Columba was now a priest twenty-five years of age; and he began to think of founding a church in his native territory. The Annals of Ulster record the founding of Derry by Columba in the year A.D. 545;[241] and it was brought about in this way. The first cousin of St. Columba, Ainmire, son of Setna, who succeeded to the throne of Tara later on, was in A.D. 545 prince of Ailech and the neighbouring territory. His eldest son Aedh, was then a boy of ten years; but it seems, according to O’Donnell’s Life of Columba, the king in the name of his son Aedh, offered the fort in which he then dwelt on the site of the present city of Derry to his cousin in order to found his church and monastery. Columba, however, was at first unwilling to accept the gift, because his master Mobhi had not yet given him, as was customary, permission to found a church—doubtless thinking him too young and inexperienced. But Mobhi himself was taken sick, and died of the plague in A.D. 544, shortly after Columba had left him; and before he died he retracted his prohibition, and sent two of his disciples to Columba with his girdle as a sign to give him full permission to act as he pleased. These messengers had just then arrived; and so Columba gladly accepted the gift of his cousin, and founded his church on, what was called then and long after, the Island of Derry. It was a rising ground oval in shape containing 200 acres of land, surrounded on two sides by the Foyle, and on the third by low marshy ground since known as the ‘bog.’ The slopes of the hill were covered with a beautiful grove of oak trees, which gave its name to the place. In ancient times it was called Daire Calgaich, but after the tenth century it came to be more commonly known as Daire Columcille.
Columcille’s original church, called the Dubh-Regles, was built close to the site now occupied by the Roman Catholic Cathedral; and hence it was outside the walls of the modern city. Nigh to it were three wells anciently known as Adamnan’s Well, and Martin’s Well, and Columba’s Well. One of them is, it appears, now dry; and the others are called simply “St. Columb’s Wells.” Near to the church there was also erected a round tower, which in like manner has completely disappeared. So anxious was Columba to spare the beautiful oak-grove which covered the hill, that he would not even build his church with the chancel towards the east according to custom, because in that case some of his beloved oaks should be cut down to make room for the church. It was probably for the same reason he built on the low ground at the foot of the hill, instead of on its slope or summit, where the modern city stands. He strictly enjoined his successors to spare the sacred grove, and even directed in case any of the trees were blown down by the storm to give a part to the poor, a part to the citizens, and to reserve another part as fuel for the guest-house. In later ages a cathedral called Templemore was built on the slope of the hill; and the Dominicans, Augustinians, and Franciscans had each a church and a monastery in the city of St. Columba. It also seems that a Cistercian convent was founded there, but not a trace of any of them now remains; so effectually did the imported colonists change the physical as well as the religious aspect of the city.
We know very little of the history of Derry during the period that Columba ruled over his monastery in person. He always loved it dearly, and many a time his heart turned fondly from his lonely island in the Scottish main to his beloved Derry.
“The reason I love Derry is
For its peace, for its purity,
And for its crowds of white angels
From one end to the other.
My Derry! mine own little grove!
My dwelling, my dear little cell;
O eternal God, in heaven above.
Woe be to him, who violates it!”
From all the highlands and valleys of Tir-connell his kith and kin rallied round the young monk in his infant monastery. It was built on the border-land between the territories of Eoghan and Conal; and in after ages every acre of its termon lands was stained with blood, shed in fratricidal strife by the two great clans of the north. It stood, too, under the shadow of that ancient keep, the Grianan of Ailech, which, it is said, was the abode of the northern kings long before the Christian era. It was certainly the Royal Fortress of the Hy-Niall in their proudest days, and still rears its stately walls, that overlook at once the Foyle and the Swilly, as if in silent scorn of time and storm and man.
It will help us to understand better the subsequent history of Columcille, if we try now to realize what manner of man he was. He came of a fierce and haughty race, and seems to have been himself by nature, notwithstanding his name, a man of ardent temperament and strong passions. He was, says an ancient commentator,[242] quoting from a still more ancient poet, “a man of well-formed and powerful frame; his skin was white, his face was broad and fair and radiant, lit up with large grey luminous eyes; his large and well-shaped head was crowned (except where he wore his frontal tonsure) with close and curling hair. His voice was clear and resonant, so that he could be heard at the distance of fifteen hundred paces, yet sweet with more than the sweetness of the bards.” Truly a great and striking man to hear and to look at; one to admire but also to fear, and moreover, animated with lofty purpose, and inspired with all the dauntless courage of his race. In many respects his character appears to us to bear a very striking resemblance to the character of the Prince of the Apostles both in its strength and in its weakness.
Doubtless such a man as we have described, found it not only useful, but necessary to chastise his body and bring it under subjection. “Though my devotion is delightful,” he is represented as saying of himself, “I sit in a chair of glass, for I am fleshly and often frail.”[243] We are told that he practised the most extreme austerities. He barely took food enough to sustain nature, and that was of the simplest kind. “He did not,” says the Felire, “take as much in a week as would serve for one meal of a pauper.” He abstained from meat and wine, living exclusively on bread and water, and vegetables—sometimes contenting himself with nettles. He slept on the bare ground with a stone for a pillow, and a skin for a coverlid. Three times at night he rose to pray; and often scored his flesh with the discipline in atonement for his sins. By day he read, or preached to the brethren, or recited the divine office; and not unfrequently he took a share in the manual labour of the monks—carrying on his own broad bare shoulders the sacks of meal from the mill to the kitchen.
No wonder with such an example before their eyes that the young nobles of Tirconnell strove with generous emulation to excel each other in the service of God. What marvel if the white-robed brethren under such a master became angels in the flesh; and what wonder if God’s angels came down from heaven, and “crowded every leaf on the oaks of Derry,” to listen to such a brotherhood chanting at midnight’s hour and at morning’s dawn the inspired strains of the Hebrew Bard?
III.—The Schools of Durrow and Kells.
We know from the express statement of Venerable Bede that Columba founded the noble monastery of Durrow before he left Ireland for Iona.[244] Like Derry, it takes its name from an oak-grove; for it means the Plain of the Oaks—in Irish Dair-magh. It was anciently called Ros-grencha—the oak plain of the far famed Ros-grencha—and also Druim-Cain, or the Beautiful Hill; and even to-day whoever wanders through the rich pastures and the stately groves of Durrow will readily admit that it well deserves its ancient name. It is situated not far from Clara in the barony of Ballycowan, in the King’s County; but in the time of Columcille it formed part of the ancient kingdom of Teffia. Aedh, son of Brendan, prince of the territory, gave it to Columcille for the purpose of founding a monastery. It is true that Brendan himself was alive until A.D. 576; but, as not unfrequently happened in Erin, after the death of Crimthann in A.D. 533 the lordship passed not to his brother, but to his nephew, Brendan’s son, who doubtless had been previously recognised as the tanist. If, as Bede says, the monastery was founded before Columba set out for Britain in A.D. 563, it certainly was not completely founded; for several years after Columba’s arrival in Britain we read of the building of the Great House of the monastery—whether that was, as Petrie thinks, the round tower, or what is more likely, a larger church than the original one designed to accommodate the enlarged community.