CHAPTER III.

THE MONASTIC CHURCH IN IONA.

[Sidenote: A.D. 563.

St. Columba crosses from Ireland to Britain with twelve

followers.]

‘In those days the Saint, with twelve disciples, his fellow-soldiers,

sailed across to Britain.’[168] Such is the short and simple statement

of Columba’s earliest biographer. Adamnan gives us the additional

information that it was ‘in the second year after the battle of

Culdremhne, that is, in the year 563, and in the forty-second of his

age, that Columba, resolving to seek a foreign country for the love of

Christ, sailed from Scotia, or Ireland, to Britain.’[169] In the same

year, which is again marked by Adamnan as being two years after the

battle of Culdremhne, we find him living in Britain with King Conall,

son of Comgall,[170] the successor of that Gabhran who had met his

defeat and death in the battle with the powerful king of the Picts in

560. The territories occupied by the Scots of Dalriada had in

consequence been much restricted, and for the time probably did not

extend much beyond the peninsula of Kintyre, and perhaps Cowal, for

while his predecessors are termed _Ri Alban_ by the old annalist

Tighernac, Conall bears the title of _Ri Dalriada_ only. His chief seat

appears at this time to have been at a place which the annalist calls

Delgon, or Cindelgend, in Kintyre; and it seems to have been situated on

the west coast of Knapdale.[171] The curious cave chapel at Cove, on

Loch Caolisport, which tradition says was Columba’s first church in

Scotland before he sailed to Iona, is probably connected with his

residence with King Conall.[172]

Columba seems to have followed the mode usual at the time of commencing

a missionary work, by exhibiting the Christian life in its purity and

self-denial, as well as by preaching the Word; and accordingly Bede

tells us that he converted the Pictish nation ‘by example as well as by

the Word.’[173] His first object therefore would be to obtain the grant

of some island suitably situated for his purpose, where he could found

one of those primitive Celtic monasteries in which alone it was at the

time possible to lead the Christian life. The island selected for the

purpose was that small island which is separated from the great island

of Mull by a narrow channel, and which bore the name of _Ia_ or _Hii_,

now called Iona.[174] It has been made a subject of controversy whether

Columba received the donation of this island from Conall, the king of

Dalriada, or from Brude, the king of the Picts; and a rather profitless

discussion has followed upon it. The principal authorities are, on the

one side, the old annalist Tighernac, and on the other, the Venerable

Bede; but although the latter historian preceded the former by at least

three hundred years, it is maintained that Tighernac was likely to be

better informed. In recording the death of King Conall in 574, he adds

that ‘it was he who immolated the island of Ia to Columcille.’[175]

Bede’s account, however, is very circumstantial. He says, on his first

mention of the island of Hii, ‘which island belongs indeed to the realm

of Britain, being separated from it by a sound of no great size; but

was, by the donation of the Picts who inhabit these districts of

Britain, given over to the Scottish monks from whose preaching they had

received the faith of Christ.’[176] These accounts, though involving an

apparent contradiction, are not in reality inconsistent with each other.

Before the settlement of the Irish colonists in Dalriada, the districts

forming it were occupied by a Pictish population. The Scots extended

themselves by degrees, and some time prior to 560 their possessions had

probably reached, at all events, the islands of Mull and of Iona. The

Dalriads were already Christians. Whatever they won for themselves was

also won for the Christian Church; and there is reason to think that

there was an earlier Christian establishment on the island. Still,

because it was situated on the frontiers of the Dalriads and the Picts,

when the former were driven back by Brude, the king of the Picts, in

560, this part of the country must have been lost to them in actual

possession. They would, however, claim it as their right, and hope to

regain it. When Columba came on the avowed mission of endeavouring to

convert these Picts, the Dalriadic king would naturally point to Iona as

a suitable position for his mission, and convey to him such right in it

as he possessed. On the other hand, Bede does not anywhere say that it

was given to him by the Pictish monarch, but that it was a donation from

the Picts who inhabited the districts of Britain from which the island

was separated by a narrow strait. These would naturally form the first

fruits of the saint’s mission, and their donation would be one, not of

the Pictish nation at large, but of the tribe of the land, which we know

was an essential preliminary to the foundation of these monastic

establishments in Ireland. Accordingly the ancient tract called the

_Amra Choluimchilli_ describes Columba as ‘a noble one who sought seven

_tuaths_, and definite for indefinite in it, or five _tuaths_ of Erin

and two _tuaths_ in Alban.’[177]

[Sidenote: Founds a monastery in Iona.]

Columba thus commenced his mission by founding his monastery in the

island of Iona. According to the old Irish Life, it was on Whitsun Eve,

which in that year fell on the 12th of May, that he arrived in the

island, when, we are further told, ‘two bishops who were in the island

came to lead him by the hand out of it; but God now revealed to

Columcille that they were not true bishops, whereupon they left the

island to him, when he told of them their history and their true

adventures.’[178] They were no doubt the remains of that anomalous

church of seven bishops which here, as elsewhere, preceded the monastic

church; and Columba appears to have refused to recognise them as

legitimately entitled to the character of bishops, and the island was

abandoned to him. It was an island well adapted in situation for his

purpose, and must have possessed many attractions to one who, like

Columba, possessed an intense love of nature and of natural objects, had

the soul of a poet, and desired to combine with his active missionary

work a life of purity and self-denial.

[Sidenote: Description of the Island.]

No one who pays merely a flying visit to Iona in an excursion steamer,

with a crowd of tourists, and sees apparently a desolate-looking island

with a few grey ruins, through which he is hurried by the guide in order

that he may return in the steamer the same day, can form any conception

of its hidden beauties,—its retired dells, its long reaches of sand on

shores indented with quiet bays, its little coves between bare and

striking rocks, and the bolder rocky scenery of its north-western and

south-western shores, where it opposes wild barren cliffs and high rocky

islets to the sweep of the Atlantic. Columba could hardly find a spot

better adapted for the foundation of an island monastery which was to

form the centre of a great missionary work, and to exhibit the Christian

life in contrast with the surrounding paganism. He would find himself in

possession of an island lying north-east and south-west, and separated

from the island of Mull by a narrow channel of about a mile broad. Its

length, about three miles and a half, and its breadth, about a mile and

a half. In the centre of the island he would see a plain extending

across it—at its narrowest part—from the eastern to the western sea,

presenting apparently fertile land well adapted for agriculture or

pasture, and, in the middle of it, a small green hillock surmounted by a

circle of stones.[179] North of this plain, on the western shore, he

would see a tract of wilder ground consisting of small grassy patches,

or dells alternating with rocky elevations, culminating in the highest

hill in the island, now called Dunii;[180] and on the northern shore, a

strip of low land extending from the base of the hill to the sea, and

terminating at the north-east end of the island in a stretch of the

purest white sand, which was destined to be afterwards the scene of a

cruel slaughter of the monks by the Danes. South of this plain he would

see a tract of low fertile land, extending along the eastern shore, and

sloping gently towards the sea; and through the centre of it a stream

issuing from some marshy ground which separates the level fields from

the bold barren tract on the west, and extends from the foot of Dunii,

and trickling through a small channel into the sea. On the south of this

stream he would find the plain hounded on the west by a natural bulwark

of rocky elevations, and between it and the sea he would probably find

the ancient cemetery in which the founders of the Dalriadic colony and

their successors, down to his own time, were buried; and farther south,

on the shore, a little harbour, or landing-place, for persons crossing

the channel from Mull. If he ascended Dunii, he would find that Iona

formed the centre of an archipelago of islands. On the north he would

see the lofty island of Rum and the low shores of Canna, and behind them

the distant and striking forms of the Coollin Hills in Skye.[181]

Looking west, the horizon would be bounded on the north-west by the

island range consisting of the two islands of Coll and Tiree, and on the

south-west the distant shores of Isla would be visible. Looking south

over the low land of the Ross of Mull, the hills called the Paps of Jura

would be very conspicuous, while the Garveloch islands, lying between it

and Mull, are hidden by the intervening land. Below him, his eye would

dwell on that part of the level fertile plain which extends from the

foot of Dunii, where it is separated from the more northern plain by a

line of rocky knolls, to the stream which flows from the marshy ground

on the south. Here no object would arrest his gaze on the sloping plain

save two isolated rocky hillocks on its highest level, and a large flat

boulder stone between them and the sea, which must have travelled, in

the glacial period of prehistoric times, across the channel from the

opposite coast of Mull. This part of the plain would appear to him to

present a favourable site for his monastery, while, by forming an

artificial lake out of the marsh from which the stream flowed, he might

increase its volume so as to enable it to turn a small mill, near which

he would place a kiln for drying the grain, and a barn for storing

it.[182] We may well suppose that Columba, when he first surveyed his

newly acquired island and thus looked around him, would form the silent

resolution that here he would place his central monastery, and that he

would not rest till he had planted a Christian church in every island

within sight.

