The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran by Anonymous (recommended reading txt) 📖

a Latin original: but the fact proves nothing more than that the author of VG borrowed this particular incident , as he borrowed his preface, from a Latin writing. All these Lives are patchworks, and their component elements are of very different origins and dates.

The date of Ciaran's birth was 25 February, A.D. 515. The Annals of Ulster says 511, or "according to another book," 516. The Annals of Clonmacnois has the correct date, 515.

The Geographical Names in this Incident. - Temoria (LA) is Tara (Irish Teamair ), Co. Meath, the site of the dwelling of the Kings of Ireland. Midhe (LA) means the province of Meath; LA is, however, in error in placing the Latronenses therein. The Connachta are the people who give their name to the province of Connacht. Mag Ai , variously spelt, is the central plain of Co. Roscommon; Raith Cremthainn ("the fort of Cremthann") was somewhere upon it, presumably near the royal establishment of Rathcroghan, but the exact site is unknown. Isel Chiarain (VG), a place reappearing later in the Life, is unknown, but doubtless it was close to Clonmacnois.
Cluain maccu Nois , the "Meadow of the Descendants of Nos," now Clonmacnois, stands on the right bank of the Shannon about twelve miles below Athlone. Extensive remains of the monastery founded by Ciaran are still to be seen there. As for Tech meic in tSaeir , "the house of the wright's son," we might have inferred that this place was also somewhere near or in Clonmacnois; but a note among the glosses of the Martyrology of Oengus (under 9th September) says that it was "in the house of the son of the wright" that Ciaran was brought up . It is therefore to be identified with the mysterious place corruptly spelt "Templevickinloyhe" (church of the son of the --?) in the extract from the Annals of Clonmacnois printed above.[11]

The Verses in this Section of VG. -The epigram on Ciaran's parents is found in many MSS. The rendering here given expresses the sense and reproduces the rhythm of the stanza, but does not attempt to copy the metre in every detail. This is known as cro cummaisc etir casbairdne ocus lethrannaigecht , and consists of seven-syllable lines with trisyllabic rhymes, alternating with five-syllable lines having monosyllabic rhymes. Literally translated the sense would run, "Darerca my mother / she was not a bad woman // Beoit the wright my father / of the Latharna of Molt."

The second stanza is misplaced, and should properly have been inserted in the following paragraph. Its metre is ae freslige -seven-syllable lines in a quatrain, rhyming abab : a being trisyllabic, b dissyllabic rhymes. The stanza is obscure and probably corrupt; so far as it can be rendered at all, the literal translation is: "He healed the steed of Oengus / when he was in a swathe, in a cradle // there was given ... / from God this miracle to Ciaran."


III. HOW CIARAN RAISED THE STEED OF OENGUS FROM DEATH (LA, LB, LC, VG)

The Four Versions. -This incident is told in all four lives, and it is instructive to note the differences of detail which they display. In LA Oengus goes to fetch Ciaran, after consulting with his friends. In LB he sends for him. In LC he goes to him, and in VG Ciaran comes without being fetched. The stanza interpolated in the preceding section of VG introduces us to another variant of the tradition, in which Ciaran was a swaddled infant when the miracle was wrought. In LB the incident is given a homiletic turn, by being told to illustrate the saint's care for animals.

Parallels. -A similar but not identical miracle is attributed to Saint Patrick (VTP, 228; LL, 565). Here the saint resuscitates horses with holy water; but in this case the saint's own curse had originally caused the horses' deaths, because they grazed in his churchyard. Saint Lasrian also restored a horse to life (CS, 796).

Tir na Gabrai ("the land of the horse") is unknown, though it presumably was near Raith Cremthainn. The story was probably told to account for the name of the field. It has been noticed that the Latin Lives are less rich in details as to names of places and people than the Irish Life. This is an indication of a later tradition, when the recollection of names had become vague, or, rather, when names which had been of interest to their contemporaries had ceased to rouse such feelings.


IV. HOW CIARAN TURNED WATER INTO HONEY (LA, LB, LC, VG)

One of the numerous imitations of the story of the Miracle of Cana. Compare incident XLIV. An identical story is told of Saint Patrick (LL, 108). Note the variety of reasons given for sending the honey to Iustus.


V. HOW CIARAN WAS DELIVERED FROM A HOUND (LA, LB, LC, VG)

Parallels. -The same story is told of Saint Patrick, in Colgan's
Tertia Vita , cap. xxxi, Septima Vita , I, cap. xlvii. Patrick likewise quoted the verse Ne tradas bestiis animus confitentes tibi (Ps. lxiv, [Vulgate lxiii] 19).

The Fate of the Hound. -This varies in the different versions. In the Patrick story just quoted it was struck immovable, as a stone. In LA it thrusts its head in circo uituli , which I have rendered conjecturally as the context seems to require, but I can find no information as to the exact nature of this adjunct to the cattle-stall. Du Cange gives arcus sellae equestris as one of the meanings of circus .

