of Armagh after a further six years, or perhaps more. It will be well to bear in mind that the revised Code regulated, among other things, the subsequent inauguration of kings and the conditions under which lands were held by the Church; while the bequests and submission to Armagh, promiscuously mentioned in the Saint's life, could only have been made after Armagh had been definitely chosen as the Primatial See."-J. J. O'Kelly, Ireland: Elements of her early story, pp. 54-55, 57-See also CHRISTIANITY: 5th-9th centuries; and Map.

ALSO IN: I, pp. 32-33.

E. A. D'Alton, History of Ireland, v.

5th-6th centuries.-Introduction of Latin culture. "The Roman Agricola had proposed the conquest of Ireland on the ground that it would have a good effect on Britain by removing the spectacle of liberty. But there was no Roman conquest. The Irish remained outside the Empire, as free as the men of Norway and Sweden. They showed that to share in the trade, the culture, and the civilisation of an empire, it is not necessary to be subject to its armies or lie under its police control. While the neighbouring peoples received a civilisation imposed by violence and maintained by compulsion, the Irish were free themselves to choose those things which were suited to their circumstances and character, and thus to shape for their people a liberal culture, democratic and national. It is important to observe what it was that tribal Ireland chose, and what it rejected. There was frequent trade, for from the first century Irish ports were well known to merchants of the Empire, sailing across the Gaulish sea in wooden ships built to confront Atlantic gales, with high poops standing from the water like castles, and great leathern sailsstout hulls steered by the born sailors of the Breton coasts or the lands of the Loire and Garonne. The Irish themselves served as sailors and pilots in the ocean traffic, and travelled as merchants, tourists, scholars and pilgrims. . . . Of art the Irish craftsmen took all that Gaul possessed the great decorated trumpets of bronze used in the Loire country, the fine enamelling in colours, the late-Celtic designs for ornaments of bronze and gold. . . . In such arts they outdid their teachers; their gold and enamel work has never been surpassed, and in writing and illumination they went beyond the imperial artists of Constantinople. Their schools throughout the country handed on a great traditional art, not transitory or local, but permanent and national. Learning was as freely imported. The Latin alphabet came over at a very early time, and knowledge of Greek as a living tongue from Marseilles and the schools of Narbonne. . . . But while the Irish drew to themselves from the Empire art, learning, religion, they never adopted anything of Roman methods of government in church or state. The Roman centralised authority was opposed to their whole habit of thought and genius. They made, therefore, no change in their tribal administration. As early as the second century Irishmen had learned from Gaulish landowners to divide land into estates marked out with pillar-stones which could be bought and sold, and by 700 A.D. the country was scored with fences, and farms were freely bequeathed by will. But these estates seem still to have been administered according to the common law of the tribe, and not to have followed the methods of Roman proprietors throughout the Empire. In the same way the foreign learning brought into Ireland was taught through the tribal system of schools. Lay

IRELAND, 5th-9th Centuries

schools formed by the Druids in old time went on as before, where students of law and history and poetry grouped their huts round the dwelling of a famous teacher, and the poor among them begged their bread in the neighbourhood. The monasteries in like manner gathered their scholars within the 'rath' or earthen entrenchment, and taught them Latin, canon law, and divinity. Monastic and lay schools went on side by side, as heirs together of the national tradition and language. The most venerable saints, the highest ecclesiastics, were revered also as guardians of Irish history and law, who wrote in Irish the national tales as competent scribes and not mere copyists-men who knew all the traditions, used various sources, and shaped their story with the independence of learning. No parallel can be found in any other country to the writing down of national epics in their pagan form many centuries after the country had become Christian. In the same way European culture was not allowed to suppress the national language; clerics as well as laymen preserved the native tongue in worship and in hymns. . . . Like the learning and the art, the new worship was adapted to tribal custom. . . . Never was a church so truly national. The words used by the common people were steeped in its imagery. In their dedications the Irish took no names of foreign saints, but of their own holy men. St. Bridgit became the 'Mary of the Gael.' There was scarcely a boundary felt between the divine country and the earthly, so entirely was the spiritual life commingled with the national."-A. S. Green, Irish nationality, pp. 2935-"Of the Irish missionaries who went afield, the fiery Columcille (also called Columba) founded his great monastery in Iona in 563. This was the base from which Scotland was evangelized. Columbanus, from Leinster, went among the Franks with a company of missionaries and from 590 till he died at Bobbio in 615 he labored among barbarians with power and intrepidity. St. Gall, an Irishman who was with Columbanus, gave his name to the famous Swiss monastery. Dagobert, the Merovingian king, who was educated in Ireland, retired in 656 to a cloister founded by an Irish abbot in France. Into Bavaria missionaries spread from Luxeuil, Columbanus's earlier headquarters. The Irish pilgrims continued to pour into the continent as evangelists and scholars and scribes, a process which continued until Ireland itself came within the savage sweep of the vikings." -F. Hackett, Story of the Irish nation, pp. 48-49. -See also EDUCATION: Medieval: 5th-6th centuries; Books: In medieval times; and below: 7th-8th centuries.