South of the central plain, the whole of the southern part of the island

consists of rocky elevations separating small grassy ravines, and

terminates in the bay called _Port-a-churich_, where tradition places

the arrival of Columba in his curach; and at its south-west corner the

island rises into the very perfection of bold rocky scenery. Here the

rocky heights which bound the central plain on the south-west are termed

_Uchdachan_, or breasts; and on the highest point overlooking the

expanse of the western sea is the cairn called _Cul ri Erin_, which

marks the spot where he is said to have ascended for the purpose of

ascertaining if he could discern from it the distant shores of his

beloved Erin. Among the several poems attributed to Columba, there is

one which so remarkably describes the scene from this spot and the

emotions it was calculated to excite in one of his temperament, that it

is hardly possible to avoid the conclusion that it contains the genuine

expression of his feelings. It bears the title _Columcille fecit_, and

has been thus translated:—

Delightful would it be to me to be in _Uchd Ailiun_

On the pinnacle of a rock,

That I might often see

The face of the ocean;

That I might see its heaving waves

Over the wide ocean,

When they chant music to their Father

Upon the world’s course;

That I might see its level sparkling strand,

It would be no cause of sorrow;

That I might hear the song of the wonderful birds,

Source of happiness;

That I might hear the thunder of the crowding waves

Upon the rocks;

That I might hear the roar by the side of the church

Of the surrounding sea;

That I might see its noble flocks

Over the watery ocean;

That I might see the sea monsters,

The greatest of all wonders;

That I might see its ebb and flood

In their career;

That my mystical name might be, I say,

_Cul ri Erin_ (Back turned to Ireland);

That contrition might come upon my heart

Upon looking at her;

That I might bewail my evils all,

Though it were difficult to compute them;

That I might bless the Lord

Who conserves all,

Heaven with its countless bright orders,

Land, strand, and flood;

That I might search the books all,

That would be good for any soul;

At times kneeling to beloved heaven;

At times at psalm-singing;

At times contemplating the King of Heaven,

Holy the chief;

At times at work without compulsion;

This would be delightful.

At times plucking _duilisc_ from the rocks;

At times at fishing;

At times giving food to the poor;

At times in a _carcair_ (solitary cell).

The best advice in the presence of God

To me has been vouchsafed.

The King, whose servant I am, will not let

Anything deceive me.[183]

In this island, then, of Iona, Columba founded his church, which not

only for a time embraced within its fold the whole of Scotland north of

the Firths of Forth and Clyde, and was for a century and a half the

national church of Scotland, but was destined to give to the Angles of

Northumbria the same form of Christianity for a period of thirty years.

[Sidenote: Character of the Columban Church.]

In estimating the character of the Columban Church, it has hitherto been

too much regarded from a narrow point of view, and its characteristics

examined as if it stood alone—an isolated church founded by Columba and

unconnected with any other. In addition to this, it has been made the

subject of controversy between the Episcopal and Presbyterian churches,

and their historians have regarded it through the medium of their own

ecclesiastical prepossessions, and claimed it as possessing the

essential characteristic of their own church. It must be viewed,

however, as in reality a mission from the Irish Church, and as forming

an integral part of that church, with which it never lost its

connection. We should not therefore expect to find that, in character,

it materially differed from that church, and we must interpret the

indications afforded to us of the peculiarities of the Columban Church,

if we are rightly to estimate their nature, by the known institutions of

the parent Church of Ireland, of which it was an offshoot. We shall find

accordingly that in every respect it resembled the Irish Church of this

period. Like that church, it was essentially a monastic church, and also

like it we find in it neither a territorial episcopacy nor anything like

Presbyterian parity, but the same anomalous position of the episcopal

order. The bishops were under the monastic rule, and as such were, in

respect of jurisdiction, subject to the abbot, even though a presbyter,

as the head of the monastery; but the episcopal orders were fully

recognised as constituting a grade superior to that of the presbyters,

and the functions which, by the general law of the church, were the

exclusive privilege of the episcopate, were not interfered with. Thus

while Bede, on the one hand, tells us that the monastery founded by

Columba in Iona was wont to have always at its head a presbyter-abbot,

to whose jurisdiction the whole province and even the bishops themselves

were by an unusual arrangement subjected,[184] Adamnan, on the other

hand, records two instances of the exercise of episcopal functions, in

which they are plainly recognised as the exclusive privilege of a

superior ecclesiastical grade. Thus we are told that Findchan, a priest

and founder of the monastery of Artchain in Tiree, brought with him from

Ireland, under the clerical habit, a certain Aid the Black, who was of a

royal family and of the race of the Irish Picts, that he might remain in

pilgrimage in his monastery for several years, for Aid had been a very

bloodthirsty man, and had slain even the king of Ireland; and that,

after Aid had spent some time in his retirement, Findchan, having called

in a bishop, had him improperly ordained a priest. ‘The bishop, however,

would not venture to lay his hands on the head of Aid, unless Findchan,

who was attached to Aid in a carnal way, would place his right hand on

his head as a mark of his approval.’ When this ordination became known

to Columba he disapproved of it, not because there was anything

irregular in the intervention of the bishop, but ‘because Findchan had,

contrary to the laws of God and the Church, placed his right hand upon

the head of a son of perdition.’[185] On another occasion, when a

stranger from the province of Munster, ‘who,’ says Adamnan, ‘concealed

through humility the fact that he was a bishop, was invited, on the next

Lord’s day, by Columba to join with him in consecrating the body of

Christ, that as two priests they might break the bread of the Lord

together, Columba, on going to the altar, discovered his rank and thus

addressed him:—“Christ bless thee, brother; do thou break the bread

alone, according to the episcopal rite; for I know now thou art a

bishop. Why hast thou disguised thyself so long, and prevented our

giving thee the honour due to thee?”’[186] We thus see two of the

episcopal functions—viz., that of ordination and that of celebrating the

eucharist with the pontifical rite—as well as the honour due to those

possessing episcopal orders, as fully recognised as was the jurisdiction

of the presbyter-abbot over them. The monastery founded by Columba in

the island was, like many others of the island monasteries, one which

was to consist of one hundred and fifty monks, or persons under the

monastic rule. It is thus described in a stanza quoted in the old Irish

Life:—

Illustrious the soldiers who were in Hii,

Thrice fifty in monastic rule,

With their curachs across the sea;

And for rowing threescore men.

[Sidenote: Site of the original wooden monastery.]

The principal buildings of this earliest monastery were, as Adamnan

clearly indicates, constructed entirely of wood and wattles, and

therefore we cannot expect to find any remains of them to mark the

precise spot on which they stood. The present ruins are the remains of

stone buildings constructed at a much later period; but we should expect

to be able to trace the course of the _vallum_, or rampart, which

bounded the original monastery, and must have been, as is usual, either

an earthen rampart, or one composed of mixed earth and stones, if it was

not a stone _cashel_. We should expect, too, to find some indications of

what formed its cemetery or burial ground. Then the stream which issues

from the Lochan Mor, and is termed the Mill-stream, must have turned the

wheel of a small mill; and near it we should find the remains of the

kiln, which was of course a stone building.[187] On the north side of

the Mill-stream, near its issue from the lake, is an elevated piece of

ground, rectangular in shape, flat on the top, and in part enclosed at

the sides, which does not appear to be artificial, though adapted to

some purpose. Where this abuts on the stream are the remains of a stone

kiln. On its western side, at a little distance from where the stream

issues from the lake, is the commencement of an outer rampart, composed

of mixed earth and stones, which extends to the end of the plateau and

then proceeds north between the lake and the plain, passing the two

isolated rocky knolls on the east side, and terminates in two parallel

straight terraces about one hundred and eighty yards long. These are

termed _Iomaire nan achd ann an breithe_, or ‘the Ridge of the Acts in

judgment,’ and approach within about fifty yards of the rocky knoll

which bounds this plain on the north. Such indications as Adamnan gives

of the site of the monastic buildings would place them on the sloping

ground between this rampart and the channel. He mentions the _vallum_,

or rampart, the _canaba_, or kiln, and the _horreum_, or barn by name;

and, though he does not expressly mention a mill, he shows that there

was one, as he tells us that one of the crosses was placed in a

mill-stone as a pedestal.[188] He speaks of the _monasterium_, or

monastery proper, in terms which show that it contained a refectory of

considerable size, in which was a fireplace and a vessel of water.[189]

He mentions the _hospitium_, or guest-chamber, which was wattled,[190]

and the houses, or cells of the monks, with the _plateola_, or little

court, which they surrounded,[191] and he indicates that these monastic

buildings were constructed of wood.[192] He repeatedly mentions the

church with its _exedra_, or side chamber, and terms it an oratorium,

which shows that it was a _Duirthech_ or oak building.[193] He

frequently alludes to the house, or cell, occupied by Columba himself,

which he says was built of planks and placed on the highest part of the

ground.[194] Although no remains of these buildings exist, we can gather

what their relative position probably was from the buildings of another

early monastery founded by Columba, which appear to have been all

constructed of stone, and have thus left some remains behind them. In

one of the Garveloch islands termed _Eilean na Naomh_, or the Isle of

the Saints, are the remains of some very primitive ecclesiastical

buildings which, as we shall afterwards see, we can identify with those

of the first monastery Columba founded after that of Iona, and which,

fortunately for us, owing to the island being uninhabited, not very

accessible, and little visited, have not disappeared before the

improving hand of man. The remains are grouped together about the middle

of the island, on its south-eastern side. Here there is a small

sheltered _port_ or harbour, and near it a spring of water termed _Tobar

Challum na Chille_, or Columba’s well. Near the shore, south of this, in

a sheltered grassy hollow, are the remains of the cemetery, with traces

of graves of great age; and adjoining it a square enclosure, or small

court, on the east of which are the remains of buildings of a domestic

character. North of this is the church, a roofless building, formed of

slates without mortar, and measuring twenty-five feet by fifteen.

