Colgan, when he published his "Trias Thaumaturga" in 1647, admitted
that there was "A constant tradition amongst the inhabitants of that
country that St. Patrick was a native of Armorican Britain, which
tradition several Irishmen endorse," (In Britannia Armorica regione
Gallise natum esse vetus est traditio incolarum istius terrae cui
nonulli suffragantur Hiberni.) (Appendix 5, p. 2.)
Don Philip O'Sullivan, who published "Patriciana Decas" in 1621,
strongly upheld this view. Attempts, however, have more recently been
made to prove that St. Patrick was a native of Scotland, but there
undoubtedly existed a tradition in favour of the belief that St.
Patrick came from Gaul to Ireland, and this view is firmly held by
Keating and Lanigan, two of our ablest Irish historians.
St. Patrick narrates in his "Confession" that he was born in the
suburbs of a town called Bonaven, where there was a Roman encampment,
and that, when a youth in his fifteenth year, he was taken prisoner by
the Irish Scots, "the nation to whom he showed tender forgiveness." The
very year of his capture corresponds with the raid of Niall of the Nine
Hostages into Armorica. As the Irish Scots invaded that country just
when St. Patrick had attained his fifteenth year, and as the Saint
declared that he had been taken prisoner by men of the nation which he
had converted, it is more than probable that he was taken prisoner
during that raid.
As Bononia, or Boulogne-sur-Mer, was called Bonauen by the Gaulish
Celts, and as the "v" and "u" are convertible in Gaelic, the Bonauen of
the Gaulish Celts and the Bonaven of St. Patrick's "Confession" may
well be one and the same place. Indeed, there are arguments which seem
to place their identity beyond reasonable doubt.
St. Fiacc declares that the Apostle of Ireland was born at Nemthur.
Now, Nemtor was the name given by the Gaulish Celts to Caligula's tower
in the suburbs, and close to the City of Bononia, or Boulogne. St.
Fiacc, therefore, gives the name of the district--for the district
about Nemthur was named after the prominent landmark in its midst, and
St. Patrick the name of the town in the suburbs of which he was born.
According to the Celtic legend, Calphurnius was a Roman officer in
charge of the tower, and was slain on the occasion when his son Patrick
was made prisoner by the Irish Scots.
A close examination, however, of the "Confession" and of the old Latin
lives of the Saint, will, it seems to us, securely determine which of
the four theories--the Scotch, the Welsh, the English, or the French--
concerning St. Patrick's native country, carried with it the greatest
amount of probability.