OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Female Saints

  • Saint Tuililatha of Kildare, January 6

    January 6 is the feast day of a group of three female saints, collectively known as the ‘Daughters of Nadfrac’. Often with such groups of saints we do not have the names of the individuals who comprise it, but in this case the sources preserve the identities of  three distinct holy women- Muadhnat, Tuililatha and Osnat- albeit that that they are all commemorated on the same day. The three sisters are associated with monastic foundations in different parts of Ireland. Canon O’Hanlon starts with Saint Muadhnat, but as I have come across some further research on this saint at the last minute, I will start instead with the middle sister, Saint Tuililatha (also known as Tallula, Tuilach and more recently, Tuilclath), a successor to Saint Brigid as abbess of Kildare. At the end of his short piece Canon O’Hanlon follows the authority of the seventeenth-century hagiologist, Father John Colgan, in telling us that she flourished about the year 590, having been somewhat less impressed by the eighteenth-century Anglican antiquary, Mervyn Archdall, author of the famous survey of Irish religious houses, Monasticon Hibernicum (1786):

    St. Tallulla or Tulilach, Virgin, and Abbess of Kildare, County of Kildare. [Sixth Century.]

    The spouse of Christ leaves her home with its comforts, its joys, and its happy associations, as the bird leaves earth beneath it, soaring upward towards the skies, where it feels exposed to less danger and enjoys truer liberty. A sister to the aforementioned holy Virgin [i.e. St. Muadhnat] was St. Tallulla or Tulilach. By Archdall she is incorrectly called Falulla, and apparently without authority he assigns her rule over a community to A.D. 580. Tallulla, Abbess of Cill-Dara, or Kildare, occurs in the Martyrologies of Marianus O’Gorman and of Donegal, on this day. The epithet, Virgin, is affixed to a nearly similar entry in the Martyrology of Tallagh at the 6th of January. Here she is called Tuililatha. It cannot be ascertained, whether she preceded or succeeded St. Comnat in the government of nuns at Kildare for we only learn that the present holy abbess flourished about the year 590.

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  • Saint Cera of Kilkeary, January 5


    January 5 is the feast of Saint Cera of Kilkeary. My previous posting on Saint Cera was the account from The Lives of the Irish Saints, now we have another, this time from Canon O’Hanlon’s predecessor, Father John Lanigan. Father Lanigan wrote a four-volume ecclesiastical history of Ireland in the 1820s and often took quite a critical and sceptical tone regarding the work of earlier authorities such as Colgan and Archdall. Some of his instincts and insights were quite correct though and his work is still very readable. Lanigan’s style was to write a paragraph and then provide copious notes to back up what he had said, as you will see from his account of Saint Cera:
    The holy virgin St. Cera, alias Chier, died in 680. (155) She is said to have been the daughter of one Duibhre, and of an illustrious family of Muskerry in the now county of Cork. It is supposed that she was the St. Chier, who, together with five other virgins, applied to St. Fintan Munnu, when residing in Heli (Ely O’Carrol) for a situation to establish a nunnery, and to whom he is said to have assigned the place, where he had lived himself, afterwards called Tech-telle. (156) That St. Cera spent some time in this place I do not find any sufficient reason for denying; (157) but it is very doubtful whether she got it from Fintan Munnu, or whether he had ever resided there. (158) How long she remained in Heli we are not informed. Returning thence to her own country she founded a nunnery, called, from her name, Killchree, now Kilcrea, (159) a few miles S. W. from the city of Cork, which she governed until her death. The reputation of this saint was very great, and her festival was kept at Kilcrea not only on the 5th of January, the anniversary of her decease, but likewise on the 16th of October, as a day of commemoration.
    (155) Colgan, treating of this saint at 5 January, has, from the Irish annals, A. 679. i. e. 680 for her death.

