Ireland

or

not,

had

this

common

characteristic, that

any note

in the scale

turn be used

a tonic.

Thus, instead of being

as

the

limited, like

modern musician,

alternative of the major

case,

and seven

in

the

in its

simple

and minor keys, these old

musicians had the choice of

one

to

might

five different

keys

in the

the other, according to the

The variety of the

much confusion when

note which they chose as tonic.

church scales had given

rise to

the great composers reformed the diatonic scale, and

settled the

lines of

development by

work.

But something

future

in

the

reform,

may have
greatly

problem of musical composition

as
in

their splendid

been
it

lost for the

simplified

Irish airs are written in all the five Irish keys,

those in the key of

are

common.

The

flat

with a

flat

the

harmony.

and

seventh introduced

seventh, indeed, occurs in four

out of the five Irish keys, while, with characteristic

conservatism, the introduction of the additional note
is

not allowed to involve departure from composition

208

CELTIC IRELAND.

in the antique

which had wrought

scale

into

itself

the Irish musical taste.

The Highland Scotch music differs in no respect

from the Irish. This we should expect but it is,
;

perhaps,

Scotch

surprising

little

music

modernized

Gaelic

is

in

influenced

by

Irish

That Welsh music was

music at one period there

no doubt, but as we have

evidently, from

is

modern than

though

too,

present form than either of the

its

other two Gaelic branches.

much

it

now

good deal more

structure, a

its

is

the music of Wales

that of the western island.

In the Irish manuscripts the harp

under the

Lowland
much more

that

find

to

name

" crut,"

of

and

is

referred to

likely that in

is

it

early times the instrument had few strings, and

was

similar in this respect to the primitive harps of which

we

traces

find

countries.

The

modern type occurs

of so

many

other

picture of a true harp of the

first

ninth century, as

history

the

in

in a St. Blain

a "

manuscript of the

Cithara Anglica," and this

is

one indication among several that the modern harp

had

its

origin in the

British Isles.

Thus we hear

that in the twelfth century British harps were said to

be much superior to French.

Between the eighth and

the fourteenth centuries, Irish crut-players wandered

over Europe after the Irish manner

authority,

modern
*

Vincenzo

harp, no doubt, he

" Discorso

della

and, on Dante's

Galilei * says that the

means

Musica antica

et

harp

the

was introduced into

moderna."

Fiorenze, 15S1.

THE ARTS IN ERIN.

From

Italy from Ireland.

it

209

and similar evidence,

this

may

appears that the genesis of the true harp

be

associated with the British Isles, and especially with

Ireland, in

which country,

it is

quite evident from the

general musical history of the two countries,

the best chance of being invented.

it

had

picture of the

harp occurs on a reliquary made about 1370,

Irish

with thirty strings, and this appears to have been the

number at that time.

The last fair of Carman was held in the year 718,
and a poem descriptive of it dates from the twelfth

typical

century.

In this, there

ments used
" fidel "

at

the

is

fair,

list

of the musical instru-

among which we

find the

This was, no doubt, the same

mentioned.

bowed
instrument which was the progenitor of the modern
fiddle or violin.
The fiddle, like the bagpipe, which
as the mediaeval " viele " on the Continent, the

is

enumerated among the instruments

also

appears to have been

fair,

peasantry,

use chiefly

among

the

and neither are admitted to any such

place in the literature as

and

in

at the

is

accorded to the royal

aristocratic harp.
It

Irish

used

in

Scotland,

instrument, and

poses

however, that

certain,

is

bagpipe, which was

till

in

later times the

identical with

that

now

was a very noted and favourite

chiefly relied

on for military pur-

the time of the treaty of Limerick.

In

the sixteenth century, the Italian Galilei, in writing

of the bagpipe, says,

" It is

much used by

the Irish
P

CELTIC IRELAND.

2IO
to

its

sound

unconquered,

this

and warlike

fierce,

people march their armies and encourage each other

to deeds of valour.

as invite,
Irish

and,

With

it

also they

accompany

dead to the grave, making such mournful sounds

their

nay almost

force, the

bystanders to weep."

music survived the twelfth century

if this

had not been the

case,

it

had

in Ireland,

any

at

rate

a direct descendant in Scotland, and found a second

home

in

Wales, where a kindred race with kindred

ideas, tastes,

and customs, was

at this very time dis-

posed to look to Ireland for advice and assistance.

So, in

1 1

80,

through the agency of

Griffith

the Welsh Eisteddfod was revived

at least, of Irish influences,

canon was regulated by

with the

and some of

Irish,

and the Welsh musical

is

Welsh

manifestly connected

it is

the close approximation of the

at this time of

The Welsh

Irish harpers.*

vocabulary of musical terms

ap Conan,

in the presence,

Irish,

thus marking

two peoples musically

national revival.

From

the

time of Griffith ap Conan, the Welsh Eisteddfodic

institution never died out,

and

its

steady persistence

expresses a resolve of which

Welshmen may

proud that the national

should not die in those

inner

movements which

ever the

And

political

life

are of

its

well be

very essence, what-

fortunes of the nation might be.

so to-day popular musical education

so popular

that children catch the taste and faculty for song like

an infection

is

a living

reality in

Wales

* Sullivan's Introduction, p. 625.

as

it

is

THE ARTS IN
nowhere

two

else in these

ERIN.

1 I

Ireland, ere long,

islands.

perhaps, will relight her popular torch of music at the

altar

where she helped to rekindle a dying

blaze, and,

taking up the line of a popular musical culture at the

point to which

Wales has brought

it,

make every

Irish

town and hamlet ring with the music of an educated

choir.

