CHAPTER XX.
THE SCHOOLS OF DESMOND.
| “I found in Munster, unfettered of any, Kings and queens, and poets a-many; Poets well skilled in music and measure, Prosperous doings, mirth and pleasure.” —King Aldfrid’s Poem. |
I.—The School of Cork—St. Finbarr.
Munster was always celebrated for classical studies. Even within the memory of living men it attracted ‘poor scholars’ from every part of Ireland; and they were received, as they were in the days of Bede and King Aldfrid, with kindly welcome and generous hospitality. In spite of the confiscations and penal laws of three hundred years, the old Celtic love of learning was still cherished in Munster, and the doors were never closed against the homeless scholar, or bard, or sheanachie. As in the days of Bede, “they willingly received them all, and took care to supply them with food, and also to furnish them with books to read, and their teaching gratis.”[343] Of the Desmond schools the most celebrated, though not, perhaps, the earliest, was the School of Cork founded by St. Finbarr.
The name of the city itself is derived from Corcagh, which signifies a marshy place; and at the time St. Finbarr founded his church there, and for centuries afterwards, it certainly well deserved the name. Especially when the mountain floods came down the valley of the river Lee the whole right bank of the stream was converted into a vast lake called Loch Eirce or Loch Irce.[344] This valley extends from west to east, and is enclosed on either side by bold and fertile hills, now crowned with groves and villas which render Cork one of the most picturesque cities of the empire. The river Lee itself rises in the wild and barren mountain range which separates Cork from Kerry, and after a course of more than fifty miles, flows into the sea below the city. The river before reaching the city, divides itself into two main branches, which afterwards re-unite, thus forming an island of considerable extent, on which the city proper was originally built, and strongly fortified by walls and towers.
The Lee may be said to take its rise in the mountain lake of Gougane Barra, which is merely a natural reservoir that collects the streams flowing down the sides of these wild mountains. The name simply means ‘Barra’s Lone Retreat,’[345] because, as we shall presently see, the saint dwelt for some time on an island in the lake.
The facts of St. Finbarr’s history are narrated in two Latin Lives which have been published by Mr. Caulfield of Cork College.[346] His baptismal name was Lochan; but as the boy grew up with beautiful fair hair he was called Find-barr; and sometimes Barra, Barre, Bairre, or Barry. He was sprung from the Hy-Briuin Ratha, who dwelt about Lough Corrib in the County Galway. His father, Amergin, being the fruit of unlawful love, left his native territory and came to the territory of Hy-Liathain in the County Cork, where his skill as an artificer secured him the patronage of the local dynast, who appears to have dwelt at Achad Duirbchon in Muskerry. This dynast is described also as righ of Rathend.