OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Irish Saints

  • Saint Cubretan of Moville, October 17

    October 17 is the commemoration of Saint Cubretan, a holy man associated with the County Down monastery of Moville. The Martyrology of Donegal records:

    17. C. SEXTO DECIMO KAL. NOVEMBRIS. 17.

    CUBRETAN, Anchorite, of Magh-bile.

    Although the passing of various abbots of Moville is recorded in the Irish Annals, they do not note our saint and thus there is no information recorded about the period in which Cubretan the Anchorite flourished. The Anglican scholar, Bishop William Reeves gives this brief sketch of the monastery with which he was associated:
    MAGH-BILE – This church, which stood a short way from the head of Strangford  Lough, and about an English mile to the N. E. of Newtownards, was founded by Finian, or Findbarr [fionn barr ‘white top’], as he was sometimes called,—” a flavis capillis ” (Maguir). The ancient Life of St. Comgall, in the Books of Armagh and Kilkenny, speak of him as ” Vir vitae venerabilis S. Finbarrus Episcopus, qui jacet in miraculis multis in sua civitate Maghbile”. Marian Gorman styles him “Findianus corde devotus, Episcopus de Mag-bile’… The Annals of Inisfallen refer the death of St. Finian to the year 572. It is calculated that his church was founded about the year 540. The memory of this Finian was so much revered in the diocese of Down, that he was regarded as the patron saint of that part of Ulster.

    Rt Rev. William Reeves, Ecclesiastical Antiquities of Down, Connor and Dromore (Dublin, 1857), 151.

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  • Saint Riaghail of Muicinis, October 16

    The Irish Calendars commemorate Saint Riaghail of Muicinis on October 16, a saint who may also have been honoured in Scotland. There he was later confounded with an eastern saint said to have brought the relics of the apostle Andrew to Scotland. The Monasticon Hibernicum has this to say of Saint Riaghail and his locality:

    Mucinis, Regulus, who was living in the time of the great St. Columb, was abbot of Mucinis, in Lough-Derg, bordering the County of Galway; his festival is held here on 16th of October.

    to which Bishop Moran has added:

    The name of St. Regulus, in Irish Riaghail, is entered in the Martyrology of Donegal, on the 16th of October: — “Riaghail, Abbot of Muicinis, in Loch Deirgdheire.” He is also commemorated in the Felire of Aengus with the strophe: — “Riaghail, gifted was his career.” His Acts are inserted in the Breviary of Aberdeen and he is especially honoured in St Andrew’s, in Scotland, on March 30th and October the 17th.

    Rt. Rev. P.F. Moran, ed.,M.Archdall, Monasticon Hibernicum, Volume II, (Dublin, 1876), 223.

    I was left unsure if our Irish saint is the same as the saint venerated in Scotland and turned to Bishop Forbes’ work on the Scottish calendars to see what evidence he could muster:

    REGULUS or RULE. March 30 and October 17.—The commemoration of the Scotch S. Regulus occurs in the Breviary of Aberdeen on March 30, the same day as that of “S. Regulus or Rieul, who, having converted the country of Senlis to the faith, about the same time that S. Dionysius preached in France, was made first bishop of Senlis, and died in peace in the midst of his flock.”—(Alban Butler ad diem, on the authority of the Bollandists and Tillemont.) So Usuardus, “Apud castrum Silvanectensium, depositio Sancti Reguli episcopi et confessoris.”—(Ed. Seller, p. 180.) Another day, the 17th of October, is also kept in his honour: Quoniam in quadragesima de eo non fuerit servitium, omnia sicut in alio festo, sed differtur in crastinum (Brev. Aberd. pars estiv. fol. cxxviii.); and it is remarkable that the 16th of October is the day of S. Riaghail, abbot of Muicinis, in Lough Derg on the Shannon (Mart. Donegal). He is commemorated in the Felire of Aengus at October 16th as

    Riaguil raith arremsin.
    [Riagail gifted was his career.]

    which is glossed by
    i. Riagail Muicindsi fa Loch derc.
    [i.e. Riaghail of Muicinis in Loch Derg.]

