OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

ALL THE SAINTS OF IRELAND

  • Saint Comán of Lismore, October 31

    We close the month of October with the commemoration of an abbot of Lismore, County Waterford, a successor to the founder, Saint Carthage or Mochuda. The Martyrology of Donegal lists two abbots of Lismore at 31 October – Comán and Colman – but, as the following extract from a diocesan history suggests, we may be dealing with a single individual:

    31 C. PRIDIE KAL. NOVEMBRIS. 31.

    COMÁN, Ua Ciarain, Abbot of Lis-mor.
    COLMAN, Abbot of Lis-mor. The age of Christ when he resigned his spirit was 702.

    The church and monastery of Lismore, which grew to be one of the renowned centres of ancient Irish learning and piety, owed its foundation to St. Mochuda of the 7th century. Mochuda, otherwise Carthage, was a native of Kerry, and he had been abbot of Rahan in Offaly. It is probable that there had been a Christian church at Lismore previous to the time of Mochuda, for in the Saint’s Life there is an implied reference to such a foundation. Be this as it may, Mochuda, driven out of Rahan, with his muintir, or religious household, migrated southward, and, having crossed the Blackwater at Affane, established himself at Lismore in 630. In deference to Mochuda’s place of birth the saint’s successor in Lismore was, for centuries, a Kerryman. Lismore grew in time to be a great religious city, and a school of sacred sciences, to which pilgrims from all over Ireland and scholars from beyond the seas resorted. The rulers of the great establishment were all, or most of them, bishops, though they are more generally styled abbots by the Annalists. Among the number are several who are listed as Saints by the Irish Martyrologies, scil:

    Comman, grandson of Ciaran, abbot of Lismore … … … Oct. 31.

    [His name is written Colman in Martyr. Donegal.]

    Patrick Power, Waterford & Lismore – A Compendious History of the United Dioceses (Cork, 1937), 5-6.

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  • Saint Ernach of Duneane, October 30

    There is a considerable amount of confusion surrounding the identity of the saint commemorated at the County Antrim locality of Duneane on October 30. For although the calendars record the name of a male saint Ernach at this date, they also record a female Hercnat or Ergnata on the same day. This female saint has a second feast at January 8. The diocesan historian, Father James O’Laverty, attempts to sort out the confusion, although he ends by introducing yet another saint into the mix: 

    Colgan (Acta. S.S. 8 Jan.) says, “St. Ergnata flourished
    about the year of Christ, 460, and our Hagiologists relate,
    that her festival was celebrated in the Church of Cluainda-en
    (the meadow of the two birds), in the district called
    Fiodhbhaidh (Feevagh), and in the Church of Tamhlact-bo,
    both on the 8th of January, and on the 31st (recte 30th), of
    October.” Colgan adds in a note that Cluain-da-en is a
    parochial church on the banks of Lough Neagh. Two
    transcripts of the Calendar of Aengus, read at the 30th of
    October, where it commemorates St. Ernach — “Ernach a
    virgin (uag) a high pillar,” but the oldest transcript which
    Whitley Stokes gives, reads, “Ernach, a youth (oc), a high
    pillar.” It is obvious that there were two saints, one a
    virgin, the daughter of the prince, who gave Armagh to St.
    Patrick; she was named Ergnata, or Eargnath, or Herenat,
    and was honoured on the 8th of January, with a festival in
    the Church of Tamlachtbo, in the parish of Eglish, Armagh. While there was another saint called by nearly
    the same name, though a man, who was honoured by a
    festival in the Church of Duneane, which was held on the
    30th of October. In process of time, the hagiologists confounded the two on account of the similarity of names.
    Thus the Calendar of Donegal has, at the 8th of January, “Eargnat, Virgin of Dun-da-en, in Dalaraidhe,” and
    again at the 30th of October, it has

    “Hercnat, Virgin of Dun-da-en, in Fiodhbhadh (Feevagh),
    of Dalaraidh.”

    The note on the Festology of Aengus, in the L. Breac,
    sets the matter at rest.

    Ernach-i-MacTairnd, &c., Ernach, i.e. son of Tairnd, is his
    name, but it fitted not the quatrain; and in Dun-da-en, in
    Fidbaid (Feevagh), of Dalaraidhe, is he”.  Dun-da-en, the old form of the name Duneane, signifies
    “the fort of the two birds,” in allusion to some old legend
    a version of which is given below. Feevagh is still the name of
    district adjoining Duneane. St. Ernach, whose festival was
    held on the 30th of October, in Duneane, seems to be the
    same St. Ernin, whose festival was held on the 31st of May, in Cranfield. 

    Rev. James O’Laverty, An Historical Account of the Diocese of Down and Connor, Ancient and Modern, Vol. III (Dublin, 1884), 333-334.

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  • Saint Abbán of Moyarney, October 27

    One of the saints, commemorated on October 27 in the Martyrology of Oengus as ‘Abbán an abbot fair and train-having’, presents us with something of a mystery as to his identity. One problem is that as the scholiasts’ notes make clear, the lifespan of this saint was said to have exceeded three hundred years:

    27. Abbán, great-grandson of Cormac, i.e. from Cell Abbain in Hui Muiredaig and from Mag Ernaidi in Húi Cennselaig, i.e. in Húi Buidi; and a great-grandson of Cormac is he himself; and this is the feast of his nativity.

    Abbán, son of Laignech, son of Cainnech, son of Imchad, son of Cormac, son of Cucorp.

    Seventeen pure-shaped years, in addition to the number three-hundred, the age of Abbán, shapely lord, while he was in the body.

    This plus the extraordinary number of churches which claim Abbán as founder, has led many writers to speculate that there must have been more than one saint of this name, even though the sources try to present a single individual, Abban of Kilabban, a nephew of Saint Ibar, whose feast is commemorated on March 16. Writer Eoin Neeson attempts to clarify the matter:

    ABBAN of Moyarney, County Wexford. An abbot who has been confused with Abban of Killabbban in Laois and whose feast-day is on March 16. They may have been the same individual, but there is no certainty either way. Tradition would suggest that there were two Abbans, while holding that there was only one; but if so he must have been singularly long-lived for he died in 630, yet is reputed to have preached before the coming of Patrick (432). It is probable that there were two Abbans, to-day’s being the latter. He was of royal blood and, indeed, was imprisoned by his father because he chose the Church rather than the local kingship. He is invoked against shipwreck.

    Eoin Neeson, The Book of Irish Saints (Cork, 1967), 190.

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