Irish Saints of September: Saran of Lesan

Today, September 21 on the Julian calendar, is the feast of Saint Saran of Lesan. There are 12 saints of this name listed in the Martyrology of Donegal, our saint is distinguished by the use of his patronymic, son of Tighernach. He is associated in that calendar with the placename Lesan in Sliabh Callan, which a note appended to one of the manuscript copies of the Martyrology of Donegal identifies as Lessan, County Derry. He is also associated with a second locality, Cluainda-acra in Cechair. In a chapter dealing with the parish of Clooney, County Clare in his book The History and Topography of the County of Clare, James Frost writes of this place:

In the Martyrology of Donegal, under the date of the 21st of September, is found the following entry:—“Saran, son of Tighernach, son of Maenach of Lesan, in Sliabh Callann, and of Cluain-da-acra, in Cehair.” O’Curry was of opinion that this Cluain-da-acra might be the Clooney of Corcomroe.[44] The church is much ruined by time. At a little distance is a holy well dedicated to St. Flannan, where rounds are yet made. In a townland of the parish, called Killeighnagh is a small burial-ground, and in another place named Mooghna, is noticed a little grave-yard and well styled Tobar Mooghna, used by persons suffering from sore eyes.

[44] See his Letter in the Ordnance Survey Papers relating to Clare, in Royal Irish Academy Library, Vol. xiv., B. 23, p. 314.

Canon O'Hanlon has this short account of our saint:

St. Saran mac Tiagharnaigh of Lesan, on Mount Callan, and of Cluain da-acra in Cheachair.

The name, Saran mac Trenaich, is found in the Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 19th of September; and this entry seems referable to the present date. The O'Clerys state, that the present holy man was the son of Tighernach, son of Maenach. At the end of those saints he commemorates at the 21st of September, Marianus O'Gorman celebrates with eulogy this holy man, invoking his intercession and that of others in the following manner: "Saran, the goodley gem, Tigernach's son, whom I choose: may they fly with me past tribulation to starry heaven as I ask!" The Irish comment on the text runs: Saran mac Tigernaigh meic Maenaigh ó Lesan i Sliabh Callann ocus o Cluain dá acra isin Cechair. Thus rendered into English: Saran, son of Tigernach, son of Maenach, from Lessan in Sliab Callann and Cluain da Acra in the Cechair.

At this date, we read in the Martyrology of Donegal, that Saran was of Lesan—said to be identical with Lessan, Londonderry County —in the Sliabh Callann, and of Cluainda-acra, in Cechair. There is a repetition, at this date, of his name, paternity and places, in the Irish Ordnance Survey Copy of the O'Clerys' Irish Calendar. A corresponding account is to be found in a manuscript copy of that Calendar, once in Mr. O'Curry's possession. The foregoing entry in the Martyrology has been extracted to furnish it.

Irish Saints of September: Doroma

Today, September 20 on the Julian calendar, we have a notice of another of our enigmatic female saints, Doroma or Daroma. The Martyrology of Oengus describes her as a 'queen':

D. xii. cal. Octobris.
Attecham na hóga
doairset ar nhdala,
ind rígain Daroma
cona slóg ron-snáda!

20. Let us beseech the virgins,
may they visit our assemblies!
may the queen Daroma
with her host protect us!

although the notes added by a later anonymous commentator rather more prosaically describe her as a 'virgin' and reduce her 'host' to 'five companions':

20. Doroma .i. uirgo. L. cum .u. socis suis.

20. Doroma, i.e. a virgin with her five companions.

I find this notice intriguing and would love to have some further details of this holy lady, but alas, that was a task which defeated Canon O'Hanlon, as he admits below. Perhaps Professor Ó Ríain's new Dictionary of Irish Saints will be able to tell us something more?

Festival of Doroma.

The Feilire of St. Aengus has a festival at the 20th of September, for a queen named Doroma and a commentator in the Leabhar Breac copy has notes, which hardly give any additional intelligence regarding her. Nowhere can I find what might serve to throw light on her name, period or place.

Irish Saints of September: Comgell

Today, September 19 on the Julian calendar, is the commemoration of an elusive Irish female saint, Comgell. Her name is recorded on the earliest surviving Irish calendar, the Martyrology of Tallaght, as Comgell, virgin, and her feast is also noted on the later Martyrologies of Marianus O'Gorman and of Donegal. Like so many of our holy women, however, we have no details of when and where she flourished, so Canon O'Hanlon can only bring us the details from the calendars:

St. Comgell or Caomhgheall, Virgin.

