Brian has been from very old times a favourite Christian name in both Brittany and Ireland, the first no doubt from the Christian honours of the blessed Bran, the second from the source whence he was named.
The great glory of Brian in Ireland was in the renowned Brian Boromhe, King of Leinster, or of the tribute, so called from the tribute, once shaken off by Ulster, but which he re-imposed. He defeated the Danes in twenty-five battles, and finally was slain in the great battle of Clontarf, on the Good Friday of 1014. Around that battle has centered a wonderful amount of fine legendary poetry on both sides.
Brian, or Bryan, is a very frequent Christian name, but according to the usual lot of its congeners, has an equivalent, i. e. Bernard, chiefly in Ulster, with which it has not the most distant connection.
Brien was always a favourite in Brittany, and is very common as a surname with the peasantry there. The Bretons, who joined in the Norman conquest, imported it to England. Two landholders, so called, are recorded in Domesday Book; and during the first century of Norman rule it was far more common than at present, when it is considered as almost exclusively Irish. Some of our older etymologists have been beguiled into deriving it from the French bruyant, noisy.
The feminine Brennone is given in German dictionaries, but it, as well as Brennus, are there derived from old German, and explained as protection, which is clearly a mistake.
Brieuc was a Breton saint; Breasal was once common in Ireland, and survives in a few families, but is generally turned into Basil, and sometimes to Brazil, in which shape the Manxmen frequently bore it.
Brîgh or strength, is the most satisfactory explanation of Brighid, the daughter of the fire-god, and the goddess of wisdom and song, skill and poetry.
Cormac, king and bishop of Cashel, explains the word as a ‘fiery dart;’ but this looks like one of the many late and untrustworthy interpretations of Keltic names.
Brighid was always a favourite female name in Ireland, and has become one of the very few Keltic ones of European popularity. This was owing to a maiden who was brought up by a bard, and afterwards became a pupil of St. Patrick; and from a solitary recluse at Kildare, rose to be the head of five hundred nuns, and was consulted by the synod of bishops. She died in 510, and after her death, a copy of the Gospels was found in her cell, too beautiful to have been written by mortal hand, “with mystical pictures in the margent, whose colours and workmanship were, at first blush, dark and unpleasant, but in the view marvellously lively and artificiall.”
It was long kept at Kildare, and a little hand-bell, such as was much used by the Irish missionaries, and which had belonged to her, and was, therefore, called Clogg Brighde, or Bridget’s Bell, was exhibited to the devout, in both England and Ireland, until it was suppressed by a prohibition from Henry V., perhaps, because it tended to keep up a national spirit.