5th-9th centuries.-Wars of Septs.-Coming of the Danes. "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 fastnesscs, 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 highkingship 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,

IRELAND, 5th-9th Centuries

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 Mugna, 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

CROSS OF KELLS

Meath County, Ireland

the supremacy. This was one of the elements that gave opportunity to the Anglo-Normans. . . 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

IRELAND, 7th-8th Centuries

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. . . . 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 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."-F. Hackett, Story of the Irish nation, pp. 53-55-"Intercourse between the northern lands and Ireland must have begun at a very early date. It was only a few days' journey, and, as the Viking vessels were galleys propelled by oars as well as by sails, they were independent of the weather. The Irish traded and married with them a century before the invasion. Even in the old Irish epic of the heroic period, there is mention of warriors from Norway, 'the Northern Way,' and of Irish chieftains who were levying tribute on the Shetlands, the Orkneys, and the Faroes. . . . In the year 794 occurred the first powerful Norse attacks in Irish waters, when the sea-robbers landed on Rechru, now Lambay, off Howth, which they devastated, and some other small islands north of Dublin, and simultaneously they launched attacks at such distant points as the Isle of Skye and Glamorganshire in South Wales."-S. MacManus, Story of the Irish race, Pp. 268-269.-See also SCANDINAVIAN STATES: 8th9th centuries.

7th-8th centuries.-Learning and civilization. -Its diffusion over Europe.-"When Huns, Vandals, Franks, Alemanni, Langobards, Angles and Saxons swept across Europe and threw the greater part of the Continent back into barbarism, Ireland remained the only country where culture, learning and scholarship kept couth with their elder sources. Alone in Western Europe during the sixth century, in Ireland a pure Latin was written, and Greek so much as understood. Alone in Western Europe, in Ireland a wide culture existed, based not only on the study of classical authors and the sciences of the time, but especially active in the creation of a national literature, legendary and historical. During these years Ireland earned her title, Insula Sanctorum et Doctorum. Therefore Continental scholars, flying before the barbarian hordes, passed over into Ireland with their books. They were welcomed and honoured. . . . Ireland became the scene of extraordinary activity in scholarship. North and south, east and west, great seminaries and colleges of learning arose; and as the fame of these grew with the years, scholars came from far afield to study in the Irish schools. They came in such numbers that the [Brehon] lawyers, ... were compelled to devise laws to knit them into the fabric of the State, seeing that it was contrary to the tradition of hospitality in the nation that they should be put to any charge for their schooling or their entertainment. And when towards the end of the sixth century peace again came to Europe, Irish scholars set forth with their books to repair the ruin that had been caused. . . . Irish missionaries and scholars came to the peoples that

now inhabited Europe as the heralds for the most part of a new theme. They were the first evangelisers of England, and instructed its first poet [Cædmon] in his letters. The schools founded by Charlemagne were in all cases inspired by Irish scholarship, and were in most cases prompted by Irish scholars, and founded and conducted either by them or their pupils. In Germany also, in the northern lowlands, among the Alps, and in Northern Italy, schools and seminaries were established. As far afield as Iceland, Syria and Egypt, these missionaries of civilisation went, carrying their books."-D. Figgis, Historic case for Irish independence, pp. 4-6.