A festival in honour of Comgell or Caomhgheall, Virgin, is found registered in the published Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 19th of September, although the 16th of October Kalends—corresponding with the 16th of September—is substituted. A similar error occurs in the Book of Leinster entry of her name. At this same date, Marianus O'Gorman commemorates Comgell, noticed by his commentator as having been a virgin. In the Martyrology of Donegal, she is commemorated at the 19th of September.

Irish Saints of September: Enna of Emlaghfad

Today, September 18 on the Julian calendar, is the commemoration of Saint Enna (Endeus, Enda), abbot of the monastery of Emlaghfad, County Sligo. In the Life of Saint Colum Cille by the 16th-century Donegal chieftain Manus O'Donell, it was said that this monastery was a Columban foundation. Bishop William Reeves, in the introduction to his translation of the Life of Columba by Adamnan, records the following note of the locality:

22. EMLAGHFAD. Imleach fada, "the long marsh." Here, according to O' Donnell, St. Columba founded a church on the west side of a hill called Tulach-segra [now Tully in Toomour] in the district of Corann, appointing Enna, son of Nuadhan, its first minister. It is now a parish church in the diocese of Achonry, and county of Sligo.

Canon O'Hanlon in his account below of Saint Enna notes that his predecessor, Father John Lanigan, who was writing in the 1820s, believed that our saint was the same individual as Enda, son of Nuadan, who was listed as belonging to the second order of Irish saints. The translator of the Martyrology of Gorman, Whitley Stokes, accepted this identification in his listing of the three orders of saints as commemorated in O'Gorman's calendar. I have previously posted Stokes' list here. One thing that surprises me, in view of the claimed link between Saint Enna's monastery and Saint Colum Cille, is that Saint Enna does not appear on the Martyrology of Donegal for this day. The 12th-century Martyrology of Marianus O'Gorman appears to be the only major calendar which records his feast.

ST. ENDEUS, ABBOT OF EMLAGHFAD, COUNTY OF SLIGO.

[SIXTH CENTURY.]

...St. Endeus or Enna was probably born about the middle of the sixth century, being son to Nuadan. We have few notices left regarding him. However, as Dr. Lanigan remarks, nothing occurs to prevent us from supposing him to have been that Endeus alluded to, in the Second Class of Irish Saints. He is thought to have been a disciple of St. Columkille, the great Apostle of Caledonia. St Columba founded a monastery at a place called Imleachfoda. Over this, he placed St. Enna, as its first minister. The former residence of Endeus is now called Emlaghfad, in Sligo County. This ancient town lies six miles south of Sligo, and one from Ballymote. It is now a parish church, in the diocese of Achonry; and Prince O'Donnell, the Biographer of St. Columkille, tells us, that the subject of his Memoir erected a Church there, on the west side of a hill, called Tulach-sugra. At present it is known as Tully, in Toomour, within the barony of Corann.

The year of St. Endeus' or Enna's death is unknown. The festival of this saint has been referred to the 18th of September, by Marianus O'Gorman. This was probably the Natalis, or day of his death. However, we do not find his festival in the Martyrologies of Tallagh or of Donegal at that date.

Irish Saints of September: Grellan of Hy-Many

Today, September 17 on the Julian calendar, is one of the feastdays of Saint Grellan, patron of the district of Hy-Many. An account of his life forms the lead article for this day in Volume 9 of Canon O'Hanlon's Lives of the Irish Saints. Most of the account is taken up with a long discourse on the legendary founder of the tribes of Hy-Many and of battles with the Firbolgs etc. I have omitted all of this and also the closing account of the O'Kelly family who claim Saint Grellan as a particular patron. If you would like to read this material however, you can view Canon O'Hanlon's The Life of Saint Grellan, Patron of the O'Kellys and of the Tribes of Hy-Maine as a separate booklet here or the complete entry from The Lives of the Irish Saints in a nicely-formatted pdf version here. It seems clear that there is a degree of confusion around the time when Saint Grellan flourished, some of his hagiographers have sought to place him in the time of Saint Patrick, which would place him in the fifth century, the 17th-century hagiologist Father John Colgan, however, believed him to have been a disciple of Saint Finian of Clonard and a participant at the Columban Synod of Easdra which would place him a century later. The picture of Saint Grellan on the left was taken by Andreas F. Borchert at Saint Michael's parish church at Ballinasloe, County Galway.

