September 9 is the feast of Saint Ciarán, founder of Cluain Mhic Nóis, Clonmacnoise, County Offaly.  Below is an essay by English Catholic writer, Marian Nesbitt, in which she sketches the history of this famous foundation. The later status and importance of Clonmacnoise owed much to its strategic location on the River Shannon, but here we can read the hagiographical account from the Life of Saint Ciarán, with the trope of the saint rejecting other promising locations until he found the site from where ‘many souls would ascend to heaven.’ Clonmacnoise also developed a particular reputation as a centre for learning and Miss Nesbitt describes some of its famous teachers and alumni. She also pays a generous tribute to the debt owed by her own countrymen in the Middle ages to Clonmacnoise, something all the more striking when we consider that this essay collection was published in 1913, when the Home Rule Crisis had strained the relationship between Ireland and Britain to breaking point:

 

XXII.
A  HAUNT  OF  ANCIENT   PEACE.

ON a bare slope in one of the most desolate spots to be found in Ireland stand the grey ruins of what was once an ancient national institution, a great school of learning; and, more than  this, “a true and living centre of European culture, to which men’s thoughts turned from far-off events and cities of illustrious kings”. Here, from different countries, came numbers who  desired to apply themselves to study; and here scholarship increased side by side with sanctity. We know that St. Columba’s monastery at Iona, whence the light of Christian truth was brought to many parts of Britain, was the most important of all the foundations made  outside of Ireland after the time of St. Patrick; and it is almost equally certain that no religious community established in Ireland after that date was so influential as the one which was inaugurated at Clonmacnoise by one of Columba’s younger contemporaries — “the gentle,  loving, tender-hearted” Ciaran, who became his intimate friend at Clonard, where they had both been educated.

The massed group of buildings and low stone walls, with towers springing out of their midst,  sloping up from the lonely stretch of river are, as we have said, all that now remain of once  famous Clonmacnoise. There are two round towers there; and it has been suggested by those who, having made a careful study of the subject, can speak with authority, that the  presence of these distinctive monuments of time may be explained by the fact that “in a community so exposed, so numerous, and probably so prosperous, more lives and valuables had to be secured than could be huddled in haste into one of the bell-tower fortresses”.

How often, for instance, at Kells, must the alarm have been given from the high tower, one of the finest examples of  “those  astounding  belfries,” as the round towers have been truly called, which were erected all over Ireland in the days when the unarmed inmates of monastic houses needed a place of sudden and safe retreat for themselves and their treasures! We can picture the custodian of the famous Book hurrying in breathless haste up the wooden ladder to the narrow doorway, ten feet above the ground, carrying with him the Book and its cumhdach, or casket; and drawing up the ladder as soon as he and his companions were  inside. Then the barbarous hordes of Danes were free to assault at will, with axe or crowbar, the huge round pillar of solid masonry: the Book, that gem of Irish art, which has been described as “incomparably the first among all the illuminated manuscripts of the world,” was safe with the monk who had charge of it, — safe in a building so impregnable that whole armies might have stormed it in vain.

Old documents tell us that Ciaran, when about to make his foundation at Clonmacnoise, set forth with eight companions from Hare Island, on Lough Ree; and, taking his way down the river, “rejected one spot as too fertile and too beautiful for the abode of  saints”. Looking back through the mists of ages, we seem to see the little party of devoted men drifting along the quiet, sedge-bordered stream, where swallows dipped and darted as they do  today; and every now and again a heron winged its solitary flight across that flat, yet flowing water, on either side of which stretch wide meadows that are often flooded, and that are called by the people callows.

Here, too, even at the present time, may be found that old and characteristic form of navigation — namely, the “cot,”  or large  flat-bottomed punt. Very  picturesque indeed look those ancient craft when piled high with turf; and it is still no unusual  occurrence to meet one being worked along the bank, with a pole  from the stern, by a countryman in a large slouched hat, whilst a  boy, on a thwart forward, keeps an oar out to the stream.