North-east of this is a building resembling the cells appropriated to

the abbots of these primitive monasteries. Farther off, on higher

ground, are the remains of a kiln, and on a slope near the shore are two

beehive cells resembling those used by anchorites.[195] Somewhat of the

same arrangement characterised the early monastic buildings at Iona, so

far as the existing remains and the indications afforded by Adamnan

enable us to fix their site. The small creek now called _Port na

muintir_, or the harbour of the community, considerably to the south of

where the mill-stream enters the sea, is, from its situation opposite a

similar harbour on the coast of Mull, probably the _portus insulæ_, or

landing-place of the island, mentioned by Adamnan. The remains of the

stone kiln fix its site. Columba’s cell was, he tells us, on the highest

ground, and another passage shows that it was near a small hillock

overlooking the monastery.[196] On the east side of the rampart,

however, just where it passes near the isolated rocky knoll called _Cnoc

na bristeadh clach_, is an elevated piece of level ground where the

fragments of a cross were found; and here it must have been, for Adamnan

tells us that Ernan the priest, who was Columba’s uncle, and presided

over the monastery he had founded in the island of Hinba—that is, the

very monastery the remains of which we have been describing—feeling

himself seriously ill, desired to be taken back to Columba, who set out

from his cell to the landing-place to meet him, while Ernan, though

feeble, attempted to walk from the landing-place to meet Columba; and,

when there were only twenty-four paces between them, Ernan suddenly died

before Columba could see his face, and breathed his last as he fell to

the ground; and Adamnan adds, ‘that on the spot where he died a cross

was raised _before the door of the kiln_, and another where Columba

stood.’ It is obvious from this narrative that the kiln was between

Columba’s cell and the landing-place, and the former must have been

nearly as far to the north as the latter was to the south-east of it.

There in his cell, overlooking the monastery, Columba sat and wrote or

read, having one attendant and occasionally two of the brethren standing

at the door and awaiting his orders; and here he slept on the bare

ground with a stone for his pillow. From his cell there appears to have

been a _via_ or road which crossed the mill-stream in front of the kiln,

and led from thence to the harbour or landing-place now called _Port na

muintir_.[197] Then the flat boulder stone fixes the site of the

refectory and the other conventual buildings which formed the monastery

proper. Adamnan indicates that it was at some distance from the eminence

immediately behind Columba’s cell which overlooked it.[198] We learn

from an incident mentioned by Adamnan in connection with Cainnech’s

monastery of Achaboe in Ireland, that it contained a refectory in which

was a table whereon the _eulogia_, or blessed bread, was divided;[199]

and a curious passage in the preface to an old poem attributed to

Columba shows us that the same custom was used at Iona, but that a large

flat stone was used for a table. It is as follows:—‘On a certain day

Columcille was in Hii, and no one was with him except Boithin; and they

had no food except a sieve of oats. Then said Columcille to Boithin,

“Illustrious guests are coming to us to-day, O Boithin;” and he said to

Boithin, “Remain thou here ministering to the guests, whilst I go to the

_Muillinn_, or mill.” He took upon him his burden from off a certain

stone that was in the _Recles_ or monastery; _Blathnat_ was its name,

and it exists still, and it is upon it that division is made in the

_Proinntig_, or refectory. However, the burden was heavy to him; so that

he made this hymn in alphabetical order from that place until he arrived

at the mill.’ Another version of the preface says that ‘the name of that

stone is _Moelblatha_, and he left prosperity on all food which should

be placed upon it.’[200] The refectory, therefore, was at some distance

from the mill, and its site was marked by a stone remarkable enough to

have a special name, to be capable of being used as a table, and to

survive the building which enclosed it. Between this spot and the sea

are the remains of an old burial-ground, marked by two upright pillar

stones, over which a third was once placed, resembling a rude cromleac,

or stone gateway. The _Duirthech_, or oratory, was placed probably on a

higher part of the sloping ground between the conventual buildings and

Columba’s cell. The site thus indicated of the older wooden monastery

places it about a quarter of a mile north of the present ruins, which

are on the south side of the mill-stream and therefore between the kiln

and the shore. Outside of the _vallum_, or rampart, was the _Bocetum_,

or cowhouse, mentioned by Adamnan; and the land on the east side of the

island, south of the mill-stream, appears to have been used for pasture,

while the fertile land forming the western part of the central plain, as

well probably as the level land at the north end of the island, was used

for tillage; and there appear to have been two granaries for storing the

grain—one near the monastery, and the other close to the fields under

tillage.

[Illustration:

Map of

PART OF IONA

shewing site of the

MONASTERIES.

_J. Bartholomew, Edin.^r_

]

[Sidenote: Constitution of the monastery.]

The members of this community were termed brethren. They took a solemn

monastic vow on bended knees in the _oratorium_, and were tonsured from

ear to ear—that is, the fore part of the head was made bare, and the

hair was allowed to grow only on the back part of the head. They were

addressed by Columba as his _familia_ or chosen monks. They consisted of

three classes. Those of advanced years and tried devotedness were called

seniors. Their principal duty was to attend to the religious services of

the church, and to reading and transcribing the Scriptures. Those who

were stronger and fitter for labour were termed the working brothers.

Their stated labour was agriculture in its various branches, and the

tending of the cattle; and probably, in addition to this, the service

within the monastery in the preparation of food and the manufacture of

the various articles required for personal or domestic use. Among these

Adamnan mentions the _pincerna_, or butler, who had charge of the

refectory and its appointments, and the _pistor_, or baker, who was a

Saxon. The third class consisted of the youth who were under

instruction, and were termed _alumni_, or pupils. The dress of the monks

consisted of a white _tunica_, or under garment, over which they wore a

_camilla_, consisting of a body and hood made of wool, and of the

natural colour of the material. When working or travelling their feet

were shod with sandals, which they usually removed when sitting down to

meat. Their food was very simple, consisting of bread sometimes made of

barley, milk, fish, eggs; and in Iona they appear to have also used

seals’ flesh. On Sundays and festivals, and on the arrival of guests,

there was an improvement of diet; and an addition, probably of flesh

meat, as mutton or even beef, was made to the principal meal.

With regard to divine worship, Adamnan does not specially mention a

daily service; but the recitation of the Psalter is so repeatedly

alluded to as an important part of the service, that a part of the day

was probably given to it, from which, however, the working brethren were

exempt. But the principal service was unquestionably the celebration of

the Eucharist, which took place on the _dies dominica_, or Lord’s day,

on the stated festivals of the church, as well as on such particular

occasions as the abbot may have appointed. It is termed by Adamnan ‘the

Sacred Mysteries of the Eucharist,’ or ‘the Mysteries of the Sacred

Oblation.’ The priest, standing before the altar, consecrated the

elements. When several priests were present, one was selected, who might

invite a brother presbyter to break bread with him in token of equality.

When a bishop officiated, he broke the bread alone, in token of his

superior office. The brethren then approached and partook of the

Eucharist. The chief festival in the year was the Paschal solemnity, or

Easter. The practice of making the sign of the cross is repeatedly

mentioned by Adamnan. One very important feature of this monastic system

was the penitential discipline to which the monks were subjected. The

ordinary discipline consisted of fasting on Wednesday and Friday and

during Lent, to which those who practised extreme asceticism added the

strange custom of passing a certain time with the body entirely immersed

in water, and in that uncomfortable condition reciting the whole, or

part, of the Psalter; but when any one, whether lay or cleric, desired

to enter upon a special course of exercises, it was usual to select a

distinguished saint as his _Anmchara_, soul-friend, or spiritual

director, under whose direction it was fulfilled. After the commission

of any offence, the penitent was required to confess his sin before the

community, generally on his knees, and to perform such penance as the

abbot prescribed, when he was either absolved or enjoined a more

lengthened discipline. Adamnan records two instances of this severer

discipline. In one, where the sin was a very great one, Columba imposed

as a penance perpetual exile in tears and lamentations, among the

Britons; and in another, the penitent, who had assumed the clerical

habit, was sentenced to do penance for seven years in the island of

Tiree, and accomplished his penance in the monastery of Maigh Lunge in

that island. In conclusion, all the members of the community, as well as

the affiliated monasteries, were, by their monastic vow, bound to yield

prompt and implicit obedience to the abbot of the mother church, who was

termed holy father and holy senior.[201]

Such is a short view of the character of the monastic system established

by Columba in the island of Iona. It presented the same life of strict

submission to a rule enforcing observance of religious duty, ascetic

practice and self-denial, which characterised the monastic church in

Ireland, and its doctrines in no respect differed from those of that

church. Their doctrinal system was that common to the Western Church

prior to the fifth century, and it is pervaded by the ecclesiastical

language of that early period. The divergence which took place between

the Irish and the Roman Churches related to points of doctrine, or

matters of observance, which emerged in the Western Church after that

date, when all intercourse between it and the Churches of Britain and

Ireland, beyond the bounds of the Roman empire, had been for the time

interrupted; and to the authority of the Church of Rome with regard to

such matters of faith and practice, when they again came into contact,

the Columban Church, in common with the Irish Church, opposed the custom

of their fathers, for which they claimed the sanction of the second

general council, held in the year 381. To use the language of

Columbanus, the Columban Church ‘received nought but the doctrine of the

evangelists and apostles;’ and, as we learn from Adamnan, the foundation

of Columba’s preaching, and his great instrument in the conversion of

the heathen, was the Word of God.[202]

[Sidenote: St. Columba’s labours among the Picts.]