Besides the universal reverence and love, with which Ireland regards the memory of her great Apostle, St. Patrick, most of our provincial districts and their families of distinction have patron saints, for whom a special veneration is entertained. Among the latter, St. Grellan's name is connected with his favoured locality. The extensive territory of Hy-Many is fairly defined, by describing the northern line as running from Ballymoe, County of Galway, to Lanesborough, at the head of Lough Ree, on the River Shannon, and in the County of Roscommon. It extended nearly due east and west, taking in all the southern part of this last-named county. The eastern boundary ran along the River Shannon's course, from Lanesborough to Scariff, in Clare County, and west of Lough Derg. Thence, the southern and western boundaries proceeded by Feacle, on Lough Graney, County of Clare, and passed some distance west of Loughrea to Athenry; thence, they continued through Killererin parish, near Tuam, and on to Ballymoe. All of these last-mentioned localities are situated within the County of Galway.

OF this holy man Lives have been written; while one of them is to be found in a Manuscript of the Royal Irish Academy, and another among the Irish Manuscripts, in the Royal Library of Bruxelles. Extracts containing biographical memoranda relating to him are given by Colgan, and in a much fuller form by Dr. John O'Donovan, as taken from the Book of Lecan. There is also a notice of him, in the "Dictionary of Christian Biography." Colgan promised to present his Life in full, at the 10th of November; but he did not live to fulfil such promise.

It is to be regretted, that so few biographical particulars have been given in the only brief accounts we can find, regarding the Patron of Hy-Many. A very ancient copy of St. Grellan's Life is quoted by Duald Mac Firbis in his Genealogical Book, as a proof of the existence of the Firbolgs in the province of Connaught, after the period of the introduction of Christianity; and, also, it is cited, by Gratianus Lucius, in his "Cambrensis Eversus," as a proof of the fact, which he thinks it establishes, namely, that the ancient Irish paid tithes. No vellum copy of this Life is now in Dublin. There is an Irish Life of St. Grellan in paper, and transcribed by Brother Michael O'Clery. It is kept in a thick quarto volume, among the Manuscripts of the Burgundian Library, at Bruxelles. Besides this, there is a paper copy of his Life —probably containing similar matter — and preserved in the Royal Irish Academy, among its manuscripts. The Life of St. Grellan is in a quarto Miscellany of 352 written pages, copied by James Maguire, a good and faithful scribe, according to Eugene O'Curry. This transcript was finished in the year 1721, and in some place called Dubhbhaile (Black-Town). The pages are written in double columns, and chiefly Lives of Saints are to be found in it. The Life of St. Greallan is contained there, from page 235 to 240.

The usual name given to this holy man is Grellan, or Greallain, in Irish, and this has been Latinized into Grellanus. Dr. Lynch writes of him as Grillan, when alluding to the Patron of Hy-Many, in his celebrated work. According to the accounts we have of the saint, he was a contemporary with St. Patrick, and he must have flourished about the close of the fifth century. He is classed among the Irish Apostle's disciples, and this too is stated, in the tenth chapter of his own Life. He also obtained the episcopal rank, being renowned for his sanctity and miracles.

His father's name was Cuillin son of Cairbre Cluaisderg, of the Lagenians, while Eithne was the name of his mother. He was born in the time of St. Patrick, as the first chapter of his Irish Life states, and a legend is there introduced, as serving to illustrate the prognostications of his subsequent distinguished career, and especially accompanying the event of his birth.

In the time of Lugaidh Mac Laoighaire Mac Neill, a great thunderstorm was heard by all the men of Erinn, and they were astonished at its unusual loudness. They asked Patrick, the son of Alpin, what it portended. He answered, that Greallan was then born, and that he had been only six months in his mother's womb, at the time. Hence, we should infer, that he came into the world towards the close of the fifth century. Wars and commotions are said to have prevailed in Ireland, at the advent of our saint's birth. We are told, likewise, that Greallan had been fostered by one named Cairbre, probably a relation among his family connexions.

Among the many other cares of his mission, St. Patrick took charge of Greallan's education, and made him a companion. He enrolled this young disciple amongst his brethren, taking him to Ath-Cliath, Dublinne when he went there. This must have been after the middle of the fifth century. Then is quoted a poem, in which St. Patrick said, that a noble person should be in the land of Leinster. This promise was an allusion to our saint, whose purity and virtues are there praised.

