The life of St. Patrick and his place in history

by J. B. Bury

A Life of Patrick written in Irish (but largely interspersed with Latin passages and clauses) is extant. A Latin translation of it was published by Colgan, who named it the Vita Tripartita because it is divided into three parts. This translation represents a different text from that preserved in the two existing MSS. from which Dr. Stokes published the editio princeps of the Irish text (Rolls Series, 1887). This edition can hardly claim to be critical, as no attempt whatever is made to establish the mutual relations of the MSS.[321] It is clear, even on a superficial examination, that the two extant MSS. imply an archetype representing a tradition different from the text which Colgan followed.

A study of the language of the Life, which is full of “Middle-Irish” forms, led Dr. Stokes to conclude that it was compiled in the eleventh century (Introd. pp. lxiv sqq.). The text contains several references to events of the ninth century (ib. p. lxiii); and Joseph, bishop of Armagh, who is mentioned at the end of Part III. (p. 266), is evidently identified rightly by Stokes with the bishop who died A.D. 936.[322] But this passage has further significance. The writer, having enumerated the members of Patrick’s household, says: “and that is the number that should be in Joseph’s company.” It is a clear inference that he was a contemporary of Joseph, and that this appendix (found in the Egerton MS. and in Colgan’s version) was written in the first half of the tenth century. This consideration suggests that, if the linguistic forms prove that the Life could not have assumed its present shape before A.D. 1000, then the work of the eleventh-century compiler was practically confined to “modernising” an older compilation and substituting new for ancient forms. In its older shape the Life existed in the time of Bishop Joseph, when the enumeration of Patrick’s household was appended. But there is nothing to show that the Life as a whole was not put together at an earlier period. The references to events and persons of the ninth century may be significant. There is one passage which especially suggests the second half of the ninth century. “Quod probavimus: Connacán son of Colman came into the land with a host” (p. 174). Connacán’s death fell in A.D. 855; he was killed in Ulster.[323] The expression quod probavimus, instead of “which was fulfilled,” suggests that the event was within the recollection of the writer. This, taken along with the reference to Cenngecán, king of Cashel (ob. 897), may raise a presumption that the Life took shape in the latter part of the ninth century. It may, of course, be argued by those who would ascribe greater antiquity to the work that these references were posterior insertions, not due to the original compiler. I am inclined to think, however, that this involves an unnecessary multiplication of hypotheses. The material used by the compiler was older than the ninth century, but there is no positive indication to suggest that the compilation was older.

The tendency of the work is strongly marked. Like Tírechán’s Memoir, it is intended to support the claims of Armagh. Dr. M’Carthy even describes it as, in its present form, “rather a plea for the privileges of the primatial See than a eulogy of the apostle of Ireland.”[324]

It is to be observed, indeed, that the tendency is entirely absent from Part I. This, however, would hardly justify us in assuming a different authorship or date for the composition of Part I.; inasmuch as the subject matter of this part (Patrick’s childhood, youth, arrival in Ireland, and the Tara legend) did not offer opportunities for urging the Armagh claims. It may also be observed that all the references to events later than A.D. 800 occur in Parts II. and III.

The last paragraphs of Part I. (pp. 60-62), which are omitted in the Rawlinson MS., have clearly been inserted here from the end of Part III. (pp. 256-8). The motive of this repetition is, doubtless, supplied by a remark of Dr. M’Carthy: “That upon the recurrence of his festival a sketch of the life and labours of St. Patrick should be delivered in the churches of Ireland would be a procedure in mere conformity with ecclesiastical usage.” The Tripartite Life was practically used as material for sermons, though we may not feel warranted to go so far as to say that it represents sermons reduced to literary form. The particular paragraphs in question were added to Part I. as a “wind-up” for pulpit purposes. There is a similar but shorter wind-up to Part II.

Among these added paragraphs (p. 60 = p. 256) occurs a bibliographical notice:—

“These are the miracles which the elders of Ireland declared and connected with a thread of narration. Colombcille, son of Fedlimid, first declared Patrick’s miracles and composed them. Then Ultan, son of Conchobar’s descendant; Adamnan, grandson of Tinne; Eleran of the wisdom; Ciarán of Belach Duin; Bishop Ermedach of Clochar; Colman Uamach;[325] presbyter Collait of Druim Roilgech” (trans. Stokes).

Of these works we know nothing, though we may suspect that “Ultan” may refer either to the memoir of Tírechán (cp. the lemma in the Lib. Arm.) or to the book which Ultan lent to Tírechán. Observe that no mention is made of Muirchu’s Life. But Muirchu was certainly a source of the Tripartite. If, therefore, this list represents the works which were used in the compilation, the compiler did not use Muirchu’s Life directly, but some later work in which it had been wholly or partly incorporated. This agrees with a conclusion which I had entertained on other grounds, namely, that the compiler used W (the common source of V₂ and V₄) in which the Muirchu narrative had been incorporated with non-Muirchu material. The inference would be that the author of W is to be sought in the list. For instance, Ciarán of Belach Duin, who died A.D. 775,[326] would suit chronologically.

The material of Tírechán appears almost entirely in Parts II. and III. But there are considerations which suggest that it was not derived merely from Tírechán, but from the older written material from which Tírechán himself selected the memoranda which he has recorded. The compiler certainly used Tírechán’s memoir, which was accessible to him if he wrote at Armagh; but he has added supplements which produce the impression of having belonged to the original records and not of being later interpolations. (Cp., for example, the account of the altar in Sliab Húa-n-Ailella, p. 94, and of the inscriptions at Selce, p. 106.) It would, perhaps, be impossible to prove this directly, but there is another fact connected with the sources of the Life which enables us to establish the probability indirectly.