7th-15th centuries.-Early Irish manuscripts. -Sagas.-Annals. See BOOKS: In medieval times; CELTS: Ancient Irish sagas; ANNALS: Irish. 9th-10th centuries.-Danish conquests and settlements.-"When, about the year 832, the Norse felt ready to make their first great attack on Ireland in force, they had the advantage of having as their leader [Turgeis] one of the most extraordinary and capable figures in Nordic history. ... He came with a great fleet of 120 ships, which held some ten thousand or twelve thousand picked men, and which he divided into two divisions. One squadron of sixty ships entered the Liffey, while Turgeis himself with the other sailed up the Boyne. . . . He even got some support from the Irish and for a time it looked as if the whole northern portion of the island might speedily fall under his sway. His design included the supplanting of Christianity by the heathenism of his own country. With that end in view he took possession, some years previously, of Armagh, Ireland's Holy City, . . . where the Abbot, who was regarded as the spiritual head of Ireland, resided. Turgeis drove away 'the Follower of St. Patrick,' converted the church into a pagan temple and made himself high priest of the new religion. ... These things took place in or about the year 845, and for some years all the foreigners in Ireland recognised Turgeis as their sovereign, though it could hardly be said that he had founded a kingdom. His ablest opponent among the native chieftains was Niall, provincial king of Ulster. ... About the year 845, he was, somehow, taken prisoner by Maelsechlainn (Malachy) king of Meath, and drowned in Loch Owel. . . . After his death, the Norsemen abandoned their settlements on Lough Ree, moved up the Shannon and fought their way along the rivers and lakes to the Sligo coast where a fleet had assembled to carry them home. Thereafter the tide of victory turned for a while in favour of the Irish, and a new epoch began in the history of the Scandinavian invasion of Ireland."-S. MacManus, Story of the Irish race, pp. 269-270.-"The 9th century was the period of Danish plunder, and of settlement along the coasts and in convenient places for purposes of plunder. Towards the latter end of this century the Irish in Ireland, like the English in England, succeeded in driving out the enemy, and there was peace for forty years. Then came the Danes again, but bent more definitely than before on permanent settlement; and their most notable work was the establishment of the Danish kingdom of Dublin, with its centre at one of their old haunts, Ath Cliath on the Liffey, where the city of Dublin was built by them.... Nor was Dublin the only Danish city. Limerick, Cork, Waterford, Wexford, all became the centres of petty Danish kingdoms, active in commerce, skilful for those times in domestic architecture, and with political and legislative ideas identical in their essence with those of the people among

IRELAND, 9th-10th Centuries

whom they settled. In the course of the 10th century the Danes nominally became, for the most part, converts to Christianity. But it appears that they derived their Christianity mainly from English sources; and when they began to organize their Church, they did so after the Roman manner, and in connection with the see of Canterbury."-S. Bryant, Celtic Ireland, ch. 5.—“Hitherto the Vikings, were all of Norwegian stock, but with a few Danes and Swedes among them. During the tenth and eleventh centuries, however, the Danes . . . who at that time were ravaging the southern and western coasts of England, took the lead in Viking activities. They were better organised than the Norse and had a more centralised government. . . . The year 847 marks the first sudden descent of the Danes, 'in seven score ships,' upon the eastern shores of Ireland. They at once proceeded to attack the Norwegians and to contest the possession of the coast settlements with them. . . . [In 853 "Olaf the white" and Ivar] assumed joint kingship over the foreigners in Ireland and set up their capital at Dublin. From there the Norwegians gradually gained ground and established vassal states and a string of trading posts and stations for their fleets along the coast. Many of these settlements bear Scandinavian names from fiords, Strangford and Carlingford in the north, and Wexford and Waterford in the south, for example. . . . The most important artery reaching into the heart of Ireland is the River Shannon. On its banks the Vikings, who were most probably Danes, founded and fortified, in the second half of the ninth century, a city which they called Limerick, 'Limerick of the mighty ships,' as one of the old chroniclers calls it. The city flourished and exerted an influence over all Munster. . . . [It soon became a rival to Dublin, and the two cities engaged in constant warfare with the aid of Irish chieftains, who in their turn, asked and received aid from the Danes. Aed Finnliath who reigned in Ulster in the ninth century, is said to have been the first to make an alliance with the foreigners.] But, indeed, from the time of the first coming of the Northmen to their final defeat, there probably never was a war in which they and the Irish were not, in some degree, banded together. Irish literature of a thousand years ago is obsessed with the spectre of the Norse occupation of Ireland, and, if we are to believe the native annalists, a night of misery had really settled down on the country with the coming of the Vikings."--S. MacManus, Story of the Irish race, pp. 271-273.Raids were frequent with all their accompaniments of slaughter, enslavement and plunder. The soldiers of the foemen were billeted on the people, and a heavy tax was exacted under penalty of the loss of the nose for non-payment. Little could be done to oppose the strong, compact bodies of invaders. The population was sparse and scattered; there were no fortified towns, then or later, for the Irish are not a town-loving race, moreover the nation was broken up into numerous clans, and divided by the jealousies of chieftains, most of whom claimed descent from a common source, and almost none of whom was willing to pay allegiance to another. Even the ties of an embryo feudalism were lacking to bind the people into a semblance of unity. The early incursions of the Danes seem to have been purely predatory, and even after they began to settle down in their fortified cities, and engage in commerce, raids into the interior of the country were frequent and were often invited by the bickerings and dissensions between the chieftains. Thus, during the