A kinsman to the celebrated Colla da Chrioch chieftain in Ulster possessed great influence in Hy-Many, a territory of the Firbolgs, in the time of St. Patrick, when he is said to have visited Echin, the son of Brian, son of Eachach, King of Connaught. Eachin refused to be converted, but all his brothers embraced the faith. Eoghan, who was son to Duach Gallach, one of Eachin's brothers, was afterwards baptised by St. Grellan. On this occasion a great miracle was wrought, at a place called Achadh Fionnabhrach. When only a child, Eoghan had died, to the inexpressible grief of his parents. However, when St. Grellan beheld this afflicting state of affairs, he raised his staff, and then applied it to the body of their child. This touch caused him to be resuscitated, and it impressed a mark on their son, which was afterwards visible. As a consequence, he bore the name, by which he was best known, namely, Eoghan Scriabh, or "Owen the Striped." The miraculous crozier was thenceforward held in great veneration. It is said, that Duach Gallach was a Christian, having been baptised by St. Patrick, while the wife of Echin, called Fortrui, was aunt to St. Benignus, a favourite disciple of the Irish Apostle. The latter proclaimed that he should be a king, and that from his race kings should proceed. In fine, Eachin was baptised at Kilbennin, near Tuam.

At Achadh Fionnabhrach, Duach Gallach bestowed a tract of land, and he gave possession of it to St. Grellan. The name was even changed — owing to this peculiarity of circumstance — from Achadh Fionnabhrach to that of Craobh Greallain, which signifies, the "Branch of Grellan." This name is said in his Irish Life to have been owing to a branch, which Duach and St. Patrick gave our saint in token of possession. Here, east of Magh-Luirg, this saint is said to have built a Church, before the arrival of Maine-Mor in Connaught. When alluding to Craobh Ghreallain, Mr. O'Curry remarks, that he believed its precise situation was not known. As a token of the veneration for our saint, Duach required that every chieftain's wife should give seven garments as a tribute to Grellan and, for payment of this ecclesiastical assessment, the guarantee of St. Patrick had been asked and obtained afterwards by the local Patron.

...Afterwards, St. Grellan selected at Kilcloony the site for a church. There he built on a rising ground, or Eiscir, a little distance to the north-west of Ballinasloe town. Some ruins are yet remaining there, but it would be altogether hazardous to assert the walls date back to the fifth century. The Irish were accustomed to impose voluntary assessments of the nature, already indicated by the record we iiave quoted, to mark their consideration and respect for those distinguished by their ministerial works. It is stated, in the Irish Life of St. Grellan, that he received the first offspring of any brood animal; such as hog, and lamb, and foal, in Hy-Many. These tributes were regularly paid to the successors of the holy man in the church honoured by his presence and labours during life.

Notwithstanding the statements in his own Irish Life, that St. Grellan flourished in the time of St. Patrick, it seems most likely he was not then born, and, moreover, it has been stated, his father's name was Natfraich, that Grellan had been a disciple to St. Finian of Clonard, and that he assisted at the great Council at Easdra, held by St. Columkille before he returned to Scotland; wherefore, Colgan was justified in placing his career at A.D. 590. Whether or not he lived in the seventh century cannot be ascertained from any known record.

St. Grellan was honoured with particular devotion in the Church of Killcluian, diocese of Clonfert, on the 17th of September. On this day his feast occurs, according to Marianus O'Gorman, our traditions and Calendars, while he seems to have had a second festival, at the 10th of November. It seems strange, that at neither day he is mentioned in the Feilire of St. Aengus the Culdee, nor is the date for his death recorded in our Annals. However, we may fairly assume, that he lived on, until near the close of the sixth century.