    (156) Archdall places Tech-Telle or Teaghtelle in the county of Westmeath, because Colgan says that, from having been in Heli, it afterwards was comprized in the western Meath, But by western Meath Colgan, and the older writers whom he quotes, understood not only the present Westmeath, but likewise the King’s county, in which Tech-Telle ought to be placed, whereas no part of Heli ever extended as far as what is now called Westmeath. Tech-Telle, or the house of Telle, got its name from St. Telle, son of Segen, who was contemporary with Fintan Munnu, and accordingly lived in the early part of the seventh century, and whose memory was revered on the 25th of June. (See AA. SS. p. 15. and 713.) Archdall has for this saint another Teach Telle at Teltown in the county of East Meath. And why? Because Colgan, speaking of him (at 713 ib.) places Teach-Telle in Midia, or Meath in general. But he had elsewhere (p. 15.) observed, that the part of Midia, in which Teach-Telle lay, was the western; and we have just seen that it was in the tract now called the King’s county. It is plain, on comparing the passages of Colgan, that he knew of only one Teach-Telle. As to Teltown, a place not far from Kells to the East, there is no reason to think that it owes its name to any saint, and it is more than probable that it is the same, at least in part, as the ancient Tailten, celebrated for the sports held there in former times. (See Not. 6. to Chap, v.)

    (157) She is stated to have been in that place before it was occupied by St. Telle. The only difficulty is that Telle flourished before the death, in 635, of Fintan Munnu. But St. Cera seems to have been young at the time she is said to have been there. Supposing that this was about 625, her having lived until 680 contains nothing contradictory or unchronological.

    (158) See Not. 78. to Chap. xv.

    (159) Colgan, in the Acts of this saint, which he has endeavoured to patch up, pretends that she had founded the nunnery of Kilcrea, before she went to Heli. The only reason, that appears for this position, is that he thought, and indeed very strangely, that she was the St. Ciara who is mentioned, in the Life of St. Brendan of Clonfert, as a holy virgin, contemporary with him, and living in Muscrighe Thire. He confounded Muscrighe Thire with the Muskerry of Cork, not recollecting, as he often does elsewhere, that the former was the tract now called Lower Ormond in Tipperary, whereas the latter was known by the name of Muscrighe Mitine. This is not the worst part of his hypothesis; for he knew that St. Brendan was dead since 577. And yet he would fain make us believe that a person, who lived until 680, was a distinguished saint in his days. To enable us to swallow this anachronism, he says she might have reached the age of 130. Harris was so led astray by this stuff, that he assigned the foundation of Kilcrea to the sixth century. Archdall says nothing (at Kilcrea) about the time of this foundation; but (at Teachtelle) he introduces St. Cera building an abbey, as he calls it at Teachtelle, before the year 576. Passing by these absurdities, I shall only add that, if there was a St. Ciara or Cera in Brendan’s time, she was different from the one of Kilcrea, and that she belonged to Lower Ormond. Colgan observes that, besides the St. Cera of Kilcrea, three other holy virgins of the same name are mentioned in the Irish calendars.
    Rev. J. Lanigan, An Ecclesiastical History of Ireland, Volume III (Dublin, 1829), 129-131.

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  • Saint Samthann of Clonbroney, December 19

