Insula Sanctorum et Doctorum; Or, Ireland's Ancient Schools and Scholars

by John Healy

IV.—Writings of Cormac Mac Cullinan.

Cormac Mac Cullinan is described by the Four Masters “as a king, a bishop, an anchorite, a scribe, and profoundly learned in the Scotic tongue.” The Martyrology of Donegal adds that although he had been married to the celebrated Gormlaith, daughter of Flann, his conqueror, he had always lived a perfect virgin, sleeping covered only with his thin tunic, and frequently immersed in cold water whilst chanting his psaltery. We, however, are more concerned with the king’s writings than with his penances. Enough of his works still remain to prove the truth of the Masters’ statement, that he was profoundly versed in the Scotic tongue, and we may add, not only in the language, but in the laws, the literature, the history, and the antiquities of his native country.

Cormac’s Glossary is a work that is now well known to Irish scholars, thanks to the diligent labour of John O’Donovan and of Dr. Whitley Stokes, by whom it was translated and published in 1868. The book is now a rare and dear one, but invaluable for a student of the Celtic language and literature. It contains quotations from Latin authors, from Irish chronicles, and from the poems of our native bards and ollaves. There are also numerous references to the laws, romances, druidism, and mythology of ancient Erin. From another point of view the work is interesting, not so much for its philological learning, as because it shows the extent and variety of the scholarship, cultivated in our Irish Schools during the ninth century. As O’Curry says—“The author (of the Glossary) traces a great many of the words, either by derivation from, or comparison with, the Hebrew, the Greek, the Latin, the British, and (as he calls it) the Northmantic language, and it contains at least one Pictish word—Cartait—almost the only word of the Pictish language that we possess.”[449] There is no work in any living European language that gives such evident proof of high culture in the ninth century as this most interesting monument of Celtic learning.

A second great work that has been usually attributed to Cormac is the Psalter of Caiseal. O’Donovan in his learned Introduction to the Book of Rights explains, we think, very satisfactorily the conflicting statements that have been made by Irish scholars with reference to this famous compilation. Colgan and Keating, two eminent authorities, both ascribe to Cormac Mac Cullinan the composition of that noble work, “which,” says Colgan, “has always been held in the highest estimation.” On the other hand, Connell Macgeoghegan, the translator of the Annals of Clonmacnoise, ascribes it to Brian Boru, and that, too, in the most formal language. Stranger still, Colgan himself, in another passage attributes the famous Chronicle called the Psalter of Caiseal to St. Benignus, the favourite disciple of St. Patrick; but he cautiously adds that Benignus began its composition—inchoavit et composuit—which can be well reconciled with what he says of Cormac Mac Cullinan’s share in the work. In a word, Benignus began it, and made it suitable to his own time; Cormac enlarged and perfected it, making all the necessary changes in point of language and matter, which the lapse of 350 years imperatively demanded; and finally, in the time of King Brian Boru it may, as Macgeoghegan asserts, have been still further corrected and enlarged to suit the needs of the time, and then formally approved of by that monarch, as well as by his bishops and his nobles.

St. Benignus, though born in Meath, was of Munster origin. St. Patrick sent him to preach especially in those districts which he did not himself visit. Hence Benignus, we are told, went through Kerry and Corcomroe in his missionary labours; but particularly devoted himself to Southwestern Connaught, and built his chief church at Kilbannon, near Tuam. He also specially blessed that province, the natives of which still affectionately revere the memory of the gentle saint with the sweet voice and winning gracious ways.

Now, when the Munstermen heard of the preference and the blessings which Benignus gave to Galway, they were jealous, and complained that he slighted his own kindred. So to please them, Benignus went down to Caiseal, and remained there from Shrovetide to Easter, composing in his own sweet numbers a learned book, which would immortalise the province of his kinsmen, and be useful, moreover, both to her princes and to her people.

Such was the beginning of the Psalter of Caiseal, the great Domesday Book of the South, written in verse, and recording the sub-divisions of the kingdom, the rights and privileges of its various sub-kings, the gifts they were entitled to receive from the King of Caiseal, the boundaries of their territories, and so forth. A portion of this primitive Psalter of Caiseal appears to have been embodied in the existing work, the authorship of which, although not in its present form, has been rightly attributed to the same St. Benignus.

Cormac Mac Cullinan in his own day undertook to re-edit this Psalter of Caiseal, and no man was better qualified for the purpose, both by his office and by his learning. In the accomplishing of his task he was assisted by his secretary, Selbach, the Sage, a Munster poet, whom Colgan describes as a man of singular piety and learning,[450] and also by Ængus, another sage, of whom nothing else is known. Several poems have been likewise attributed to Cormac, but their authenticity is very doubtful.

Colgan, Keating, and Sir James Ware all speak of the Psalter of Caiseal as extant in their own time; but it has since unhappily disappeared, although a very considerable fragment is contained in a MS. now in the Bodleian Library of Oxford. That MS. was, O’Donovan tells us, transcribed in A.D. 1453 for Mac Richard Butler, by Shane O’Cleary, doubtless a member of the famous antiquarian family of that name. It contains several ancient poems and other treatises which undoubtedly formed part of the Psalter of Caiseal as compiled by King Cormac.

Besides his share in the composition of the Psalter of Caiseal, Selbach, Cormac’s learned secretary, is also said to have been the author of a work well known to Irish scholars as the Naoimh-Senchus, or poetical history of the saints of Erin. It is one of the authorities which Michael O’Clery constantly quotes in the Martyrology of Donegal; and Colgan expressly attributes its authorship to Selbach the Sage, or, as he calls him in Latin, Selvacius, and he frequently cites that work under his name.[451] The Naoimh-Senchus has also, but with less probability, been attributed to Ængus Ceile De, of whom we have already spoken.