Such then was the form in which, in the monastery founded by him in the

island of Iona, Columba exhibited the Christian life to the surrounding

heathen, and such the spirit in which he proceeded to do battle with the

paganism which confronted him. Directly facing him to the east was the

great pagan nation of the northern Picts, occupying the whole of

Scotland north of the great range of the Mounth, and extending from sea

to sea. Immediately before him, separated from Iona by a narrow channel,

was the large island of Mull, with its low flat promontory stretching

out towards the island; and behind it, on the mainland, extended the

western districts of Ardnamurchan, Morven, and Lochaber, separated from

the main body of the Pictish kingdom by the western part of the range of

Drumalban, that part of it which was situated south of the Mounth

forming the eastern boundary of the Scottish kingdom of Dalriada.

It was probably not long before the influence of the little colony of

Christian monks, and that of its founder, was felt in the neighbouring

districts occupied by a Pictish population. Columba appears to have been

two years on the island before he attempted to approach the powerful

monarch of the Pictish nation, who was the more direct object of his

mission, and in that period he probably won over the greater part of the

people of the districts of Ardnamurchan and Lochaber. In Adamnan’s

narrative he appears three times in the former district, which he

appropriately terms that ‘stony region;’ on one occasion, travelling

through it with two of his monks; on another, baptizing a child

presented to him by its parents, who must have been already converted;

and, on a third, denouncing some Scottish pirates, who had robbed

Columban, whose guest he was then, and who is termed his friend.[203] In

Lochaber he appears twice: once as the guest of a man of humble

condition, who was the owner of five heifers, and whom the Saint

blessed; and, a second time, when he relieves a very poor peasant who

had come to him. These notices seem to indicate that Columba had at an

early period made his way as a missionary among the rural population of

these districts.[204]

[Sidenote: A.D. 565.

Converts King Brude.]

It was in the year 565, two years after he landed in Iona, that he

appears to have crossed the great mountain barrier of Drumalban and made

his way to the court of King Brude,[205] whose royal palace was situated

near the river Ness.[206] Adamnan relates that, when the Saint made his

first journey to King Brude, the king would not open his gates to him.

When Columba observed this, ‘he approached the folding doors with his

companions, and, having first formed upon them the sign of the cross, he

knocked at and laid his hand upon the gate, which instantly flew open of

its own accord, the bolts having been driven back with great force. The

Saint and his companions then passed through the gate thus speedily

opened.’[207] Adamnan does not tell us who his companions were, which is

unusual with him; but we learn from the Life of St. Comgall that they

were, in point of fact, two of the most distinguished saints of the

period,—Comgall of Bangor and Cainnech of Achaboe. They both belonged to

the race of the Irish Picts; and therefore Columba probably thought that

his mission to the king of the Picts of Scotland would be materially

aided by their presence. According to this Life, Comgall made the sign

of the cross upon the gates of the castle, and they immediately fell

broken to the ground. Columba made the sign of the cross on the door of

the royal house, with the same effect. Cainnech, however, made the sign

over the hand of the king, which held a sword with which he intended to

slay them, and the king’s hand was instantly withered; and it so

remained till he believed in God, and, being made faithful to God, his

hand was restored.[208] The old Irish Life of Columba, in narrating the

same occurrence, says simply that ‘the gate of the castle was shut

against him, but the iron locks of the town (_Baile_) opened instantly

through the prayers of Columcille;’ and we may well suppose that the

bolts may have been withdrawn and the anger of the king disarmed through

no greater miracle than the impression created by the imposing presence

of the three ecclesiastics with their attendants. Adamnan implies this

when he says that, ‘when the king learned what had occurred, he and his

councillors were filled with alarm, and immediately setting out from the

palace, advanced to meet, with due respect, the holy man, whom he

addressed in the most conciliatory and respectful language. And ever

after from that day, as long as he lived, the king held this holy and

reverend man in very great honour, as was due.’[209] Although Adamnan

does not specifically say that the king was then converted, we may infer

that it was so, on the authority both of the Life of St. Comgall and of

the Pictish Chronicle, which places the event in the eighth year of King

Brude, and expressly says that he was in that year baptized by St.

Columba.[210] The Irish Life adds an incident which is nowhere else

recorded, that ‘Mailcu, the son of the king, came with his _Drui_ to

contend against Columcille, through paganism; but they perished through

the words of Columcille, both the king’s son and his _Drui_ with him;

and the name of God and Columcille was magnified through it.’[211]

[Sidenote: Character of the paganism of the Scots and Picts.]

The indications which we receive from Adamnan and from other sources, as

to what the character of the paganism of these northern Picts really

was, are extremely slight; but such as they are, we may infer that the

pagan system which Columba had to encounter among the heathen Picts in

no respect differed from that which characterised the pagan tribes of

Ireland, and which St. Patrick found opposed to him when executing his

own Christian mission. The popular belief undoubtedly is that the

so-called Druidical religion preceded Christianity both in Scotland and

in Ireland; but, before examining the grounds of the traditionary belief

as to the leading features of this system, it may be well to ascertain

what we can really learn from the oldest sources as to its real

character. The ancient metrical Life of St. Patrick, ascribed to Fiacc

of Sleibhte, says of him—

He preached threescore years

The Cross of Christ to the _Tuatha_ of Feni.

On the _Tuatha_ of Erin there was darkness.

The _Tuatha_ adored the _Side_.

They believed not the true Godhead

Of the true Trinity.[212]

And who these _Side_ were we learn from the Book of Armagh, which tells

us that on one occasion St. Patrick and his attendants assembled one

morning at a well, or fountain, near Crochan or Cruachan, the ancient

residence of the kings of Connaught, in the county of Roscommon; ‘and

lo! the two daughters of King Laoghaire, Ethne the Fair and Fedelm the

Ruddy, came early to the well to wash, after the manner of women, and

they found near the well a synod of holy bishops with Patrick. And they

knew not whence they were, or in what form, or from what people, or from

what country; but they supposed them to be men of _Sidhe_, or gods of

the earth, or a phantasm. And the virgins said unto them, “Where are ye?

and whence come ye?” And Patrick said unto them, “It were better for you

to confess to our true God, than to inquire concerning our race.” The

first virgin said, “Who is God, and where is God, and of what is God,

and where is his dwelling-place? Has your God sons and daughters, gold

and silver? Is he everliving? Is he beautiful? Did many foster his Son?

Are his daughters dear and beauteous to men of the world? Is He in

heaven or on earth? in the sea? in rivers? in mountainous places? in

valleys? Declare unto us the knowledge of Him! How shall He be seen? How

is He to be loved? How is He to be found? Is it in youth? Is it in old

age He is to be found?”’[213]

Whatever may be the traces of a higher and more advanced mythology among

the Irish, we can see from the questions of the king’s daughter that the

objects of the popular belief were rather the personified powers of

nature. Mysterious beings, who were supposed to dwell in the heavens or

the earth, the sea, the river, the mountain, or the valley, were to be

dreaded and conciliated. These they worshipped and invoked, as well as

the natural objects themselves in which they were supposed to dwell; and

this conception of them runs through the early history of Ireland during

the pagan period. Thus Tuathal Teachmhar, a mythic monarch of Ireland,

is stated in the Book of Conquests to have received as pledges from the

nation ‘sun and moon and every power which is in heaven and in earth,’

that the sovereignty should be for ever allowed in his family;[214] and

King Laogaire, the contemporary of St. Patrick, when he attacked the

people of Leinster in order to exact from them the tribute called the

Borumha, and was defeated and taken captive, was obliged to give as

pledges ‘sun and moon, water and air, day and night, sea and land,’ that

he would not ask the Borumha as long as he lived; but having again

attempted to exact the Boroime, he was killed by the ‘sun and wind and

the other elements by which he had sworn: for no one dared to dishonour

them at that time.’[215] By the Christian Church they were regarded as

demons. Thus in an ancient tract, contained in the _Leabhar na

h-Uidhri_, we are told that ‘the demoniac power was great before the

introduction of the Christian faith; and so great was it, that they,

that is, the demons, used to tempt the people in human bodies, and that

they used to show them secrets and places of happiness, where they

should be immortal; and it was in that way they were believed. And it is

these phantoms that the unlearned people call _Sidhe_ and _Aes

Sidhe_.’[216]

In connection with this belief was the class of people called _Druadh_,

who were supposed to be able to conciliate these gods of the earth, or,

by their influence with them, practise incantations and work spells.

Thus, in the ancient hymn called _Ninine’s_ Prayer, he says of St.

Patrick—

He fought against hard-hearted _Druide_.

He thrust down proud men with the aid of our Lord of fair heavens.

He purified the great offspring of meadow-landed Erin.

We pray to Patrick, chief apostle, who will save us at the judgment from

doom to the malevolence of dark demons.[217]

St. Patrick himself, in the very old hymn attributed to him, prays to be

protected

Against snares of demons,

Against black laws of heathenry,

Against spells of women, smiths, and _Druadh_.

And Fiacc in his poem says, ‘The Druids of Laogaire concealed not from

him the coming of Patrick.’[218] In the Book of Armagh we find, from the

indications there given of the paganism which St. Patrick overthrew,

that it bore the same character. Thus we are told in the Life of St.