    The Breviary of Aberdeen says that he is specially honoured in S. Andrews and its diocese. The Martyrology of Aberdeen associates him with the church of Kylrewni…

    Alexander Penrose Forbes, D.C.L. Bishop of Brechin, Kalendars of Scottish Saints, (1872), 436-437.

    Thus it would appear that it is the close coincidence of the feast days of the Irish saint and of the Scot  which suggests they are the same person. The Irish Bishop Moran, however, presents a plausible case for the presence of our Saint Riaghail in Scotland in another of his works. After establishing that the original name for St Andrew’s was Kilrigmond, he says:

    The first mention which we find of Kilrigmond points it out as a monastery of Irish religious, and, among other saints, the patron of Kilkenny, St. Canice, pursued there a life of holy seclusion for some  time. Even St. Regulus himself is found to have been one of those Irish saints, and his name is none other than the Irish Riaghail. He was a contemporary of St. Canice, and famed in our early church as abbot of Muicinish, in Lough Derg, on the Shannon, and, like many of our saints, it is probable that he made North Britain the theatre of his missionary zeal, and closed his days at Kil-Rigmond. It was only in the year 736 that the Pictish monarch, in gratitude to God for a great victory which he had achieved, erected there a church in honour of his patron, St. Andrew, which he enriched with vast possessions, and which in the course of time became the royal and primatial church of the whole kingdom. At the time that St. Andrew’s was thus founded, Kil-Rigmond had the Irishman, Tuathal, for its abbot, whose demise is recorded in the Annals of Tighernach under the year 747.

    Right Rev. P.F. Moran, Irish Saints in Great Britain (Dublin, 1879), 200.

    Note: For more on the legend of Saint Regulus see here.

  • Saint Becc mac Dé, October 12

    D.Wright, Druidism (1924)

    October 12 is the feast day of Saint Becc (Bec, Beg) mac De, whom the Irish Annals say was a sixth-century saint with a particular gift for prophecy.  He is a well-known character in mythology, where he appears in the role of druid to King Diarmaid, but Saint Becc’s feast day is also recorded on the Irish calendars. The Martyrology of Donegal has this notice:

    12. QUARTO IDUS OCTOBRIS. 12.

    BECC, son of De, son of Gnoe. He was of the race of Colla-dachrioch, and a celebrated prophet.

    One of the prophecies attributed to this holy man concerns the birth of Saint Brendan the Navigator which is recorded in the Betha Brennain, the Irish Life of Brendan. The following text and commentary are from the work of Kerry parish priest, Father Denis O’Donahue:

    There dwelt at some distance from the house of Finnlugh, a certain rich man, whose name was Airde (5), son of Fidach. At this time there came to his mansion a chief prophet of Erin, whose name was (6) Becc MacDé; Airde inquired of Becc, “What unknown event was soon to happen there ;” and Becc answered: ” There will be born this night, between you and the sea, your true and worthy king, whom many kings and princes will devoutly honour, whom he will bear with him to heaven.”

    5. — Airde MacFidaigh.

    The mansion of this “brugaid” (great farmer) in which St. Becc was entertained when he prophesied the birth of Brendan, stood on the crest of a verdant knoll or hillock in the townland of Listrim, adjoining the parish of Ardfert, commonly called Cahirard (stone fortress on the height), but which, an accurate map of the locality, more than three hundred years old, shows to be Cahirairde (fortress of Airde). From this Fenit lies due west, “between it and the open sea according to the prophecy of St. Becc, as given in the Book of Leinster: ” this night thy king is born between thee on the west and the sea.” On the top of this hillock can be easily traced at present the ring of the foundations of the Cathair, which crowned its swelling slopes, showing a diameter of more than one hundred feet inside the walls, which must have been at least seven feet in thickness at the base; but of those walls, and of whatever buildings lay within them, not a stone remains in situ, all having been drawn away for building purposes during many generations. But nothing can efface the tokens of early and long occupation of the surface all around its site, for its emerald verdure, which in early summer makes it conspicuous in the landscape for many miles in all directions, can only be accounted for by its uses for man’s habitation for long centuries.

