Period of Danish Invasion
THE Irish people, having settled down to the Christian form of worship,
were enjoying “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” building
churches and colleges, and sending out a stream of saints and scholars
to the rest of Europe, when, about the end of the eighth century, the
restless Norsemen, universally called “Danes” in Ireland, swept down in
their galleys by thousands on the Irish coasts, and, after many fierce
conflicts, succeeded in establishing colonies at the mouths of many of
the great rivers of the island. There they built fortified towns, from
which they were able to sally forth by sea or land to change their base
of operations and establish new conquests. Dublin at the mouth of the
Liffey, Drogheda at the mouth of the Boyne, Wexford at the mouth of the
Slaney, Waterford at the mouth of the Suir, and Limerick at the estuary
of the Shannon, are all cities founded by the Danes, who were natural
traders and fierce warriors. They did not confine their attentions
exclusively to Ireland, but, about the same period, conquered Saxon
England, ruling completely over it; and they established a strong colony
on the north coast of France, which is called Normandy to this day, and
from which sprang, by a combination of Scandian with Gallic blood, the
greatest race of warriors—the Romans, perhaps, excepted—the world has
known.
The native Irish met their fierce invaders with dauntless courage, but
they had been so long at peace that they were no longer expert in the
use of arms, and the Danes were all-powerful on the seas. Those Norsemen
were pagans, and had no respect for revealed religion, literature, works
of art, architecture, or, in, short, anything except land-grabbing and
plunder. It must be remembered that most of northern Europe, at the
period written of, was in a benighted state, and that Great Britain
itself was barely emerging from the intellectual and spiritual gloom of
the Dark Ages. The Norse invaders, whenever successful in their
enterprises against the Irish chiefs, invariably demolished the churches
and colleges, murdered the priests, monks, and nuns—often, however,
carrying the latter into captivity—and burned many of the priceless
manuscripts, the pride and the glory of the illustrious scholarship of
ancient Ireland. In the middle portion of the ninth century—about
840—when Nial III was Ard-Righ of Ireland, came the fierce Dane
Turgesius, at the head of an immense fleet and army. He at once
proceeded to ravage the exposed portions of the coast, and then forced
his way inland, laying the country under tribute of all kinds as he
advanced. He made prisoners of Irish virgins and married them, by main
force, to his barbarous chiefs. He even occupied the celebrated
monastery of Clonmacnois and its university as a headquarters, converted
the great altar into a throne, and issued his murderous edicts from that
holy spot. Clonmacnois, translated into English, means “the Retreat of
the Sons of the Noble,” and was the Alma Mater of the princes and
nobility of Ireland. This crowning outrage, coupled with insults offered
to Irish ladies, finally aroused the spirit of burning vengeance in the
breasts of the Irish people. Tradition says that thirty handsome young
men, disguised as maidens, attended a feast given at Clonmacnois by
Turgesius and his chiefs. When the barbarians were sated and had fallen
into a drunken stupor, the youths rose upon and slew them all. The body
of Turgesius, with a millstone tied around the neck, was thrown into a
neighboring lake. Then the nation, under the brave Nial III, rose and
drove the Norsemen back to the seacoast, where they rallied. Another
raid on the interior of the island was attempted, but repelled. Sad to
relate, the gallant King Nial, while attempting to save the life of a
retainer who fell into the Callan River, was himself drowned, to the
great grief of all Ireland. The name of the river in which he perished
was changed to the Ownarigh (Ownaree) or King’s River—a designation
which, after the lapse of ages, it still retains.
A period of comparative repose followed. Many of the Danes became
converts to Christian doctrine, and there was, probably, more or less of
intermarriage among the higher classes of the rival races. But the
Norsemen retained much of their old-time ferocity, and, occasionally,
the ancient struggle for supremacy was renewed, with varying success. It
is humiliating for an Irish writer to be obliged to admit that some of
the Irish Christian princes, jealous of the incumbent Ard-Righ, did not
remain faithful to their country, and actually allied themselves with
the Danes, participating in their barbarous acts. This explains why, for
a period of about three hundred years, in spite of repeated Irish
victories, the Norsemen were able to hold for themselves a large portion
of Ireland, especially the districts lying close to the sea, where they
had no difficulty in receiving supplies and reinforcements from Denmark
and Norway. Many of those old Irish princes were, indeed, conscienceless
traitors, but the people, as a whole, never abandoned the national
cause.
The feuds of the Munster chiefs, toward the end of the tenth century,
had the unlooked-for effect of bringing to the front the greatest ruler
and warrior produced by ancient Ireland. Because of a series of
tragedies in which the hero himself bore no blameful part, Brian of
Kinkora, son of Kennedy and brother of Mahon, both of whom had reigned
as kings of Thomond, or North Munster, ascended the throne of that
province. Mahon, progenitor of the southern MacMahons—from whom
descended the late President of the French Republic, Maurice Patrice
MacMahon, Marshal of France and Duke of Magenta—was murdered by Prince
Donovan, a faithless ally. His younger brother, Brian, afterward called
Borumah or “Boru”—literally, “Brian of the Cow Tribute”—fiercely avenged
his assassination on the treacherous Donovan, and on the Danish settlers
of Limerick, who were the confederates of that criminal in his evil
acts. Brian, young, powerful, and destitute of fear, after disposing of
Donovan, killed with his own brave hand Ivor, the Danish prince,
together with his two sons, although these fierce pagans had taken
refuge in the Christian sanctuary on Scattery Island, in the Shannon,
and then swept the remaining conspirators, both Irish and Danes, off the
face of the earth. Prince Murrough, Brian’s heir, then a mere boy, slew
in single combat the villanous chief, Molloy, who, as the base
instrument of Donovan and Ivor, actually killed his uncle, King Mahon.
Afterward, Brian reigned for a brief period, quietly, as King of
Thomond. He had a profound insight and well knew that only a strong,
centralized government could unite all Ireland against the foreigners,
and he designed to be the head of such a government. He had only one
rival in fame and ability on Irish soil—the reigning Ard-Righ, Malachy
II. This monarch had scourged the warrior Northmen in many bloody
campaigns. In one battle he slew two Danish princes, and took from one a
golden collar, and from the other a priceless sword. The poet Moore
commemorates the former exploit in the well-known melody, “Let Erin
Remember the Days of Old.”
Brian of Kinkora, fiery of mood, enterprising, ambitious, and, we fear,
somewhat unscrupulous in pursuit of sovereignty, a born general and
diplomat, as either capacity might suit his purpose, burned to possess
himself of the supreme sceptre. His ambition led, as usual under such
conditions, to acts of aggression on his part, and, finally, to civil
war between Malachy and himself. A terrible struggle raged in Ireland
for twenty years, until, at last, Ard-Righ Malachy was forced to
capitulate, and his rival became High King of Ireland in his place. The
Danes, naturally, took advantage of the civil strife to re-establish
their sway in the island, and gained many advantages over the Irish
troops. Moved by the danger of his country, the noble Malachy allied
himself with Brian, and, together, they marched against the Norsemen and
drove them back to their seacoast forts. But those bold and restless
spirits did not, therefore, cease to war upon Ireland. Again and yet
again they placed new armies in the field, only to be again baffled and
routed by either the skilful Brian or the devoted Malachy.
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