OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Irish Saints

  • Saint Flann Fionn Cuillin, January 14

    The saints commemorated on the Irish calendars for January 14 are all somewhat obscure. Last year I looked at the life of Saint Baetan of Inisbofin, who appears to have been a successor to Saint Colman at the island monastery founded in the wake of the Paschal dating controversy. O’Hanlon lists another saint for this day, whose feast, like that of Saint Baetan, is well attested in the sources, but about whom we also have few other details, save that he seems to have flourished in the Cork area:

    St. Flann Fionn Cuillinn, of a place near Cork.

    Hereafter it may be possible for local investigators to discover the sites of holy places, the names alone being on record. The Irish MS. Calendar of the O’Clerys, which is kept in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy, mentions a saint, named Flann Fionn Cuillinn, at this day. He is said to have been from or of a place near Cork. We may suppose the place, called Cuillen or Cullen, must have been convenient to this southern city. A festival in honour of Flann fion i Cuillin i Fail Corcaighe, occurs in the Martyrology of Tallagh, on the 14th of January. Besides the foregoing entries, we find set down in the Martyrology of Donegal, on this day, Flann Finn of Cuillinn, in the vicinity of Corcach. This holy man must have flourished during or before the eighth century, since his festival, at this date, has been inscribed by St. Oengus the Culdee, in his Irish Metrical Calendar.

    Pádraig Ó Riain’s 2011 Dictionary of Irish Saints wonders if he might be the same person as Saint Flann of Derrynaflan, the site where the wonderful chalice and altar vessels were found in County Tipperary. 

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  • Saint Cummine mac Duibh of Drum Druith, January 12

    Canon O’Hanlon’s Lives of the Irish Saints records at January 12 a Saint Cummine (Cummeine, Cummain) who illustrates many of the difficulties faced by hagiologists in trying to discover the identity of some of our native saints:

    St. Cummein or Cuimmine, Son of Dubh, of Drum-Druith.
    A festival in honour of Cuimmine mac Duibh, of Druim Druith, is registered in the Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 12th of January. The place to which he belonged has not been identified. The Martyrology of Donegal likewise mentions, as having a festival on this day, Cummein, son of Dubh, of Drum-Druith. There is a Cuimin, son of Dima Dubh, belonging to the race of Fiachra, son to Eochaidh Muighmhedhoin. Finding a saint of this name interred at Bobbio, in the north of Italy, and not being able to discover with any certainty his having been different from the present holy man, Colgan has some memoranda regarding him inserted at the 12th of January. The name of Cummine first occurs at this date in our Calendars; and for no better reason is the Cummine or Cumian of Bobbio here introduced.
    The German scholar, Michael Richter, in his recent volume on Bobbio, the Italian foundation of Saint Columbanus, rules out this connection and assigns the Bobbio saint’s feastday to July 9. Cummine is a relatively common name in the Irish sources, the most famous saint of this name being the scholarly Cummine the Tall.

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  • Saint Anfadan of Glendalough, January 11

    At January 11 we commemorate one of the successors to Saint Kevin of Glendalough, Bishop Anfadan. He is recorded in the very earliest of the Irish Martyrologies but Canon O’Hanlon is unable to pin down definitively when he flourished:
    St. Amphadhan, or Anfadan, Bishop of Glendalough, County of Wicklow.
    We can only discover, in reference to this holy successor of St. Kevin, that an entry is made in the Martyrology of Tallagh, at the 11th of January, Anfadan, Bishop of Glendalough. The period of this bishop’s rule, we have not been able to ascertain. In the Annals of the Four Masters, there is mention of Anfadan, Abbot of Linn-Duachail, who died A.D. 758, but he does not appear to have had any connection with Glendalough. We read, likewise, in the Martyrology of Donegal on this day, about an Amphadhan, Bishop of Gleanndaloch. His name has been Latinized, Amphianus, in a table following the Martyrology proper.

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