¹ Moore, George, A Story Teller's Holiday, 2 vols. (London, 1928)Google Scholar.

² For economy of words, the term “syneisactism” will be used in this essay to denote the living together of a male ascetic and a virgo subintroducta. Other terms used to describe these women were “agapetae” (Bonizo of Sutri, Liber De Vita Christiana, ed. Perels, E. [Berlin, 1930], 55, 205)Google Scholar, “conhospitae” (infra, p. 556), “mulieres extraneae” (Cone. Nicea, c. 3), “mulieres adoptivae” (Cone. Bracar. II, c. 32, PL 84:579), “sisters” (infra, n. 52), and combinations of these terms.

³ Moore, , op. cit., viiiGoogle Scholar.

⁴ Irish scholars have been slow to publish ancient Celtic source material and slower yet in the publication of source material relating to syneisactism. As will be seen from the citations in this essay, the majority of texts dealing with the virgines subintroductae were published in the early decades of this century.

⁵ A similar reaction met the publication of Achelis, H., Virgines Subintroductae (Leipzig, 1902)Google Scholar. See Black, M., The Scrolls and Christian Origins (N.Y., 1961), 86Google Scholar.

⁶ Achelis, , op. cit., 223Google Scholar.

⁷ It must be remembered that syneisactism was carried on for several centuries in orthodox communities and was condemned officially only at a fairly late date in the early Church. Nicea, c. 3, is the best known of the early conciliar condem-nations.

⁸ See, for example, Danielou, J., The Theology of Jewish Christianity (London, 1964), 37sGoogle Scholar; Quispel, G., The Syrian Thomas and the Syrian Macarius, Vigiliae Christianae 18 (1964), 226–35Google Scholar; and Quispel, G., Gnosticism and the New Testament, in The Bible in Modern Scholarship, ed. Hyatt, J. P. (Nashville, Tenn., 1965), 252–71Google Scholar.

⁹ Although all of the studies on these characteristics are too numerous to list here, perhaps the most impressive are those dealing with the distinctively Mosaic character of early Celtic canon law. There are, for example, references to clean and unclean foods, cities of refuge, tithes, and the Year of Jubilee. Bockenhopf, K., Speisatzungen mosaischer Art in mittelalterlichen Kirchenrechtsquellen des Morgen und Abendlandes (Münster, 1907)Google Scholar; Fournier, P., De quelques infiltrations byzantines dans le droit canonique de l'epoque carolingienne, in Melanges offerts a G. Schlumberger (Paris, 1924), 67–78Google Scholar; and Fournier, P., Le Liber ex lege Moysi et les tendances bibliques de droit canonique, Revue Celtique 30 (1909), 221–34Google Scholar. In a recent monograph by Kottje, R., Studien zum Einfluss des Alten Testaments auf Rechl und Liturgie des friihen Mittelalters (VI. bis VIII. Jhrt.) (Bonn, 1964), 17Google Scholar, 27ft., the Celtic use of Old Testament names is treated extensively, as well as important parallels between the Irish peregrinatores and their Old Testament fore-bears.

¹⁰ Achelis, , op. cit., 34Google Scholar. The history of the medieval canonical condemnation of syneisactism remains to be written. Briefly, it can be said that after the condemnations of the ancient Church, there followed a line of condemnations in the Spanish and Gallic councils of the sixth and seventh centuries. Except for a few specific conciliar condemnations of syneisactism, most conciliar decrees in the period from A.D. 700-1000 were more generally directed against association with all but a select group of women. Nonetheless, the early condemnations of syneisactism were kept alive in the canonical collections, almost all of which contain the ancient canons. Most notable is the Iro-Italian Collection in V Books (Vat. Lat. 1339), in which these ancient prohibitions run to almost four full folio pages (fol. 72V-76V). In the eleventh century there is a resurgence of conciliar decrees against syneisactism—-Rome (1059 and 1063), Liseaux (1064), and Rouen (1072). Thereafter, many of the prohibitions are directed against the practice in clearly heterodox communities. That the practice is condemned as late as the eleventh century in orthodox circles in the West makes questionable the special pleading for Ireland made by J. CARNEY, Old Ireland and her Poetry, in Old Ireland, ed. R. McNally (N.Y., 1965), 155.

