"If thou hast the right, O Erin,
to a champion of battle to aid thee
thou hast the head of a hundred
thousand, Declan of Ardmore."
(Martyrology of Oengus).
Five miles or less to the east of Youghal Harbour, on the southern
Irish coast, a short, rocky and rather elevated promontory juts, with a
south-easterly trend, into the ocean. Maps and admiralty charts call it
Ram Head, but the real name is Ceann-a-Rama and popularly it is often
styled Ardmore Head. The material of this inhospitable coast is a hard
metamorphic schist which bids defiance to time and weather. Landwards
the shore curves in clay cliffs to the north-east, leaving, between it
and the iron headland beyond, a shallow exposed bay wherein many a proud
ship has met her doom. Nestling at the north side of the headland and
sheltered by the latter from Atlantic storms stands one of the most
remarkable groups of ancient ecclesiastical remains in Ireland--all that
has survived of St. Declan's holy city of Ardmore. This embraces a
beautiful and perfect round tower, a singularly interesting ruined church
commonly called the cathedral, the ruins of a second church beside a holy
well, a primitive oratory, a couple of ogham inscribed pillar stones,
&c., &c.
No Irish saint perhaps has so strong a local hold as Declan or has left
so abiding a popular memory. Nevertheless his period is one of the great
disputed questions of early Irish history. According to the express
testimony of his Life, corroborated by testimony of the Lives of SS.
Ailbhe and Ciaran, he preceded St. Patrick in the Irish mission and was a
co-temporary of the national apostle. Objection, exception or opposition
to the theory of Declan's early period is based less on any inherent
improbability in the theory itself than on contradictions and
inconsistencies in the Life. Beyond any doubt the Life does actually
contradict itself; it makes Declan a cotemporary of Patrick in the fifth
century and a cotemporary likewise of St. David a century later. In any
attempted solution of the difficulty involved it may be helpful to
remember a special motive likely to animate a tribal histrographer,
scil.:--the family relationship, if we may so call it, of the two saints;
David was bishop of the Deisi colony in Wales as Declan was bishop of
their kinsmen of southern Ireland. It was very probably part of the
writer's purpose to call attention to the links of kindred which bound
the separated Deisi; witness his allusion later to the alleged visit of
Declan to his kinsmen of Bregia. Possibly there were several Declans, as
there were scores of Colmans, Finians, &c., and hence perhaps the
confusion and some of the apparent inconsistencies. There was certainly
a second Declan, a disciple of St. Virgilius, to whom the latter
committed care of a church in Austria where he died towards close of
eighth century. Again we find mention of a St. Declan who was a foster
son of Mogue of Ferns, and so on. It is too much, as Delehaye ("Legendes
Hagiographiques") remarks, to expect the populace to distinguish between
namesakes. Great men are so rare! Is it likely there should have lived
two saints of the same name in the same country!
The latest commentators on the question of St. Declan's period--and they
happen to be amongst the most weighty--argue strongly in favour of the
pre-Patrician mission (Cfr. Prof. Kuno Meyer, "Learning Ireland in the
Fifth Century"). Discussing the way in which letters first reached our
distant island of the west and the causes which led to the proficiency of
sixth-century Ireland in classical learning Zimmer and Meyer contend that
the seeds of that literary culture, which flourished in Ireland of the
sixth century, had been sown therein in the first and second decades of
the preceding century by Gaulish scholars who had fled from their own
country owing to invasion of the latter by Goths and other barbarians.