Nor

is

such a revival and development of the

may

be hoped.

characteristic

marks of

popular taste for song the most that

The song

itself,

with

melody and rhythm,

is

all

its

not

lost.

It

remains for the

musical genius of Irishmen to study, to

reproduce

it,

with

all

feel,

and to

the developments of which

it is

capable and which the general progress of the art

has

made

other

arts,

when the
all

possible.

In music, as in poetry and the

an Irish Renaissance

at hand,

a time

living thought of Irish artists, instinct with

the knowledge-gain that

is

humanity's

heritage from the past, will infuse

growth,

is

common

new powers

of

life,

and development into those old forms of

expression and ideas of beauty which are the national

heritage of every Irishman.

INDEX.
Art, Effect of
Irish, 180,

Norman

invasion on

199

Artisans, position in tribe, 153

Aenach, or

fair,

of Tara,
Aicill,

Book

i68

Artistic instinct, Irish, 179, 180, 187

Assembly, Hills

70

of, 79,

139, 141

Edmund

Aileach, 193
Airechts, or Courts of Justice, 159,

of, 70,

122

Spenser's

descrip-

tion, 71

Tribal, origin of Parliaments

and Courts of Justice, 133

etc.

Aires, or nobles, 142

Various kinds

Echtai, 158

Attecotti, 3,

of, 164, etc.

T,T,

Elective, 154

Fine, 167

Forgaill, Tuisi, Ard, Cosraing,

157
Architecture, 188
Irish

Romanesque, 197-199

Ardagh, Chalice of, 181, 182

Ard Macha, i.e. Armagh, foundation of royal seat, 31
1 1 7, 129, 130
See founded by Patrick, 113

Argyle, 43
national, 71, 73

its failure, 76, etc.

forts in, 192,

194
Art, Character of Irish design
183, 1S6

Bards, Influence

in,

xiii.,

of, xiii.,

for

104, 113

77

in danger, 122

Migratory habits of, 81

Poets' " Pot of Avarice," 82

qualifications of, xi., 84

Army, Cormac's
,

Bardic competition, 84
preparation of the Irish
Christianity, xii.,

Primacy,

Arran, Stone

Bagpipe, 209
Banshee, 100, loi

Satire of, S3

Tutorial habits

Two

classes of,

of,

82

xiii..

Si

INDEX.

214
Barristers, 8i, i6o
Barrows, Long, of Stone Age, 3
Round, of Bronze Age, 4
Belgae, 5
,

Cairbre Cinn Cait, 33

cow-nobleman, 142
Book of Durrow, 184

Bo-aire,

Caledonians,

i.e.

ofKells, 185
So,

the, 6,

100,

189
Brehon, Moral influence of the, 77,
78
, Antiquity of the, 81
law.

Tenants,

See Land,

Women,

revision

Fosterage,

etc.

by Cormac Mac Art,

Brian Boru, 125, 128

86

Irish

attack

Roman,

on

34, 35
,

Irish

settlements

in

West,

35. etc.
,

Tribute paid to Irish kings in

South- West, 38, 39

Bronze Age men, 4, 17
Bruigh, the borough, village, guild,

Germs of local government

in,

165
Bruighfer, the borough magistrate,
election of king in his house,

of Kremmiinster, 182
Christianity,

Irish

probable convener

of

the

Roman,

48,

115

relation to directly represen-

tative system, 155

rechta,

bye-laws

borough, 154, 155

of

the

116

advantages of

this,

centralization

and union with

Rome

of

Irish,

in

the twelfth

century, 117-119, 129-131

Circles of stone, 6

System

of,

141

Clochan, 194
Compurgators, 161

Connor

]\Iac

Nessa, 73

power of making,

142-143
strangers

with

manorial

lords, 148

Cormac Mac

Tocomrach, 167

Bruigh

v.

64
Decadence of Roman, from
fourth century, 60
, Irish, in Europe, 60, etc.
Roman Church organization
influence
prevails,
and
Irish
abroad declines, 64, 66, 67
Church, Tribal organization of Irish,

of

141, 155

Cemeteries, Royal, 6, 97, 189

Chalice of Ardagh, 181, 182

Contracts, King's

154
,

See Tenant

Ceile.

Classes,

154, 155
,

209

fair of,

Cashel, 194
Cathair, 191, 192

of the Judgments, 87
Britain,

190

13, 19,

54,

69
Brigit, St.,

Last

Bothachs, 146

Boyne, Brugh on

5,

Carman, 168

Art, 35, 68, etc.

Coronation stone, 47, 53

Council of the Alehouse, 167
Courts of law. See Airecht
Cremation, 2, 188
Crimes.

See Torts

INDEX.
Crimes, Responsibility of family

for

Elective kings, 141, 155-156

for

nobles, 153
Eric of king and aires, 142

member's, 140, 160

Responsibility of

tutor

Erigena Joannes, 57
Ethnic traditions, Irish, 16

pupil's, 173

Cromlech.

See

21

Dolmens

Executive government, 156-158

Crosses, Irish stone, 186, 187

Cruithuigh, or Picts, in Ireland,

finance, 165

of,

IOO-I02
Family ("Fine"),

Fairies,

Confederation

of,

of

assembly, or Mathluagh, 164

58, 125,
,

Foster, 171

Industrial, 154

etc.
,

Structure

Irish, 136, etc.

Dalaradia and Dalriada, 43

Danes, Pagan crusade

Aenach

See

Fair.

