[335]. A.D. 668. Navigatio Colman Episcopi cum reliquiis sanctorum ad insulam Vaccæ Albæ in quo fundavit ecclesiam et navigatio filiorum Gartnaith ad Hiberniam cum plebe Scith.—Tigh.
670 Venit gens Gartnait de Hibernia.—Tigh. For the Columban settlements in Skye see Reeves’s Adamnan, edit. 1874, p. 274. Colman’s course to Iona can be traced by the dedications. Menmuir and Fearn in Forfarshire are dedicated to St. Aidan, and he is himself patron saint of Tarbet in Easter Ross.
[336]. Wilfrido administrante episcopatum Eboracensis ecclesiæ, necnon et omnium Nordanhymbrorum, sed et Pictorum, quousque rex Osuiu imperium protendere poterat.—B. iv. c. iii.
[337]. Nam in primis annis ejus, tenero adhuc regno, populi bestiales Pictorum feroci animo subjectionem Saxonum despiciebant, et jugum servitutis a se abjicere minabantur, congregantes undique de utribus et folliculis Aquilonis innumeras gentes, quasi formicarum greges in æstate de tumulis ferventes, aggerem contra domum cadentem muniebant. Quo audito Rex Ecgfridus humilis in populis suis, magnanimus in hostes, statim equitatu exercito præparato, tarda molimina nesciens, sicut Judas Maccabæus in Deum confidens, parva manu populi Dei contra enormem et supra invisibilem hostem cum Bernhaeth subaudaci Regulo invasit, stragemque immensam populi subruit, duo flumina cadaveribus mortuorum replens, ita (quod mirum dictu est) ut supra siccis pedibus ambulantes, fugientium turbam occidentes persequebantur, et in servitutem redacti populi, usque ad diem occisionis regis, subjecti jugo captivitatis jacebant.—Eddii Vit. S. Wilf. c. xix. The name Bernhaeth has all the appearance of a Saxon name, and it is hardly possible to avoid the suspicion that he is the same person as the father of ‘Brectred dux regius Norndanhymbrorum,’ who was slain by the Picts in 698, and who is called by Tighernac, filius Bernith. He may have been the Anglic ruler over the subjected Picts who had joined them, and may have provoked the insurrection in order to make himself independent.
[338]. 672 Expulsio Drosto de regno.—Tigh.
[339]. Sicut igitur Ecgfrido Rege religioso regnum ad Aquilonem et Austrum per triumphos augebatur: Ita beatæ memoriæ Wilfrido Episcopo ad Austrum super Saxones et Aquilonem super Britones et Scotos, Pictosque regnum ecclesiarum multiplicabatur; omnibus gentibus carus et amabilis, ecclesiastica officia diligenter persolvebat et omnibus locis presbyteros et diaconos sibi adjuvantes abundanter ordinavit, inter seculares undas fluctuantes moderate novas ecclesias gubernabat.—Eddii Vit. S. Wilf. c. xxi.
[340]. Trumuini ad provinciam Pictorum, quæ tunc temporis Anglorum erat imperio subjecta.—Bede, H. E. B. iv. c. xii. Later writers who knew of no Picts but those of Galloway have made it Trumuin’s diocese, but there can be no doubt that Bede throughout refers to the province of the Picts north of the Firth of Forth.
[341]. Bredei reigned twenty-one years, and died in 693, which places the beginning of his reign in this year.
[342]. This is proved by the poem afterwards quoted, attributed to Adamnan, in which he is called ‘the son of the king of Alcluaith;’ and in another poem, attributed to Riagal of Bangor, he is said to fight for the land of his grandfather. The continuator of Nennius calls him the ‘fratruelis’ of Ecgfrid, that is, the son or descendant of his father’s brother; and Anfrait, the father of Talorcan, was the brother of Osuiu, the father of Ecgfrid. It is curious to see how very little of real Pictish blood he had.
[343]. A.D. 680 Obsessio Duinbaitte.—An. Ult. A.D. 681 Obsessio Duin Foither.—Ib.