“The cot  is indigenous,” says a  well-known writer, — “as old,  probably,  as  the  skin-covered curragh”. Irish armies and Danish hosts, in all likelihood, used these curious boats; for history  makes mention of no special difficulty experienced by  the fleets in shooting rapids; though doubtless,  when greater speed was required, they had “the  long, narrow war canoes, which  have been found time and again preserved in bogs.”

When the eight monks and their holy young leader arrived at the sloping field which was then  named “The Height of the Spring,” Ciaran called a halt. “Here,”  he cried, ” let us remain; for many souls will ascend to heaven from this spot !” Thus, in the year A.D. 544, on a site which eventually became so  illustrious, was founded the venerable University of Clonmacnoise.

The monastic rule was exceedingly severe in those early days. Flesh-meat was almost excluded, and the small and zealous community lived, in very truth, the “simple  life,” — building its own churches and cells of wood or wattles, spinning its own wool, farming its own  land, whilst the religious were the inaugurators of whole societies of cooperative labour. The  very end and object of their being was service; though, on the other hand, it is very evident  that in a place where such scholars were produced, manual work must ever have been  subservient to study. Scholars and teachers lived in small huts. “Classes,” we are told, “were  held out of doors. Churches existed only for sacred uses; and they were multiplied, not  increased in bulk, as the Congregation augmented.” Though there are seven of them still at Clonmacnoise, the  largest is not more than sixty feet in length.

Some words of the Venerable Bede give us an excellent idea of this famous establishment, which has been quaintly described by a modern writer as “a germinal Oxford, reduced to its  essentials, gown unallowed by town “.  Writing of the great pestilence of 664, the saintly  Benedictine historian tells us that “many of the nobility and the lower ranks of the English  nation” were at that time in Ireland, which was also being devastated by the terrible sickness. Some, it seems, embraced the religious life; others chose to apply themselves to study, going about from one master to another. “The Irish,” he adds, “willingly received them all, and took care to supply them with food, also to furnish them with books and teaching gratis.” Here we have not only a vivid picture of the wandering scholars of those far-off days, but incontrovertible proof (furnished by one of the most remarkable  Englishmen the world has ever known) of that charming Hibernian generosity and hospitality which still flourish as vigorously as of yore.

If we study its history with care, we find that the school of Clonmacnoise has contributed more to our knowledge of the past than almost any other seat of Irish learning. Foreigners, as has already been remarked, came to study within its venerable walls; and its inmates, though they had left the world and the things of the world, toiled and wrought and thought with an extraordinarily single-hearted devotion; striving by every means in their power, and in the face of difficulties which we, in the present age, can hardly realize, to raise their mental together with their spiritual standard. It has been truly said that they “had no desire to cloister their intelligences,” and the scholarly work they have left behind proves that such was indeed the case.

Colchu the Wise, who was the chief professor or lector (ferlegind), not only taught those who came from other countries to benefit by his training, but sent his own Irish pupils to study at the principal centres of learning abroad; for mention of them is made in a letter from “Alcuin, the humble levite, to his blessed master and kind father, Colchu”. This “humble levite,” as everyone knows, was one of the most gifted and influential men in Europe; and it is deeply  interesting, after the lapse of many centuries, to read words that, from their intimacy, seem to bring the writer before us.

The whole tone of the letter makes it abundantly clear that the two scholars had met, even if Alcuin had not himself studied in Ireland, as  some  have  believed. On the other  hand, Colchu may have stayed in the celebrated monastery  of  St. Martin at Tours, when Alcuin presided over that favourite resort of Irish priests. However this may be, the two were friends— kindred souls — linked together by the strongest ties of affectionate sympathy; both had “followed knowledge like a sinking star beyond the utmost bounds of human thought”; and both had kept in constant touch, despite the changes that came with changing years.

