September 3 is the commemoration of a Saint Colman and a degree of confusion seems to have arisen over the name of his locality, with some sources calling it Druim ferta and others Cluain ferta. The translator of the later Martyrology of Donegal notes that at Druim ‘The word Droma is written as a gloss over Cluain, meaning that we should read Drumfert, not Clonfert, here.’ Canon O’Hanlon suggests that the place is now the parish of Kilclonfert, County Offaly, which was known as King’s County prior to Irish independence. I note that the local Catholic parish church at Kilclonfert is dedicated to Saint Colman, and that there appears to have been a revival of interest in the maintenance of the holy well dedicated to the saint. There is a two-part video online showing the annual clean-up of the well by a local family who reckon this is their hereditary right, the soundtrack wasn’t to my taste but at the end of the second part the people seem to fall quiet as they pray softly and then add some blessed water to the newly-cleaned well, which looks splendid after all their work. Below are the details from the calendars for the feast of Saint Colman, which seem to be the only information Canon O’Hanlon is able to bring:

St. Colman, of Cluain or Druim Ferta Mughaine, now Kilclonfert, King’s County.

In the Feilire of St. Aengus, at the 3rd day of September, we have an entry for the feast of Colman of Druim Ferta. A commentator, on that copy contained in the Leabhar Breac, states, that the place is to be identified with Cluain Ferta Mugaine in Offaly. It is at present known as Kilclonfert, a parish in the Barony of Lower Philipstown, and King’s County. Some ruins of the old Church are still visible. Near them may be found the well of St. Colman, but corruptly called St. Cloman’s well…According to the Martyrology of Donegal, veneration was given at the 3rd of September to Colman, of Cluain-Ferta or Druim-Ferta. This place is also called Mughaine, in Ui Failghe, or Offaly, a district in Leinster.

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A saint named Berchán is not celebrated before the 10th century. No Berchán is found in the uninterpolated text of the 9th-century ecclesiastical calendar Féilire Oengusso. By the 12th century when notes were added to the text, two Bercháns are common. Berchán of Eigg (10 April) and Berchán of Clúain Sosta (4 December)… In the Martyrology of Tallaght there are four individuals named Berchán: Berchán of Eigg (10 April), Berchán of Clúain Caon (24 May), Berchán (5 June) and Berchán of Clúain Sosta (4 August)….

Among these holy men, Berchán of Clúain Sosta was the best known in the Middle Ages. His name is not found in the original text of the Féilire Oengusso, but it is in the notes in Rawlinson B.505 where he is described as fer dá leithe (“man of two halves”) who lived half his life in Scotland and half in Ireland. He is identified as a native of Britain who is settled at Clúain Sosta in the territory of the Kingdom of Uí Failge (now Cloonsast, Co. Offally). Among the bishops listed in the Book of Leinster is included Berchán i Clúain Sasta. The list of bishops of Ireland compiled by the celebrated 17th-century antiquarian Dubhaltach mac Firbisigh on 17 March 1666 includes a ‘Berchán, bishop and prophet from Clúain Sosta, and his feast day is 4 December’… The full name of the bishop from Clúain Sosta was Berchán mac Muiredaich who is identified as Berchán of Clúain Sosta in the Book of Leinster’s version of his mother’s genealogy. Her name was Fiaman ingen Diarmata, from the northern branch of the powerful Uí Neill dynasty. Berchán mac Muiredaich’s paternal genealogy is also preserved in the Book of Leinster, where he is described as prophet, bishop and poet.

Saint Berchán’s reputation as a prophet is referred to by Gerald of Wales in his book, The Topography of Ireland. He lists the saint as one of the four prophets of Ireland, the other three being Saints Patrick, Colum Cille and Moling. Gerald is especially interested in Berchán as he is credited with a prophecy that the English would prevail in Ireland until they were subdued by a king from Uí Fáeláin. In a later Irish manuscript of Gerald’s other work, The Conquest of Ireland, this prophecy has become a prediction of the conquering Anglo-Norman Richard de Clare, or Strongbow, whom we last encountered on the blog being given a deathbed lesson in the proper respect for the Irish saints by Saint Brigid herself (see here.)

Saint Berchán is also mentioned in a number of other medieval sources including the Book of Howth and the Book of Fenagh. His prophecies were also supposedly collected and published in 1317 by Walter de Islip, the royal custos of Kilkenny. The prophecies continued to be of interest to the Irish in their later struggles against the English, they are credited, for example with contributing to the Irish victory over the English forces at the Battle of Yellow Ford in 1598.

Finally, Saint Berchán is also associated with a book, produced at his monastery of Clúain Sosta. There is a note in the Leabhar Breac that its version of a history of Alexander the Great came from the Book of Berchán and that its copy had been made in the monastery of Clúain Sosta. Hudson records that the book was still extant in the 16th century, when the Earl of Kildare listed a ‘Saint Beraghan’s boke’ in his library catalogue. It has since disappeared and its fate remains unknown.

In the 19th century, the scholar John O’Donovan recorded in his Ordnance Survey Letters that the local people of Clonsast kept the memory of their patron saint alive. He wrote ‘the Patron is vividly remembered to be St. Brachan (Brochan?) (perhaps a contradiction for Berachan) whose memory was annually celebrated with great devotion at his well called Tobar-Brachain on the third of December’. O’Donovan’s letter of 1837, which includes an interesting account of the suppression of the traditional pattern days at Clonsast can be read in full here.

It would thus seem that the December date may have the better claim to be the feastday for Saint Berchán. Whatever the case, I find him to be a fascinating and compelling figure, this ‘man of two halves’ and will explore some of the works associated with him in future posts.