St. Grellan is the principal patron of those portions of Galway and Roscommon counties, formerly known by the designation of Hy-Many; and, for many centuries, even to the present age, the crozier of St. Grellan had been preserved in the territory. Dr. Lynch declares also, that in his time this pastoral staff of St. Grellan was held in great veneration. A relic of this kind, when used as a standard, was usually called cathach, i.e., proeliator, such as the celebrated cathach of St. Columkille. This crozier of St. Grellan was preserved for ages, in the family of O'Cronghaile, or Cronelly, who were the ancient Comharbas of the saint. This term of Comharba had moreover an ecclesiastical meaning, and according to the usages which prevailed in early times, and in our country, generally it signified successor in a see, church, or monastery; but, in due course, it had a wider signification, and the Comhorba was regarded as the vicar — a legal representative of the Patron Saint, or founder of the Church. But, the word Comhorba is not exclusively ecclesiastical; for in the ancient laws of Erin, it meant the heir and conservator of the inheritance; and, in the latter sense, it is always used, in our ecclesiastical writings. The crozier of St. Grellan was in existence, so late as the year 1836, it being then in the possession of a poor man, named John Cronelly, the senior representative of the Comharbas of the saint, who lived near Ahascra, in the east of the county of Galway; but, it is not to be found at present, in that county. It was probably sold to some collector of antiquities, and it is not now known to be in the possession of any person; yet it seems incredible, that such an interesting relic could have been lost, as we have been enabled to ascertain the fact of its preservation to a comparatively recent period.

A dictionary of Irish Saints

This forthcoming title from Four Courts Press will go straight to the top of my wish list!

A dictionary of Irish Saints
Pádraig Ó Riain

Hardback
660pp. October 2011
ISBN:978-1-84682-318-3
Catalogue Price: €65.00
Web Price: €58.50


Scarcely a parish in Ireland is without one or more dedications to saints, in the form of churches in ruins, holy wells or other ecclesiastical monuments. Professor Pádraig Ó Riain’s Dictionary of Irish Saints is intended to serve as a guide to the (mainly documentary) sources of information on the saints named in these dedications, for those who have an interest in them, scholarly or otherwise. The need for a summary biographical dictionary of Irish saints, containing information on such matters as feastdays, localisations, chronology, and genealogies, although stressed over sixty years ago by the eminent Jesuit and Bollandist scholar, Paul Grosjean, has never before been satisfied. Professor Ó Riain has been working in the field of Irish hagiography for upwards of forty years, and the material for the over 1,000 entries in his Dictionary has come from a variety of sources, including Lives of the saints, martyrologies, genealogies of the saints, shorter tracts on the saints (some of them accessible only in manuscripts), annals, annates, collections of folklore, Ordnance Survey letters, and other documents. Running to almost 700 pages, the body of the Dictionary is preceded by a Preface, List of Sources and Introduction, and is followed by comprehensive Indices of Parishes, Other Places (mainly townlands), Alternate (mainly Anglicised) Names, Subjects, and Feastdays. Professor Ó Riain’s Dictionary has been described as ‘an astonishingly comprehensive, intelligent and well-organized work’; it is unlikely to be superseded for many decades to come.

Pádraig Ó Riain is Professor Emeritus of Early and Medieval Irish at University College Cork, and the previous holder of Visiting Professorships at Bochum and Freiburg in Germany and at Aberystwyth in Wales. He is a former holder of the Parnell Fellowship at Magdalen College, Cambridge, and was the first Irish scholar to be awarded the Humboldt Prize. A former President of the Irish Texts Society and a former Member of Council of the Royal Irish Academy, Professor Ó Riain is the author of numerous publications on Irish hagiography, placenames, personal names, and textual transmission.


Forthcoming
7 October 2011

Irish Saints of September: Mirren of Paisley

Today, September 15 on the Julian calendar, we commemorate an Irish saint who began his career at the monastery of Bangor under the tutelage of its founder, Saint Comgall, but is today remembered as patron of Paisley in Scotland. Canon O'Hanlon, in the September volume of his Lives of the Irish Saints, begins the entries for this day with an account of Saint Mirren (Merinus, Meadhran, Mirin, Mirrin, Mirren), but below is the account from Bishop Forbes' work on the Scottish calendars which quotes from the lessons of Saint Merin's feast from The Breviary of Aberdeen:

The acts of S. Merinus, in the Breviary of Aberdeen, are very circumstantial. Bishop Merinus was given by his parents to S. Comgal, to be trained in the monastery of Bangor, where he eventually assumed the monastic habit and became prior. His rule was a gentle one. Once, when Finnian of Movilla came to the monastery in the absence of S. Comgal, and asked for milk, of which there was none, the cellarer, at the bidding of S. Merinus, was told to bring some from the cellar, which was accordingly done, and distributed among them that sat at meat. He laid the pains of childbirth on an Irish King who contemned him. He was seen by one of the community in his cell, on one occasion, to be surrounded by a heavenly light, and on another occasion he recalled to life one of the brethren who had fallen down overcome by thirst and fatigue in the valley of Colpdasch. At length, full of miracles and holiness, he slept in the Lord at Pasley, and in his honour the said church is dedicated to God.—(Brev. Aberd. pars estiv. fol. cvi.)

