From these compilations it might be possible to reconstruct the common annalistic structure on which they are based; with the help of the chronological tracts and poems which are contained in the Book of Leinster, the Book of Ballymote, etc. It is clear that for such a reconstruction the Annals of Ulster would supply the clearest traces of the plan.
The Irish seem to have had a special taste and faculty for chronological computations,[334] and in the early part of the seventh century, if not sooner, they were laying the foundations for national Annals on the model of the Roman Annals. In the Annals of Ulster a number of entries, ranging from A.D. 467 to A.D. 628, are justified by references to the Liber Cuanach. Zimmer, with great probability, identifies Cuana, the author of this lost work, with Cuana mac Ailcene, a king of Fermoy, whose death is noted in Chron. Scot. and in Annals of F. M. under A.D. 640.[335] The references under the year 482 show that the Book of Cuana dealt with (the chronology at least of) the pre-Christian period. The authorship of a south Irish prince is consistent with the circumstance that many of the entries in question relate to the affairs of South Ireland.[336] For chronological studies I may refer also to the evidence of Tírechán, on which I have dwelt in Eng. Hist. Rev. April 1902, 244-5.
The Annals of Ulster (and Tigernach) have some entries in Latin and others in Irish. Of the Latin entries, some relate to Roman history, others to native history. So far as the fifth and sixth centuries are concerned, it is reasonable to conjecture that the Latin entries represent an early and generally accepted synchronistic reconstruction, which had been made with the help of Roman annals, and especially the Chronicle of Marcellinus. It has been proved by Dr. MacCarthy, from the synchronistic treatises which he has studied in connexion with Tigernach, that the chronology of pre-Patrician history was based on Jerome’s edition of the Chronicle of Eusebius. For the fifth and sixth centuries Isidore and Bede are referred to, as well as Marcellinus; but most of the foreign entries are taken verbally from Marcellinus. The difficulties and uncertainties of the synchronisers seem to be reflected in the alternative dates of the Annals of Ulster, where an event given under one year often appears in another place, with the addition hic alii dicunt, or something of the kind.
In regard to the few and brief entries relating to Patrick, the internal evidence testifies to the antiquity of the tradition, and excludes any suspicion of fabrication on the part of the annalistic compilers. While the legendary date of Patrick’s death, which had become vulgar in the seventh century, was admitted and emphasised, the true date, notwithstanding the inconsistency, was allowed to remain; and in the second place, not a single notice based on the assumption that Patrick was still alive appears in the interval between the true date and the false date. A fabricator who was concerned to invent notices about Patrick would not have been likely to leave thirty years a complete blank. Thus if the few Patrician entries prior to A.D. 461 were fabrications, it would seem that they must have been invented before the legendary date of his death in A.D. 493 had become current. This consideration establishes a strong presumption of their antiquity; if they are not genuine, they must have been very early inventions. But intrinsically they offer nothing to arouse suspicion; on the contrary, it is incredible that a fabricator, producing annalistic records in the interest of a “Patrician legend,” would have confined himself to the interpolation of just these slender notices. These entries will be found under the years 432, 439, 441, 443, 444, 461; the notices of the deaths of Secundinus, 447 (Ann. Inisf. 448), and Auxilius, 459, may perhaps be added.
Dr. MacCarthy has made it highly probable that the Paschal Table formed the nucleus or framework of the early (from A.D. 432) portion of the original Annals (loc. cit. p. c. sqq.). On this hypothesis he is able to give so satisfactory an explanation of the notice of Patrick’s advent, that the truth of the hypothesis may almost be said to be demonstrated. The mission of Palladius is recorded, in the words of Prosper, under A.D. 431, with which the Inisfallen and Ulster Annals begin. But it is assigned to the wrong consuls in Ann. Ult.; A.D. 431 was the year of Bassus and Antiochus; but it is here described as the year of Aetius and Valerius, who were consuls in A.D. 432. Obviously, therefore, the words Aetio et Valerio consulibus have been erroneously transferred from the notice s.a. 432 to the preceding year; as is borne out by a passage in a chronological tract in the Book of Ballymote, where we read: “The year after that [the sending of Palladius], Patrick went to preach the gospel to Ireland. Etius and Valerianus were the two consuls of that year” (loc. cit. p. cix. note). Now, seeing that the advent of Patrick is not recorded in any Roman chronicle, and that Irish events are not dated in the Irish Annals by consular years, the question arises how the advent of Patrick came to be associated with the consuls of the year. Dr. MacCarthy solves the problem, simply and I think convincingly, by pointing out that Patrick drew up (before he left Gaul) and took with him to Ireland a prospective Paschal Table, which, like other western Paschal tables, would have had its initial year distinguished by the consuls. Even if we had no definite testimony that Patrick took with him a Paschal Table, we could have no doubt that he must have done so;[337] it was an inevitable precaution. But we have the definite testimony of Cummian, who mentions the 84 Paschal cycle, “quem sanctus Patricius, papa noster, tulit et fecit.”[338] The initial year in this table would naturally be the year in which Patrick started for Ireland, A.D. 432; and thus the year of his advent was recorded with a consular date.
As for the other Patrician notices in the Annals enumerated above, the most probable origin seems to be that they were derived from brief entries made in the margin of this or another Paschal Table dating from the fifth century.[339] This view best accords with the paucity and the nature of the notices, which were certainly not composed by any one wishing to work the incidents of St. Patrick’s life into existing Annals.
The old Welsh Annals (Annales Cambriae: the edition in the Rolls series has been superseded by that of Mr. E. Phillimore in Y Cymmrodor, ix. p. 141 sqq. 1888) contain a few notices of Irish ecclesiastical history. This chronicle extends from A.D. 444 to 977, but the first entry is under 453 and the last under 954, the preceding and the following years being respectively blank. Mr. Phillimore gives reasons for supposing that the Annals in their present form were finished in 954 or 955 (p. 144).
Now it is to be observed that before the year 516 (to which the battle of Badon is falsely assigned) there is no entry bearing on British history. Before this year there are only five entries, of which four relate to Ireland, and the fifth to the celebration of Easter. They are as follows:—
an’ [A.D. 453] Pasca commutatur super diem dominicum cum[340] papa leone episcopo rome.