OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: relics

  • The Tomb and Relics of Saint Columbanus

    Below is a short paper by Margaret Stokes on the tomb and relics of Saint Columbanus written in the late 1880s. As we are dealing with scholarship well over a century old I would treat the theories of the origins of the artistic styles offered here with caution, but the description of the relics is most interesting:

    Miss MARGARET STOKES, through the Director, communicated a paper on the tombs at Bobio of St. Columbanus and his followers, Attalus, Congal, Cummian, and others, whose names are given by Padre Rossetti in his Catalogue of the followers of Columbanus, but in their Latin forms, the Irish equivalents to which are omitted.

    The tomb of Columbanus is a white marble sarcophagus, formerly surmounted by a marble recumbent statue of the saint, the front and sides of which were adorned with bas-reliefs illustrating events in the life of the saint. Among the interesting features in these bas-reliefs should be noted the booksatchell carried by St. Columbanus in the first, and the watervessel presented by Gregory the Great to the saint at the consecration of his monastery in the central compartment. This sarcophagus stands as an altar in the crypt of the old Lombardic church dedicated to the saint at Bobio, while the tombs of those disciples who followed him from Ireland to Italy are ranged in the walls around that of their master.

    The sculptures on five of these sarcophagi offer fine examples of the interlaced work described by Canon Browne at the meeting of the Society on February 19th, as found in Italy at this period and before it, even in the time of imperial Rome. Such patterns were spoken of by Miss Margaret Stokes in her paper read upon the same occasion as gradually introduced with Christianity into Ireland, and there engrafted on a still more archaic form of Celtic art. Thus an Irish variety of such pattern sprang into life. The fact that there is no trace of such Irish individuality in the decorations on the tombs of the Irish saints at Bobio, that there is nothing to differentiate these designs from those that prevailed throughout Lombardy in the seventh century, goes far to prove that this style did not come from Ireland into Italy. Whether, on the other hand, it reached the Irish shore borne directly from Lombardy by the passengers to and fro from Bobio to its parent monastery in Bangor, Co. Down, is yet matter for future research.

    The next monument described was the marble slab inscribed to the memory of Cummian, bishop in Ireland at the beginning of the eighth century. We learn from the epitaph itself that Liutprand, king of Lombardy from A.D. 720 to 761, had the monument executed of which this slab was the covering, the artists’s name, Joannes Magister, being given at the foot. The inscription consists of nineteen lines, twelve of which are laudatory verses in hexameters, the remaining portion being a request for the saint’s intercession.

    The knife of St. Columbanus, described by Mabillon in 1682, as well as by Fleming, is still preserved in the sacristy of the church. It is of iron, and has a rude horn handle. The wooden cup out of which the saint drank is also preserved, and in the year 1354 it was encircled by a band of silver, with an inscription stating that it had belonged to St. Columbanus. The bell of the saint is another relic, and it is known that on the occasion of the translation of the saint’s relics to Pavia this bell was carried through the streets of that city at the head of the procession.

    The vessel brought by pope Gregory the Great from Constantinople, and given by him to St. Columbanus at the consecration of his monastery, agrees in form with that which is represented in the bas-relief on the saint’s tomb, and is said to have been one of the water vessels used at the wedding feast at Cana in Galilee. A silver bust representing the head of St. Columbanus completes the list of relics connected with this saint, which are still preserved in the sacristy of his church at Bobio.

    In the discussion that followed, Professor Browne said he was convinced, after careful examination of Miss Stokes’s careful drawings and diagrams, that the Hibernian theory of the Irish origin of interlacing ornament in Italy was now quite dead.

    With regard to the date of a remarkable vase preserved at Bobio, and said to have been given to St. Columbanus by St. Gregory, the President thought the vase was quite as early as if not earlier than St. Gregory’s time, and probably of Greek origin.

    Thanks were ordered to be returned for these Exhibitions and Communications.

    Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of London, 2nd ser. Vol XIII, (1889), 270-271.

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  • The Arrival of Saint Maelruain with the Relics of the Saints at Tallaght, August 10

    Canon O’Hanlon has a notice of a wonderful feast of the translation of the relics of the saints by Saint Maelruain of Tallaght at August 10:

    The Arrival of St. Maolruain, with the Relics of Virgins and of other Saints, at Tallagh, County of Dublin.

    In the Martyrology of Tallagh, we find a festival for this day, as characterized at the head of this paragraph. We learn from the Life of St. Aengus, the Culdee, that he often travelled about, engaged on inquiries, which enabled him to illustrate the Saint-History of Ireland. Doubtless, he failed not to collect some relics of those holy persons, whenever he travelled abroad; and, it is likely, that his distinguished superior and local contemporary, St. Maelruan, who had kindred tastes, made special journeys for similar purposes. One of these returns must have been solemnly commemorated at Tallagh, in the eighth century, and before the death of St. Maelruan, on the 7th July, 792. That commemoration was probably continued annually, on this day, and at that particular place, in recognition of those treasures deposited by the holy founder in the house of his religious community.