That a colony from Bangor should come to Paisley is not at all improbable. In the life of S. Kieran, at March 5, in Colgan's Acta SS. Hib. (p. 461), there is a notice of a S. Medranus, who is mentioned in the lost Kalendar of Cashel with a S. Tomanus:—"SS. Medranus et Tomanus in una ecclesia in Britannica Arcluidensi."—(Ibid. p. 465 a, note 31.) Paisley is within easy distance of Dumbarton. Colpdasch has not been identified.

Camerarius, who makes his day the 17th, states that he was Abbot of Newbattle, in the Lothians. This is impossible, but we find traces of him —

1. In the parish of Kelton, in Kirkcudbright. "There is in the south-east boundary of the parish the vestige of an ancient chapel and churchyard, called Kirk Mirren, now entirely neglected, and of which nothing is known but the locality and the name."—(N. S. A., Kirkcudbright, p. 170; O. S. A. viii. p. 297.)

2. In the parish of Kilmarouock, a chapel, still known as S. Mirren's Chapel (marking by the name of its patron saint some old connection with the abbey of Paisley), stands now in ruins upon Inch Murryn, the largest island of Lochlomond.—(Orig. Par. i. p. 35.)

3. At Kilsyth there is a remarkable spring, on the south of Woodend, called S. Mirrin's Well.—(Orig. Par. i. p. 43.)

4. In the parish of Coylton is a farm called Knock Murran.—(N. S. A., Ayr, p. 656.)

5. In the parish of Edzell, on the south side of the Korth Esk, is the burn of Murran, but there are no distinct traces of his memory anywhere on the east coast of Scotland.

Alexander Penrose Forbes, D.C.L. Bishop of Brechin, Kalendars of Scottish Saints, (1872), 397-398.

Where the Cross Passes the Evil in Anything is Powerless

Today, September 14 on the Julian calendar, is the feast of the Universal Exaltation of the Precious and Life-creating Cross. Father John Ryan, in his classic work on Irish monasticism, has written of the use of the sign of the cross by the Irish monastic saints:

To invoke the divine aid against these evil powers the sign of the cross was in constant use. St. Columban, during his meditations in the woods near Luxeuil put that holy sign on his forehead frequently as a form of armour. His monks did the same whenever they left the monastery. Columban's successor at Luxeuil, the abbot Athala, had a cross erected outside his cell, so that when going out or returning he could lay his hand upon it before putting the sign of salvation upon his brow. A torch when lighted by a junior monk had to be handed to a senior to be thus blessed, and spoons when used at table had to be treated similarly by the brethern. In Iona the same custom prevailed; for it is recorded that St Columcille was displeased when the holy sign was not placed on a milk vessel (Adamnan ii, 16). The 'signum salutare' might be placed on tools and used for various pious purposes. When his uncle Ernan died suddenly on the way from the harbour to the monastery, a cross was raised on the spot where life failed him and another on the spot where Columcille stood awaiting his approach. Another cross, fixed securely in a large millstone, was erected in the place where the old white horse wept for the saint's approaching end just before his death. Caesarius of Arles shows that the practice of signing oneself with the sign of the cross was very common in Gaul. St. Patrick made the sign of the cross upon himself a hundred times during the day and night, and never passed a cross upon the wayside without alighting from his chariot and spending a while beside it in prayer. St. Jerome said it could not be made too frequently. The hermits in the Egyptian desert were wont to make the holy sign over their food and drink, before they took their repast, and one of them is credited with the statement that "where the cross passes the evil in anything is powerless."

Rev. John Ryan, S.J., Irish Monasticism - Origins and Early Development (2nd edn. 1972, reprinted Irish Academic Press, 1986), 234-235.