Dae, a family policeman, 158

Dal, tribal assembly dealing with

overthrown

Religious, 114
Fasting on a creditor, 163
Feast (Feis) of Tara, 31, 70, 170
Feni of Erin, 73, 79
,

at Clontarf,

128

Danish attacks on churches, 181

in Ireland,

cities

and

parlia-

ments, 127

Fergus Mac Ere, 43

Feudalism and tribalism, 144, 150-

Church, 129-130
,

First, bishop,

128

kingdom of Dublin, 126

on law-abiding
Davies, Sir J.,
character of Irish, 78

Dolmens,

Distribution

Ethnology of their builders, 8

Downpatrick, 127
Druid, 83, 133
Duns, or forts, 191
,

Flaths, or Lords, 154, 155

Fodhla Ollamh, 69
Fomorians possibly pure Ugrian, iS

regulating.

See

Duns

Sec

Fosterage
,

Natural

growth

174-175

of,
,

Physical, 76

of

and modern Irish tenants, 149

" Fine." See Family
Finn Mac Cumhal, 73, 75

Forts.

Laws

fair

Firbolgs, 16, 19, 20, 24, 25, 190

Stone, 28, 192, 193

Eilucation,

at

Fuidirs, 146, 148

88- 189

of,

152

" Fidel," >. "fiddle,"

Carman, 209

of

system

Gaelic language in Aquitaine, 28

and

Picts, il, 12

physical type, xiv., 13, 21

INDEX.

2l6
Gavelkind, 134

136-139
Germaniis of Auxene in Wales, 40,

Geilfine,

Kenneth Mac Alpine, 45-47

41

and Patrick's mission, 108

Gods and goddesses, Irish, 31,

Kimbay Mac Fiontann, 30

98,

99

Kindred, Solidarity

Gossipred, 171

Greek

in Irish monasteries, 56

Guilds, Origin

of,

168

149

153

Gwyddel and Gwyddel

of,

group of, 154

Foster, and nationality, 98,

Artificial

Idea of foster, and religion

Ffichti, 10

of nature, 101-103

King, Election of, 141, 155, 156

High, of Erin, 31, 32, 156
Limited privileges of, 142,
,

143. 151

Hallelujah Victory, 40

Kremmilnster, Chalice

Harmony, Limited knowledge

of,

182

of, in

Ireland, 203
Harp, Probable origin of modern,

208, 209

Historian, Duties of Irish, xi., 81,

160

Land, Tribal tenure of, 133, 134

English law applied to Irish,
,

History, Materials of Irish, x., etc.

Honour-price of king and

aires,

136, 148

142

Fixity of family

Houses of ancient

Irish, 190, 191

how

tenure

Law

Private ownership

of succession in, 134

in,

135
genuine,

Landlordism,

Law, Criminal.

lona, 44, 47

Illuminated

MSS., Dates

Illumination, Irish art

of,

of

no

Laoghaire,

xiii.

Idols, 104

Origin

146-148

Iberian stock, 13, 19, 20

Ideals, Irish, of heroism,

of,

secured, 139, 140

of,

1S4

iS

Sec Torts

Civil, 162, 163

Common,

common

Learning, Ireland mission

abroad, 185

inherit-

ance in Britain and Ireland, 162

home

of,

in dark ages, 61, 65

,

Mission

homes

of,

centres

become

119, 120

Legislatures, Source of, 133, 163

Judges.

SceY>x^\\ox\.

Judicial system.

Jury,

Germs

See Airecht

of trial by, 162

Irish.

Libraries

See

Tocomrach
MSS.,

containing Irish

XV., xvi., 185

INDEX.
Normans and

Lindisfarne, 48
Literature,

iiy

when

written, xv.

the four nations, 49

and Irish development, 177178, 199-200

M
Mac

Ere, 97

Ogams, Stone,

Magistrates, 80, 155, 159

Manuscripts.

in south-west, 193

Oratories, 196

Malachy O'Morgair, 130

See Libraries

Mathluagh, 164, 167

Metal-work in Petrie Museum, 179

how

dated, 181

Paganism,

Irish, 90
gods as Tuatha or Sidhe, 99-

Milesians from the South, 27, 193

,

Four families

of,

Physical type

of, 21,

31

102

23

fairy fosterage,

Missions, Irish, to Picts, 44

,
to English, 48
,

to

Germany, 63

to

Northern Isles, 55
Western Europe, 55, 61,

to

modern form,

103

pagan

four great

homage

to ancestral dead, 93,

homage

to national heroes,

sun and

fire

festivals, 91,

92
97

etc.

Mithal Flalha, 164

Tuatha, 164

9S

worship, 95

two great religious

ideas,

Monasteries, Irish, abroad, 44, 47,

96

48,62
,

at

home.

See Schools

Music, Irish, 201

Cambrensis on, 203

Scotch and Irish, 208
Welsh and Irish, 208, 210
Musical scales, 205-207
,

Races, Tradition of three Celtic, in

Ireland, 16

Celtic, fair, 19

Mac

Firbis's three types, 23

mixed types, 5, 20
two modern types contrasted,

21

Rath, 190

Naas, 112

Red Branch

National Irish assembly, 69

Rent, Origin

unity, bardic, 77
of the children of,

Nemidh, Story
25

Niall of the Nine Hostages, 35, 39

"

fair

of Emania, 73
of, 143

rent "

and " rack rent "

distinguished in laws, 148

,

Judicial, 144

Round

towers, 181, 195-196

INDEX.

