_Parallels._--As Ciaran gave up his monastery to Donnan, in like
manner Munnu surrendered his settlement to the virgin Emer (CS, 495).
The list of equipments delivered by Ciaran to Donnan introduces us
to the "human beast of burden," Mael-Odran, a servile functionary
occasionally met with in Irish literature. A well-known incident of
St. Adamnan introduces him travelling "with his mother on his back"
(see Reeves, _Vita Columbae_, p. 179). As to the bell, it may be worth
noting that my friend Mr. Walter Campbell, formerly of Athlone, has
informed me that an ancient bronze ecclesiastical bell, found on the
lake shore opposite Hare Island, was long preserved, and used as
a domestic bell, in the cottage of a man named Quigley. The owner
believed that it was the bell of St. Ciaran, possibly that mentioned
in VG: this is not impossible, though hardly likely, as a bell of such
antiquity would most probably be of iron, and rendered useless
by corrosion. Unfortunately, the bell in question is no longer
forthcoming: it disappeared one day from Quigley's house, stolen, he
believed, by a tourist who chanced to pass by.
Note Donnan's relationship to Senan as set forth in VG. He was
brother's-son of Senan, but had the same mother as Senan. Clearly this
indicates a _ménage_ such as that indicated by Cæsar as existing among
the wilder tribes of Britain; a polyandry in which the husbands were
father and sons (_De Bello Gallico_, V, xiv). These people were
probably pre-Celtic, and this strengthens the arguments already put
forward for a pre-Celtic origin for the Protagonist of our narrative.
On the subject of the burial of the chieftains of Ui Neill and the
Connachta at Clonmacnois, see Plummer, i, p. cx. Neill is the genitive
of Niall.
_Ard Manntain_ is now unknown.
The chronological indications contained in VG are sufficiently close
to accuracy to show that they have been calculated, though the
computor has made a miscount of a year. The eighth of the calends of
February (25th January) in A.D. 548 was actually a Saturday, but it
was two days before new moon. The same day in A.D. 549 was the tenth
day of the moon, but it fell on a Monday.
Of the companions of Ciaran, Oengus (properly Oenna) succeeded him as
abbot, dying in A.D. 569; Mac Nisse, who was an Ultonian, followed
him, and died 13 June 584 (aliter 587). The others, however, do not
appear to have found a place in the martyrologies. Mo-Beoc is a
different person from the famous Mo-Beog of Loch Derg in Co. Donegal.