period of relief from invasion which followed the death of Turgesius, we read of the Ardri plundering both Munster and the north; in 895 he overran Connaught; a few years later Connaught and Meath were at war. Again, early in the tenth century the Ardri in alliance with Leinster plundered Munster, which was prosperous under the rule of Cormac, prince-bishop, a strong and also a very learned man. Cormac defeated the allies; then turned and defeated Meath and Connaught. Not satisfied with his success, however, he claimed the seat of the Ardri, and invaded Leinster to collect tribute; but was defeated in battle (908) by the followers of the Ardri, and the men of Leinster and Connaught and was slain. Meantime warfare between the Danes and Irish had again begun, and too often the Danes had Irish allies. Thus Cormac of Ossory gave his grand daughter in marriage to Thurston the Red, and was himself made king of Dublin. But under his successor, Sitric the Dane, Ossory was overrun by his late allies, assisted by the Desies, whose home was in the south of Waterford. In 901 Dublin was taken by the Ardri, Flan; but in 916 was taken from his successor by Tomar the Dane, who ground the country down by every sort of oppression. After this there was constant fighting between the Danes and Irish with success now on one side, now on the other, for over sixty years. Then in a great battie at Tara, Malachy II, the Ardri, defeated the Danes at Tara (980). For sixteen years, he carried all before him, and seemed to be on the way to build up a strong kingdom across the island, in Leinster, Meath and Connaught. But a stronger man than he had risen in Dalcassia to the south. This was Brian, son of Kennedy, chief of Thomond, and high king of Munster. Brian's eldest brother, who had fought continuously against the Danes, and their allies, the men of Leinster, was betrayed in 976 "some say by an Irish prince, and treacherously put to death by his Norse and Irish enemies. Brian, then thirty-five years of age, became king of Munster and took quick vengeance on the assassins. In three years' time he was the undisputed king of the southern half of Ireland. . For a few years there was show of friendship between [Brian and Malachy], . . . and in 998 they came to an understanding, and made a truce according to which . . . [Brian was king of the southern, Malachy of the northern half of the island]. Thereupon the Leinstermen allied themselves with the Dublin Danes and revolted. Brian and Malachy united their forces, 'to the great joy of the Irish,' as the Four Masters say, and, in 999, defeated them. . . . The two Irish kings soon quarrelled again, and in the year 1002, Malachy, finding that there was defection in his ranks, was compelled to resign his supremacy to the superior force of Brian and to step down to the position of a provincial king. . . . Both Malachy and Brian were extraordinary men and it would seem as if Ireland was not big enough for both of them. . . . [Had Brian] begun his career at an earlier age and had he not had to contend with foreign invasion, he would no doubt have succeeded in welding the Irish clans into a strongly centralised and compact empire. That design probably never entered into his calculations. As it was, he did achieve that result to a certain extent and his reign was remarkably successful. . . . He had his royal seat at Kincora, a well situated place near Killaloe, on the Shannon, where he ruled with a steady hand, established his power and authority on a firm basis, enforced law and order, imparted rigid and impartial justice, and dispensed a royal