The fact that these scholars, who were mostly Christians, sought asylum
in Ireland indicates that Christianity had already penetrated thither, or
at any rate that it was known and tolerated there. Dr. Meyer answers the
objection that if so large and so important an invasion of scholars took
place we ought have some reference to the fact in the Irish annals. The
annals, he replies, are of local origin and they rarely refer in their
oldest parts to national events: moreover they are very meagre in their
information about the fifth century. One Irish reference to the Gaulish
scholars is, however, adduced in corroboration; it occurs in that well
known passage in St. Patrick's "Confessio" where the saint cries out
against certain "rhetoricians" in Ireland who were hostile to him and
pagan,--"You rhetoricians who do not know the Lord, hear and search Who
it was that called me up, fool though I be, from the midst of those who
think themselves wise and skilled in the law and mighty orators and
powerful in everything." Who were these "rhetorici" that have made this
passage so difficult for commentators and have caused so various
constructions to be put upon it? It is clear, the professor maintains,
that the reference is to pagan rhetors from Gaul whose arrogant
presumption, founded on their learning, made them regard with disdain the
comparatively illiterate apostle of the Scots. Everyone is familiar with
the classic passage of Tacitus wherein he alludes to the harbours of
Ireland as being more familiar to continental mariners than those of
Britain. We have references moreover to refugee Christians who fled to
Ireland from the persecutions of Diocletian more than a century before
St. Patrick's day; in addition it is abundantly evident that many
Irishmen--Christians like Celestius the lieutenant of Pelagius, and
possibly Pelagius himself, amongst them--had risen to distinction or
notoriety abroad before middle of the fifth century.
Possibly the best way to present the question of Declan's age is to put
in tabulated form the arguments of the pre-Patrician advocates against
the counter contentions of those who claim that Declan's period is later
than Patrick's:--
For the Pre-Patrician Mission.
I.--Positive statement of Life, corroborated by Lives of SS. Ciaran and
Ailbhe.
II.--Patrick's apparent avoidance of the Principality of Decies.
III.--The peculiar Declan cult and the strong local hold which Declan has
maintained.
Against Theory of Early Fifth Century period.
I.--Contradictions, anachronisms, &c., of Life.
II.--Lack of allusion to Declan in the Lives of St. Patrick.
III.--Prosper's testimony to the mission of Palladius as first bishop to
the believing Scots.
IV.--Alleged motives for later invention of Pre-Patrician story.
In this matter and at this hour it is hardly worth appealing to the
authority of Lanigan and the scholars of the past. Much evidence not
available in Lanigan's day is now at the service of scholars. We are to
look rather at the reasoning of Colgan, Ussher, and Lanigan than to the
mere weight of their names.
Referring in order to our tabulated grounds of argument, pro and con, and
taking the pro arguments first, we may (I.) discard as evidence for our
purpose the Life of St. Ibar which is very fragmentary and otherwise a
rather unsatisfactory document. The Lives of Ailbhe, Ciaran, and Declan
are however mutually corroborative and consistent. The Roman visit and
the alleged tutelage under Hilarius are probably embellishments; they
look like inventions to explain something and they may contain more than
a kernel of truth. At any rate they are matters requiring further
investigation and elucidation. In this connection it may be useful to
recall that the Life (Latin) of St. Ciaran has been attributed by Colgan
to Evinus the disciple and panegyrist of St. Patrick.
Patrick's apparent neglect of the Decies (II.) may have no special
significance. At best it is but negative evidence: taken, however, in
connection with (I.) and its consectaria it is suggestive. We can
hardly help speculating why the apostle--passing as it were by its front
door--should have given the go-bye to a region so important as the
Munster Decies. Perhaps he sent preachers into it; perhaps there was no
special necessity for a formal mission, as the faith had already found
entrance. It is a little noteworthy too that we do not find St.
Patrick's name surviving in any ecclesiastical connection with the
Decies, if we except Patrick's Well, near Clonmel, and this Well is
within a mile or so of the territorial frontier. Moreover the southern
portion of the present Tipperary County had been ceded by Aengus to the
Deisi, only just previous to Patrick's advent, and had hardly yet had
sufficient time to become absorbed. The whole story of Declan's alleged
relations with Patrick undoubtedly suggests some irregularity in Declan's
mission--an irregularity which was capable of rectification through
Patrick and which de facto was finally so rectified.
