OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Irish Saints

  • Saint Acobran of Kilrush, January 28

    January 28 is the feast of Saint Acobran of Kilrush, about whom not a great deal appears to be known. We have already met this saint, for in a post on a trio of saintly brothers commemorated on 28 November, I mentioned the contention of the English writer, Sabine Baring-Gould, that one of these brothers, also called Acobran, was to be identified with today’s saint. If our Acobran did indeed go off to Cornwall and later on to France as Baring-Gould claims, Canon O’Hanlon knows nothing of it, and it would not be like the good Canon to fail to claim such a career for an otherwise obscure Irish saint. On the contrary, in the Lives of the Irish Saints Acobran is depicted as a shadowy figure whose very location is the subject of doubt, with the Martyrology of Donegal initially identifying him with Kilrush, County Clare but then suggesting in the table appended to the Martyrology that this particular Kilrush is to be found in County Kildare. In the late 1830s when O’Donovan and his co-workers were carrying out their Ordnance Survey work in the parish of Kilrush, County Clare a letter noted ‘According to the Irish Calendar the Saints Mellan and Occobran were venerated at Cill Rois in the Termon of Inis Cathaigh on the 28th of January, but neither of them is now remembered in the Parish’. It may be that the cult of the most famous saint of Inis Cathaigh, Saint Senan, overshadowed and eventually displaced that of Saint Acobran. Canon O’Hanlon, as he often does when there is not much to say about a saint, goes into a description of church ruins associated with Saint Senan, but below are the essentials of what he has to tell us of Saint Acobran:

    St. Acobran of Kilrush, Probably in the County of Clare.

    …Without any other distinction, he is mentioned in the Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 28th of January, But we are not left in doubt regarding his locality, if we depend on the succeeding statement. According to the Martyrology of Donegal, we find Accobhran, of Cill-Ruis, in the Termon of Inis-Cathaigh, as having a festival celebrated on this day. In a table postfixed to this Martyrology, his place is thought to have been Kilrush, in the county of Kildare. He is said to have been otherwise called Occobhran, whence Ocobrus, Ocoras [Desiderius). The place usually designated for this saint is the present Kilrush, a parish in the barony of Moyarta and county of Clare. The present saint, to whatever place he belonged, appears to have lived in or before the eighth century. This is proved from the “Feilire” of St. Aengus the Culdee. With its English translation, Professor O’Looney has furnished the following stanza from the Leabhar Breac copy in the R. I. A.

    G. u. kl. With Acobran we celebrate
    The passion of eight noble virgins;
    They gained a triumph of righteousness,
    The great Miserian host.

    These latter seem to have been martyrs in Africa, and to have been part of a band, commemorated in St. Jerome’s ancient Martyrology….

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  • Saint Cróine, January 27

    January 27 is the feastday of an early female saint, Cróine, one of many Irish saints to have been recorded on the Irish calendars, but who has left no Vita to give further details of her life. As Canon O’Hanlon explains, there is even no certainty as to the locality in which she may have flourished, the Martyrology of Tallaght identifying her with Inuse Lochacrone which may suggest a County Sligo location, and the 19th-century scholar John O’Donovan placing her at Kilcroney, County Wicklow. The latest work on the Irish saints, Pádraig Ó Riain’s 2011 Dictionary of Irish Saints, places her instead at the County Carlow location of Ardnehue (Ceall Inghean nAodha) and sees her as one of three daughters of Aodh. Ó Riain acknowledges the confusion of this holy lady with others of the same name, including Cróine of Inis Cróine, who may be one of a number of possible doubles.

    St. Croine, Virgin, of Kill-Crony, in the County of Wicklow, or at Inishcrone, County of Sligo.

    A festival in honour of Croni of Inuse Lochacrone is entered in the Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 27th of January. The locality named is possibly identical with the present Inishcrone, near the River Moy, in Tireragh barony, county of Sligo. A strong castle of Eiscir-Abhann, stood here. Inishcrone town, with the ruined church and graveyard, is in the parish of Kilglass, and near the rocky shore, at Killala Bay. Again, there was a Cill-Cruain, now Kilcrone, an old church, giving name to a townland and parish in the barony of Ballymoe, in the county of Galway. We find that Croine, virgin, of Cill Croine, is recorded, likewise, in the Martyrology of Donegal, on this day. She is of the race of Máine, son of Niall. Her place has been identified with Kill-crony, in the county of Wicklow, and as giving no name to a modern parochial district, it may have been denominated from the establishment of a cell or nunnery here, by the present saint, while possibly clerical ministrations had been supplied by the religious community or pastor, living at Kilmacanoge, in remote times. More we cannot glean regarding this holy woman yet, we may conjecture, she must have flourished at a very early period.

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  • Saint Guaire Mór of Aghadowy, January 22

    January 22 is the commemoration of a northern saint, Guaire Mór of Aghadowy, County Derry. Canon O’Hanlon has this to tell us:

    St. Goar, Guarius, or Guaire Mór, of Aghadowy, County of Londonderry. [Probably in the Seventh or Eighth Century.]

    In the days of early youth, most probably this holy man had fought his way into the sanctuary of God as a young priest, and had arrived at distinction in the Church. We read in the Martyrology of Donegal, as having been venerated on this day, Guaire Mór, of Achadh Dubhthaigh, now the parish of Aghadowy or Aghadoey, county of Londonderry, on the banks of the Lower Banna, or River Bann. He was the son of Colman, son to Fuactage, son to Ferguss, son to Leogaire, son to Fiachre, son to Colla Uais, who was Monarch of Ireland. He is styled abbot of the foregoing place, in the plain of Li. The Martyrology of Tallaght records him on the 22nd of January, under the simple designation of Guaire. It does not seem probable this saint was the original founder of the monastery at this place, nor does his epithet of Mór, “great,” seem equivalent to “elder.” He was first cousin, yet removed by a later generation, to the saint, bearing this same name, whose feast occurs on the 9th of this month; and our present Guaire Mór probably succeeded the other in order of time. Perhaps, indeed, notwithstanding such a probability, and his apparently junior age, this Guaire Mór may have founded Aghadowey Church singly, or in conjunction with his cousin; and the term applied to the present saint might indicate superiority, celebrity, or position. Perhaps simply a difference of stature may have caused the distinction in names between Guaire Mór and Guaire Beg.

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