REMAINS AT MONASTERBOICE. COUNTY LOUTH.
To the observing and imaginative traveller, our island must present a great number of peculiarities of aspect which will not fail to excite his notice, and impress themselves indelibly upon his mind. The scantiness of wood—for its natural timber has nearly all disappeared—and the abundance of water, are two of the characteristics that will most strike him; and, next to these, the great extent of prospect usually afforded to the eye in consequence of the undulating character of its surface. Sparkling streams are visible everywhere, and shining lakes and noble rivers come into view in rapid succession; while ranges of blue mountains are rarely wanting to bound the distant horizon. The colours with which Nature has painted the surface of our island are equally peculiar. There is no variety of green, whether of depth or vivid brightness, which is not to be found covering it; they are hues which can be seen nowhere else in equal force; and even our bogs, which are so numerous, with all their mutations of colour, now purple, and anon red, or brown, or black, by their vigorous contrasts give additional beauty and life to the landscape, and assist in imparting to it a sort of national individuality. Our very clouds have to a great degree a distinctive character—the result of the humidity of our climate; they have a grandeur of form and size, and a force of light and shadow, that are but rarely seen in other countries; they are Irish clouds—at one moment bright and sunny, and in the next flinging their dark shadows over the landscape, and involving it in gloomy grandeur. It is in this striking force of contrast in almost every thing that we look at, that the peculiarity of our scenery chiefly consists; and it appears to have stamped the general character of our people with those contrasting lights and shades so well exhibited in our exquisite and strongly-marked national music, in which all varieties of sentiment are so deeply yet harmoniously blended as to produce on the mind effects perhaps in some degree saddening, but withal most delightfully sweet and soothing. A country marked with such peculiarities is not the legitimate abode of the refined sensualist of modern times, or the man of artificial pleasure and heartless pursuits, and all such naturally remain away from it, or visit it with reluctance; but it is the proper habitation of the poet, the painter, and, above all, the philanthropist; for nowhere else can the latter find so extensive a field for the exercise of the godlike feelings of benevolence and patriotism.
Yet the natural features of scenery and climate which we have pointed out, interesting as all must admit them to be, are not the only ones that confer upon our country the peculiar and impressive character which it possesses. The relics of past epochs of various classes; the monuments of its Pagan times, as revealed to us in its religious, military, and sepulchral remains; the ruins of its primitive Christian ages, as exemplified in its simple and generally unadorned churches, and slender round towers; the more splendid monastic edifices of later date, and the gloomy castles of still more recent times—these are everywhere present to bestow historic interest on the landscape, and bring the successive conditions and changes of society in bygone ages forcibly before the mind; so that an additional interest, of a deep and poetical nature, is thus imparted to views in themselves impressive from their wild and picturesque appearance. So perfect, indeed, is this harmony of the natural and artificial characteristics of Irish scenery, so comprehensively do both tell the history of our country, to which Nature has been most bountiful, and in which, alas! man has not been happy, that if we were desirous of giving a stranger a true idea of Ireland, and one that would impress itself on his mind, we should conduct him to one of our green open landscapes, where the dark and ruined castle, seated on some rocky height, or the round tower, with its little parent church, in some sequestered valley, would be the only features to arrest his attention; and of such a scene we should say emphatically, This is Ireland! And such a scene is that which is presented by the ruins represented in our prefixed illustration.
Passing along the great northern road from Drogheda to Dundalk, and about four miles from the former, the traveller will find himself in an open pastoral country, finely undulating, thinly dotted with the cottages of the peasants, and but little adorned by art. On one side, to his left, he will see a little group of ruins, with a lofty but shattered round tower, giving index of their age and character. These are the ruins of the long since celebrated religious establishment of Monasterboice, one of the most interesting groups of their kind in Ireland. They consist of two small churches, a round tower, and three most gorgeously sculptured stone crosses, standing in the midst of a crowd of tombs and head-stones of various ages. Both the churches are of great antiquity, though, as their architectural features clearly show, of widely separated ages—the larger one exhibiting the peculiarities of the ecclesiastical structures of the twelfth century, and the smaller those of a much earlier date. Both are also simple oblongs, consisting of a nave and choir; and the round tower appears to be of coeval architecture with the earlier church.
The tower, which is of excellent construction, is built of the slatey limestone of the surrounding hills, and is divided into five stories by belts of stone slightly projecting. The upper story has four oblong apertures, and the lower ones are each lighted by an aperture having an angular top. The doorway, which faces the south-east, has a semicircular arch, and is constructed of chiselled freestone: it is of the usual height of five feet six inches, by one foot ten inches in breadth, and is six feet from the present surface of the ground. The circumference of the tower is fifty-one feet, and its height is one hundred and ten; but its original height was greater, as a considerable portion of its top has been destroyed by lightning.
In these churches and this tower Monasterboice has nothing which may not be found in many other early religious foundations in Ireland; but in the magnificence of its sculptured stone crosses it may be said to stand alone. They are the finest of their class in the country; but, as we shall make them the subjects of distinct notices, with illustrations, in our future numbers, it is not necessary for us to enter into a more particular description of them here.