Patrick that ‘the gentiles were about celebrating an idolatrous

solemnity accompanied with many incantations and some magical inventions

and other idolatrous superstitions; their kings being collected, also

their satraps with their chief leaders, and the principal among the

people, and _Magi_ and enchanters and soothsayers and doctors, inventors

of all arts and gifts, as being summoned before Laogaire in Temar.’[219]

Again the _Magus_ of King Laogaire challenges St. Patrick ‘to perform

signs’ to show their respective powers. The _Magus_, in presence of them

all, ‘commenced his magical incantations, and brought down snow upon the

whole plain;’ but St. Patrick blesses the plain, when ‘the snow

immediately vanished without rain, clouds, or wind.’ The _Magus_,

‘having invoked the demons, brought down very thick darkness upon the

earth,’ which also St. Patrick dispelled.[220] In Tirechan’s Annotations

we are told that St. Patrick ‘came to the fountain of Findmaige, which

is called Slan, because it was indicated to him that the _Magi_ honoured

this fountain and made donations to it as gifts to God,’ and further,

‘that they worshipped the fountain like a God.’[221] And again we are

told that St. Patrick ‘came to Muada; and behold the _Magi_ of the sons

of Amolngid heard that the Saint came into the country, a very great

crowd of _Magi_ assembled, with the chief _Magus_, named Recrad, who

wished to slay Patrick; and he came to them with nine _Magi_ clad in

white garments, with a magical host.’[222] Besides the objects of

nature—the clouds of heaven, the water of the earth, the trees and

fountains—in which these gods of the earth were supposed to dwell, they

seem also to have been adored in the shape of idols. The word in Fiacc’s

Hymn translated ‘darkness’ is glossed by ‘the worship of idols;’ and the

few notices we have of them indicate that they were usually pillar

stones. Thus, in the Dinnsenchus, Magh-Sleacht is said to have been thus

called ‘because there was the principal idol of Erin, that is, the

_Cromcruach_ and twelve idols of stone around it, and himself of gold;

and he was the God of all the people which possessed Erin till the

coming of Padric;’[223] and in Cormac’s Glossary the word _Indelba_ is

glossed as ‘the names of the altars of these idols, because they were

wont to carve on them the forms of the elements they adored there.’[224]

Among the Picts of Ireland we find indications of the same system. Thus,

in an account of the foundation of Emain Macha, the chief seat of their

kings, which is contained in the Book of Leinster, we are told that

‘three kings that were over Erin in co-sovereignty, who were of the

Ultonian, or Pictish, race, made an arrangement that each man of them

should reign seven years. There were three times seven guarantors

between them: seven _Druid_, seven _Filid_, or poets, seven _Octighern_,

or military leaders—the seven _Druid_ to scorch them by incantations;

the seven poets to satirise and denounce them; the seven _toisechs_ to

wound and burn them, if each man of them did not vacate the sovereignty

at the end of his seven years.’[225]

The legendary accounts of the settlement of the Picts in Scotland are

pervaded by the same pagan system. According to these legends, the

Cruithnigh came from Thrace to Ireland under six brothers, and the king

of Leinster offered them a settlement if they would expel a people

called the _Tuatha Fidhbha_. One of the brothers, ‘Drostan, the _Drui_

of the Cruithnigh, ordered that the milk of seven score white cows

should be spilled when the battle should be fought. This was done, and

the battle was fought by them, viz., Ardleamhnachta in Ibh Ceinnselaigh.

Every one, when wounded, used to lie down in the new milk, and the

poison did not injure any of them.’ They are then driven out to

Scotland, but ‘six of them remained over Breaghmuigh. From them are

every spell, and every charm, and every sreod, and voices of birds, and

every omen.’[226] In the old poem which is quoted in these legends,

Drostan, a thoroughly Pictish name, is called ‘the powerful diviner,’

‘The plundering host of Fea’ are said to have been aided by poison. Then

it is added—

The _Drui_ of the Cruithnech in friendship

Discovered a cure for the wounded,

New milk in which they were washed

In powerful bathing.

The six who remained are thus described:—

There remained of them in Ealga,

With many artificers and warriors;

They would not leave Breaghmach—

Six demon-like _Druadh_—

Necromancy and idolatry, illusion,

In a fair and well-walled house.

Plundering in ships, bright poems,

By them were taught;

The honouring of _sreod_ and omens,

Choice of weather, lucky times,

The watching the voice of birds

They practised without disguise.[227]

In another legend, when Cruithnecan, who had settled in Pictland,

demands wives for his people from the Irish, ‘he swore by heaven and by

earth, and the sun and the moon, by the dew and the elements, by the sea

and the land, that the legal succession among them for ever should be on

the mother’s side.’[228] There is a poem, attributed to Columba, in

which the same account is given of the pagan system opposed to him. He

says—

It is not with the _sreod_ our destiny is,

Nor with the bird on the top of the twig,

Nor with the trunk of a knotty tree,

Nor with a _sordan_ hand in hand.

And again—

I adore not the voice of birds,

Nor the _sreod_, nor a destiny on the earthly world,

Nor a son, nor chance, nor woman;

My _Drui_ is Christ the Son of God.[229]

The indications afforded by Adamnan of the characteristics of the pagan

system which Columba found opposed to him among the northern Picts, are

quite in harmony with these notices. Thus, as we found King Laogaire

with his Druid opposed to Patrick during his mission, so we find, in

Adamnan’s account of Columba’s mission, Broichan the ‘Magus’ occupying

an influential position at the court of King Brude, whose tutor he had

been.[230] We have already seen that in the Book of Armagh the term

‘Magi’ is applied to those who in the Irish documents are termed

_Druadh_; and that the one is the recognised equivalent in Latin for the

other there can be no doubt, for in a tract contained in the Leabhar

Breac, giving an account of the visit of the Magi to the infant Jesus,

the title is, ‘Of the story of the “_Druad_” incipit;’ and in another

tract in the same book, giving an account of the parentage and country

of King Herod, and of the ‘Magi,’ or Wise Men of the East, the account

of the latter begins, ‘It shall now be inquired what was the family of

these _Druad_, and what country they came from.’[231] Adamnan too uses

the name as one well known, when he tells of a robber who dwelt in the

island of Colonsay and was in the habit of crossing to Mull and stealing

the young seals which were bred for the use of the monastery of Iona,

and whom he terms Erc Mocudruidi, or Erc the Druid’s son.[232]

We find too, that their beliefs, so far as Adamnan indicates them,

possessed the same character. Thus he tells us that on one occasion,

when Columba had been tarrying some days in the province of the Picts,

he converted a certain peasant with his whole family, through the

preaching of the Word of Life; and that the husband was, together with

his wife, children and domestics, baptized. A few days afterwards one of

his sons is attacked by a dangerous illness and brought to the point of

death; whereupon the ‘Magi,’ or _Druadh_, began with great bitterness to

upbraid the parents, and to extol their own gods as more powerful than

the God of the Christians, and thus to despise God as though he were

weaker than their gods. The son dies; but Columba comes and raises him

from the dead, and thus confirms the faith of the peasant.[233] These

gods, too, appear as demons dwelling in fountains. Thus we are told that

again, when Columba was staying in the province of the Picts, he heard

that there was a fountain ‘famous among the heathen people, which the

foolish men, having their senses blinded by the devil, worshipped as

God. For those who drank of this fountain, or purposely washed their

hands or feet in it, were allowed by God to be struck by demoniacal art,

and went home either leprous or purblind, or at least suffering from

weakness or other kind of infirmity. By all these things the pagans were

seduced and paid divine honour to the fountain.’ Columba blesses the

fountain in the name of Christ; and, having washed his hands and feet,

he and his companions drank of the water he had blessed. ‘And from that

day,’ adds Adamnan, ‘the demons departed from the fountain,’ and people,

instead of being injured, were cured of many diseases by it.[234] Then

we find Broichan, the ‘Magus,’ or _Drui_, of King Brude, informing

Columba that he will prevent him from making his voyage along Loch Ness;

‘for,’ he says, ‘I can make the winds unfavourable to thy voyage, and

cause a great darkness to envelope thee in its shade.’ The Saint goes to

the lake with a large number of followers, and the ‘Magi’ begin to

exult, seeing that it had become very dark and that the wind was very

violent and contrary. ‘Nor should we wonder,’ says Adamnan, ‘that God

sometimes allows them, with the aid of evil spirits, to raise tempests

and agitate the sea.’ Columba calls on Christ the Lord, and embarks in

his small boat, which at once carries him along against the wind.[235]

These Christian missionaries appear not to have denied the reality of

those powers exercised by the Druids through their earth gods, but to

have attributed them to the agency of evil spirits, and to have believed

that their gods were demons; and this seems to have called forth the

counter-superstition that these old Celtic saints held familiar

intercourse with the angels of God, and in their turn received powerful

aid from them—a belief which these saints themselves perhaps were not

unwilling to recognise. We can see how such a belief would colour mere

natural phenomena, and we have perhaps a very striking instance of it in

an incident narrated by Adamnan. While Columba, he tells us, was living

in Iona, ‘he went to seek in the woods a place more remote from men and

fitting for prayer. And there, when he began to pray, he suddenly

beheld, as he afterwards told a few of the brethren, a very black host

of demons fighting against him with iron darts. These wicked demons

wished, as the Holy Spirit revealed to the saint, to attack his

monastery and with the same spears kill many of the brethren. But he,

singlehanded against innumerable foes of such a nature, fought with the

utmost bravery, having received the armour of the Apostle Paul. And thus

the contest was maintained on both sides during the greater part of the

day; nor could the demons, countless though they were, vanquish him, nor

was he able, by himself, to drive them from his island, until the angels

of God, as the saint afterwards told certain persons, and those few in

number, came to his aid, when the demons in terror gave way.’ On the

same day, when the saint was returning ‘to his monastery, after he had

driven the devils from his island, he spoke these words concerning the

same hostile legions, saying, Those deadly foes who this day, through

the mercy of God and the assistance of his angels, have been put to

flight from this small tract of land, have fled to Tiree; and there, as

savage invaders, they will attack the monasteries of the brethren and

cause pestilential diseases, of which many will be grievously ill and

die.’[236] We can understand how such a persuasion should, to Columba’s

mind, have peopled a dark thunder-cloud with a host of demons preparing

to attack his monastery, and converted its flashes of lightning into

iron darts; and how when as it passed over to Tiree his prayers brought

angels to his assistance—a belief that would be confirmed if, after

seeing the thunder-clouds hang over Tiree, he received the news of a

sudden outbreak of sickness there. We may compare this incident with the

verses attributed to Columba, and believed to have formed the prayer

with which he aided his kinsmen at the great battle of Culdremhne:—

O God! why wilt thou not drive from us

This mist which envelopes our number?

