OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Author: Michele Ainley

  • Saint Id of Aghade, July 14

     

    A saint associated with Saint Patrick is commemorated on July 14. Canon O’Hanlon rounds up the traditions and calendar entries concerning the feast of Saint Id (Idus) and the locality in which he flourished:

    St. Id, Bishop of Ath-Fhadhat, now Ahade or Aghade, County of Carlow.

    [Said to have lived in the Fifth Century.]

    If what is generally accepted in relation to this holy man be correct, he must have flourished at a very early period in the Irish Church. The present saint, called Id or Idus, is said to have been one of St. Patrick’s disciples, and to have been invoked in the old Irish metrical prayer, which bears the name of St. Moling. The reference to Colgan’s Manuscripts is relied on for the foregoing statement. Unless the name can be resolved into Aed or Aedus, we do not find any such person in the published Acts of St. Patrick. The Martyrology of Donegal registers a festival to honour Id, Bishop of Ath Fhadhat, in Leinster, at the 14th of July. That place to which he belonged is said to be situated in the barony of Forth, and it gives name to the present parish of Aghade, in the county of Carlow. However, if the traditional accounts regarding it, as found in the romantic literature of ancient Erinn, be founded on anything approaching truth, the denomination of his place ought rather be called Ahade. There can hardly be a question, but that the original name of Ahade was Ath Fadat, or Fadat’s Ford. There is a legendary Dindscanchas or nomenclature history of its situation, in the Book of Leinster, the substance of which is given by Professor Eugene O’Curry. [The story goes, that Etan Cend Derg or of the Red Head, with his household, fought Liath of Doire Leith, with his son Fadad and his two daughters Doe and Caichne, at Loch Lurcan, for the right of fishing in the Barrow. Liath was killed in this battle. Some time, afterwards, Fadad, the son of Liath, with his two sisters, Doe and Caichne, mustered their friends, and another battle was fought in the same place. There, on the banks of the Slaney, Fadad was killed. In commemoration of this event, the place was afterwards called Ath Fadad or the Fort of Fadad, a name which it retains to the present day, under the slightly Anglicized form of Ahade.]

    The Protestant church of the union of Ballon and Aghade stands on the site of one much older, and the foundations have been utilized for the erection of the more modern building, which is said to have been so old, that the date and cost of its erection are unascertainable. The church is prettily situated, on a gently elevated ground, and in the midst of a highly cultivated district. A rivulet running close to the churchyard adds greatly to the beauty of this tranquil scene. Some interesting tombs and their inscriptions are to be found there. It has been stated, that about the middle of the twelfth century, by Dermod Mac Murchad, King of Leinster, a nunnery had been here founded, for nuns of the order of St. Augustine, but it was then attached to the nunnery of St. Mary de Hogges, in the city of Dublin. There is now no remembrance of the nunnery in this locality. A blessed well—but without a name—is there, while other antiquities exist, and numerous human remains have been turned up, between Ahade and the town of Tullow.

    Under the head of Ath Fadat, Duald Mac Firbis enters the name Id, bishop of Ath-Fadat, in Leinster, for this day. At the 14th of July, St. Idus, Bishop of Ath-Fada, in Leinster, is set down by Rev. Alban Butler. In the “Circle of the Seasons,” at this same date, he is simply called a bishop in Leinster. Little of a reliable character can be gleaned regarding him.

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  • Saint Mosiloc of Cloonatten, July 13

    At July 13, Canon O’Hanlon has a notice for a County Wexford saint whose name appears on all of the calendars, but of whose life we otherwise have very few details. In the account below of Saint Mosiloc, I have transferred some of the original footnotes citing the calendar entries plus remarks by the Irish Ordnance Survey scholars, John O’Donovan and W. M. Hennessy, on the locality associated with the saint, into the text. There is a website dealing with the study of Wexford placenames here. Finally, please note that the Martyrology of Aengus records the saint at the 13th of July and not June as printed on page 224 of Volume 7 of The Lives of the Irish Saints:

    St. Mosiloc or Mothiolog, of Cloonatten, Parish of Kilmichael Oge, County of Wexford.

    The name of this holy man, as Siloc, is entered in the “Feilire” of St. Aengus, at the 13th of June. There he receives a high encomium. In the “Leabhar Breac” copy we have the following stanza, translated into English by Whitley Stokes, LL.D. :—

    “Sweet the name with splendour
    of Evangelus the sainted,
    with my Siloc of the kings,
    he went into the noble realm of peace.”