LB and LC, which have many points of affinity, are in this incident almost word for word identical. They agree in saying that the men setting on the hound were spurred ( uexati ) by an evil spirit. The misplacing of this incident in LB is probably due to a transposition of the leaves of the exemplar from which it was copied.


VI. HOW CIARAN AND HIS INSTRUCTOR CONVERSED, THOUGH DISTANT FROM ONE ANOTHER (LA, VG)

Topography of the Story. -Assuming that Raith Cremthainn was somewhere near Rathcroghan, the distance between this and Fuerty would be about fourteen miles. There is no indication on the Ordnance map of any rock that can be identified with the cross-bearing stone on which Ciaran used to sit, though it clearly was a landmark well known to the author of LA. ( Pacé LA, Rathcroghan is north of Fuerty.)

Parallels. -The closest parallel is the story of Brigit, who heard a Mass that was being celebrated in Rome, though unable to hear a popular tumult close by (TT, 539). Something resembling the action of a wireless telephone is contemplated, the voices being inaudible to persons between the speakers. Thus the tales of saints with preternaturally loud voices are not quite in point. Colum Cille was heard to read his Psalms a mile and half away (LL, 828); Brenainn also was heard at a long distance (LL, 3419). The burlesque Vision of MacConglinne parodies such voices (ed. Meyer, pp. 12, 13).


VII. CIARAN AND THE FOX (VG)

Parallels. -There are endless tales of how saints pressed wild animals into their service; indeed the first monastic establishment of Ciaran's elder namesake, Ciaran of Saigir, consisted of wild animals only: a boar, a badger, a wolf, and a stag (VSH, i, 219; Silua Gadelica , i, p. 1 ff.). Moling also kept a number of wild and tame animals round his monastery-among them a fox, which, as in the tale before us, attempted to eat a book (VSH, ii, 201); otherwise, however, the stories differ. Aed rescued a stag from hunters, and used its horns as a book-rest (VSH, ii, 296); Coemgen similarly rescued a boar (VSH, i, 244). So, in Wales, Saint Brynach caused stags to draw his carriage, and committed his cow to the charge of a wolf ( Cambro-British Saints , pp. 10, 296). Saint Illtyd tamed a stag which he had rescued from hunters ( ibid. , pp. 164, 473).

Herding of Cattle. -There is abundant evidence from the Lives of the saints that the herding of the cattle while pasturing was an important duty of the children of the household. There was no little risk in this, owing to the prevalence of wolves.

Reading the Psalms. -The Psalms seem to have been the first subject of instruction given to young students; LB, 4, indicates that Ciaran's lessons with Iustus did not go beyond the mere rudiments of learning. There is in the National Museum, Dublin, a tablet-book containing six leaves of wax-covered wood, on which are traced a number of the Psalms in the Vulgate version; this was most likely a lesson-book such as is here described. The story evidently grew up around an actual specimen, that bore injuries, explained as being the tooth-marks of the fox.

Versions of the Tale. -It would appear that this story was originally an account of how Ciaran and his distant tutor could communicate, quite independent of incident VI. It has become awkwardly combined with VI into a conflate narrative, as is shown by the silence about the fox in LA. According to the one story, they used their supernatural "wireless telephone." According to the other, the fox trotted back and forth with the book. In the conflate version, it would appear that Iustus dictated Psalms to Ciaran by "telephone," Ciaran then wrote them on his tablets, and the fox waited till he was finished and then carried them for correction to Iustus. (As is observed in the footnote in loc , p. 73, we must read "Iustus" for "Ciaran" in the passage describing the proceedings of the fox).

The Homiletic Pendant. -The unexpected homiletic turn given to this story in VG may perhaps find its explanation in facts now lost to us; the passage reads like a side-thrust at some actual person or persons. It may possibly refer to the act of sacrilege committed by Toirdelbach ó Briain, in 1073, who carried away from Clonmacnois the head of Conchobar ó Maeil-Shechlainn; but being attacked by a mysterious disease-imparted to him, it was said, by a mouse which issued from the head and ran up under his garment-he was obliged to return it, with two gold rings by way of compensation. He did not recover from the disease, however, but died in 1086 ( Annals of Four Masters ).


VIII. HOW CIARAN SPOILED HIS MOTHER'S DYE (VG)

I have found no parallel to this most remarkable story. It displays the following noteworthy points-

1. It belongs to the Ciaran-tradition which places the home of the family in Cenel Fiachach.

2. It preserves what has every appearance of being an authentic tradition of a prohibition against the presence of males, even of tender years, when dyeing was being carried on.[12]

3. Most likely the saint's curse-indeed, the whole association of the tale with Ciaran-is a late importation into the story: it was probably originally a [Pagan] tale, told as a warning of what would happen if males were allowed to be present at the mystery. The different colours which the garments assumed are perhaps not without significance; Sullivan, in his introduction to O'Curry's Manners and Customs (i, p. 405), says "the two failures ... are simply the failures which result from imperfect fermentation and over-fermentation of the woad-vat."

4. There is an intentionally droll touch given to the end of