(III.) No one in Eastern Munster requires to be told how strong is the
cult of St. Declan throughout Decies and the adjacent territory. It is
hardly too much to say that the Declan tradition in Waterford and Cork is
a spiritual actuality, extraordinary and unique, even in a land which
till recently paid special popular honour to its local saints. In
traditional popular regard Declan in the Decies has ever stood first,
foremost, and pioneer. Carthage, founder of the tribal see, has held and
holds in the imagination of the people only a secondary place. Declan,
whencesoever or whenever he came, is regarded as the spiritual father to
whom the Deisi owe the gift of faith. How far this tradition and the
implied belief in Declan's priority and independent mission are derived
from circulation of the "Life" throughout Munster in the last few
centuries it is difficult to gauge, but the tradition seems to have
flourished as vigorously in the days of Colgan as it does to-day.
Declan's "pattern" at Ardmore continues to be still the most noted
celebration of its kind in Ireland. A few years ago it was participated
in by as many as fourteen thousand people from all parts of Waterford,
Cork, and Tipperary. The scenes and ceremonies have been so frequently
described that it is not necessary to recount them here--suffice it to
say that the devotional practices and, in fact, the whole celebration is
of a purely popular character receiving no approbation, and but bare
toleration, from church or clergy. Even to the present day Declan's name
is borne as their praenomen by hundreds of Waterford men, and, before
introduction of the modern practice of christening with foolish foreign
names, its use was far more common, as the ancient baptismal registers of
Ardmore, Old Parish, and Clashmore attest. On the other hand Declan's
name is associated with comparatively few places in the Decies. Of these
the best known is Relig Deaglain, a disused graveyard and early church
site on the townland of Drumroe, near Cappoquin. There was also an
ancient church called Killdeglain, near Stradbally.
Against the theory of the pre-Patrician or citra-Patrician mission we
have first the objection, which really has no weight, and which we shall
not stop to discuss, that it is impossible for Christianity at that early
date to have found its way to this distant island, beyond the boundary of
the world. An argument on a different plane is (I.), the undoubtedly
contradictory and inconsistent character of the Life. It is easy however
to exaggerate the importance of this point. Modern critical methods were
undreamed of in the days of our hagiographer, who wrote, moreover, for
edification only in a credulous age. Most of the historical documents of
the period are in a greater or less degree uncritical but that does not
discredit their testimony however much it may confuse their editors. It
can be urged moreover that two mutually incompatible genealogies of the
saint are given. The genealogy given by MacFirbisigh seems in fact to
disagree in almost every possible detail with the genealogy in 23 M. 50
R.I.A. That however is like an argument that Declan never existed. It
really suggests and almost postulates the existence of a second Declan
whose Acts and those of our Declan have become mutually confused.
(II.) Absence of Declan's name from the Acts of Patrick is a negative
argument. It is explicable perhaps by the supposed irregularity of
Declan's preaching. Declan was certainly earlier than Mochuda and yet
there is no reference to him in the Life of the latter saint. Ailbhe
however is referred to in the Tripartite Life of Patrick and the cases of
Ailbhe and Declan are "a pari"; the two saints stand or fall together.
(IV.) Motives for invention of the pre-Patrician myth are alleged,
scil.:--to rebut certain claims to jurisdiction, tribute or visitation
advanced by Armagh in after ages. It is hard to see however how
resistance to the claims in question could be better justified on the
theory of a pre-Patrician Declan, who admittedly acknowledged Patrick's
supremacy, than on the admission of a post-Patrician mission.
That in Declan we have to deal with a very early Christian teacher of the
Decies there can be no doubt. If not anterior to Patrick he must have
been the latter's cotemporary. Declan however had failed to convert the
chieftain of his race and for this--reading between the lines of the
"Life"--we seem to hear Patrick blaming him.
The monuments proper of Declan remaining at Ardmore are (a) his oratory
near the Cathedral and Round Tower in the graveyard, (b) his stone on the
beach, (c) his well on the cliff, and (d) another stone said to have been
found in his tomb and preserved at Ardmore for long ages with great
reveration. The "Life" refers moreover to the saint's pastoral staff and
his bell but these have disappeared for centuries.
