continued battle was fought between them: in the course of which, Malachy treacherously retired from the field with the forces of Meath. The fight continued from eight in the morning until four in the afternoon, when the Danes, no longer able to sustain the impetuosity of the Irish troops, fled and fell in every direction. Multitudes of the Irish princes and nobles were slain on that day, and among them the valiant and worthy Brian. But the Danes were totally defeated and overthrown, and their power in Ireland 'received a decisive blow, from which they never were able to recover. Prince Murtogh, the son of Brian Boru, and Malmordha, with whom the war had originated, were also among the slain. We must not however suppose that the Danish troubles of Ireland ended with the battle of Clontarf; on the contrary we read of Armagh, Swords, Clonard, and other towns being plundered by them in the very next year; and the same kind of depredations were continued by them more or less during the remaining part of the eleventh century.*

* Annals of Ulster and the Four Masters. Colgan, Acta SS.

§ 17-OSTMAN INFLUENCE IN THE

CHURCH OF IRELAND, AND HOW IT HELPED TO INTRODUCE ROMANISM.

The first circumstance which afforded to the Roman Church an opportunity of obtaining a footing in England, was, as we have seen, the conquest of that country by the Pagan Saxons. Somewhat similar was the occasion of the first establishment of Romanism in Ireland; for the introduction of that form of Christianity into our country appears when traced to its source to have been closely connected with the influence of the Danes or Ostmans who settled here somewhat before its arrival. It was through England that Ireland first became connected with the Roman Church and subject to the authority of the Pope; and the first intimate intercourse which existed between any Irish Christians and the English Church, was carried on between the Ostman bishops of Ireland and the archbishops of Canterbury. It has been already said that the towns of Dublin, Waterford, and Limerick, were in the eleventh century in possession of these Ostmans: now, they being, as Arch

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bishop Ussher has it,* a colony of the Norwegians and Livonians, and so countrymen to the Normans, when they had seen England subdued by the Conqueror, and Normans advanced to the chief archbishopric there, would needs now assume to themselves the name of Normans also, and cause their bishops to receive their consecration from no other metropolitan but the archbishop of Canterbury. And forasmuch as they were confined within the walls of their own cities, the bishops which they made had no other diocese to exercise their jurisdiction in, but only the bare circuit of those cities; whereupon we find a certificate made unto Pope Innocent III., in the year 1216, by the archbishop of Tuam and his suffragans, that 'John Papiron, the legate of the Church of Rome, coming into Ireland, found that Dublin indeed had a bishop, but such an one as did exercise his episcopal office within the walls only.'

"The first bishop which they had in Dublin, as it appeareth by the records of that Church, was one Donatus, (or Dunanus, as others call him,) upon whose death in the year 1074, Gothric their king,

* Religion of A. I. chap. viii.

with the consent of the clergy and people of Dublin, chose one Patrick for their bishop, and directed him into England to be consecrated by Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury, who sent him back with commendatory letters, as well to the said Gothric, king of the Ostmans, as to Terdeluachus, (or Tirlogh) the chief king or monarch of the Irish.

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Hereupon, after the decease of this Patrick, in the year 1085, the same Terdeluachus, and the bishops of Ireland, joined with the clergy and people of Dublin in the election of Donatus, one of Lanfranc's own monks in Canterbury, who was by him there also consecrated.

"Then when he died, in the year 1095, his nephew Samuel, a monk of St. Albans, but born in Ireland, was chosen bishop in his place, by Murierdach king of Ireland, and the clergy and people of the city, by whose common decree he was sent unto Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, for his consecration.

"Not long after, the Waterfordians, following the example of the Dublinians, erected a bishopric among themselves, and sent their new bishop to Canterbury for his consecration; the manner of

whose election the clergy and people of Waterford, in the letters which they wrote at that time unto Anselm, do thus intimate-'We and our king Murchertach and Dofnald the bishop, and Dermeth our captain, the king's brother, have made a choice of this priest, Malchus, a monk of Walkeline, bishop of Winchester.'"

The last bishop of Dublin, in the year 1122, was sent unto Anselm's next successor for his consecration the writ of King Henry I. to the archbishop of Canterbury on that occasion ran as follows: Henry, king of England, to Ralph, archbishop of Canterbury, greeting: The king of Ireland hath signified to me by his writ, and the burgesses of Dublin, that they have chosen this Gregory for their bishop, and send him unto you to be consecrated. Wherefore I wish you in compliance with their request, to perform his consecration without delay. Witness, Ranulph, our Chancellor at Windsor.'

"All the burgesses of Dublin likewise, and the whole assembly of the clergy, directed their joint letters to the archbishop of Canterbury at the same time, wherein, among other things, they write