OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Saints of Dublin

  • Saint Colga of Lusk, February 20

    February 20 is the feastday of Saint Colga the Wise, lector at Clonmacnoise, reputed teacher of the English saint Alcuin and author of a famous prayer known as the Scuab Chrabhaidh (Broom or Besom of Devotion). I was interested to see that in his entries for this day in Volume II of his Lives of the Irish Saints, Canon O’Hanlon does not begin with this famous Saint Colga but with another, lesser-known abbot of Lusk, County Dublin, who shares the same name. Indeed, it seems that Colga of Lusk is assigned this feast day by the 17th-century hagiologist Father John Colgan, simply on the grounds that this is the day when his Clonmacnoise namesake is commemorated:

    ARTICLE I.—ST. COLGA, ABBOT OF LUSK, COUNTY OF DUBLIN

    [SEVENTH CENTURY.]

    EVERY step, taken in religious progress, tends to purify and to ennoble a monk’s profession. Nor can it fail to impart a generous and an honourable impulse, in the home of his choice. Colgan acknowledges his inability to discover any important biographical particulars, regarding this saint, with the exception of a few, which are entered in his collection. The Bollandists and Dr. Lanigan have only a passing allusion to him. It is supposed, that our saint was son to Moenaegh, and that he presided over the monastery of Lusk, as abbot. This establishment is thought to date back so far as before the close of the fifth century, when St. MacCuilinn or Macculind, its founder, is said to have died. The place is certainly most ancient, and it has many historic associations of very great importance. In the old graveyard may still be seen a very perfect specimen of an Irish round tower, attached to a mediaeval church, which has lately undergone restoration, in a very excellent style of Gothic architecture. No doubt, a more ancient church occupied this site. This holy man flourished about the year 690, or even later ; for, he is named, as one of those who subscribed with other prelates of Ireland, to the Acts of a synod, held by Adamnan, about the year 695 or 696. A copy of these decrees, called the Cain Adhamnain, or the “canons of Adamnan” had been in Colgan’s possession. He has also placed on record some of the subscribers’ names, to these statutes. Wherefore our saint was not identical with one bearing a similar name, and exercising a like office, in the same place, and whose death occurred A.D. 782, according to the Annals of the Four Masters. The Colga, who died in 782, or more correctly, 787, is expressly named in our Annals, as son to Crunnmail. The present St. Colga did not long survive the year, in which the celebrated synod of Adamnan had been held  for, we read, about the death of his successor, an abbot of Lusk, who departed this life, in the year 731. The present holy man died, probably, near the beginning of the eighth century ; nor do we know what reason, his namesake, Father John Colgan, had, for giving him a festival at this date, beyond the circumstance of another celebrated Colga or Colgu having been venerated on the 20th day of February.

  • St Noe of Finglas, January 27

    January 27 is the commemoration of a County Dublin saint, Noe of Finglas. In a paper entitled ‘Finglas’ read to the Old Dublin Society on October 13, 1971, Michael J Tutty summarised the early history of the locality and its associated saints :

    It was from the heights of Finglas, tradition tells us that, that St. Patrick looking down on the small settlement variously known as Baile Atha Cliath or Dubh Linn, prophesised that it would one day be a great city, that it would be the capital of Ireland. St. Patrick apparently, did not set up a church at Finglas but a well associated with his name was venerated in the area for centuries and was even “adopted” by an eighteenth century quack who endeavoured to capitalise on the reputed healing powers of its waters. Finglas was the site of a Celtic abbey which has been associated with Saint Canice, Feast October 11th, and who is more particularly associated with Kilkenny.  The saint studied at the famous school conducted by Saint Moibhí on the banks of the Polka river at nearby Glasnevin and which flourished in the 6th and 7th centuries. Little is known of this Celtic foundation at Finglas beyond the recording of the names of no less than five saints associated with it: Saint Flann (f. January 21), St Noe (f. January 27), St Dubhlitir (f. May 15), and St. Faelchu (f. September 24). St Dubhlitir is said to have been abbot of Finglas being succeeded by Flann who is recorded as having been a bishop,  a scribe and an anchorite. It is probable that the abbey at Finglas ceased to exist during the reign of the norsemen by whom it was plundered.  

    The name is derived from the Irish Fionn Glass meaning a clear stream, from the rivulet which runs through the one-time village and joins the Polka at Finglas Bridge ………

    Michael J. Tutty ‘Finglas’ in Dublin Historical Record Vol. 26, No. 2 (Mar., 1973), pp. 66-73.

    Thus it seems that we have no further information about our saint’s career, even though at one time Finglas was a sufficiently important monastic foundation to have the deaths of at least some of its abbots noted in the Irish Annals. Canon O’Hanlon has but a couple of lines to contribute, I will only add that the information about Saint Noe’s burial in the old cemetery is derived from the seventeenth-century hagiologist, Father John Colgan:

    St. Noe, of Finglas, County of Dublin.

    In the Martyrologies of Tallagh and Donegal, we find entered on this day, Noe of Finnghlais. This village lies about two miles north of Dublin city. In that ancient cemetery adjoining his remains probably rest, and in some unnoted grave.

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  • Saint Lucán of Tamhnach, January 23

    On January 23 the Irish calendars commemorate Saint Lucán of Tamhnach. The problem appears to be in identifying whether the locality associated with the holy man lies in the lakeland county of Fermanagh, or in County Dublin. Canon O’Hanlon’s account though starts off by saying that the place name Tamhnach is not a common one in Leinster and is illustrated by Wakeman’s sketch of the Fermanagh site:

    St. Lucain or Lucan of Tamhnach, or Tawny. 

    In reference to the etymological meaning of this saint’s place, we are told, that Tamhnach (Tawnagh) signifies a green field, which produces fresh, sweet grass. This word enters very generally into names in Ulster and Connaught, especially in the mountainous districts; it is found occasionally, though seldom, in Leinster, and still more seldom in Munster. In modern names it usually appears as Tawnagh, Tawny, and Tonagh, which are themselves the names of several places. In the north of Ulster the aspirated m is often restored, and the word then becomes Tamnagh and Tamny. In composition it takes all the prreceding forms, as well as Tawna and Tamna. We find, according to the Martyrology of Donegal, that Lucán of Tamhnach, was venerated on this day. And in the Martyrology of Tallagh, we meet a nearly similar entry, on the 23rd of January. The Irish form of his place, is Anglicized, Tawny. There is a Tamhach-an-reata, now Tawny—said to be in the parish of Derryvullan, barony of Tirkennedy and county of Fermanagh. Not far removed from this, on the townland of Derryvullan, in a parish bearing this same name, is represented a “holy well,” beside the modern Protestant church, and close to Tamlacht Bay, on the River Erne. In Tamlacht, belonging to this parish, there is an ancient church, and “St Patrick’s well,” which flows beside a gigantic tree. There is likewise a parish, called Taney or Tawney, in the half-barony of Rathdown, and county of Dublin. Here the old church-site and cemetery may be seen delightfully situated on a green knoll, near the railway station at Dundrum. Prior to 1152, it is said, this was a rural see. St. Laurence O’Toole, in 1178, confirmed  its possessions to Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, under the title of  “Churchtown with the Grange of Clonskene.” It does not seem an easy  matter to determine the site of this saint’s church nor his period.

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