“The news of your fatherhood’s health and prosperity rejoiced my very heart,” writes Alcuin; and he adds: “Because I judged you would be curious about my journey, as well as about recent political events, I have endeavoured to acquaint your wisdom with what I have seen and heard, so far as my unscholarly pen will permit me. First, let your loving care know that,  through God’s mercy, the Holy Church has peace, and advances and increases in all quarters of Europe.” After further details of current happenings, he goes on: “For the rest, holy Father, let your revered self know that I, your son, and Joseph, your countryman, are, by God’s grace, in good health; and all your men who are with us serve God prosperously”. This last sentence refers, beyond a doubt, to Colchu’s pupils, and is in itself sufficient proof that they were then at Tours  monastery.

At Clonmacnoise taught also, in 816, Abbot Suibhne (or Sweeny), whose fame was destined to live in the writings of  his pupil Dicuil, an Irish  monk who, in 825, wrote a geographical treatise “On the Measurement of the Globe,” which was discovered amongst the manuscript records in Paris, and which throws a very luminous light on those far-off  days, and shows us  “Irish monks making their way through Trajan’s Canal from Egypt to the Red Sea,” — men of  science, as well as of religion, who considered it their duty to study those wonderful monuments of antiquity for which the mysterious land of Egypt is so famous. “Although we never read in any book,” writes Dicuil, “that any branch of the Nile flows into the Red Sea, yet Brother Fidelis told, in my presence, to my master Suibhne (to whom, under God, I owe whatever knowledge I possess), that certain clerics and laymen from Ireland, going to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, sailed up the Nile for a long way.” This  same Brother Fidelis, Dicuil further informs us, “measured the base of a pyramid, and found it 400 feet in length”.

It is from Clonmacnoise that we derive the celebrated Book of the Dun Cow, which, with the exception of the Book of Armagh, is, says a reliable authority, “the  most ancient compilation of which we have the original manuscript”. Maelmuire, the monk who copied it, was a scribe of note, and his end was most tragic. Robbers slew him in A.D. 1109, whilst he was writing in the great church; though in all probability he was working in a scriptorium, such as we may still see in  Cormac’s chapel at Cashel, which is built over the church, under the high-pitched stone roof.

The great stone church which stands today was built by Flann, High King of Eire; and by Colman, then abbot both of Clonmacnoise and Clonard. Near this church is a wonderful sculptured cross,  having, on its eastern side, scenes from the life of our Divine Lord; and, on the western, the interested archaeologist can still discern the Celtic inscription, now dim from the storms of centuries: “Pray for Flann, son of Malachy”. In another panel we read: “Colman made this cross for King Flann”. Firm and upright, it has braved the tempests of a thousand years, — a beautiful  and touching type of that immutable faith so deeply rooted in Irish hearts that persecution, famine, poverty, and even death itself, have had no power to shake it.

Possibly earlier, but certainly not later, than the eleventh century, Ireland, we are told, “developed the art of vernacular literary prose, and the annalists had recourse to this medium of expression”.  Some of the first of these, whose work has come down to us, lived and worked and died at Clonmacnoise. There, too, Duald MacFirbis made a copy of the annals of the Irish. This annalist,  who was murdered by  a Cromwellian soldier, was perhaps “the latest of all the hereditary professional scribes and scholars”.

Alas, for ruined Clonmacnoise, that ancient university within whose precincts lie so many illustrious dead! It will be remembered that Ciaran, when founding his abbey there, declared that  many souls would ascend to heaven from that spot; and, as time went on, the conviction grew that those who were interred “in the graveyard of the noble Ciaran” would never, because the place was so hallowed, be condemned to eternal damnation. Royal personages deemed it an honour, and gave gifts in order that they might be buried there. Rory O’Conor, the last titular King of all Ireland, though he died in the Abbey of Cong,  to which he had retired A.D. 1183, leaving his son as regent, yet found his last home at holy Clonmacnoise, whither his remains were carried, “to have St. Ciaran’s privilege”.