2l8

Sizars, Ancient, 174

Skene on

Picts, 12

Spain, Migrations from, to Britisli

Sahaid Cuirimtigi, 167

Saints, Irish: Finnian of Clonard,

Isles, 7

Stock, Irish custom of taking, 143,

144
Strangers absorbed into tribe, 149,

42, 119
Brigit,

86

Columba, 45, 47, 120

Columbanus, 54, 61, 124, etc.
Cummian of Durrow, 118

Finnian of Moville, 121

150

Gallus, 62, 123

Taillte,

Kilian, 63

Monastic,

Clonard, 42,

19,

in

Ireland

Tara, the capital, 3

brooch, 179

120

City

Decline

of,

191

Armagh Lismore, 59

Bangor, 57, 124

Taxation (power of purse), 166

British students in these, 59,

Tenants, Saer and daer stock, 144,

of, 71,

155

145

Clonmacmoise, Mayo, Clon-

fert,
,

Glasnevin,

Cormac Mac

46- I 48

Art's three, of

Torts,

of,

with

Ireland, 43, etc.

of,

develops,

Mor on

Sencleith, 146

of,

Earliest, in existence, 183

stroyed by Danes, 180, 181

Silures, 3, 13,

40

Refinements of

Irish,

162

Classes outside, 145, etc.

connection with Caledonians,

20

Sidhe, 17
the, 99,

of, 160, etc.

Chief Baron Gilbert on, 161

190

early examples probably de-

worshipped

Law

149

167, 190

Tuatha De Danann, 16
and cemetery on the Boyne,

Religious, 114, 115

Irish

Irish,

Tribesmen, common, 143, 148

138

Shrines, 179

145,

152
Tribe and land, 133

fosterage, 172

Sept, Formation

144,

Tribalism and feudalism, 145, 150-

46

Sculpture, 186

Senchus

Modern

Secular, instituted, 122

Kingdom

of lord and,

Tocomrach, 166,

Moville, 124

Scotland, Early connection

-,

Law

148

Manorial, of various grades,

Lough Erne, 120

Law, Literature, War, 79

Hedge, 175

65

98

Tanistry, 140, 14

Saul, 109, 113

Schools,

100

connection with North, 17, 19

Double character of, 17, 99

Tumuli,

4,

189

INDEX.

219

Welsh music, 208, 210

Eisteddfod, 170,210

Gorsedd, 84

Ugrian races, 5,18

Ulster, Early military organization

in, 30,

73

Usnagh, Synod

of,

130

and scholars, 42
whitby. Council at, 48
Witness and bail of kings and
s^j^ts

aires,

142
of lords for fuidir tenant, 148
of tenants, 145

Women
\'iele

(modern

violin),

209

W
Wales and Ireland,

in battle, 72, 85, 86, 122

German, 85
Laws affecting marriage

Laws

of,

87
35, 210,^211

88

affecting property of,

Law-writer's ideal

Learned

Irish,

of,

90

86

THE END.

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.

PAGAX IRELAND AT HOME.

there were four,

the

man

we count

the several varieties of

The ancient
modern appliances of legal

of law as constituting one class.

Irishman had
advice

if

all

the

when he went

to law, besides judges of several

grades, from the ollamh or chief judge attached to

the king's court

down

to the

common

judges in the

nor was Irish society quite without

more kinds than one. He had his
attorney, moreover, as also had the Welsh, who called
him the " guider," and the Irish barrister was called
" the burnisher," who brightened up his client's case.
These varieties may however have been of later
inferior courts

magistrates of

development than the third century.

is

But the Brehon

probably as old as Miledh himself, or older.

The literary class had two branches the poet

who represented more particularly the ancient bard,
and the historian whose was the practical duty of
acting as a book of reference on

and of

territorial rights as

all

points of genealogy

constituted

by

contract.

In the inter-territorial courts, for example, the historian sat on the judicial bench.

indeed,

He,

like the brehon,

was a professional person with

definite duties

attached to the court, and had not the wide-spreading

influence of his wandering poetic brother.

For the poets wandered a good

deal.

They knew

every inch of Irish ground, and attached

stories to definite localities with the

Every event

in

all

their

utmost precision.

bardic literature happens in a real

space, and thus the bards have covered the whole of

CELTIC IRELAND.

82

the land with a living mantle of Irish romance.*

bard

tells his tale, as

the place of

it

The

the general plans his battle, with

The wander-

visibly before his mind.

ings of the poets had other uses

it

brought them into

communication with one another, and, as they always

had an historical intention in their story-telling, this
contact with other minds was clearly important.

them the national and

great consequence.

To

provincial parliaments were of

On

such occasions they met one

another, and they also got

good audiences

for their

recitations.

When

a poet travelled he took a band of pupils

with him, teaching them whenever he found

venient,

sometimes indoors, but oftener

it

con-

in the

open

His rank as poet entitled him to be received

air.

with a certain number of his

company at a respectable
house, and when his company was too numerous the
neighbours were glad to entertain the excess. The
chief poet was generally accompanied

various degrees,

who had

by

assistants of

not yet attained the highest

rank.

In this aspect the poet appears as a schoolmaster,

occasionally travelling with his pupils from place to

But he had a well-understood duty to the

community which supported him and showed him

place.

honour.

He and

his fellows entertained their hosts

with music, song and recitation.

In wealthy houses

* See Standish O'Grady's " Early Bardic Literature, Ireland," p. 3.

ct seq.

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

83

it

was the custom

reward

for

bard some handsome

to give the

on such occasions,

special services

his

named

generally a reward which he

himself.