    6. — St. Becc MacDé. The Annals of the Four Masters record his death: “The age of Christ, 557; the nineteenth year of Diarmid; St. Becc, son of Dé, a celebrated prophet, died.” His name is on the Calendars of Irish Saints for October the 12th, on which his festival was kept. He was son of Dé-Druad, sixth in descent from Mainne, son of Niall of the “Nine Hostages.” There is no other reference, as far as I know, to his visit to Kerry, save what we find in the Lives of Brendan; but we may well believe that many of the early saints, such as he, came to Kerry, after St. Benignus, to visit the Christian converts there, and to promote the spread of faith and piety amongst them.

    Rev. D. O’Donohue, Brendaniana: St. Brendan The Voyager In Story And Legend (Dublin, 1893), 7-9, 41-42.
    The prophecy of future greatness at the time of the birth of a saint is a common theme in hagiography and Saint Becc plays the same role in the Irish Life of Saint Ciarán, this time at a site where Saint Brigid had made a prediction regarding Saint Ciarán some time before:

    Becc mac De prophesied, saying there —

    Son of the wright
    with choruses, with choirs.
    In comely cloak,
    with chariots, with chants.

    R.A.S. MacAlister, ed. and trans, The Latin and Irish Lives of Ciaran, (London and New York, 1921), 69.
    Saint Becc met his death in accordance with a prophecy, after himself prophesying the end in store for King Dermot. He is in the company of another Irish prophet-saint, the great Colum Cille of Iona, when the moment comes, according to the account preserved in the Egerton 1782 MS:

    Dermot went to Tara and again said to Beg: “let me have certain knowledge what manner of death it is that shall carry me off.”

    Beg said: “that is not matter of doubt: — “in Beg’s rath thou shalt drink a malt-drink of a single grain ; and there it is that thou shalt be laid, Dermot.”

    “My kingdom after me — after what fashion shall it be?” asked Dermot; and then it was that Beg enunciated this: — “An evil world is now at hand: in which men shall be in bondage, women free; mast wanting, woods smooth, blossom bad; winds many, wet summer, green com; much cattle, scant milk; dependants burdensome in every country, hogs lean, chiefs wicked; bad faith, chronic killing; a world withered, raths in number.”…

    “Be our magicians brought to us,” Dermot said, “that we ascertain whether it be the one thing that they and Beg forbode for us.”

    “He doubts me does he,” says Beg; and thereupon in great anger and in vindictive dudgeon goes out from Dermot, having after him a great crowd that begged of him a prophecy, and so on until he saw Columbkill that awaited him. He saluted him, and Columbkill said: ” it is a marvellous prophecy; from God comes this great foreknowledge that is vouchsafed thee.”

    “God we thank for the same,” Beg answered. Columbkill enquired then: “knowest thou thine own death’s day ?”

    “Cleric, I know it well,” quoth Beg : “there are yet seven years of my life.”

    “That is a grand thing for him  to whom it is so done; if indeed it be true,” said Columbkill.

    “It is not true,” Beg said: “there are but seven months of my life.”

    “Good again, if it be true,” said Columbkill.

    “It is not true,” Beg said : “there are of my life but seven hours of the day — speedily let me have communion and the sacrifice!”

    Then the cleric tonsured him, gave him communion and sacrifice, and he went [presently] to Heaven. Now it had stood prophesied for Beg that before he attained to death he must utter three falsehoods [as above]; for up to that hour he never had told a lie. For the same reason also it was that Columbkill sought him out, for he knew that in that day he had to die incontinently.

    ‘Death of King Dermot’ in S.O’Grady, ed. and trans., Silva Gadelica (I-XXXI), Volume II (London and Edinburgh, 1892), 85-86.

    I have also included the vignette on Saint Colum Cille and the death of Saint Becc at my other site here but have taken that account from a different source.

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