Long ages ago, Enoch O’Gillan wrote a poem about the dead at Clonmacnoise, which has been rendered into English. Two verses must suffice for quotation here: —

In a quiet watered land, a land of roses,
Stands St. Ciaran’s city fair,
And the warriors of Erin in their famous generations
Slumber there.

There beneath the dewy hillside sleep the noblest
Of the Clan of Conn;
Each below his stone, with name in branching ogham,
And the sacred knot thereon.

History shows that despite the fact that the celebrated seat of learning lay “pent between limitless bogs and the river” — far  enough, it would seem, in its “passionless peace,” from the strife of tongues and the dreadful horrors of war, — it was, nevertheless, destroyed by violence some five  and twenty separate times. Ten of these raids were carried out by the Danes, who plundered  without mercy; the most famous of their leaders being Turgesius, whose aim appears to have been  the  complete  conquest  of  Ireland. For the rest, Clonmacnoise, ruined, desolate, almost forgotten, it may be, offers many points of interest. And lovers of the past, who wander amongst its churches, towers, and crumbling walls, have no difficulty in repeopling it with grave, scholarly  monks, and eager students athirst for knowledge; or in picturing the once warm welcome extended to all who sought learning and hospitality at their hands.

Marian Nesbitt, Our Lady in the Church and Other Essays (London, 1913), 216-224.

 

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November 3 is the feast day of Saint Camelacus (Camulacus, Caomhlach, Cáemlach) of Rahan, County Offaly. He appears to have been the original founder of the church at Rahan, but was later overshadowed by Saint Mochuda (Mochutu) or Carthage, the saint more readily associated with the monastery at this site. An original founder saint being eclipsed subsequently by another isn’t unknown. Speaking of the seventh century, Richard Sharpe, the translator of The Life of Saint Columba for the Penguin Classics series, makes this point:

They were years that witnessed immense changes in Irish society and in the Irish church. In particular, some early saints disappear from view as their churches were eclipsed by those of other saints. For example, a letter written in the 630s to Ségéne, fifth abbot of Iona, mentions a group of leading church founders; the list includes St Nessan, who fades from view before anything was recorded of him. Rahan, Co.Offaly, was regarded as the church of St Camelacus in the early seventh century, but a hundred years later his place had been reassigned to St Mochutu.

Richard Sharpe, ed. and trans. Adomnán of Iona, Life of St Columba (Penguin Books, 1995), p.4

But fortunately, unlike Saint Nessan, Saint Camelacus did not vanish completely for he is recorded in a number of early medieval sources. One of Saint Patrick’s earliest hagiographers, Tirechán, writing in the closing decade of the seventh century, recorded the names of bishops appointed to establish churches by the Irish patron. He tells us:

He sent Camelacus of the Comienses to Mag Cumi and with his finger pointed out to him the place from the hill of Granard, that is the church of Raithen.

What ‘of the Comienses’ means has never been determined. Some scholars feel that the saint’s own name raises questions too. Aidan Breen writes in the online Dictionary of Irish Biography:

The name Came(u)lacus is unusual. It could be Gaulish, and the epithet ‘of the Comienses’ might therefore refer to some Gaulish tribal group. If that is the case, Camelacus would have been one of the Gaulish bishops who assisted Patrick, along with Auxilius, Iserninus and Secundinus.

However, he goes on to acknowledge that the name Camelacus could be a Latinization of the Irish Cáemlach and Commienses of a tribal grouping in Offaly.

The Martyrology of Gorman records the saint under the name ‘Caemlach’ on November 3 with a scholiast note adding ‘from Rathen’. The Martyrology of Donegal records ‘CAEMHLACH, of Raithin’ at the same date.