The host which has deprived us of our judgment,

The host which proceeds round the cairn?

He is a son of storm who betrays us.

My _Drui_—he will not refuse me—

Is the son of God and truth with purity.[237]

We thus see that the paganism which characterised the Irish tribes and

the nation of the northern Picts exhibits precisely the same features;

and all the really ancient notices we possess of it are in entire

harmony with each other in describing it as a sort of fetichism, which

peopled all the objects of nature with malignant beings to whose agency

its phenomena were attributed, while a class of persons termed _Magi_

and _Druadh_ exercised great influence among the people from a belief

that they were able through their aid to practise a species of magic or

witchcraft, which might either be used to benefit those who sought their

assistance, or to injure those to whom they were opposed. How unlike

this is in every respect to the popular conception of what is called the

Druidical religion will be at once apparent. The process by which this

monstrous system has been evoked was simply to invest these same

_Druadh_ with all the attributes which Cæsar and the classical writers

give to the Druids of Gaul, and to transfer to those northern regions

all that they tell of Druidism in Gaul; to connect that with the stone

monuments—those silent records of a remote age, and possibly of a

different race, which have outlived all record of their time; and to

assume that the stone circles and cromlechs, which are undoubtedly

sepulchral monuments,[238] represent temples and altars. Add to this

some false etymologies of terms which are supposed to contain the name

of Bel or Baal,[239] and we have at once the popular conception of the

Druidical religion, with its hierarchy of Archdruids, Druids, Vates, and

Eubates, and all its paraphernalia of temples, altars, human sacrifices

and the worship of Baal.[240]

[Sidenote: Proceedings of St. Columba in converting the northern Picts.]

Adamnan, unfortunately, gives us no details of the conversion of the

nation of the northern Picts from the pagan system which prevailed among

them; but so powerful a monarch as their king, Brude mac Maelchon,

having been won over to the Christian faith, the task of spreading the

knowledge of the true religion among the nation at large would be

greatly facilitated, and less reluctance would be shown to follow his

example. Columba, no doubt, proceeded in the usual way by establishing

monasteries, or small Christian colonies, among the Pictish tribes.

Adamnan records but two instances of conversion beyond the districts

which more immediately surrounded Iona; but as we find, in the former,

Columba in friendly intercourse with the families of peasants whom he

had won over to the Christian faith, so, in the latter, the conversions

are of those in the rank of chiefs. In the one case he was travelling

near Loch Ness, and hearing that an old man, who was a heathen, but ‘who

had preserved his natural goodness through all his life even to extreme

old age,’ was at the point of death, he hurried on to the district of

_Airchartan_, or Glen Urquhard, on the north side of the lake, where he

found ‘an aged man called Emchat, who, on hearing the Word of God

preached by the saint, believed and was baptized, and immediately after,

full of joy and safe from evil and accompanied by the angels who came to

meet him, passed to the Lord. His son Virolec also believed and was

baptized with all his house.’[241] In the other instance he was staying

for some days in the Island of Skye, when ‘a boat came into the harbour,

on the prow of which sat an aged man, the chief of the _Geona_ cohort.

Two young men took him out of the boat and laid him at the feet of the

saint. After being instructed in the Word of God, through an

interpreter, the old man believed and was at once baptized by him; and

when the baptism was duly administered, he instantly died on the same

spot, and was buried there by his companions, who raised a heap of

stones over his grave.’[242] In both cases these old men, who were

obviously of the _Flaith_, or chieftain class, seem to have been

prepared to accept the true religion, and probably partially instructed

in its truth, and hastened to be received into the church before death

carried them off.

The position which Columba appears now to have held at the court of King

Brude, and the disappearance of the ‘Magi,’ or _Druadh_, from the

struggle, show the extent to which the Christian Church had been adopted

in the land; for we find him staying among the Picts, and addressing

King Brude in the following terms, in the presence of the ruler of the

Orkneys:—‘Some of our brethren have lately set sail, and are anxious to

discover a desert in the pathless sea. Should they happen, after many

wanderings, to come to the Orcadian islands, do thou carefully instruct

this chief, whose hostages are in thy hand, that no evil befall them

within his dominions. The saint took care to give this direction because

he knew that, after a few months, Cormac would arrive at the

Orkneys.’[243] This is the language of one in a position of influence

and authority. It is unfortunate that Adamnan should tell us so little

of St. Columba’s real history and work among the heathen Picts, and so

much of his miracles, prophetic utterances, and the manifestations of

angels towards him; but his work is rather a panegyric than a biography,

and his object is more to throw light upon his character, and to

demonstrate his superior holiness, than to contribute a detail of

historical events. The early period at which he wrote makes every hint,

however slight, of great value; and we must be thankful for what we have

got.

Columba seems to have been mainly engaged in the work of spreading the

truth among the Pictish tribes for nine years after the conversion of

King Brude, when he appears to have at length also attained the

political object of his mission. In the year 574 died Conall, son of

Comgall, king of Dalriada, in the thirteenth year of his reign.[244] The

territories over which he ruled were, as we have seen, greatly

restricted in extent, as compared with those of the previous rulers, who

were termed kings of Alban; and Saint Berchan says of him—

Thirteen years altogether

Against the hosts of the Cruithnigh ruled the illustrious.

When he died he was not king,

On Thursday in Kintyre.[245]

According to the law of Tanistry, the succession fell to his cousin

Eogan, son of that Gabran who had been defeated and slain by King Brude

in 560; and Columba would have preferred to see him succeed, as he

regarded him with affection; but he probably thought that his brother

Aidan would suit his purpose better. Aidan was connected through his

mother with the Britons of Strathclyde, and had played his part for a

few years in the British wars. Columba announced that he had seen, ‘on a

certain night, in a mental ecstasy, an angel sent to him from heaven,

and holding in his hand a book of glass, containing the appointment of

kings; and having received the book from the hand of the angel, had read

therein the name of Aidan; and on his being reluctant to appoint him

king, the angel had struck the saint with a scourge,’ and added these

words,—‘Know for certain that by God am I sent to thee with the book of

glass, that in accordance with the words thou hast read therein, thou

mayest inaugurate Aidan into the kingdom.’ This was repeated three

times.

[Sidenote: A.D. 574.

St. Columba inaugurates King Aidan and attends the assembly

of Drumceatt.]

There was no gainsaying such a statement by one in Columba’s position.

Aidan came to Iona, and Columba there ordained him king. During the

words of consecration, he prophesied that the throne would remain to his

children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and, laying his hand

upon his head, he consecrated and blessed him.[246] Columba’s object in

inaugurating Aidan with this solemn rite was to place him in the rank of

an independent king, and to induce the Pictish monarch to recognise him

as such over the whole of the Dalriadic territories. In order to secure

the former object, he took advantage of an approaching synod, summoned

to meet at Drumceatt, a mound on the river Roe, in the county of

Londonderry. This great convention was called together by Aedh, son of

Ainmire, king of Ireland, in the year 575,[247] and consisted of all the

petty kings and heads of tribes, and of the principal clergy of Ireland.

Columba attended it, accompanied by King Aidan, and by a retinue who are

thus described by the poet Dallan Forgaill:—

Forty priests was their number,

Twenty bishops, noble, worthy,

For singing psalms, a practice without blame,

Fifty deacons, thirty students.[248]

The assembly was held not far from Columba’s monastery of Derry; and no

doubt this retinue would consist of persons taken from his Irish

monasteries, as well as of those who accompanied him from Iona.

Columba’s object would be to make as imposing an appearance as possible;

and there is no improbability in its having been composed not only of

priests but of bishops.

According to the ancient tract called the _Amra Columcille_, there were

‘three causes for which Columcille came from Alban to Erin at that

time—viz., for the releasing of Scannlan Mor, son of Cendfaelad, king of

Ossory, with whom he went in pledge; and for the staying of the poets in

Erin—for they were in banishment on account of their burdensomeness, for

there used to be thirty in the company of each _ollamh_ or chief poet,

and fifteen in the company of each _anrad_, or poet next in rank; and

for pacification between the men of Erin and Alban about Dalriada.’