The "Oratory" is simply a primitive church of the usual sixth century
type: it stands 13' 4" x 8' 9" in the clear, and has, or had, the usual
high-pitched gables and square-headed west doorway with inclining jambs.
Another characteristic feature of the early oratory is seen in the
curious antae or prolongation of the side walls. Locally the little
building is known as the "beannacan," in allusion, most likely, to its
high gables or the finials which once, no doubt, in Irish fashion,
adorned its roof. Though somewhat later than Declan's time this
primitive building is very intimately connected with the Saint.
Popularly it is supposed to be his grave and within it is a hollow space
scooped out, wherein it is said his ashes once reposed. It is highly
probable that tradition is quite correct as to the saint's grave, over
which the little church was erected in the century following Declan's
death. The oratory was furnished with a roof of slate by Bishop Mills in
1716.
"St. Declan's Stone" is a glacial boulder of very hard conglomerate which
lies on a rocky ledge of beach beneath the village of Ardmore. It
measures some 8' 6" x 4' 6" x 4' 0" and reposes upon two slightly jutting
points of the underlying metamorphic rock. Wonderful virtues are
attributed to St. Declan's Stone, which, on the occasion of the patronal
feast, is visited by hundreds of devotees who, to participate in its
healing efficacy and beneficence, crawl laboriously on face and hands
through the narrow space between the boulder and the underlying rock.
Near by, at foot of a new storm-wall, are two similar but somewhat
smaller boulders which, like their venerated and more famous neighbour,
were all wrenched originally by a glacier from their home in the Comeragh
Mountains twenty miles away.
"St. Declan's Well," beside some remains of a rather large and apparently
twelfth century church on the cliff, in the townland of Dysert is
diverted into a shallow basin in which pilgrims bathe feet and hands.
Set in some comparatively modern masonry over the well are a carved
crucifixion and other figures of apparently late mediaeval character.
Some malicious interference with this well led, nearly a hundred years
since, to much popular indignation and excitement.
The second "St. Declan's Stone" was a small, cross-inscribed jet-black
piece of slate or marble, approximately--2" or 3" x 1 1/2". Formerly it
seems to have had a small silver cross inset and was in great demand
locally as an amulet for cattle curing. It disappeared however, some
fifty years or so since, but very probably it could still be recovered in
Dungarvan.
Far the most striking of all the monuments at Ardmore is, of course, the
Round Tower which, in an excellent state of preservation, stands with its
conical cap of stone nearly a hundred feet high. Two remarkable, if not
unique, features of the tower are the series of sculptured corbels which
project between the floors on the inside, and the four projecting belts
or zones of masonry which divide the tower into storeys externally. The
tower's architectural anomalies are paralleled by its history which is
correspondingly unique: it stood a regular siege in 1642, when ordnance
was brought to bear on it and it was defended by forty confederates
against the English under Lords Dungarvan and Broghil.
A few yards to north of the Round Tower stands "The Cathedral"
illustrating almost every phase of ecclesiastical architecture which
flourished in Ireland from St. Patrick to the Reformation--Cyclopean,
Celtic-Romanesque, Transitional and Pointed. The chancel arch is
possibly the most remarkable and beautiful illustration of the
Transitional that we have. An extraordinary feature of the church is the
wonderful series of Celtic arcades and panels filled with archaic
sculptures in relief which occupy the whole external face of the west
gable.
St. Declan's foundation at Ardmore seems (teste Moran's Archdall) to have
been one of the Irish religious houses which accepted the reform of Pope
Innocent at the Lateran Council and to have transformed itself into a
Regular Canonry. It would however be possible to hold, on the evidence,
that it degenerated into a mere parochial church. We hear indeed of two
or three episcopal successors of the saint, scil.:--Ultan who immediately
followed him, Eugene who witnessed a charter to the abbey of Cork in
1174, and Moelettrim O Duibhe-rathre who died in 1303 after he had,
according to the annals of Inisfallen, "erected and finished the Church"
of Ardmore. The "Wars of the Gaedhil and Gall" have reference, circa 824
or 825, to plunder by the Northmen of Disert Tipraite which is almost
certainly the church of Dysert by the Holy Well at Ardmore. The same
fleet, on the same expedition, plundered Dunderrow (near Kinsale),
Inisshannon (Bandon River), Lismore, and Kilmolash.