hospitality. Though much of his time was given to preparation for war, he still found time to build forts, roads and churches. He founded schools and encouraged learning, dispatched agents abroad to buy books, and during his reign the bardic schools began to rise again. He had diffiIculties with his own people, and indeed his title as emperor was never admitted by . . . [the kingdoms of the north, from whom he took hostages]. Nor were the Leinstermen any too friendly and he had to maintain permanent garrisons in parts of Munster. . . . Brian even attempted to extend his power beyond the limits of Ireland In the year 1005 he fitted out a fleet manned by Norsemen from Dublin, Waterford, and Wexford and Irish and pillaged the shores and levied tribute on the inhabitants of northern and western Britain. He did not extirpate the Danes who were domiciled in Ireland or banish them from the kingdom, but treated them with the utmost leniency, and recognised the element of strength they would add to promote commerce and develop the resources of the country. In return for the Dublin Danes binding themselves to follow him in his wars, he was obliged to guarantee them and the other foreigners possession of their territory in Ireland. [Nevertheless he reigned in peace for twelve years.]"-S. MacManus, Story of the Irish race, pp. 276-278.-See also NORMANS: 8th9th centuries: Island empire of the Vikings; SCANDINAVIAN STATES: 8th-9th centuries.

ALSO IN: C. Halliday, Scandinavian kingdom of Dublin.-C. F. Keary, Vikings of western Christendom.-G. H. Orpen, Ireland under the Normans, v. 1, pp. 30, 31.

1014.-Battle of Clontarf.-Results.-Influence of the Danes.-Unfortunately Brian made marriage alliances with his late enemies which were fatal to the power of his house. He gave his daughter in marriage to Sitric, son of the king of Dublin, and himself married Gormflaith, daughter of the king of Leinster, and Sitric's mother, "fairest of women, who did all things ill." Her taunts about his vassalage, and a petty quarrel with Murrough, Brian's eldest son, led her brother the king of Leinster to revolt. He and his men "were quickly joined by the Dublin Danes, by Flaherty O'Neill of Tirowen and by O'Rorke of Breffni. Those two latter chiefs suddenly invaded Meath and defeated Malachy, but in a second battle were defeated. . . . Malachy pursued them and ravaged the country but he was met by the Leinstermen and Danes, defeated . . . [and] pursued to his own country which was plundered to its centre. . . . Malachy appealed to Brian, [the Ardri who was in part successful against the enemy, but failed to capture Dublin]. The next few months were spent by both sides in preparing for the great struggle which all felt to be near. From Kincora the summons went forth and was readily answered . . . [and the names of clans and chieftains reads like a roster of the ancient names of Ireland. The princes of Uladh and Tirowen in the north alone remained aloof and the Scots of Caledonia sent a contingent]. When all these forces were assembled there must have been not less than 20,000 assembled under the command of the old warrior King. In bringing together the Danes, nobody was more active than Gormfleth. . . . She had sent her son, Sitric, to the Danish leaders to beg their assistance, bidding him agree to any terms which they might demand. From Norway and Denmark, from the Orkney and Shetland Isles, from Northumbria and Man, from Skye and Lewis and Cantire and Cornwall, these Northmen came. . . . By Palm

forces on both sides could not have fallen short of 20,000 men. . . . The utmost fury was displayed on all sides. . . . Hardly a nobly born man escaped, or sought to escape. The ten hundred in armor, and 3,000 others of the enemy, with about an equal number of the men of Ireland, lay dead upon the field. One division of the enemy were, towards sunset, retreating to their ships, when Brodar the Viking, perceiving the tent of Brian, standing apart, without a guard,

Isles, all record the event. . . 'Brian's battle,' as it is called in the Sagas, was, in short, such a defeat as prevented any general northern combination for the subsequent invasion of Ireland. Not that the country was entirely free from their attacks till the end of the 11th century; but, from the day of Clontarf forward, the long cherished Northern idea of a conquest of Ireland seems to have been gloomily abandoned by that indomitable people."-T. D'A. McGee, Popular his