Columba then came to the assembly, and ‘all rose up before him for

welcome to him. According to another tradition,[249] however, there rose

not up one before him but Domnall, the king’s son. For the king said

there should not rise up one before him; for he knew that about which he

had come, and his coming was not thought well of by him; for the staying

of the poets or the releasing of Scannlan was not pleasing to him. So

that it is then Columcille blessed this Domnall, because he was reverent

to that extent.’ The burdensomeness of the poets arose from their right

to exact what was called _coinmed_, or refection from the tribes for

themselves and their retinue; and Columba, who, as a poet himself,

sympathised with them, succeeded in having their sentence of banishment

revoked on condition of the retinue, for which _coinmed_ could be

exacted, being reduced to twenty-four for each _ollamh_, and twelve for

each _anrad_. The chief _ollamh_ of Erin at this time was Dallan

Forgaill; and out of gratitude for Columba’s efforts on behalf of the

poets, he composed the poem termed the _Amra_, or praise of Columcille.

The preface from which this account is taken states the superstitious

use that was made of it. ‘Columcille promised to Dallan the gifts and

produce of the earth for this praising; and he took not them, but

heaven, for himself and for every one who would recite it each day, and

would understand it between sense and sound. _Ut quidam dixit_,

‘_Amra Coluim_—every day

Whoever will recite it completely,

Will reach the good bright kingdom,

Which God granted to Dallan.’[250]

Columba did not, however, succeed in obtaining the liberation of

Scannlan Mor. With regard to Dalriada, which was the main object of his

attending the assembly, the question was how far the colony, now that

Aidan had been solemnly inaugurated king, should be made independent of

the mother country. As a colony or subject state, it was liable to the

same burdens as were exacted from all the petty principalities in

Ireland. These consisted in the payment of certain rents and tributes

known as _cain_ and _cobach_, and certain military services which

consisted of what was called _fecht_, or the obligation of joining the

superior king in expeditions, and _sloged_, or ‘hosting,’ that is,

taking part in the general levy of the country for war. This question

was referred to Colman, son of Comgellan, who was of Dalriada, ‘and

Columcille said it is he who should make pacification between the men of

Erin and of Alban; and this is the judgment he gave:—Their _fecht_ and

their _sloged_ with the men of Erin always, for there is _sloged_ with

territories always; their _cain_ and their _cobach_ with the men of

Alban, or their sea gathering only with the men of Alban, but all beyond

that with the men of Erin.’[251] That is, the kingdom of Dalriada in

Scotland was to be freed from all tribute towards the supreme king of

Ireland, but they were to join in expeditions and hostings when called

upon, with the exception of the sea gathering, or maritime expedition.

This made Aidan practically independent, and Dalriada ceased to be a

subject state to Ireland. On his return from the assembly, Columba had

probably little difficulty in obtaining from King Brude a recognition of

Aidan’s character as independent king over the western districts which

were occupied by the Scots of Dalriada.

-----

Footnote 168:

Hiisdem diebus sanctus, cum duodecim commilitonibus discipulis, ad

Britanniam transnavigavit.—Pinkerton, _Vit. Sanctor_, p. 29.

Footnote 169:

Adam. Pref. 2, p. 3 (ed. 1874).

Footnote 170:

Adam. B. i. c. 7.

Footnote 171:

The ancient district of Kintyre was much greater in extent than the

modern district of that name. It included Knapdale, and extended as

far as Loch Gilp on the east and Loch Crinan on the west. John, Lord

of the Isles, dates a charter from Cleandaghallagan, in Knapdale,

which seems to be the same place.

Footnote 172:

_New Stat. Ac._ vol. vii. p. 263.

Footnote 173:

Gentemque illam verbo et exemplo ad fidem Christi convertit.—Bede, _H.

E._, B. iii. c. 4.

Footnote 174:

Dr. Reeves has conclusively shown that the name of Iona has arisen

from a misprint of the word Ioua, the adjective form used by

Adamnan—the root of which was Iou.—See Reeves’s _Adamnan_, p. cxxvii.

The oldest forms of the name are Hii, Ia, and I. But we shall, for

greater convenience, retain the conventional name of Iona. The usual

etymologies of _I thona_, the island of waves, or _I shona_, the

sacred isle, are of course untenable.

Footnote 175:

_Bass Conaill mic Comgaill Ri Dalriada_ xiii anno regni sui qui

oferavit insolam Ia Colaimcille.—_Chron. Picts and Scots_, p. 67.

Footnote 176:

Quæ videlicet insula ad jus quidem Brittaniæ pertinet, non magno ab eo

freto discreta, sed donatione Pictorum, qui illas Brittaniæ plagas

incolunt, jamdudum monachis Scottorum tradita, eo quod illis

prædicantibus fidem Christi perceperint.—Bede, _H. E._, B. iii. c. 3.

Footnote 177:

_Amra Choluim Chilli_, translated by O’Beirne Crowe, p. 65. The

expression ‘definite for indefinite’ is obscure, but means probably a

‘definite title from the tribe.’

Footnote 178:

O’Donnel, who introduces this statement into his Life, supposes they

were Druids in disguise; but there is no warrant for this.

Footnote 179:

This plain is termed by Adamnan Occidentalis Campulus. It is now

called the _Machar_. The hillock is now called _Sithean Mor_, but the

circle of stones has long since disappeared.

Footnote 180:

This tract is termed by Adamnan “Saltus,” or wilds, and is now called

_Sliabh Meanach_.

Footnote 181:

The author may be permitted here to enter his protest against the

cockneyism which, under the inspiration of the guide-books, has

transformed the name of the Coollin hills into the Cuchullin hills,

now universally adopted. The change has taken place within the

author’s recollection, and forty years ago was quite unknown. Martin

terms them in 1702 the Quillins. The name Cuillin has no connection

whatever with Cuchullin.

Footnote 182:

Such was the impression produced upon a party of archæologists who sat

one day in 1876 on the brow of the hill.

The knolls bounding the plain on the north are called _Cnuic na

Bearna_, ‘the knolls of the gap’; the highest of the two isolated

hillocks, _Cnoc na briste clach_, and the other _Cnoc an tuim

dharich_. The lake is called _Lochan Mor_, and the stream _Sruth a

Mhuilinn_, or ‘the mill stream.’

Footnote 183:

The original of this interesting poem is in one of the Irish MSS. in

the Burgundian Library at Brussels. It was transcribed and translated

for the late Dr. Todd by the late Professor O’Curry, and was kindly

given to the author by Dr. Reeves, Bishop of Down and Connor, then

Dean of Armagh, in 1866.

Footnote 184:

Bede, _H. E._, B. iii. c. 4.

Footnote 185:

Adamnan, B. i. c. 29.

Footnote 186:

_Ib._, B. i. c. 35.

Footnote 187:

Pennant, who visited the island in 1772, after describing the existing

ruins and the small rising ground on the west of them called the

Abbot’s Mount, says, ‘Beyond the mount are the ruins of a kiln and a

granary, and near it was the mill. The lake or pool that served it lay

behind.’

Footnote 188:

Adamnan, _Vit. S. Col._, B. i. c. 35; B. iii. c. 24.

Footnote 189:

_Ib._ B. i. c. 18.

Footnote 190:

_Ib._ B. ii. c. 3.

Footnote 191:

_Ib._ B. iii. c. 7.

Footnote 192:

_Ib._ B. ii. c. 46.

Footnote 193:

_Ib._ B. ii. cc. 41-46.

Footnote 194:

Sanctus sedens in tuguriolo tabulis suffulto.—B. i. c. 19. Duo vero

viri, qui eadem hora ejus tugurioli ad januam stabant, quod in

eminentiore loco erat fabricatum.—B. iii. c. 23.

Footnote 195:

See Reeves’s _Adamnan_, Ed. 1874, App. i. p. 318, for a fuller account

of these remains.

Footnote 196:

_Ib._ B. iii. c. 24, p. 97.

Footnote 197:

Reeves’s _Adamnan_, p. 33. The site of this cell must have been close

to where the present house called Clachanach stands, and the remains

of the cross which stood here were found behind the barn.

Footnote 198:

Adamnan, _Vit. S. Col._, B. i. c. 24.

Footnote 199:

Et cum forte post nonam cœpisset horam in refectorio eulogiam

frangere, ocius deserit mensulam, unoque in pæde inherente calceo et

altero pro nimia festinatione relicto festinanter pergit hac cum voce

ad ecclesiam.—_Ib._ B. ii. c. 12.

Footnote 200:

_Lib. Hymn._, part ii. p. 220. Mr. Hennessy suggests that the syllable

_Blath_ here stands for Blad, a portion, fragment, partition,

division, which is also written _Blod_, _Blag_, _Blog_, and by O’Clery

in his glossary _Bladh_, who explains it by _rann no cuid do ni_, a

portion, or share, of a thing. That _Moel_, or _Mael_, when applied to

a stone means a flat-surfaced stone, which exactly answers the

description of the boulder. He thinks _Moelblath_ may be fairly

rendered ‘the flat stone of division.’

Footnote 201:

In the introduction to Dr. Reeves’s _Adamnan_, ed. 1874, will be found

a most elaborate and exhaustive account of the constitution,

discipline, and economy of the community at Iona, to which the reader

is referred for the authorities of the above short sketch. A more

important contribution was never made to the church history of

Scotland than this work, which, for accuracy, critical judgment and

thoroughness, is unsurpassed; and a constant reference to it must be

understood in all that relates to Iona.

Footnote 202:

Adamnan, B. i. c. 27; B. ii. c. 33; B. iii. c. 15.

Footnote 203:

Adamnan, B. i. 8; B. ii. 9, 23.

