436 Account of Marianus Scotus. [BOOK IV. A. D. 1088. and it seems with reason, for his extensive knowledge and his ability as a teacher. He brought down the annals of Ireland to the very year of his own death, which occurred at Clonmacnoise in A.D. 1088.* Account of A.D. 1028. His superstitious piety. Marianus Scotus was born in 1028, and was Scotus, born educated, it is supposed, in the monastery of Clonard, after which he removed to the continent in 1056, and at first lived with the Irish monks of Cologne, and subsequently at Fulda and Mentz. He died in A.D. 1086. His reputation for piety was very great, we are told; but he was however by no means free from the superstitious influence of the times in which he lived. For we read that on occasion of a fire which broke out in Paderborn in 1058, and consumed the whole place, a recluse of that city named Paternus, who appears to have been an Irishman, "could not by any means be induced to quit his cell, but remained there for the purpose of obtaining, as he supposed, the crown of martyrdom!" And Marianus, "looking on him as a real martyr, set out from Cologne not many days after; and having visited his tomb on account of the good things that were said of it, prayed on the very mat on which Paternus had been burned" to death. Marianus has however been considered as one of the first men of his times for learning: and His Chronicle. * Lanigan, iii. 487-489. CH. I.] Sulgen, bp. of St. David's, comes to study in Ireland. 437 his valuable "Chronicle" which he continued A. D. 1070. down to A.D. 1083, exceeds any thing of the kind which the middle ages have produced. He wrote also notes on all the Epistles of St. Paul, which are still extant, and said to be of some merit.* character of century il An interesting evidence of the literary repu- The literary tation which Ireland still continued at this time the Irish of to enjoy, occurs in the life of Sulgen, who was the eleventh bishop of St. David's about the year 1070. In lustrated a poem written by his son John, we read that from the life Sulgen came to Ireland to study there, and spent ten or thirteen years in this country in the study of the Scriptures. With ardent love for learning, Sulgen sought Where science beam'd with bright and glorious ray. His journey interrupted as he went; For, sailing toward the country where abode The people famous in the Word of God, His bark by adverse winds and tempests toss'd, At length arriving on the Scottish soil, He soon applies himself to studious toil: *ib. 446, and vol. iv. 7, 8. of Sulgen, bishop of St. David's. VOL. II. E 438 A. D. 1070. Inferences drawn by State of learning in Ireland in the 11th century. [Book IV. Of precious treasure in the Law divine: In high repute for learning home he came ; In these lines, besides the circumstance of Archbishop Sulgen's coming to study in Ireland, there are Ussher from two other things (as Archbishop Ussher has going lines. remarked) worthy to be noticed by us; First, the fore that although in the ninth century of Christianity, the Norwegian pirates, with Turgesius for their leader, keeping possession of this island for thirty years, destroyed by fire almost all the churches and books, yet notwithstanding this, the study of Christian literature again revived, and Ireland so late as in the eleventh century was still (as an ancient author styles it) "a workshop of men famous for learning and sanctity;" Secondly, that so late as down to this period, Ireland still our Irish people still retained the name of Scots, as belonging to them peculiarly. For John says named Scotia. * Vid. Ussher's Sylloge. Præf. Although the original narrative in Ussher, (and as quoted thence by Dr. Lanigan,) distinctly mentions that John was son to Sulgen, yet the Maynooth Church historian carefully suppresses this relationship, and mentions John merely as a member of Sulgen's family: it being considered perhaps safer to hide, not from the vulgar merely, but even from students of Church History, a circumstance that might be looked on as unfavorable to the notion of the necessity of clerical celibacy. See Carew's Ch. Hist. p. 372. CH. II.] Gillebert's efforts in favor of the Church of Rome. 439 in his poem, that his father had designed going A. D. 1170. to Ireland for the purpose of study, but that the vessel, in which he had embarked with the intention of sailing thither, having been driven from her course by adverse winds, he had been thus brought to Albania, (i.e. Scotland; see page 142,) and that after delaying there for five years, he at length arrived at the Scottish soil, (i.e. Ireland,) where he spent many years in the study of the sacred Scriptures. CHAP. II. FURTHER EXERTIONS FOR INTRODUCING INTO IRELAND THE Limerick for introducing the into Ireland. GILLE or Gillebert, first bishop of the Danish Gillebert city of Limerick, and first pope's legate for bishop of Ireland,* was one of the most strenuous and chief agent effective agents in the work of promoting the growing intimacy between our ancient Irish pope's power clergy, and those of the Church of Rome. Con- A.D. 1106. sidering indeed the early period at which he commenced his labours, the zeal and activity with which he pursued them, and the success that attended his efforts, he may almost be regarded as the father and author of the plan for * Bern. Vit. Mal. cap. x. Ed. Ben. 440 Of Gillebert, and his zeal for promoting the [Book IV. A. D. 1106. bringing Ireland into spiritual subjection to the authority of the Roman bishop. His lessons on the subject, if not the first, were certainly some of the most striking that had been yet delivered to the people of this land in favour of the doctrine of the supremacy of the pope. His correspondence with Anselm archbishop bury. Gillebert, in early life, had travelled on the continent, and had been intimately acquainted with Anselm, at Rouen in France, several years of Canter- before his promotion. Afterwards however their acquaintance was interrupted for a time, during which they appear to have lost sight of one another, until it was renewed by Gillebert in a letter which, after he had been made bishop of Limerick, he addressed to Anselm, in 1106 or subsequently. In this letter he congratulates the English primate on the successful termination of some difficult struggles about ecclesiastical authority in which he had been engaged; requests his acceptance of a small present of twenty-five pearls, which accompanied his letter, and begs to be remembered in his prayers. Anselm in reply to this communication, sent back to GilleGillebert to bert a very gracious answer, in which, after the intro thanking him for his kind congratulations and present, &c., he makes bold "to advise him to exert himself with earnestness towards correcting and extirpating, as far as he is able, whatever may be wrong in that country, [i.e. Ireland,] and Anselm in reply urges labour for duction of Roman usages. |