It is

indeed, that the poets were sometimes avari-

said,

and once or

cious,

numerous and
against them.

when they became very

twice,

popular

the

exacting,

Thus we hear

Avarice," and once a bard went so

tion, the

rose

that the vessel in which

they collected their fees was called the

from the high king of Erin,

feeling

reward

in

"

Poets' Pot of

far as to

demand

for his recita-

golden brooch of Tara, an event which might

have led to the suppression of the bardic order had

not been for the intervention of St. Columba.
of

avarice

because

might

be,

the

poet was
to

refusal

by the

the

satisfy

more objectionable
it
was followed, or

poet's satire.

Irishman greatly dreaded

tion that the terrible satire

This the sensitive

seemed

it

must bring

to his imaginaevil to

pass by

the mere effective utterance of the idea of such

The

it

The

evil.

poet's satire was, indeed, a sort of literary curse

into

which the poet threw

and

his

dramatic

all

force of language

his

instinct.

Like other academic

classes, the

bards of Ireland

had, no doubt, their faults, begotten of privilege and

the pride of intellect
all

probability, the

ever had.
the

Irish

taste,

and

Under

but they were, nevertheless,

truest

benefactors that Ireland

their influence

people that vivid

literary capacity

in

was developed

in

imagination, dramatic

which distinguishes the

CELTIC IRELAND.

84

peasant of our

Irish

tendency to which the

own

time,

Irish

bards are themselves the

and of the inborn

result.

Side by

side,

and often

identified with the literary

classes,

was the Druid,

" the

stories

often call him.

He

man
it

aimed

Nature

at ruling

him, for his object

his logical

methods not

men

in all ages.

for the service of

men, and

he experimented on Nature with his magical

The

difference

nor did

power

the

is

people

tentedly with his

arts.

that he did not criticise his ideas,

work good

to

the

the would-be man

quite different from those of scientific

He

" as

was who aspired to

know and have power over Nature,

of science, as we might truly call
was exactly the same, and

of science

"

who
or

him for his

So he conjured con-

reverenced
ill.

and

druidical wand,"

mists" or "druidical storms

not, the explanation of

"

arose

another druid

"

druidical

or, if

they did

in opposition,

or the wrath of the

Tuatha De Danann, the gods of

these

were manifestly satisfactory ex-

the country
planations.
It is

probable that admission to the professions

was, from an early period, consequent on the attain-

ment

of a recognized quantity of learning and per-

haps some original composition

but whether the

graduation of a candidate was dependent on election

by

several poets, or

only,

we

was by the decree of his teacher

Probably both methods had

do not know.

their time.

It is certain,

however, that for important

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

'

such as that of chief poet

posts,

85

in a king's court,

candidates displayed their knowledge and

competitive contest, and

The

degree and the bardic competition

though somewhat

faintly,

most successful was

the

chosen by general consent.

the

skill in

among

idea of a bardic
is

still

preserved,

other good old Celtic

by the Welsh Gorsedd.

is no question more important in
the general inquiry as to the social ideas and conideas,

Perhaps there

dition of a people than that of the position assigned

to

The

women.

stories are

useful as the histories

on

this point

and the laws

quite as

and the

stories,

as well as the laws, reveal a state of the national

mind and manners worthy in

courteous modern Irish peasant's

men have

ancestors.

nothing else to be proiid

proud of

least be

this,

that in

respect of the

this

all

of,

If Irish-

they might at

times Irish

women

have been treated with the chivalry, not merely of

tenderness, but of genuine respect

may,

too,

and

Irish

to take a part in their brothers' work,

comrades to

their husbands.

of the surprise experienced

Most

tribes

that which

and be

by the Romans on observ-

women

of the

were held, a surprise only equalled by

moved them on

finding that these

were accustomed occasionally to take the

battle

real

of us have heard

ing the position of respect in which the

German

women

be proud that they have always been ready

with the

men.

Well,

the

Celtic

women
field

of

tribes

of

Ireland exhibit the same two phenomena from the

CELTIC IRELAND

86

The

earliest times.

daughter

wife

treated with respect, even though the

may

be very capricious about marrying

And, on the other hand, while

the suitable prince.

there

woman, be she

of the

zvill

is

or daughter,

championesses

bardic

are

the

like

Macha, and that queen of the ragged

foster mother-in-arms to the

while there are powerful

Meave who

isle

Ultonian

who was

champion Cuculain, and

queens

like

the celebrated

led the three provinces of Ireland against

Ulster about nineteen hundred years ago, the fact

women

that Irish

of war

plain,

is

The

The

women

"

"

sphere

than there

is

doubtless

that they

is

high regard.

In ancient

own

in their

special sphere then

now, and the general subordination of

ing the activity of

traditional

in

was more of that

individual to family

and

exceptions,

however, manifestly

stayed for the most part

there

were,

point to be noticed

were permitted and held

Ireland

them from

late as the year 697,

Columban monk, Adamnan.

women

warlike

time

fight in

since a law restraining

the influence of the

exceptional.

were not slow to

was passed as

military service

by

later

life is

women.

in

Nevertheless, there were

other fields

we should
list

specially effective in limit-

of the

think, than

more
that

suitable,

of war

Tuatha De Danann

as

the

historians

names of two women and four men and

the names of women occur not unseldom in the lists
contains the

of judges and expounders of the law.

of

"

learned

women

"

as

druidesses.

We

also hear

All

these

/'AGAN

women

eminent pagan
brated

to

8/

are precursors of the

cele-

the contemporary of St. Patrick,

St. Brigit,

who seems

IRELAND AT HOME.

have been a decidedly strong-minded

person, abbess of the Kildare monastery, with a bishop

under

and

her,

in perfectly

comrades of the other sex

the Church.*

These

good-fellowship with her

in the

instances,

prove more, but they prove

work of learning and

and others, do not

this, first

a clear tradition, to which custom

women

favour of allowing
" sphere," if

to

that there was

corresponded, in

come out of

their

they wanted to come, and secondly that

Irishmen were not slow to award them the honours

they might reap

in

other

fields.