    December 19 is the feastday of one of my favourite Irish saints – Samthann of Clonbroney, County Longford. The Martyrology of Oengus devotes its entire entry for this day to her:
    C. xiv. cal. Ianuarii. 
    19. Blithe unto my soul,
    with the vastness of her host,
    be the fair pure manna of elemental God,
    Samthann of Clúain Brónaig !
    The later Martyrology of Donegal reads:
    19. C. QUARTO DECIMO KAL. JANUARII. 19. 
    SAMHTHANN, Virgin, of Cluain-Bronaigh, in Cairbre in Tethbha, near Granard. She was of the race of Fiatach Finn, monarch of Erin. The age of Christ when she went to heaven was 734.
    We are blessed in having a surviving Life of Saint Samthann which records how, having forsaken her aristocratic husband on their wedding night to follow the religious life, she came to the monastery of Clonbroney and was put in charge by its founder, Saint Fuinech. The following excerpts from the Vita Sanctae Samthannae Virginis have been taken from Dorothy Africa’s translation:
    5. At that time the foundress of Clonbroney, the blessed virgin Fuinech, dreamt that sparks of fire in the likeness of Saint Samthann came and consumed the whole monastery, and then rose up in a great flame. She told her dream to the sisters and gave this interpretation: “Burning with the fire of the Holy Spirit, Samthann will make this place shimmer by virtue of her merits and in the splendour of miracles”. For that reason, Fuinech sent for Samthann and gave her the community.
    Like Saint Brigid of Kildare, with whom she has much in common, many of Saint Samthann’s miracles concern food and in the one recorded below, she also emerges as a saint with a sense of humour:
    6. After she had taken charge, first she wanted to construct an oratory of trimmed timber, and so she sent for carpenters and other workmen to bring in timber from forests nearby. One of the carpenters, observing the paucity of the provisions and the number of workers, thought to himself “Oh, if only we could have forty wheaten loaves with butter and cheese and milk, for such a quantity of bread suffice us.” Man is not frustrated in his desire for something his soul has desired. For through the merits of holy Samthann, all he had thought he saw placed before him. The intimate of Christ, giggling, said “The thought of your heart is fulfilled is it not?” And he said to her “Indeed so Mistress, there is neither something in addition, or anything missing.” Then all gave thanks to God and ate their fill.
    But, as an Irish saint, it doesn’t do to cross her, even at a distance:
    16. Once the holy servant of Christ desired to build a large hall for the work of the sisters, and sent Nathea the prioress with the craftsmen into the forest of Connacht for pine timber. When they had searched for three whole days without finding the wood, the weary group decided on the fourth day to return home. While they slept that night, the blessed Samthann suddenly appeared in a dream to her disciple Nathea, saying “Tomorrow morning cut down bog willows at the root, and you will find enough pine lying there.” At daybreak, they did just so as she instructed, and found the pine they desired. But the owner of the woods, seeing such a heap of pine, said, “unless you buy them, you will not get these trees.” Nathea said to him “we will buy them willingly”. The following night Samthann appeared in a vision to that man. She spoke in a threatening voice, saying “What tempts you fellow, to withold these things offered to God?” Then she struck his side with a staff, saying “wretch, unless you do penance, know that you will die very soon.” Next morning, that man, stung by penance, gave them the lumber outright. When word got out, the inhabitants of the region praised God as manifest in the holy Samthann. They provided sixty yokes of oxen and conveyed all that wood back to the monastery.
    But, of course, the Life balances such accounts of the saint’s displeasure with accounts of her mercy. Below is my very favourite instance of her clemency, where Saint Samthann deals leniently with a young whippersnapper who fails to show her the proper respect:
    23. Once the community of brothers on the isle of Iona sent some of their members to the holy Samthann with a boatload of wool. While they were clearing the level surface (of the sea), the calm of the air changed suddenly. The waves, raised by the heightening of the winds, menaced them angrily with death. A lad among them spoke up foolishly, saying, “Let’s throw the granny’s wool overboard lest we sink”. The navigator of the ship refused to allow this, and said, “Certainly not, with the old lady’s wool we shall either live or die”. With this remark, such serenity of the sea ensued that the wind disappeared altogether and they resorted to rowing. Then the same boy piped up again, “Why can’t the granny provide us any wind now?” The navigator responded, “we believe that God will assist us for the sake of her merits”. At once the wind filled their sails and they capitalized on this gift for three whole days and nights until they reached the harbour at Colptha. When they had arrived at the monastery of the blessed virgin, they saluted her as they entered and kissed her hand. When the aforesaid lad approached her, the virgin said “Now what was that you were saying about me at sea when the storm threatened you with death?” The boy was confounded into silence with shame. She said to him “Never doubt this, if ever dangers corner you, call upon me boldly”.
    The Life ends with a beautiful image of Saint Samthann’s journey to heaven at the end of her earthly life:
    26. On the very night in which her spirit returned to heaven, the holy abbot Lasran, of whom we spoke earlier, awoke and saw two moons, one of which dipped towards him. He was mindful of his own request, for he had asked her that when she passed to the celestial realm she would bend toward him. Recognizing her in the guise of a star, he said, “Well done, Samthann, faithful servant of God, for now you are ushered into the rejoicing of the Lord, your spouse.” In this fashion she faded away, climbing into the sky, where eternal life is enjoyed for ever and ever, Amen.
    Dorothy Africa, trans., Life of the Holy Virgin Samthann, in T. Head, ed., Medieval Hagiography – An Anthology (Routledge, 2001), 97-110.
    Amen indeed!

    A further selection from the Life of Saint Samthann can be read here.

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