OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Category: Irish Saints

  • Saint Cobarchair of Gulban gort, July 30

    On July 30 the Irish calendars record the memory of Saint Cobarchair as well as the name of his father and of the place where he flourished. Canon O’Hanlon is unable to identify the saint’s location but explains that due to the saint’s name meaning ‘help’ he was later confused with the Patrician episcopal saint Auxilius, an identification which he rejects:

    St. Cobarchair, or Cobuir, Son of Goll, of Gulban gort.

    In the Martyrology of Tallagh, we find that veneration was given at the 30th of July to Cobarchair, Gulbain Guirt mac h. Gairb.  The word Cobhairm has the meaning of “aid,” or “help” and, in Latin, it maybe represented by the word Auxilius. Hence, it has been conjectured, that he was St. Patrick’s disciple. The present holy man is entered in the Martyrology of Mairanus O’Gorman. At the same date, in the Martyrology of Donegal,  occurs the name of Cobuir, son of Goll. From this latter patronymic, it seems clear, that  the present holy man must be distinguished from St. Auxilius, son of Ua-Baird, St. Patrick’s disciple, and the Patron of Killossy, county of Kildare.  His feast, in one instance, has been referred to the 16th September.
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  • Saint Cummine, Son of Aride, July 29

    The name of another obscure Irish saint is recorded in the Irish calendars at July 29. In the case of Saint Cummine (Cuimmein, Cuimín)  a patronymic has also been preserved, but the knowledge that he is the son of Aride does not help to identify him with any particular time or locality. Our saint shares his name with a number of others, most famously perhaps the learned Saint Cuimín Fada whose feast falls on November 12:

    St. Cummine or Cuimmein, Son of Aride.

    The name of Cumianus, Cummine, or Cuimmein, appears at the 29th of July, in the Martyrologies of Tallagh, of Marianus O’Gorman and of Donegal. He is called the son of Aride, Ardi or Aradius.

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  • Saint Lutt of Tigh Luta, July 27

    One of the purposes of this blog is to bring before us the names of long-forgotten saints and today in Saint Lutt of Tigh Luta we encounter one of the many obscure Irish holy women listed on our calendars. Reading Canon O’Hanlon’s account below there is only a single sentence  of information directly relevant to the saint and that is the recording of her name and locality in the Martyrology of Donegal. The rest of the paragraph is taken up with a discussion of the history of possible locations where she may have flourished and with a refutation of ‘Maria Monk’ style contemporary prejudices:

    St. Lutt, Virgin, of Tigh Luta, in Fothartha Mora.

    From the earliest times in Ireland, holy women sought to escape from the snares of this world, by retiring to institutions where they could live together in a holy and peaceful state of society. Yet, even when the rights of conscience were partially recognised in these Islands, and when nunneries began to increase, some intolerants outside the Church imagined that these convents required regulation and inspection. It was foolishly asserted, that moral if not physical restraint was often used, to retain religious ladies within their beloved walls of enclosure. Such charges and suspicions were alike insulting to the nuns, and even to their outer-world relations and friends. Veneration was given, at the 27th of July, according to the Martyrology of Donegal, to Lutt, a virgin, of Tigh Luta, in Fotharta Mora; Where that district or place was situated does not seem to be known. The people called Fotharta were descendants of Eochadh Finn Fuathart, brother to Conn of the Hundred Battles, and who settled in Leinster Here they acquired lands in the counties of Carlow and of Waterford. The territory of Fothart Osnadhaigh—comprised in the present barony of Forth, in the county of Carlow—was so called from Cill Osnadha, now Kellistown. It was more frequently known as Fotharta Fea, from the plain of Magh Fea, in which that church was situated. The O’Nuallains, Anglice, O’Nolans or Nowlans, were the chief inhabitants of this district. The chief family of the Fotharta, in the county of Wexford, commonly called Fothart an Chairn, now Carnsore Point, took the name of O’Lorcain, or Larkin, but shortly after the Anglo-Norman invasion, the O’Lorcains were dispossessed. There were other territories of the name in Leinster, such as Fothart Airbreach, around the Hill of Cruachan Bri Eile, now Croghan, in the north-east of ihe King’s County; and Fothart Oirthir Life, in the present county of Wicklow.

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