The life of St. Patrick and his place in history

by J. B. Bury

It was natural that the spread of new religious ideas should excite the misgivings of the Druids, but so long as the new doctrine was professed only here and there in isolated households, they could hardly gauge its force or estimate the danger. It is not unlikely that shortly before the coming of Palladius they awoke to the fact that a faith, opposed to their own interests, was gaining ground, for, at the same time, the Christian communities were discovering that they deserved and required a bishop and an ecclesiastical organisation. The apprehension of the Druids may be reflected in a prophecy attributed to the wizards of the High King. They foretold that a foreign doctrine would seduce the people, overthrow kings, and subvert the old order of things, and they designated the preacher of the doctrine in these oracular words:[72] “Adzehead will come with a crook-head staff; in his house, with hole-head robe, he will chant impiety from his table; from the front (eastern) part of his house all his household will respond, So be it, so be it.” It would not be legitimate to build any theory on an alleged prophecy, when we cannot control its date. But we may admit, without hesitation, that this ancient verse, which was assuredly composed by a pagan, contains nothing inconsistent with the tradition that it was current before the coming of Patrick. There is nothing to stamp it as an oracle post eventum. The knowledge which it shows of Christian usages was accessible to the Druids, inasmuch as Christianity was already known, had already won converts, in Ireland. And if, as we have seen reason to believe, the Christians of Ireland negotiated for the appointment of a bishop a year or two before the sending of Palladius, there would be no difficulty in supposing that the Druids at this juncture, aware that a leader was expected, expressed their apprehensions in this form. But whatever be the truth about the oracle, whether it circulated in the mouths of men before the appearance of Palladius and Patrick, or was first declared at a later period, it possesses historical significance as reflecting the agitation of heathenism, roused at length to alarm at the growth of the foreign worship.

CHAPTER V
IN THE ISLAND-PLAIN, IN DALARADIA

The spot where the river Vartry, once the Dee, reaches the coast, just north of the long ness which runs out into the sea at Wicklow, has a historical interest because this little river mouth, now of no account, was a chief port of the island in ancient times for mariners from south Britain and Gaul, a place where strangers and traders landed, and where the natives could perhaps most often have sight of outlandish ships and foreign faces. It was the port where Patrick would most naturally land coming from south Britain; but in any case he could hardly do otherwise than first seek the region where Palladius had briefly laboured. This would naturally be the starting-point, the place for studying the situation, forming plans, perhaps opening negotiations. But there is no record of this first indispensable stage in the new bishop’s work, and our ignorance of his relations to these communities in southern Ireland is one of the most unhappy gaps in our meagre knowledge of his life. He has no sooner landed in the kingdom of Leinster than tradition transports him to the kingdom of Ulidia.

VOYAGE TO ULIDIA

We must see where this tradition—this Ulidian tradition—would lead, though we cannot allow it to guide us blindly. There are two connected narratives professing to describe important passages of Patrick’s work in Ireland. One of these[73] contains some genuine, unvarnished records as to Christian communities which he founded. The other[74] is compact of stories which it is difficult to utilise for historical purposes, though it be admitted that they have elements of historical value. The most striking parts of it are pure legend, but they are framed in a setting which might include some literal facts. And the historical background is there, though we have to allow for some distortion by anti-pagan motives. But the difficulty which meets the critic here is due to the circumstance that he has no sufficient records of a genuine historical kind to guide him in dealing with this mixed material. Most of those who have undertaken to deal with it have adopted the crude and vain method of retaining as historical what is not miraculous. There is much which we can securely reject at once, but there are other things which, while we are not at liberty to accept them, we must regard as possibly resting on some authentic basis. We have not the data for a definite solution. It has seemed best, then, to reproduce the story, to criticise it, and point out what may be its implications.

IN DALARADIA

If we stand on the steep headland which towers above the sea halfway between the Danish towns of Wicklow and Dublin, the eye reaches from the long low hill prominence under which the southern town is built, northward to the island of Lambay. A little beyond, hidden from the view and close to the coast, are some small islets which in ancient days were known as the isles of the Children of Cor. If we could see these minute points of land, we should be able to take in, with a sweep of the eye, the first stage of St. Patrick’s traditional journey when he steered his boat northward from the mouth of the Dee to bear his message to the woods and glens of Ulidia. The story tells that he landed on one of these islets, which has ever since been known as Inis Patrick. The name attests an association with the apostle. It might be said that, if he travelled to Ulidia by sea, as he may well have done, it was a natural precaution, in days when travellers might be suspected as outlaws or robbers, to land for a night’s halt on a desert island rather than on the coast, where churlish inhabitants might give a stranger no pleasant welcome. From the island which bears his name he continued his course along the coast of Meath, past the mouth of the Boyne, and along the shores of Conaille Muirthemni, which formed the southern part of the Ulidian kingdom. This was the country where in old days Setanta,[75] the lord of the march, is said to have kept watch and ward over the gates of Ulster. But it was in more northern parts of the Pictish kingdom that Patrick’s purpose lay, and he steered on past the inlet which was not yet the fiord of the Carlings, past the mountainous region of southern Dalaradia, till he came to a little land-locked bay, which in shape, though on a far smaller scale, and not flanked by mountains, resembles the Bay of Pagasae. But the sea-portal to Lake Strangford, as it is now called, is a much narrower strait[76] than the mouth of the Greek gulf. Patrick rowed into this water, and landed, he and those that were with him, on the southern shore of the bay at the mouth of the Slan stream, which till recent years was known by its old name.[77] They hid their boat, we are told, and went a short distance inward from the shore to find a place of rest. Had they rowed farther westward and followed, past salt marshes, the banks of the winding river Quoile, they would have soon come to a great fortress, Dún Lethglasse. But of the country and the country’s folk the tale supposes that they knew nought. A swineherd espied the strangers from his hut, and, supposing them to be thieves and robbers, went forth and told his master. The region is embossed, as it were, with small hills, and one of the higher of these hills was the master’s abode. Dichu was the name of this man of substance, and he was one of those “naturally good” men whom Patrick, though he was not a Pelagian, may have been prepared to find among pagan folk. At the tidings of his herd, Dichu was prepared to slay the strangers, but when he looked upon the face of Patrick he changed his mind and offered hospitality. Then Patrick preached to him and he believed, the first convert won by the apostle in the land of the Scots.