It is also certain that

they held by no means a

servile place in that sphere.

This

is

proved by the

marriage laws on the one hand, and the woman's

property laws on the other.

At
if

woman's marriage her

father, or

her family

he were dead, conferred on her a portion

case of one daughter usually a third

personal

for her ozvn

to use land,
tribal

in

the

of her father's

also gave her a

and these constituted her separate property

bridal gift,

and

Her husband

property.

use.
it is

As

regards inheritance of the right

manifest that the Irish tribal custom

ownership of land would lead

in the first

instance to the principle of inheritance in the male

line only.
*

Indeed,

if

woman

married into another

For references see O'Curry's " Manuscript Materials of Ancient

Irish History," p. 339, et seq.

CELTIC IRELAND.

88
tribe, it

was evidently impossible that she should ever

in tribal

own

times be allowed to share

Nevertheless,

tribe.

we

find

it

in

the land of her

stated, as a reform

of older law, that a father might give one third of his

lands to his daughter

if

there were no sons

ultimately daughters could inherit

daughters to inherit

by a
woman,
Ulster

said to have been completely

legal decision in the case of a certain

established

the Judgments,

is

Brigit

Ambui, known

who pleaded

of "

women's

Nessa, at the beginning of the Christian

it,

law could only have been quite

women

not married out of the

would naturally apply

The marriage
which proves
origin.

at

What

the careful

woman

For no

less

tribe,

in

though,

later,

it

are

is,

in the first place,

which the interests and dignity

protected by the divorce

in

it

laws.

was lawful

from her husband, taking with her

certain cases part, of her marriage

portion and her husband's bridal

compensation

gift,

for the injury

obtaining, more-

done

her.

It will

mention the three minor of these causes (i)

a blemish ever so slight were inflicted on her, by

suffice to
if

for

once that they are not of Christian

concerns us here

for her to separate

over,

purity,

all.

than seven different causes

the whole, or

its

effective

laws show a singular ease of divorce,

manner

of the

to

It

era.

however, that

so long as tribal ownership prevailed in

this

Mac

king Conor

would seem probable on the face of

of

Brigit

as

the cause

rights " in the time of the Ulster

and

This right of

all.

fAGAN IRELAND A 7 HOME.

beating or otherwise maltreating her

89
she were

(2) if

rendered the subject of ridicule by her husband

full

(3) if

and other social matters were

Every noble woman," says the law

rights in domestic
"

not given her.

tract,

commenting on

this last condition, "

to the exercise of her free will."

women

entitled

is

Let us hope the

of Erin did not abuse their privileges.

Another part of the marriage law

more

still

is

This deals with the respective rights of

suggestive.

the two contracting parties in three carefully dis-

tinguished cases:

the marriage of equal rank,

(i)

when the wealth and

social

persons are such as

make them

(2) the

to

the support of the household

is

when

similar marriage,

In the

case,

first

parties are plainly laid

is

equally

more than

party

it

is

the wealth belongs

equal

the

down.

forfeited "

And

his to her.

of equality,
either

"

the

to the wife.

two

wealth to him no

to carry out this principle

"

made by

a contract

not a lawful contract without the

is

and

(3)

each gives the

except

in

case of contracts

tending equally to the welfare of both."

told

of the

rights

What

her

decreed that

consent of the other,

are

two

equals

social

marriage of unequal rank, when the husband'?

property

other

of the

position

quote

Brehonic view on

this

the subject

oppose the evidence of the

of headship that

is

as

an

" The

man ...

Again, we

index

of

the

woman may

for

it

is

law

between them, and though the

law cedes the headship to the man, because of his

CELTIC IRELAND.

90

manhood and

nobility,

he has not the greater power

woman on

of proof upon the

only a contract that

is

that account, for

and

system

privilege

and

The

two

proportionate

rights

member has

wealthier

supported by the woman's wealth

same footing

as the

woman

their

to

the greater

and the law takes no account of

parties

consistent with the whole social

is

status

property.

man

this

is

between them."

In the marriage of unequal rank, the

have

it

The

sex.
is

on the

supported by the man's.

After describing minutely the regulations for the

latter case, the writer of the tract begins his

treatment

of the former by the simple statement that in this

man

case " the

ivoman

goes in the place of the zvonian

m the place of the man!'

Nor does

appear that

it

equalization before the law

and

this

was

somewhat prosaic

at all destructive of

man

romantic tendency to idealize the typical

the

and

typical

woman

as

different,

however

similar.

Even the law-writer betrays himself quaintly

derivation he gives of the Irish words, for
" ben,"

and

tells us,

"

for

man

" fer."

Thus they

from the kindliness of a

dignity of a man, and

to

the

in the

women

are called, he

woman and

the

reach these qualities they

exist!'

The law

tract

from which

quotations are taken was

Christian times
* See

"

Law

of Social

but

this

and the other

undoubtedly written

in

have dealt with the subject

Connexions"

in

" Brelion Laws,"

vol.

ii.

p.

391.

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

in

this place

because

it

is

evident from the whole

tenor of early Irish history, and the internal evidence

of the legal definition of rights here considered, that

And,

the ideas reflected are those of Irish paganism.

indeed,
to

it

make

country

takes

little

knowledge of European history

manifest that the early Christianity of each

assumed,

with

modifications,

the

character of the paganism which preceded

ethical

it.