    In a commentary added, he is styled and identified as “my Siloc, i.e., of Cell Mo-siloc in Ui-Degad, in Ui-Cennseliag.” Hence, it should seem, that Siloc was simply his name, and it is entered Silog in the Calendar of Cashel. Veneration was given to Mosiloc Cluana Daethcain, at the 13th of July, as appears in the Martyrology of Tallagh. In Rev. Dr. Kelly’s edition of the Martyrology of Tallagh, this place is identified with Clonkeen, Queen’s County. His name and place are elsewhere differently entered. At this same date, we find in the Martyrology of Donegal, Mothiolog, of Cill Mothiolog, in Ui-Ceinnsealaigh, or Mothiolog, of Cluain Aithghin. This place is Cloonatten, in the parish of Kilmichael Oge, in the barony of Gorey, and county of Wexford. A note by O’Donovan says, “Mothiolog now corrupted to Kilmichaelog,” I find another note appended by William M. Hennessy to this ancient denomination, “Kilmokiloge or Kilmichaeloge, near Gorey, County Waterford,”(? Wexford). There is a curious old church in that locality. In the Kalendar of Drummond the feast of this saint is inserted, at the present date. Thus: “13 iii. Idus. In Hibernia Sancti Confessoris Mosiloc.”—Bishop Forbes’ “Kalendars of Scottish Saints”, p. 18. There is an entry of Mosilocus, at the 13th of July, in the work of the Bollandists. Father O’Sheerin supplied them with the notice inserted.

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  • Saint Nazair of Liethmore, July 12

    July 12 is the commemoration of a Saint Nazair of Liethmore. Although Canon O’Hanlon makes no mention of it, I find the name of this saint a rather curious one for an Irishman, but he is recorded in virtually all of the surviving calendars:

    St. Nazarus, Nazair, or Nasan, Bishop of Liethmore, County of Tipperary.

    The festival of Nazarius is found in the “Feilire” of St. Aengus, at the 12th of July: “Unto the angels departed Nazarius the story of every synod”. A commentary on it states, likewise, that he was bishop of Liath in Eblind, or bishop of Liath Mór Mochoemoic. In the published edition of the Martyrology, we find this entry: “Nazair o Liath,” occurring at the iv. of the Ides, or 12th of July. The editor of this Martyrology has also correctly identified Leith-mór with Leamakevoge, near Thurles, county of Tipperary. Both names are also referable to the Liath mentioned in the Martyrology of Tallagh. Besides, Marianus O’Gorman has also given us the name of this saint, called also Nasan, with an eulogy, at this same date. According to the Martyrologies of Cashel and of Maguire, the Natal day of St. Nazarus, Bishop, was celebrated at Liethmore, on the 12th of July. There appears to have been a diversity of opinion, on the part of most Irish writers, regarding the exact location of Leithmore. By some writers, it has been placed exactly four miles distant from the monastery of Bishop Colman at Doire mor; and both of those places are thought to have been in the present King’s County. Colgan placed Liathmor in the vicinity of Kinnetty, the very ancient Life of Pulcherius stating, that it was only four miles distant from St. Colman’s church of Doire-mor, thought to have been identical with Kilcolman, near Birr, and which, it is curious to observe, lies exactly four miles north-east from that place called Leagh on the engraved Map of the Down Survey. However, in the Life of St. Mochcemhog or Mochcemoc, also called St. Pulcherius, it is said, St. Colman’s monastery of Doire mor was situated on the confines of Munster and of Leinster, but within the boundary of the former province, and in the territory of Ely. This was supposed to have been Ely O’Carroll; but, there was a southern Ely, lying near Thurles, and while this was within Munster, it was also on the borders of ancient Leinster. However, the precise locality of Liathmore is now found to be identical with the townknd of Leigh, within the parish of Two Mile Borris, situated south-east in Elyogarty barony, and in the county of Tipperary. The ancient name is said to have been Buirgheis Leith, and it was denominated, Borris Leigh, from the celebrated old church of Liath

    Mochoemog, situated in that parish. It is probable, we must place the present holy man subsequent to the time of St. Mochoemhog or Mochcemoc, who was first Abbot and founder of Liath-more. In the Martyrology of Donegal, at the 12th of July, is entered the feast of St. Nazair, Bishop of Liathmor, in Ebhlinn. The Bollandists, who derived their information from Father O’Sheerin, also record Nazarius de Lieth, at this date.

     

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