Irish Saints of September: Neman Mac Ua Duibh

Today, September 13 on the Julian calendar, is the feast of Saint Neman or Naemhan distinguished in the Irish calendars by the patronymic Mac Ua Duibh. This may serve to differentiate him from Saint Neman of Cill Bia whose feast we noted on September 1. The 17th-century hagiologist, Father John Colgan, believed today's saint Neman to be the same individual as one mentioned in the Life of Saint Fechin of Fore. Canon O'Hanlon, however, is able only to bring us details of the feast of Saint Neman from the various Irish calendars:

St. Neman or Naemhan Mac Ua Duibh. [Probably in the Seventh Century]

We find entered in the Martyrology of Tallagh, the feast of Neman Mac h. Duibh, at the 13th of September. Marianus O'Gorman has a commemoration of this holy servant of God, at this same date, with the designation of his being prudent, while a commentator calls Noeman the great-grandson of Dub. According to Colgan, this holy man accompanied St. Fechin, Abbot of Fore, when the latter went to obtain the liberation of one Aid or Aedus from Blaithmaic and Diermit II., joint Sovereigns of Ireland. Hence his period must be assigned probably to the Seventh Century. We have recorded in the Martyrology of Donegal, the name Naemhan Mac Ua Duibh, as having a festival, at the 13th of September. In the Table appended to this latter record, we meet the Latin word sanctanus introduced, after the entry of his name.

Irish Saints of September: Ciarán of Clonmacnoise

Today, September 9 on the Julian calendar, is the feast of Saint Ciarán of Clonmacnoise about whom links to previous posts can be found here. The account below of his life and virtues has been excerpted from a sermon delivered by a nineteenth-century Bishop of Ardagh, the Right Rev. George Conroy (1833-1878), on the dedication of a new church in honour of 'the sainted founder of Clonmacnois, whose heroic sanctity as monk, priest, and abbot, made him what Alcuin styles him: the glory of the Irish race.' The sermon illustrates the spirit of the 19th-century national and Catholic revival in Ireland very well indeed. It is filled with romantic imagery which contrasts the riches of Ireland's early Christian past with the degradation of the country at that time just as it contrasts the ruined churches of old with the new building arising on this occasion. The Bishop is particularly good at conveying the impact of the early training of Saint Ciarán (or Kyran as he has chosen to render the name) at the monastic school of Saint Enda of Aran. Aran exercised a particular fascination for this generation as the epitome of the harsh and lonely windswept island scenario which produced the ascetic Irish saints. We start at the point where the speaker begins to talk of 'Ireland's abiding reverence' for St. Ciarán's virtues:

That St. Kyran's virtues should never be without honour in Ireland was announced to himself thirteen centuries ago in Aran, when first he narrated to his beloved master, St. Enda, the vision that had been vouchsafed him of the future glories of Clonmacnois. He had seen the noble stream of Shannon flowing among these verdant plains, and on its banks a stately tree laden with leaves and fruits, and covering the land with its grateful shade. "That fruitful tree," explained St. Enda, "art thou thyself, for thou shalt be great before God and man, and shalt produce sweetest fruits of good works, and shalt be honoured throughout all Ireland." First fruits of these good works were the monastic virtues exercised by our saint in Aran. He entered that holy island in the bloom of his youth, and for the long years he sojourned there he was, as St. Enda described him, "the flower and strength of religious observance." His life was a pattern of humility. For seven years, well-born and scholarly as he was, he toiled with his hands at those labours which men commit to the least important of their servants. He would fain continue to the end in the practice of obedience ; and even when at length he was compelled to become the master of others, he prayed that he and his charge might still continue under the guidance of St. Enda. His austerity was marvellous. Lashed by the Atlantic waves, swept by the Atlantic blasts, the island of Aran was the home of penance and mortification. Hundreds of Ireland's saints fled to it, as the anchorets had fled to the desert solitudes of the Thebaid. "Aran", says a recent writer, "is no better than a wild rock. It is strewed over with the ruins, which may still be seen, of the old hermitages; and, at their best, they could have been but such places as sheep would huddle under in a storm, and shiver in the cold and wet which would pierce through the chinks of the walls. . . . Yes, there on that wet soil, with that dripping roof above them, was the chosen home of these poor men. Through winter frost, through rain and storm, through summer sunshine, generation after generation of them, there they lived and prayed, and at last laid down and died." Most fervent among these austere men was our St. Kyran, who made of his innocent body a martyr of penance. As day followed after day, and week after week, and month after month, for seven long years, he ceased not to sacrifice his will by minutest obedience, his body by severe labour, his repose by incessant prayer; and this with the flinty rock for his bed, with coarse and scanty food, in poor attire, exposed to frost and sun, buffeted by wind and snow. And as he was a miracle of humility and of penance, so also was he a miracle of sweetest charity. As his penitential life tells eloquently of his love for God, so the story of his parting from his brethren, when he was called away from Aran to Clonmacnois, as related in the ancient Life of St. Enda, is a proof of his loving heart towards men. As the boat that was to carry him to the banks of the Shannon was spreading its sails to the breeze, St. Kyran came slowly down from his beloved cell, weeping and surrounded by his weeping brethren. Tenderly his gaze lingered on each familiar sanctuary as he passed onwards to the beach, and there, kneeling down, he asked for the last time the blessing of the father of his soul. In sign of the charity that filled their hearts, and of the brotherhood they had contracted between themselves and those who were to come after them, a cross was erected on the spot, and the two saints said: "Whosoever in after times shall break the loving bond of this our brotherhood, shall not have share in our love on earth, nor in our company in heaven." Near to where that cross stood, a church was erected to commemorate the virtues of St. Kyran as the perfect Religious....