Having now some general conception of the main

and instincts of pagan Ireland, no inquiry
can be more interesting than one into the religious
social ideas

ideas lying behind them.

are beset

with

treatment of

it

Few

subjects of inquiry

An

greater difficulties.

would require

adequate

careful study, not only

of Irish bardic literature and the legendary lore

lingering

among

still

the Irish peasantry, with a view to

discovery of the pagan customs as well as pagan

ideas which they imply, but also a similar study of

such similar materials as exist

in

most cases

much

for other nations.

Irish non-Christian tradition

To

more

scantily

understand the

and worship, we should

understand the corresponding tradition and worship/

and

their history, for all the peoples that issued

the same

Aryan home, and grew

to express

from

them-

by diverse modifications of their original habits

feelings ideas and languages, in accordance with the
selves

diversity of the circumstances in which they lived

and grew.
Here, however,

we must be content with

much

CELTIC IRELAND.

92

narrower range, and a very incomplete

may

a few facts
tion

be stated showing

Aryan

of Irish with

Yet

idea.

connec-

the

and

generally,

tradition

indicating also the tenacious hold which the Irish

imagination has of

The memory

past.

its

great pagan festivals lingers on

races have trod, but

The

Ireland.

Day, when

first

it

is

all

Aryan

most vivid and clear

the feast of Beltine, on

is

ancient times the sacred

in

of four

that

soil

was

fire

in

May
at

lit

Tara, while no light was allowed to be visible that

night on

all

the surrounding plain

those times a lighted brand from that

kindle

all

places,

if

the
the

around, so even

fires

fire

goes out

the morning of the

the

/tzVjt^'j

house to kindle
festival

bonfires are

still

still "

lucky

" for

in a peasant's

in

house before

it is

highly esteemed.

on the

Irish hills,

young people

to

The

and

it

jump over

flames or for the cattle to pass between two

fires

practically

of

extinct.

this

comparatively

and

It

be noted,

Midwinter

the

little

should

in

festival

the old literature.

is

the
at

the tradition lingers where the superstition

least,

that

to

remote

on Midsummer Eve, when the

is

lighted

the

was used

now

of May, a lighted sod from

first

second great

and, just as in
fire

is

however,

we read
It is

the

other two that stand out as having national importance,

and there

is

not the faintest indication of any

druidical rites of sacrifice having ever been practised

in

connection with the

times.

The

third

Midsummer

festival

is

fires

during bardic

that of Samhain, or

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

93

November Eve, with which occasion was

associated

the great popular assembly and national council of

the kings at Tara, and which now, as then, connects

with the idea of mirth and sociability though

itself

no longer

There

politics.

is,

however, a superstition

about November Eve, familiar to the Irish peasantry,

may have an

which
torical

important bearing on the his-

Samhain was the time

fact that

associated with the national

Eve

is

Western

originally

November

assembly.

In the

sacred to the spirits of the dead.

Isles

the old superstitions are dying very

hard, and tradition

to be out on

is still

well alive.

It is "

dangerous

November Eve, because it is

when the dead come out

the one

night in the year

graves to dance with the

it

their night, they

is

Now,

if

fairies

do not

on the

dead, which

is

likely,

of their

hills,

and as

be disturbed.

like to

Samhain were always sacred

"

to the ancestral

then the choice of Samhain as

the time of a national assembly

may have been due to

the fact that one primary purpose of the assembly

originally was to

The

pay homage to the sacred dead of Erin.

passionate love of kindred that

the Celtic Irish

makes

it

the dead must have constituted a

in

still

characterizes

homage to
marked feature

probable that

any system of national worship they may have

had, while

it

literature, that

is

certain,

from the evidence of the

they did believe

in the

protecting power of their dead heroes.

existence and

So

it

seems

very possible that the national significance of the

CELTIC IRELAND.

94

Tara was bound up with the recognition of

festival at

the heroic dead

his

own

flourishes

who were

sacred, not merely each to

The
memory

but to the nation.

Midwinter,

of

that

is

tribe,

everywhere

the

fourth festival
of which

still

the festivities of Christmas

in

Day, though the pagan meaning has been wholly

forgotten,
entirely

the

due to

These four

of

vitality
its

the

custom being now

Christian associations.

festivals are

supposed to be connected

with the worship of the sun and moon,* and the

associated with them, in

various practices

Ireland

and elsewhere,

to be significant of ideas relative to

that worship.

We

need not, however, dwell on

subject, because, not only

now

this

have the ideas themselves

vanished from the Irish mind, but apparently

they had vanished

behind.

in bardic

general

indeed, and plenty of

fountains lakes and

and her encircling

a personality
stitious

it

hills,

seas.

poetic,

lovable,

times and

left

reverence for Nature

no trace

we

find,

sense of sacredness in

in

the winds of

Ireland

Every aspect of Nature has

however, rather than

sympathetic,

as

when

the

super-

waves

of Ireland roar in syrnpathy with the shield of her

king which had been forged by fairy smiths beneath

And

the sea.

the only clear idea

a druid's priestly function, which

* This applies,

Midwinter
tells

festivals,

us least.

we can gather
some imagine

of
to

no doubt, more especially to the Midsummer and

and these are the two of which the bardic literature

PAGAN IRELAND AT HOME.

have involved a
rites,

is

that,

ceremonial and

definite

by

his

magical arts

sacrificial

corresponding,

and

doubtless, sometimes to artistic

he

95

scientific

skill

acquired influence over Nature and bent her

Of any such

to his will.

