principle, which underlies imperialism, has not appeared in Irish polity since St. Patrick. It was for power inside Ireland that the Irish chiefs contended, until Brian Boru (spelled Boromha in the Irish language) became "emperor of the Irish." The making of the Irish state was a task of supreme difficulty, not fully achieved; but the same must not be said about the making of the Irish nation. Though there were a hundred territories and a hundred local groupings, there was a unification of land tenure and judicial habit and a community of religion. To the Firbolg or plebeian population the church gave as good standing as to the Gael. This gradually merged the two peoples into one, and quickened the process of nationality. The consciousness of Ireland, a country beloved, is to be found as early as Columcille, 563. Few poems breathe such passionate love of land as Columcille's. He looks back on the shore as he sails in his middle age to his final mission in Scotland: There's an eye of gray Looks back to Erinn far away: This is only one of the countless times that Irishmen of every age in Christendom have yearned to their land 52 as to a person, their fiber knitted to the earth of Ireland so that to leave it is a death. The political process in Ireland, even after the coming of Patrick, was still one of sept warring with sept. The Gaels sought rather than avoided the arbitrament of war. In the two hundred years of Connacht's dominance in the limestone plain, the men of Leinster, safe in their own fastnesses, tried continually to recover Tara. A new unrest came from within. Connacht's power was dispersed with the subdivisions that were made to provide for Niall's many sons. Through those subdivisions there were more Ui Neill outside Connacht than in Connacht. These Ui Neill, north and south, combined to displace the western branch from the monarchy of Ireland. They smashed Connacht at the battle of Ocha, 483. This gave the high-kingship to the Ui Neill for centuries, but Munster had yet to make a bid for supremacy. The kings of Cashel grew strong and aggressive until, after a predatory career of extraordinary ferocity, Feidlimid came in conflict with the reigning Niall over the domination of Leinster. In 908, at the Battle of Belach Magna, the king-bishops of Cashel played their last game of royal chess. Their defeat and subordination left the Ui Neill in power. In the weakening of Cashel, however, the rest of Munster was brought into the arena. Under Brian Boru this new power combined with Connacht so as to give him the headship of Ireland. West Munster, in the end, did not hold the supremacy. This was one of the elements that gave opportunity to the Anglo-Normans. 9 But it would be unhistorical to think of these conflicts as peculiar to the Irish nation. One has only to consider the condition of Britain in the same period to realize the essential disorder of the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries. The eruption of the vikings at the same time adds one more wild distraction to the predatory life of northern Europe. The vikings came sweeping the ocean toward the end of the eighth century. The most formidable pagan fighters of the North, they mastered the seas and the islands of the seas in their swift, light, stalwart seacraft. In 795 they first came to Ireland. In the beginning they had no political purpose: they were content to fall on the rich and pacific monasteries near the coast, kill the monks, whom they surprised, and help themselves to vestments, gold ornaments, chalices, fine hangings, stores, and wines. These expeditions brought terror to Christian Ireland: they stimulated the Northmen to repeat them. An uneven fight raged for fifty years. In the meantime the tidings of Christianity came to the North itself. Thereafter the invasions of Ireland became part of the tremendous and almost successful effort of the Scandinavians to conquer the British Isles. For one must see the Scandinavians as penetrating Russia, conquering Sicily, sailing up the Seine and the Thames, settling Normandy, holding the Hebrides for centuries, dominating England, and seeking to bring all Ireland under control. When the Norsemen first got their footing in Ireland it was as predatory chiefs. The names Carlingford, Strangford, Howth, Dublin, the Skerries, Leixlip, Wexford, Waterford, and Limerick testify to their successes, which built up towns where the Irish knew no towns. The heathens, as they were, reached a Dublin which was a cluster of huts. They made it a stockaded settlement. By 853 Olaf and Ivar were joint kings of Dublin. For many years they had no great security in Ireland, though Dublin was a safe base for their attacking Britain, but their incursions scarred and seared the eastern half of Ireland from 879 to 920. The downfall of Cashel allowed the Norse to slip round the coast in 914. In that year they secured Waterford, held it against Niall, and in 920 secured Limerick. Within a few years they were thick in the conflicts of West Munster. Brian beat them on the plain where Limerick Junction is now situated, twenty miles from Limerick. After his brother was murdered with the connivance of the Cashel chiefs, Brian went on to striking victories. In these conflicts, however, the Norse were not lone-handed. They merged with the Irish in the general tribal alignments of the time. 10 Brian's victories gave him a very great prestige. A man of intellectual force, he saw the waste of dissension and the necessity for a strong central power. He equally realized that Ireland must be cleared of "foreigners." He proceeded firmly, a diplomat rather than a conqueror. Except for the forces of Leinster, which evaded the fight at Clontarf on Good Friday, 1014, all Brian's ranks stood close against the Fair Foreigners and the Dark Foreigners. The Irish chronicles describe the stupendous combat. It is such as one might expect from two races who regarded valor as the true test of |