But it is as the Latin Camelacus that one of the most intriguing sources testifies to our saint. For a Hymnus Sancti Camelaci is among the twelve hymns found in the late seventh-century Antiphonary of Bangor. The hymn, Audite bonum exemplum (Hear the good example), bears a number of similarities to the better-known and much longer Audite omnes amantes (Listen, all who love God) in honour of Saint Patrick, traditionally ascribed to the authorship of Saint Secundinus, which the Antiphonary also preserves. Father Michael Curran MSC, in his 1984 study The Antiphonary of Bangor and the Early Irish Monastic Liturgy, pointed out some similarities between the two hymns. Both are alphabetical hymns, both begin with Audite and both contain some other textual similarities. Furthermore:

Audite bonum also speaks of Camelacus, who was a fifth-century contemporary of Patrick, as if he were still alive, except in the final two stanzas where he is spoken of as being in his eternal home.

All of these similarities may indicate either that Audite bonus is an imitation of Audite omnes or that both were written by the same author. The shorter hymn draws a warm and attractive picture of Camelacus, who is characterized above all by humility, gentleness and joyful fidelity in the service of God. Mention is made more than once of his poverty.

Michael Curran MSC, The Antiphonary of Bangor and the Early Irish Monastic Liturgy (Dublin, 1984), 46-47.

One of the most interesting references in the Hymn to Saint Camelacus is found in the final stanza which says that Christ will place our saint in the company of the patriarch Abraham and he will reign in paradise with the holy Lazarus. This is clearly a reference to the parable of Dives and Lazarus found in the sixteenth chapter of the Gospel of Saint Luke. In his 1887 collection The Tripartite Life of Patrick with Other Documents relating to that Saint, Whitley Stokes included the curious Tale of Patrick and his Leper, where the leper is named Comlach. Father Curran suggests that the association of Saint Camelacus with Lazarus in the hymn anticipates this later tradition. The link with lepers is further strengthened by the founding of a leper colony at Rahan by Saint Carthage, directed there, according to hagiography, by Saint Colmán of Lann Elo. A growing number of modern scholars believe that Colmán of Lann Elo is the true author of the hymn of Secundinus in honour of Saint Patrick, Audite omnes amantes and thus Father Curran wonders if Saint Colmán had a personal devotion to Saint Camelacus and might also be the author of the hymn in his honour.  He speculates that:

It is possible that the new monastery and its leper-colony was a memorial and tribute to Camelacus, the first bishop of Raithin, who was remembered for his evangelical poverty and possibly for his care for lepers, if not already regarded as a leper himself.(p.47)

Yet it remains equally possible that the Audite bonum exemplum, the Hymn to Camelacus, is a shorter and less sophisticated composition written in the style of the Audite omnes amantes.  Whatever the truth, it is fascinating to see Camelacus, this otherwise obscure holy man, being one of only three saints, along with our national apostle and Saint Comgall, Bangor’s founder, to merit a hymn in his honour in The Bangor Antiphonary:

[15.] Hymnus Sancti Camelaci.

i. Audite bonum exemplum
Benedicti pauperis
Camelaci Cumiensis
Dei justi famuli.

ii. Exemplum praebet in toto
Fidelis in opere,
Gratias Deo agens,
Hilaris in omnibus,

iii. Jejunus et mansuetus
Kastus hic servit Deo,
Laetatur in paupertate,
Mitis est in omnibus,

iv. Noctibus atque diebus
Orat Dominum suum ;
Prudens, justus, ac fideiis,
Quem cognati diligunt.

v. Regem Dominum aspexit
Salvatoremque suum :
Tribuit huic aeternam
Vitam cum fidelibus.

vi. Xps [i.e. Christus] illum insinuavit
Patriarchae Abrahae,
Yn Paradiso regnavit
Cum sancto Lazaro.

(text from F.E.Warren and W. Griggs, The Antiphonary of Bangor: an early Irish manuscript in the Ambrosian Library at Milan 2 vols, (London 1893–1895).

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