    This would have been a purely local commemoration specific to this County Dublin monastery, and scholar Westley Follett suggests that it may in fact commemorate the anniversary of its founding:

    According to the Annals of the Four Masters Tallaght was founded in 774. The Martyrology of Tallaght appears to commemorate the occasion on 10 August with the notice ‘Mael Ruain came to Tallaght with his relics of the saints, martyrs and virgins’. [1]

    This feast thus gives us a glimpse into the development of the cult of the saints in eighth-century Ireland as well as the part played by this particular monastery. Tallaght is perhaps most famously associated with the Céile-Dé movement, but also left a lasting hagiological legacy. For this monastery was associated with the production of the earliest surviving Irish calendars of the saints, The Martyrology of Tallaght and the Martyrology of Aengus. The former is essentially a copy of the Hieronymian Martyrology which reached Ireland in the eighth century (possibly via Iona) to which the commemorations of native Irish saints was added. Follett comments:

    It should not be overlooked that non-Irish saints were venerated at Tallaght. The Martyrology of Tallaght (edd. Best and Lawlor, 62) commemorates August 10 with the comment, ‘Mael Ruain cum suis reliquiis sanctorum martirum et uirginum ad Tamlachtain uenit’. Given the paucity of native martyrs in Ireland, we may presume these were the relics of non-Irish martyrs. [2]

    Various sources connected to the monastery of Tallaght give a further glimpse of devotion to the saints. The Preface to the Martyrology of Aengus, which scholars seem to agree used The Martyrology of Tallaght as a source and was written within a generation of the time of Maelruain, records a particular devotion to Saint Michael the Archangel on the part of Maelruain and claims that relics of the archangel were kept at Tallaght:

    Now it is that Maelruain who decided that he would not take land in Tamlachtu until Michael (the Archangel), with whom he had a friendship, should take it; and because of that agreement there are in Tamlachtu relics consecrated to Michael. [3]

    Follett also quotes two further Tallaght documents which show how devotion to the saints was practiced as part of the monastic day. The first is from The Teaching of Maelruain:

    It was their practice that one man should read aloud the Gospel and the Rules and miracles of the saints while their brethern were at their rations or eating their supper, so that their attention should not be occupied with their dinner. [4]

    and is confirmed in The Rule of the Céile-Dé:

    It is the practice of the Céile-Dé that while they are at dinner one of them reads aloud the Gospel and the Rule and the miracles of the saints, to the end that their minds may be set on God, not on the meal. [5]

    Finally, there is a post in the archive on an even earlier Irish saint with an interest in collecting the relics of Ireland’s holy men and women, Saint Onchu of Clonmore. The scholiast notes on his feast day record the story of his over-enthusiasm when he insisted on collecting a finger from the still-living Saint Maedoc! As a result, Maedoc prophesied that the relic collector and his collection would never leave Clonmore. And thus the Connaght man Onchu, likened in the list of parallel saints to Saint Ambrose, came to be buried at the County Carlow monastery of Saint Maedoc.

    References

    [1] Céli Dé in Ireland: monastic writing and identity in the early Middle Ages (Boydell, 2006), 173.

    [2] Ibid, 210, footnote 246.

    [3] W. Stokes, ed. and trans., The Martyrology of Oengus the Culdee (London, 1905), 12-13.

    [4] Follett, op.cit., 180.

    [5] Ibid.

    Content Copyright © Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae 2012-2015. All rights reserved.

  • A Seminar on the Shrine of Saint Manchan

    24 January is the feast of Saint Manchan of Lemanaghan, a saint whose memory still flourishes today and whose name is most famously associated with the splendid shine preserved for veneration at the parish church in Boher, County Offaly. Below is an account of a 2003 Irish Studies Seminar held at Columbia University when Professor Karen Overbey spoke on the topic of Saint Manchan’s shrine. She helps to place this relic into an historical context, particularly interesting is the political dimension and the relationship between the monastery of Lemanghan and its much more famous neighbour at Clonmacnoise.

    Speaker: Professor Karen Overbey
    Title: “Holy Ground: Politics, Patronage, and Iconography of St Manchan’s Shrine”

    Prof. Overbey presented a talk with slides. St Manchan’s Shrine, which is kept in the parish church in Boher, Co. Offaly, very near to the site of St Manchan’s medieval monastry at Lemanaghan, is the largest surviving Irish reliquary—the richly decorated, containers for the remains of a saint. Holy relics, and even their reliquaries, were the prized possessions of medieval monasteries; the presence of the saint guaranteed the sanctity of the monastic space, and allowed a connection between the earthly inhabitants and the world of the divine.