vague

limitation to this

Nature-worship as the Persian sun-and-fire worship

implies,

the

no trace whatever can

popular

peasant's

the

picture

bards,

is

observance

belief

the

in

of

be

the

found

and the

festivals

luckiness

of

except

Indeed,

fire.

of the Irish druid, as painted

by the

altogether inconsistent with the notion that

he should limit his magical activity to dealings with

the sun, that least hopeful of

one element of

fire.

scientific aspiration in

objects, or to the

all

The druid has a

He

him.

to influence the popular mind, but to

or

imagine that he does

true dash of

does not want merely

on

work an

effect

Probably

Nature.

the fact that the druidic profession was open to

students,

and that the country was

bardic intellect, contributed to

aspiration purer than

the druids

become

it

full

directly
;

The

bardic influence, too

to

must

and
have

prevent any limitation

for to the poet there

soul in the glistening of the

moan

this

could have been kept had

druids are frequently bards themselves

Nature-reverence

of the active

make and keep

either a caste or the only learned

class in the country.

contributed

all

dew on

is

as

of

much

the grass, or the

of the sea on the shore, as in the journey of the

sun across the heavens day by day.

CELTIC IRELAND.

Let US note now

this curious fact.

There

is

more

trace of sun-and-fire worship in the peasant's superstition lingering

among

literature of the

remote Irish

that suggests itself

is

us to-day than in the bardic

The explanation
surface.
The druids

past.

on the

and bards of those far-reaching bardic times were

practically heretics with respect to the

more ancient

forms of religious idea, which linger without meaning

memory, or adhere
by the bare persistence of conservative

in the Irish peasant's tenacious

to his habits

At some very

instinct.

early date, Irish

conceptions began to develop along

different

religious
line

quite

from that of the solar myth, giving scope,

on the one hand,

for the bardic imagination

and the

druidic ambition for Nature-control, and, on the other

hand, for the people's moral and religious sentiments,

bound up as these were with the idea of kindred.

For the satisfaction of these something much
more

catholic than sun-worship

was necessary.

objects of possible religious reverence

two great heads

Humanity

the Idea of Nature and

and a moral

ciates these objects

activity

relation

in

religion is one

of reverence
to

the Idea of

which asso-

ivith the idea

them.

All

come under

of human

Now, the most con-

spicuous fact about the Irish intellect

is

its

vivid-

ness of imagination, and the closeness with which that

imagination works in relation to the external nature

familiar to
"

it

racy of the

Irish poetry

soil " in

and

way that

Irish poetic feeling are

is

quite extraordinar}-.

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EDITIONS OF

SHAKSPERE'S WORKS,
THE PARCHMENT LIBRARY EDITION.
THE A VON EDITION.

The Text of

these Editions is

ever a vai-iant reading

is

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THE AVON EDITION,

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SOME PRESS NOTICES.

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Academy.
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Saturday Rruieiv.
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Each volume is handy, is beautifully printed, and
in every way lends itself to the taste of the cultivated student of ShakIt is

prettier edition of Shakspere for the price."

refreshing to

spere. "

Scotsman.

London

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SHAKSPERE'S WORKS.
THE PARCHMENT LIBRARY EDITION.
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SOME PRESS NOTICES.

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is, perhaps, no edition in which the works of Shakspere

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"For elegance of form and beauty of typography, no edition of
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They are in the strictest sense pocket volumes, yet the
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being more appropriate to library editions. The whole will be comprised
in the cream-coloured parchment which gives the name to the series."

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AN INDEX TO THE WORKS OF SHAKSPERE.

Applicable to all editions of Shakspere, and giving reference, by topics,
to notable passages and significant expressions ; brief histories of the
plays ; geographical names and historic incidents ; mention of all
characters and sketches of important ones ; together with explanations
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By
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SHAKSPERE'S WORKS.
SPECIMEN OF TYPE.
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE

My

Salar.

wind, cooling

Act

my

broth,

Would blow me to an ague, when I thought

What harm a wind too great might do at sea.
I

should not see the sandy hour-glass run

But

should think of shallows and of

And

see

my

flats.

wealthy Andrew, dock'd in sand,

Vailing her high-top lower than her ribs

To kiss her burial. Should I go to church

And see the holy edifice of stone,
And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks,
Which touching but my gentle vessel's side,
Would scatter all her spices on the stream,
Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks.
And, in a word, but even now worth this.
And now worth nothing ? Shall I have the thought
To think on this, and shall I lack the thought
That such a thing bechanc'd would make me sad ?
But tell not me I know Antonio
Is sad to think upon his merchandise.
Ant. Believe me, no I thank my fortune for it.
My ventures are not in one bottom trusted,
Nor to one place ; nor is my whole estate
:

Upon

the fortune of this present year

Therefore

my

Salar.

Not

merchandise makes me not sad,

Sala7\ Why, then you are in love.
Ant.
Fie, fie

in love neither ?

Then

let

us say you

are sad,

Because you are not merry ; and 'twere as easy

For you to laugh, and leap, and say you are merry,
Because you are not sad.
Now, by two-headed
Janus,

Nature hath fram'd strange fellows in her time

vSome that will evermore peep through their eyes
:

And
And

laugh like parrots at a bag-piper

other of such vinegar aspect

London: Kkgan

Pavi.,

Tkench &

Co.,

i.

Paternoster Square.

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DA
930

Bryant, Sophie (Willock)

Celtic Irelsmd

B78

PLEASE

CARDS OR

DO NOT REMOVE

SLIPS

UNIVERSITY

FROM

THIS

OF TORONTO

POCKET

LIBRARY