OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

ALL THE SAINTS OF IRELAND

  • Saint Tiopraite of Magh-ratha, December 27

    We have another of the many obscure Irish saints commemorated on December 27. In the case of Tiopraite of Magh-ratha, the locality associated with him brings its own problems of identification. The Martyrology of Donegal records:

    27. D. SEXTO KAL. JANUARII. 27.

    TIOPRAITE, of Magh-ratha.

    whilst the earlier Martyrology of Gorman says, rather more poetically:

    27. d. 

    Tipraite fail findnoem

    Tipraite a fair, holy fence
    The index of places attached to the Martyrology lists a number of possible locations for Magh-ratha:
    Mag Ratha, Dec. 27, gl. 2, now Moira, co. Down? or Moyra Glebe, in co. Donegal? or Moyrath, in Meath  or Moyra, in co. Longford?

    A nineteenth-century antiquarian made a case for identifying Magh-ratha with Moira, County Down, a
    locality said to have been the site of a famous eighth-century battle. He mentions our saint in passing:

    It also appears by the Calendar of Donegal, December 27, that there was another church in Magh Rath, dedicated to St. Tiopraite, but nothing more of it is known…

     
    But since the writer does not provide conclusive proof that Moira, County Down is the Magh Rath spoken of in the sources, it remains equally likely that the church of Saint Tiopraite was located at one of the other suggested sites. The website Place Names NI sums
    up the latest scholarly thinking on the derivation of this place name,
    which is not as straightforward as it might at first sight appear.  
     
    So, all we can say for sure is that the name of Saint Tiopraite is recorded on December 27 in two
    of the later Irish Martyrologies but when and where exactly he
    flourished remains open to question.

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  • 'The High-King of Heaven was born in kindly Bethlehem at Christmas' – a 15th-century Irish Poem



    Mary, the smooth white ewe, bore an
    illustrious Lamb in the stall of an ass; she merited not a mean cold lodging
    when the illustrious Lamb was with His mother.

    The High-King of Heaven was born in kindly
    Bethlehem at Christmas; when He was born He took a course from the sun so that
    He warmed the world with His glowing heat.
    The windows of the moon and ether opened at
    the tidings, so that the sun flung wide his doors, heretofore there had been a
    veil over his light.
    The air was full of his radiance, ’twas
    easy to notice it, it was one bright grove of angels reaching to heaven over
    Holy Mary.

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    Quiggin, Edmund Crosby ‘Prolegomena to the study of the later Irish bards 1200-1500′(Oxford,1911), 39.

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  • Saint Maolán of Tullaghmelan, December 25

    Among the Irish saints who celebrate their feast days on the Feast of Christ’s Nativity is Saint Maolán of Tullaghmelan. Not much is actually known of him save that he is remembered as the founder of the church of Tullaghmelan. Diocesan historian, Father Patrick Power, writes of this locality:

    Tullaghmelan Parish. 

    THE Parish, which is about average size, lies on the north bank of the Suir along the Co. Waterford boundary line. Its name Tulaigh Maoláin (“Maylon’s Height”) does not appear ecclesiastical, yet it is the tradition of the locality that Maolan was the founder of the church. In fact, an effigy of stone still preserved in the precincts of the ruin is said to be his.
    Rev. P. Power, The Place Names of Decies, (London, 1907), 353.
    The Irish calendars record the saint at December 25 with the Martyrology of Donegal listing:

    25. B. OCTAVO KAL. JANUARII. 25.

    MAELÁN, Bishop.

    whilst the Martyrology of Gorman describes him as ‘great Maelán, void of weakness’.
    The earlier Martyrology of Tallaght lists ‘Melani episcopi’ on this date, along with three other native saints.
     
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