FOOTNOTES:
[13] This word survives in another form in more than one Thingwall among place-names.
[14] The word is familiar to us in the form -ting in hus-ting, house assembly (originally hús-Þing), a council held by a king or earl and attended by his immediate followers, in contrast to the ordinary Þing or general assembly of the people.
CHAPTER X
SCANDINAVIAN INFLUENCE IN IRELAND
At the time of the Viking invasion of Ireland the various provincial kingdoms were held in loose confederation under the authority of the ardrí or high king, but these kingdoms stood in constantly shifting relations of friendship and hostility towards one another, and were themselves often split into factions under rival chieftains. There was no national army like the English fyrd. Rather it consisted of a number of tribes, each commanded by its own chief, and though the chief owed allegiance to the king, the bond was a frail one. The tribe was further divided into septs and the army was utterly lacking in any cohesive principle. It is no wonder that for many years the Irish showed themselves quite unable to cope with the attacks of forces so well organised as those of the Norse and Danish Vikings.
In vivid contrast to the chaos in political and military organisation stand the missionary enthusiasm of the Irish church and the high level of education and culture which prevailed among her clergy and literati. In the Orkneys and the Shetlands such names as Papa Westray or Papa Stronsay bear witness to the presence of Irish priests or papae as the Norsemen called them. Irish anchorites had at one time settled in the Faroes (v. supra, p. [6]), and when the Norsemen first settled in Iceland (c. 870) they found Irish monks already there. The monastic schools of Ireland were centres of learning and religious instruction for the whole of Western Europe, while Irish missionaries had founded monasteries in Italy, Switzerland, Germany and France.
Unfortunately religion and culture seem to have been almost entirely without influence on the body politic, and as the Vikings had at least in the early days no respect for the religion or the learning of the Irish nation there was nothing to prevent them from devastating Irish monasteries and carrying off the stores of treasured wealth which they contained. No plunder was more easily won, and it was only when they themselves had fallen under Christian influences and had come to appreciate Irish literary and artistic skill that they showed themselves more kindly disposed towards these homes of learning.
One feature must at once strike the observer who compares the Viking settlements in Ireland with those in England, viz. that Viking influence in Ireland is definitely concentrated in the great coast towns—Dublin, Wexford, Waterford, Cork and Limerick—and the districts immediately around them. Irish place-nomenclature bears very definite witness to this fact. Ford in Strangford and Carlingford Loughs, Waterford and Wexford is O.N. fjǫrðr, a fjord, -low in Arklow and Wicklow is O.N. ló, 'low-lying, flat-grassland, lying by the water's edge.' The O.N. ey, an island, is found in Lambey, Dalkey, Dursey Head, Ireland's Eye (for Ireland's Ey), Howth is O.N. höfuð, 'a head,' Carnsore and Greenore Point contain O.N. eyrr, 'a sandy point pushing out into the sea.' Smerwick contains the familiar O.N. vík a bay or creek, while the Copeland Islands off Belfast lough are the O.N. kaupmannaeyjar, 'the merchants' islands.' All these are found on or off the coast, while the number of Scandinavian names found inland is extremely limited. The most interesting perhaps is Leixlip on the Liffey, a name derived from O.N. laxahlaup, 'salmon-leap.' Donegal, Fingall and Gaultiere are Celtic names, but they mark the presence of the northern Gall or foreigners, while the -ster in Ulster, Leinster and Munster is O.N. -staðir (pl. of -staðr, place, abode) suffixed to the old Gaelic names of these provinces.