Regarding the age of our "Life" it is difficult with the data at hand to
say anything very definite. While dogmatism however is dangerous
indefiniteness is unsatisfying. True, we cannot trace the genealogy of
the present version beyond middle of the sixteenth century, but its
references to ancient monuments existing at date of its compilation show
it to be many centuries older. Its language proves little or nothing,
for, being a popular work, it would be modernised to date by each
successive scribe. Colgan was of opinion it was a composition of the
eighth century. Ussher and Ware, who had the Life in very ancient
codices, also thought it of great antiquity. Papebrach, the Bollandist,
on the other hand, considered the Life could not be older than the
twelfth century, but this opinion of his seems to have been based on a
misapprehension. In the absence of all diocesan colour or allusion one
feels constrained to assign the production to some period previous to
Rathbreasail. We should not perhaps be far wrong in assigning the first
collection of materials to somewhere in the eighth century or in the
century succeeding. The very vigorous ecclesiastical revival of the
eleventh century, at conclusion of the Danish wars, must have led to some
revision of the country's religious literature. The introduction, a
century and-a-half later, of the great religious orders most probably led
to translation of the Life into Latin and its casting into shape for
reading in refectory or choir.
Only three surviving copies of the Irish Life are known to the writer:
one in the Royal Library at Brussels, the second in the Royal Irish
Academy Collection (M. 23, 50, pp. 109-120), and the third in possession
of Professor Hyde. As the second and third enumerated are copies of one
imperfect exemplar it has not been thought necessary to collate both with
the Brussels MS. which has furnished the text here printed. M. 23, 50
(R.I.A.) has however been so collated and the marginal references
initialled B are to that imperfect copy. The latter, by the way, is in
the handwriting of John Murphy "na Raheenach," and is dated 1740. It has
not been thought necessary to give more than the important variants.
The present text is a reproduction of the Brussels MS. plus lengthening
of contractions. As regards lengthening in question it is to be noted
that the well known contraction for "ea" or "e" has been uniformly
transliterated "e." Otherwise orthography of the MS. has been
scrupulously followed--even where inconsistent or incorrect. For the
division into paragraphs the editor is not responsible; he has merely
followed the division originated, or adopted, by the scribe. The Life
herewith presented was copied in 1629 by Brother Michael O'Clery of the
Four Masters' staff from an older MS. of Eochy O'Heffernan's dated 1582.
The MS. of O'Heffernan is referred to by our scribe as "seinleabar," but
his reference is rather to the contents than to the copy. Apparently
O'Clery did more than transcribe; he re-edited, as was his wont, into the
literary Irish of his day. A page of the Brussels MS., reproduced in
facsimile as a frontispiece to the present volume, will give the student
a good idea of O'Clery's script and style.
Occasional notes on Declan in the martyrologies and elsewhere give some
further information about our saint. Unfortunately however the alleged
facts are not always capable of reconciliation with statements of our
"Life," and again the existence of a second, otherwise unknown, Declan is
suggested. The introduction of rye is attributed to him in the Calendar
of Oengus, as introduction of wheat is credited to St. Finan Camm, and
introduction of bees to St. Modomnoc,--"It was the full of his shoe that
Declan brought, the full of his shoe likewise Finan, but the full of his
bell Modomnoc" (Cal. Oeng., April 7th). More puzzling is the note in the
same Calendar which makes Declan a foster son of Mogue of Ferns! This
entry illustrates the way in which errors originate. A former scribe
inadvertently copied in, after Declan's name, portion of the entry
immediately following which relates to Colman Hua Liathain. Successive
scribes re-copied the error without discovering it and so it became
stereotyped.