From Aran, St. Kyran came to this part of the valley of the Shannon, but not as yet to settle in Clonmacnois. He was now a priest, and on the island of Inis-Oenghin, in Lough Ree, he practised for eight or nine years the virtues of the perfect priest with as much fervour as he had practised on Aran those of the perfect monk. Surrounded now by disciples of his own, constituted a teacher of the faith and a dispenser of the sacraments, it was no longer permitted to him to shun altogether the concourse of men. But he did all that he could to guard from the world s tainted breath the gifts he had received and the souls that had been entrusted to his charge. St. Ambrose describes to us the attractions which islands such as those that stud the noble expanse of Lough Ree possessed for the religious men of that age. They loved, he says, those islands " which, as a necklace of pearls, God has set upon the bosom of the waters, and in which those who would shun the pleasures of the world may find a refuge wherein to practise austerity, and save themselves from the snares of life. The water that encompasses them becomes, as it were, a veil to hide from mortal eye their deeds of penance; it aids them to acquire perfect continence; it feeds grave and sober thought; it has the secret of peace; it repels the fierce passions of earth. In it these faithful and pious men find incentives to devotion. The mysterious sounds of the waves call for the answering sound of sacred psalmody; and the peaceful voices of holy men, mingled with the murmur of the waters against the shore, rise harmonious to the heavens. Here, then, did St. Kyran lead the life of the perfect priest. Here did he practise the rule of a priest's life that had been given to him at Aran, which his fellow-student, St. Carthage, has written for us, and which tells of "the patience, humility, prayer, fast, and cheerful abstinence; of the steadiness, modesty, calmness, that are due from a leader of religious men, whose office it is to teach, in all truth, unity, forgiveness, purity, rectitude in all that is moral; whose chief works are the constant preaching of the Gospel for the instruction of all persons, and the sacrifice of the Body of the great Lord upon the Holy Altar" (Rule of St. Carthage). Here did he reach the perfection to which, an ancient Irish treatise invites all priests: that "their hearts should be chaste and shining, and their minds like the foam of the wave, or the colour of the swan in the sunshine; that is, without any particle of sin, great or small, resting in his heart!" And here another church was raised to perpetuate the memory of his virtues. Alas! that church also is in ruins....

...At length the day came in which, about the year 544, he who was already the perfect monk and the perfect priest was to become also the perfect abbot, founder, and ruler of the glorious monastery of Clonmacnois. How splendid were the virtues that adorned St. Kyran as the perfect abbot, let Clonmacnois itself proclaim! It was long the most celebrated religious house in Ireland. It was the mother of countless saints. It was a treasure-house of graces. It became the chief seat of learning in Ireland. It was a school of art and literature. Kings esteemed it an honour to build its walls with their royal hands. The Emperor Charlemagne sent rich presents to it through Alcuin. The chieftains and princes of Erin bestowed their gifts upon it, until, in lands and treasures, in precious chalices and sparkling gems, in stately churches and rich crosses, it was the wonder of many lands. To be laid to rest beneath its earth, as near as might be to the relics of St. Kyran, was a privilege coveted by the noblest in the land. Bright with dew, and redrosed, as it is styled in an old Irish poem, it was not its sunny meads or its bright flowers that won for it such esteem: it was Ireland's faith in the power of its founder's intercession. And yet he to whose merits all this was due ruled over the monastery he had founded for the short space of less than a single year. After seven months of labour there, he passed to his reward, and there beyond he rests, awaiting his glorious resurrection...

Rt. Rev. George Conroy, Late Bishop of Ardagh, Occasional Sermons, Adresses and Essays (Dublin, 1888), 19-24.