    Many of the shrines features mark it as exceptional. Professor Overbey noted, however, that the oddities of the shrine—its size, its form, its decoration, its figures—rather than spurring exploration, has spurred categorization. Prof. Overbey suggested that through a re-evaluation of the literary, folkloric, political and geographic contexts, St Manchan’s shrine would become less “bewildering.”

    St Manchan’s shrine was clearly intended to be carried and displayed—at each junction of base and leg there is a stout brass ring through which a pole could be slid, allowing the shrine to be hoisted and carried. St Manchan’s shrine is approximately five times larger than the tomb-shaped shrines, and its display, on the shoulders of four monks presumably in a procession—would have been public and communal. The small tomb-shaped shrines in contrast were designed to be carried individually, and perhaps somewhat privately or protectively, as on a journey.

    St Manchan himself was a founder of monastry approximately twelve miles east of the community of Clonmacnois; the site was called Lemanaghan. Despite its small size, Lemanaghan appears to have had a close relationship with the nearby prominent monastery of Clonmacnois. While the story does not survive in any medieval hagiography, a legend, recorded in the early twentieth century by a local historian, suggests a folkloric “sibling rivalry” between Sts Ciaran (the founder of Clonmacnois) and Manchan, in the tale of a dispute about the boundaries of the respective territories. This may well have some historical basis. In the early eleventh century, King Maelsechnaill donated several more parcels of land in the parish of Lemanaghan to the community of St. Ciaran, specifically as a payment for rights of royal burial in the Clonmacnois graveyard. Seen in this context, the form of St Manchan’s shrine takes on a new possible resonance, which may help to explain the differences from the earlier tradition of tomb-shaped reliquaries. Instead of a fixed burial site located in a bounded graveyard or at the side of a church, St Manchan’s tomb was moveable. It could travel around the boundaries not only of the church, but of the territory, allowing an extension of the sacred and protected space of the monastic graveyard. Prof. Overbey suggested that the burial space of St Manchan’s Shrine functioned to dilate the boundary of the Clonmacnois graveyard, extending the sacred space to the edges of Clonmacnois’s territory.

    Prof. Overbey also suggested that the form of St Manchan’s Shrine, coupled with its historical context, imply a strategic political function for the reliquary. In its fusion of divine protection and political expansion, St Manchan’s Shrine proclaims that it was the destiny of Ua Conchobair, Clonmacnois’ patron in the twelfth century, to occupy the province of Meath forever, and that the saint and the king would be dual guardians of the territory and its people.

    The Annals of the Four Masters tells us that, in 1166, “The shrine of Manchan…was covered by Ruaidhri Ua Conchobair, a prime contender for high-kingship of the whole island. Ruaidhri’s bid for military and political dominance in Ireland was contested. So it wouldn’t be unusual for Ruaidhri to become an ecclesiastical patron, enchancing his position with grants and gold. We might therefore view the figures on St Manchan’s shrine as having not religious, but military significance. The figures might represent a particularly valuable type of warrior: one with experience, prowess, and identifiable status. Yet, these warriors are not poised to strike. This symbolic troop may function as a kind of visual reminder, or even visual surrogate, of a military exchange of vassals and soldiers between Ruaidhri and his Connacht and Breffney rivals. St Manchan’s shrine is both the site and visualization of the political contract that allowed these rivals to join forces under the protection and assurance of St Manchan, their co-patron. Prof. Overbey answered questions from the floor. A sampling follows.

    Q: What are the figures wearing around their necks?
    A: They don’t have anything on their necks. That’s actually the nail pole. Those rings were used for carrying the shrine.

    Q: How is Jesus depicted? Is Jesus depicted as a warrior?
    A: He wears similar clothing: he wears a loin cloth but he has insized ribs.

    Q: Was the touching of relics and bones common?
    A: It appears that early on they were readily touchable, but they regularly get stolen and traded. For instance, St Manchan’s is sealed. This starts happening in the tenth century. Viewing crystals appear in the fourteenth century.

    Q: Is there a change in making reliquaries after the arrival of the Normans?
    A: Unfortunately, we don’t have enough evidence to say. There does appear to be subtle changes in the representation of saints. There are only three or four examples of post-Norman shrines.

    Q: Is the bone house in Clare identified?
    A: No, I actually had to go and track it down in the Burren.

    Q: You say that these figures are mature warriors but they’re not dressed for battle and they’re shirtless. Might they not just be peasants?
    A: I guess I’d want to know why they have axes and sticks. This depiction of beard tugging is a common attribute of warriors. It might be just enough to indicate that they are warriors.

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