Bibliographical Note
The most important sources for St. Patrick’s Life are contained in a manuscript known as the Liber Armachanus (preserved in the library of Trinity College, Dublin), to which frequent reference will be made in [Appendix A]. For a full account of this Codex I must refer to the Introduction to Dr. Gwynn’s definitive, “diplomatic” edition of all the documents which it contains. It is enough to say here that it was written in the first half of the ninth century, part of it at least before A.D. 807-8 by Ferdomnach, a scribe of Armagh, who died in A.D. 846. He wrote by the direction of the Abbot Torbach, and Dr. Gwynn has shown reasons for believing that the documents relating to Patrick were executed after Torbach’s death (A.D. 807). These documents were printed by Dr. W. Stokes in the Rolls edition of The Tripartite Life of St. Patrick, Part ii. (1887); and I have given my references, for the most part, to the pages of this edition because it is the most convenient and accessible. The quotations, however, are always taken from Dr. Gwynn’s reproduction of the text of the MS. Another edition of these Patrician documents by Dr. E. Hogan was published in vols. i. and ii. of the Analecta Bollandiana, 1882-3; see [App. A, ii. 3, p. 263]. The Irish parts, and the Latin passages containing Irish names, have been included in the Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus of Dr. Stokes and Professor Strachan, vol. ii. 238 sqq., 259 sqq.