From The Literary Workman.
IRELAND BEFORE CHRISTIANITY.
The ignorance of true Irish history that prevails, and the absurdity of the things given as facts to a large mass of moderately educated people, is painfully surprising. For instance, it is generally believed among a great number of people, and it is taught to them in books, that Ireland was a land of desolate bogs, and forests filled with wolves, and inhabited by lawless savages, till converted to a "sort of Christianity" by the English, of which Christianity the remarkable part was that it had nothing to do with the Pope. Many people believe St. Patrick to have been an Englishman; others think he was a Welshman, and a few bold spirits of the present day declare that they can prove him to have been an excellent Protestant. Savages, bogs, wolves, and desolation, having been taken [{542}] compassion upon by the English, they subjugated the people, taught them, gave them laws, and in the reign of Henry II. of England attached Ireland to the British crown, when that country began to have a history. Before that date, that is, before the twelfth century, for Henry II. ascended the throne in 1154, Ireland had had no history worth remembering or worth noting. This is a short summary of the chief points of the Protestant belief on that matter. And although true knowledge concerning many things has struck root and spread amazingly of late years, there is so much still to learn about Ireland, and the history of that country is at once so interesting and so edifying, that "Papers on Irish History" are offered to the readers of the "Workman" with a conviction that they will find a welcome both in that country and in England.
In looking back to the earliest years of the history of Ireland, our instructor is tradition. It is a very curious thing, however, to see that the old tales, which have passed with many for poetic fables, have assumed in these days a remarkable importance, because in so many instances science is proving tradition to be truth. Speaking of Ireland, Camden says: "If what the Irish historians relate be true, this island was not without reason called Agygia or most ancient, by Plutarch. For they begin their histories from the remotest period of antiquity, so that compared with them all other nations are of modern date, and but in a kind of infancy. They tell us that one Caesarea, granddaughter to Noah, lived here before the flood, and that afterward came Bartholanus (Partholanus), a Scythian, 300 years after the flood, and waged fierce war with the giants. Long after this, Nemethus, the Scythian, landed, and was presently driven off by the giants. Afterward, Dela, with some Greeks, made themselves masters of the island; then Gaothelus with his wife Scota, daughter of Pharaoh, arrived here, and called the island from her Scotia, and from him Gaothela, and this at the time of the Israelites' departure out of Egypt. A few ages after, Hiberus and Hermione (or as the Irish called them, Ever and Erimon), sons of Milesius, king of Spain, led some colonies into this island, which had been depopulated by a plague. These stories I neither mean to affirm nor refute, making all due allowance for antiquity." Then Camden gives his own opinion in these words: "That this island was originally inhabited upon the general dispersion of mankind, I have not the least doubt." And at this date, no one who may be quoted as understanding the subject, has any doubt of the immense antiquity of the Irish; an antiquity which, in fact, defies calculation. But it is in some measure proved by the discovery in Ireland of those weapons which are the earliest weapons of defence used by man. They are flints chipped into a shape like the head of a spear. They were used before men knew how to use metal; and they belong to that earliest time which geologists have called by the name of the stone age. Geologists have divided the early ages into three: the stone, the bronze, and the iron period. In the stone age, Ireland had a people, and the celts, or flint stones chipped into a form like a spear head, were their weapons.
The debated point of whether or not Ireland was peopled from England, is one which is of little interest. There was a time in the history of man when people could have walked over from France to England, and when Ireland was joined to Wales. Strange as this may read to some persons, it is less strange than the greater instance of, for example, Australia being found peopled, and yet parted from the rest of the world by a great sea. The people of Australia had not gone there in vessels. They had got there by land; and whether, by the gradual work of time, during which the land sunk, and the sea [{543}] flowed in over it, and by this means gave islands to the world, or whether by enormous convulsions rocks shivered, and the land was rent apart and sunk, as between us and France, where the chasm may be said to be filled in by the water that makes the Straits of Dover—however it was done, whether suddenly or not, the researches of modern science have settled that these things occurred, and that the people who were our forefathers in this manner were separated from each other. Accepting this theory as a truth, it is idle to ask whether Ireland was peopled from this country or not. But in the presence of such a theory, no person can any longer laugh at Ireland's traditional antiquity; it is more reasonable to accept it, and to allow that they have proved their ancient and hereditary intelligence by preserving history.
And this theory of the manner in which islands were divided from continents is, in fact, constantly proving itself before our eyes. Not to go out of England, we may see the progress of such a change now in Lincolnshire. The reason why the great embankments against the sea are necessary there, and have become more than ever necessary of late years, is, that the land is sinking; and but for the preventions that science and labor effect, a part of Lincolnshire would become an island.
There are now a few words to be said about the name Scotia, as applied to Ireland. The Romans called all the far "western people" Scots, or Scythians. It meant a people who sailed—a maritime people—they learnt the word in these countries, for it is Teutonic, or northern Celtic; and we use the word ourselves when we speak of a boat scudding over the waves.
That the people from Spain came to Ireland, and that the existing Irish are their descendants, is not disputed. Hiberus and Hermione, called by the Irish Ever and Erimon, left their names in Hibernia, from the Spanish for one brother, and in the Irish Erin for the other. But yet Hibernia is a comparatively modern name; and Ireland is the ancient Scotia, called Ierne by the Roman poet Claudian and other Roman writers, and Ivvorna by Diodoms Siculus, and many beside.
One word more about the rude flint weapon called everywhere a celt. It took its name undoubtedly from the people who used it. It was the weapon of the northern or Celtic nations. When Celts are found they indicate to us the existence of the men who used them, and their state of civilization. Wherever they are found they are called by this name, and their name is derived from the northern people.
Ireland has always been considered a most healthy country, and in Campbell's Philosophical Survey of Ireland, Dr. Rutty tells us, "The bogs are not injurious to health, and agues are very unfrequent here." And again, these "bogs are not, as may be supposed from their blackness, masses of putrefaction, but, on the contrary, are of such a texture as to resist putrefaction above any other substance we know of." Of such assertions we have now constant proof, and the durability of the beautiful and often highly polished ornaments made out of Irish bogwood is too well known to dwell upon.