Monasterboice, or, as it is called in the Irish language, Mainistir-buite—that is, the monastery of Buite, or Boetius—owes its origin to a celebrated bishop and abbot of this name who flourished about the close of the fifth century, and who is said to have been a disciple of St Patrick: according to our ancient annalists, he died on the 7th of December 522. Of its subsequent history but little is preserved, beyond a few scattered records of the deaths of several of its abbots and professors anterior to the twelfth century, of whom the celebrated poet, antiquary, and historian, Flann, was the most distinguished, and whose death is thus recorded in the Annals of the Four Masters:—
“1056. Flann of the Monastery, lecturer of Monasterboice, the last fountain of knowledge of the Irish, in history, poetry, eloquence, and general literature, died on the fourth of the calends of December (28th November), of whom it was said,
‘Flann of the great church of sweet Buite,
The piercing eyes of his smooth head were modest;
The godly man of Meath was he of whom we speak;
The last professor of the country of the three Finns was Flann.’”
A considerable number of historical poems by this distinguished man have descended to our times, of which a list is given in O’Reilly’s Irish Writers; but his more valuable remains are his Synchronisms of the Irish Kings, with the Eastern and Roman Emperors, and of the Christian Provincial Kings of Ireland, and the Kings of Scotland of the Irish race, with the Chief Monarchs of Ireland. Of these works, which are of inestimable value to the Irish and Scottish historian, perfect copies are preserved in the MS. Book of Lecan, in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy.
The notices in our Annals of the other distinguished men connected with Monasterboice are of little interest; but as they have never been properly collected together, we think them worthy of publication, for the use of the Irish topographical historian, to whom we trust our Journal will become a valuable repertory of authorities:
722. Ailchon, of Monasterboice, died.
769. Cormac, the son of Ailliolla, Abbot of Monasterboice, was drowned in the Boyne.
[786.] Dubdainber, the son of Cormac, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
800. Cuanna, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
836. Flaithri, Abbot of Monasterboice, a Bishop and Anchorite, died.
844. Muireadhach, the son of Flann, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
853. Radgus, the son of Maicniada, Abbot of Monasterboice, was drowned in the Boyne.
864. Colga and Aodh, two Abbots of Monasterboice, died this year.
875. Maolpatrick, the son of Ceallach, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
881. Dunadach, the son of Cormac, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
887. Fothaidh, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
922. Muireadhach, the son of Donall, Abbot of Monasterboice, chief beadsman to all the men of Bregia, youths, clerks, and the stewart of Patrick’s people, from Sliabh Fuaid (the Fews Mountain) to Leinster, died.
933. Maolbrigid, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
965. Dubdaboirenn, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
1004. Donall, the son of Macniadha, Abbot of Monasterboice, a Bishop and Holy Senior, died.
1039. Macniadha, a Bishop, and Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
1059. Donall, the son of Eodhossa, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
1067. Echtigern, the son of Flann, Aircinneach of Monasterboice, died.
1117. Eogan, the son of Echtigern, Abbot of Monasterboice, died.
These notices, extracted from the Annals of Ulster, and of the Four Masters, will show the great antiquity of the Abbey of Monasterboice, as well as the distinguished rank which it held among the religious establishments of Ireland previous to the occupation of the ancient kingdom of Meath by the English, after which period it disappears from history.
The following records from the same authorities relate to its general history:—
968. Monasterboice and Lan Lere were plundered on the Danes by Donall, King of Ireland, and he burned three hundred and fifty of them in one house.
1097. The Cloictheach (viz. round tower belfry) of Monasterboice, containing books and several other valuables, was burned.
This last notice, and many others of the kind which occur in our Annals, are of great value in showing the original uses of our round towers, as set forth in Mr Petrie’s Essay on the Round Towers of Ireland, now in course of publication.
In concluding these notices of a spot so long the abode of the piety, art, and learning of remote times, we may add, that in its present deserted and ruined state it is a scene of the deepest and most solemn interest; and the mind must indeed be dull and earthly in which it fails to awaken feelings of touching and permanent interest. Silence and solitude the most profound are impressed on all its time-worn features; we are among the dead only; and we are forced, as it were, to converse with the men of other days. In all our frequent visits to these ruins we never saw a living human being among them but once. It was during a terrific thunder-storm, which obliged us to seek shelter behind one of the stone crosses for an hour. The rain poured down in impetuous torrents, and the clouds were so black as to give day the appearance of night. It was at such an awful hour, that a woman of middle age, finely formed, and of a noble countenance, entered the cemetery, and, regardless of the storm raging around, flung herself down upon a grave, and commenced singing an Irish lamentation in tones of heart-rending melancholy and surpassing beauty. This wail she carried on as long as we remained; and her voice coming on the ear between the thunder-peals, had an effect singularly wild and unearthly: it would be fruitless to attempt a description of it. The reader, if he know what an Irishwoman’s song of sorrow is, must imagine the effect it would have at such a moment among those lightning-shattered ruins, and chanted by such a living vocal monument of human woe and desolation.
We subsequently learned on inquiry that this poor creature’s history was a sad one; she was slightly crazed, in consequence of the death of her only son, who had been drowned; and her mania lay in a persuasion, which nothing could remove, that he was not lost, but would yet return to her to bless her, and close her long-weeping eyes in peace.
P.