OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Category: Female Saints

  • Saint Kentigerna of Inch Cailleach, January 7

     

    An Irish saint who became celebrated as a hermitess in eight-century Scotland is commemorated on, January 7. Saint Kentigerna is also known as the mother of another famous Scottish saint, Fillan, whose feast we will celebrate in two days time. The following account has been taken from the work of the Scottish Episcopalian Bishop Alexander Forbes (1817–1875) on the Scottish Calendars:

    KENTIGERNA. January 7, A.D. 733.—Kentigerna, styled also Quentigerna and Caentigerna, is known to us as the recluse of Inch Cailleach on Loch Lomond, as the sister of S. Congan, and as the mother of S. Fillan. She was the daughter of Ceallach Cualann (ob. 715), a regulus of Leinster, whose pedigree from Fedhlimidh Fiorurglas is known to us through Macfirbis.—(Genealog. MS. p. 461a.)

    Ceallach was the forefather of the O’Kellys (Ui Ceallaigh Cualann), who possessed Rathdown in the County Dublin till the fourteenth century.

    The legend of this saint in the Aberdeen Breviary, which is evidently drawn from some Irish life of her distinguished son, states that she was of the royal family of the Scoti, being daughter of Tyrennus, chief of the Laynenses (Kellenus- Colgan), and married to Feriacus, Prince of Monchestree (Feradach—Colgan). She had for brother-german the devout Congan, and a son approved for gravity of manners, Faelanus. Then follows the legend of S. Ibar rescuing him from the waters when he was seen at the bottom playing with angels. Leaving Ireland, the three betook themselves to Straphilane, where they remained some time. In the end, when deprived of the society of her son and brother, Kentigema went for the sake of contemplation to Inch Cailzeoch (Inchelroche — Camerarius) in Louchloumont in Levenax, where, after living as an anchorite, her soul ascended to Christ. The parochial church of the island is dedicated to her.—(Brev. Ab. pars hyem. foL xxv. ; Colgan, Acta SS. Hib. p. 21.) The Annals of Ulster record her death in 734 (733).—(Skene, Chron. of Picts and Scots, p. 356.) For an account of Inch Cailleach, see O.S. A, vol. ix. p. 12 ; N. S. A, Stirling, p. 90.

    Alexander Penrose Forbes, D.C.L. Bishop of Brechin, Kalendars of Scottish Saints, (1872), 373.

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  • Saint Tuililatha of Kildare, January 6

    January 6 is the feast day of a group of three female saints, collectively known as the ‘Daughters of Nadfrac’. Often with such groups of saints we do not have the names of the individuals who comprise it, but in this case the sources preserve the identities of  three distinct holy women- Muadhnat, Tuililatha and Osnat- albeit that that they are all commemorated on the same day. The three sisters are associated with monastic foundations in different parts of Ireland. Canon O’Hanlon starts with Saint Muadhnat, but as I have come across some further research on this saint at the last minute, I will start instead with the middle sister, Saint Tuililatha (also known as Tallula, Tuilach and more recently, Tuilclath), a successor to Saint Brigid as abbess of Kildare. At the end of his short piece Canon O’Hanlon follows the authority of the seventeenth-century hagiologist, Father John Colgan, in telling us that she flourished about the year 590, having been somewhat less impressed by the eighteenth-century Anglican antiquary, Mervyn Archdall, author of the famous survey of Irish religious houses, Monasticon Hibernicum (1786):

    St. Tallulla or Tulilach, Virgin, and Abbess of Kildare, County of Kildare. [Sixth Century.]

    The spouse of Christ leaves her home with its comforts, its joys, and its happy associations, as the bird leaves earth beneath it, soaring upward towards the skies, where it feels exposed to less danger and enjoys truer liberty. A sister to the aforementioned holy Virgin [i.e. St. Muadhnat] was St. Tallulla or Tulilach. By Archdall she is incorrectly called Falulla, and apparently without authority he assigns her rule over a community to A.D. 580. Tallulla, Abbess of Cill-Dara, or Kildare, occurs in the Martyrologies of Marianus O’Gorman and of Donegal, on this day. The epithet, Virgin, is affixed to a nearly similar entry in the Martyrology of Tallagh at the 6th of January. Here she is called Tuililatha. It cannot be ascertained, whether she preceded or succeeded St. Comnat in the government of nuns at Kildare for we only learn that the present holy abbess flourished about the year 590.

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  • Saint Baluíne, October 4

    On October 4 our early Irish calendars present us with something of a mystery surrounding a female saint with the name of Baluíne. The Martyrology of Oengus begins:

    D. iv. nonas Octobris.
    Áil Marcellum nepscop
    co nhaidbli a bríge,
    la céssad na hóige
    in ballgel Baluíne    .
    4. Beseech Marcellus the bishop,
    with the vastness of his vigour,
    at the suffering of the virgin,
    the bright-limbed Balbina.
    The phrase ‘suffering of the virgin’ would imply a female martyr, yet as we know, the vast majority of the early Irish saints who suffered martyrdom did so contending for the faith in other countries. It is clear from the scholiast notes on this entry that later commentators were perplexed and sought to find a local identity for the ‘bright-limbed Balbina’:
    4. Baluina .i. tair ata, nó isi Bicsech ó Chill Bicsige i nHuaib macc Cuais Midhe. R1 . in marg. Baluina uirgo et martir. Nó commad hí Baluina .i. Bicsech o Chill Bicsechi i nHuib Maccuais Mide, sed non est uerum. R1
    4. Balbine .i. in the east she is. Or it is Bicsech of Cell Bicsige in Hui mace Uais in Meath. in marg. Baluina virgin and martyr. Or maybe Baluina is Bicsech of Cell Bicseche in Hui Macc-uais of Meath; sed non est uerum.
    Bigsech of Kilbixy is an Irish female saint whose feastday is commemorated on June 28. In Canon O’Hanlon’s account of her, which I posted here, he remarked that ‘this saint appears to have had another festival, at the 4th of October.’ But did she? For Balbina was not an Irish woman at all, despite the attempted Gaelicization of her name, but one of the early Roman martyrs. There seem to be two saints of this name, the first, commemorated on March 31, is said to have been the daughter of a Roman official called Quirinus and is linked to the discovery of Saint Peter’s chains. There is a second Balbina, however, whose name is attached to one of the Roman catacombs, and inevitably the identities of both have been the subject of some confusion over the centuries. In Volume 5 of his work The Sacramentary: Historical and Liturgical Notes on the Roman Missal, Ildefonso, Cardinal Schuster, records at October 4 ‘Saint Balbina, Martyr’ and it would seem that this is the second Balbina, who gave her name to the Roman cemetery and who was commemorated on this day, even in Ireland!

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