Footnote 204:

_Ib._ B. ii. cc. 20, 38.

Footnote 205:

This appears to be the best solution of the discrepancy between the

statements of Adamnan and Bede. Adamnan and all the Irish authorities

place the arrival of Saint Columba in Britain in 563, but Bede

distinctly places it in 565. Adamnan states that he lived thirty-four

years in the island, while Bede says that he died at the age of

seventy-seven, having preached in Britain thirty-two years. Bede,

however, connects his mission entirely with the Picts, and places it

in the ninth year of King Brude. The one, therefore, probably dates

from the arrival in Iona, the other from the conversion of Brude.

Footnote 206:

It is usually stated in the local guide-books that Adamnan places King

Brude’s palace ‘ad ostium Nesæ.’ No such expression, however, appears

in Adamnan. The only indication he gives is, that it was near the

river Nesa, but not on it. Dr. Reeves came to the conclusion that it

must be identified with the vitrified fort of Craigphadrick, about two

miles west of the river. It seems, however, unlikely that in the sixth

century the royal palace should have been in a vitrified fort, on the

top of a rocky hill nearly 500 feet high; and it is certainly

inconsistent with the narrative that S. Columba should have had to

ascend such an eminence to reach it. There is, however, about a mile

south-west of Inverness, a gravelly ridge called Torvean. Part of this

ridge is encircled with ditches and ramparts, as if it formed an

ancient hill fort, and at its base, along which the Caledonian Canal

has been carried, a massive silver chain was discovered in the year

1808, consisting of thirty-three circular double links, neatly

channelled round with a prominent astragal, and terminating at either

end in two rings larger than the others, which were about two inches

in diameter, the whole weighing 104 ounces, and extending to 18 inches

in length.—_New Stat. Ac._, vol. xiv. p. 14. Torvean seems to offer a

more natural site if it is not to be sought for on the other side of

the river, which may be inferred from the fact, that the only time

Adamnan notices Columba going by land instead of sailing down Loch

Ness, he went on the north side of the lake, and then he appears to

have crossed the river (Adamnan, B. iii. c. 15; B. ii. c. 58); in

which case it may have been on the eminence east of Inverness, called

the Crown, where tradition places its oldest castle.

Footnote 207:

Adamnan, B. ii. c. 36.

Footnote 208:

_Vit. S. Comgalli_, c. 44. Comgall is said in his life to have visited

Britain in the seventh year after the foundation of the monastery of

Bangor, and, as it was founded in the year 559, this brings us to the

year 565.

Footnote 209:

Adamnan, B. ii. c. 36.

Footnote 210:

In octavo anno regni ejus baptizatus est sancto a Columba.—_Chron.

Picts and Scots_, p. 7.

Footnote 211:

The visit of Columcille to Brude, and this incident which follows, is

contained in the Advocates’ Library MS. only.

Footnote 212:

Whitley Stokes’s _Gaedelica_, 2d edit., p. 131. The word _Tuath_ is

left untranslated, as it means both a territory and a tribe, as well

as the people generally.

Footnote 213:

Dr. Todd’s _Life of Saint Patrick_, p. 451. _Book of Armagh_, in

Betham’s _Antiquarian Researches_, vol. ii. p. xxvii.

Footnote 214:

Petrie, _Hist. Ant. of Tara Hill_, p. 34.

Footnote 215:

_Ib._ p. 169.

Footnote 216:

O’Curry’s _Lectures_, vol. ii. p. 198.

Footnote 217:

Stokes’s _Gaedelica_, p. 133.

Footnote 218:

Stokes’s _Gaedelica_, p. 131.

Footnote 219:

Contigit vero in illo anno idolatriæ sollempnitatem quam gentiles

incantationibus multis et magicis inventionibus aliis idolatriæ

superstitionibus, congregatis etiam regibus, satrapis, ducibus,

principibus, et optimatibus populi insuper, et magis, incantatoribus,

auruspicibus, et omnis artis omnisque doni inventoribus, doctoribus,

ut vocatis ad Loigairum.—Betham, _Ant. Res._, ii. App. p. v.

Footnote 220:

_Ib._ p. viii.

Footnote 221:

_Ib._ p. xxix.

Footnote 222:

Et venit ad illos cum viiii. Magis induti vestibus albis cum hoste

magico.—_Ib._, Ap. p. xxxi.

Footnote 223:

O’Connor, _Script. Hib. Prolegomena_, vol. i. p. xxii.

Footnote 224:

Cormac’s Gloss., _Ir. Ar. Socy._, p. 94. The gloss adds ‘verbi gratia,

figura solis.’ Is it possible that this can refer to the cup-markings

on stones and rocks?

Footnote 225:

O’Curry’s _Lectures on MS. Materials_, App. p. 527.

Footnote 226:

_Chronicle of the Picts and Scots_, p. 31.

Footnote 227:

_Chron. Picts and Scots_, pp. 37, 41, 42.

Footnote 228:

_Ib._, p. 45.

Footnote 229:

_Misc. Irish Arch. Socy._, p. 12. Dr. Todd, in his notes to the Irish

Nennius, p. 144, translates _Sreod_ by ‘sneezing;’ and the last line

he renders ‘nor on the noise of clapping of hands.’—_Life of S. Pat._,

p. 122.

Footnote 230:

Adamnan, B. ii. c. 34.

Footnote 231:

_Leabhar Breac_, Part i. p. 137; Part ii. p. 198. The old Irish word

for Druid is in the singular _Drui_; nom. plural, _Druadh_ or

_Druada_; gen. plural, _Druad_. The modern form is _Draoi_, _Draoite_,

_Draoit_.

Footnote 232:

Adamnan, B. i. c. 33.

Footnote 233:

_Ib._, B. ii. c. 33.

Footnote 234:

Adamnan, B. ii. c. 10.

Footnote 235:

_Ib._, B. ii. c. 35.

Footnote 236:

Adamnan, B. iii. c. 9.

Footnote 237:

Petrie, _Ant. of Tara Hill_, p. 123.

Footnote 238:

This Dr. John Stuart has most conclusively shown in the very able

papers in the appendix to his preface to the _Sculptured Stones of

Scotland_, vol. ii. It is to be regretted that these valuable essays

have not been given to the public in a more accessible shape.

Footnote 239:

Dr. Todd, in a note as to the meaning of the word Beltine, says, ‘This

word is supposed to signify “lucky fire,” or “the fire of the god Bel”

or Baal. The former signification is possible; the Celtic word _Bil_

is good or lucky; _tene_ or _tine_, fire. The other etymology,

although more generally received, is untenable.—Petrie on _Tara_, p.

84. The Irish pagans worshipped the heavenly bodies, hills, pillar

stones, wells, etc. There is no evidence of their having had any

personal gods, or any knowledge of the Phœnician _Baal_. This very

erroneous etymology of the word Beltine is, nevertheless, the source

of all the theories about the Irish Baal-worship, etc.’—_Life of Saint

Patrick_, p. 414.

Footnote 240:

Dr. John Hill Burton was the first to expose the utterly fictitious

basis on which the popular conceptions of the so-called Druidical

religion rests, and he has done it with much ability and acuteness in

an article in the _Edinburgh Review_ for July 1863, and in his

_History of Scotland_, vol. i. chap. iv. But he undoubtedly carries

his scepticism too far when he seems disposed to deny the existence

among the pre-Christian inhabitants of Scotland and Ireland of a class

of persons termed Druids. Here he must find himself face to face with

a body of evidence which it is impossible, with any truth or candour,

to ignore.

Footnote 241:

Adamnan, B. iii. c. 15.

Footnote 242:

_Ib._, B. i. c. 27.

Footnote 243:

Adamnan, B. ii. c. 43.

Footnote 244:

_Chron. Picts and Scots_, p. 67.

Footnote 245:

_Chron. Picts and Scots_, p. 83.

Footnote 246:

This account of Aidan’s consecration is contained in the older Life by

Cummine, and repeated by Adamnan, B. iii. c. 6. In Smith’s _Dictionary

of Christian Antiquities_, the author of the article Coronation

says,—‘Aidan was made king by him on the celebrated Stone of Destiny,

taken afterwards from Iona to Dunstaffnage, and thence to Scone,’ and

refers to Adamnan; but there is not a syllable about the stone in

Adamnan. For its removal from Iona to Dunstaffnage there is no

authority whatever, and that from Dunstaffnage to Scone is part of the

exploded fable originated by Hector Boece. The subject is fully

discussed in the author’s tract on the ‘Coronation Stone.’

Footnote 247:

575 Magna _mordail_, .i. conventio Drommacheta, in qua erant Colum

Cille ocus Mac Ainmireach.—_An. Ult._ It is three times referred to by

Adamnan, B. i. c. 38; B. ii. c. 6. He calls it ‘condictus regum.’

Footnote 248:

These lines are quoted in the old Irish Life as giving the retinue

with which Columba went to Iona; but Dallan Forgaill’s poem relates to

the convention of Drumceatt.

Footnote 249:

_Amra Columcille_ by J. O’Beirne Crowe, pp. 9, 11, 15. The same

account is given in the Advocates’ Library MS. of the old Irish Life,

evidently taken from the _Amra_. The other tradition referred to seems

to be that in Adamnan. See B. i. c. 8, where this incident is

mentioned.

Footnote 250:

_Amra Columcille_, p. 15.

Footnote 251:

_Ib._, p. 13.