¹¹ These canons were probably drawn up sometime in the fifth century, al-though there are admittedly clauses which indicate a later date. See The Works of Patrick, St., ed. Bieler, L. (London, 1953), 13Google Scholar; Kenney, J. F., Sources of the Early History of Ireland, I. Ecclesiastical (N.Y., 1929), 169ftGoogle Scholar.

¹² Canon 9. Bieler, L., The Irish Penitentials (Dublin, 1963), 54Google Scholar.

¹³ Catalogus Sanctorum Hiberniae, in Haddan, A. W. and Stubbs, W., Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents relating to Great Britain and Ireland, vol. II, pt. I (Oxford, 1873), 292Google Scholar.

¹⁴ Chadwick, Nora in The Age of the Saints in the Early Celtic Church (London, 1961), 149Google Scholar, claims that many of the extreme provisions in the penitentials are due to the Irish love of casuistry, hypothetical legal analysis, and theoretical cases. This must be admitted, but the sheer popularity and repetition of those texts and the later synodical injunctions against syneisactism would seem to indicate an interest in the virgines subintroductae somewhat beyond that which NORA Chadwick indicates.

¹⁵ Achelis, , op. cit., 124Google Scholar.

¹⁶ Mohrmann, M C., The Latin of St. Patrick (Dublin, 1961), 45fGoogle Scholar.

¹⁷ Gougaud, L., Christianity in Celtic Lands (London, 1932), 65Google Scholar. Perhaps the great monasteries approached most closely what could be called an Irish metropolis.

¹⁸ For the wandering of Irish scholars, see Waddeix, H., The Wandering Scholars (N.Y., 1955), 25–68Google Scholar.

¹⁹ Leclercq, J., el al., La spiritualié du moyen age, II (Paris, 1961), 56Google Scholar. A caveat should be introduced, however, against the ail-too romantic notion of a wild and bitter climate in Ireland. Professor Joseph Stevens has kindly referred me to the study by Huntington, E., Mainsprings of Civilization (N.Y., 1959), 598f.Google Scholar, in which it is shown that the climate of early medieval Ireland was much less severe than it is today, mild enough for the growing of grapes.

²⁰ Vitae Sanctorum Hiberniae, ed. Plummer, C., I (Oxford, 1910), cviiiGoogle Scholar, n. 2. As late as approximately A.D. 686, a document was signed the ostensible object of which was to exempt women and children from military obligation. See Chadwick, N., op. cit., 136Google Scholar.

²¹ Celtic wanderers on the Continent were later to be scolded for their disregard of diocesan boundaries. Infra, p. 556.

²² In a Ireland a saga is told of a sixth-century king, Suibne, who flees into the wilderness, lives on herbs, grows feathers, and even inhabits the treetops. At his death, his anmchara or soul-friend, St. Moiling, buries him in consecrated ground. In a later text, the Book of Aicill, it is recorded that in the days of Suibne there were numerous other hermits who were gielt or wild. See Chadwick, N., op. cit., 107.Google ScholarCarney, James, Studies in Irish Literature and History (Dublin, 1955), 129ff.Google Scholar, discusses the literary history of Suibne and shows how the tale of the totally unhistoric Suibne was conflated with the story of the historical St. Moiling. See also J. Carney, Old Ireland and her Poetry, in Mcnally, R., op. cit., 159fGoogle Scholar. Perhaps these gielts are similar to the Boskoi of the East. Festugiere, A.-J., Les Moines d'Orient, I (Paris, 1961), 43Google Scholar. An interesting pictorial representation of these gielts can be seen in the painting, “La Tebaide,” by Gherardo Starnino (1360-1409) in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Among the numerous hermits are two living in trees, one of whom has very long hair.

²³ Patrick, St., Confessions, c. 42Google Scholar. “Not that their fathers agree with them (the virgins); no — they often even suffer persecution and undeserved reproaches from their parents… How many have been reborn there so as to be of our kind, I do not know — not to mention widows and those who practice continence.” Works of Patrick, St., ed. Bieler, L., p. 34Google Scholar. On these continentes and virgins, see Bieler, , Life and Legend of St. Patrick (Dublin, 1949), 74Google Scholar.

²⁴ If one follows the chronology of the Catalogus SS. Hiberniae, this would have occurred in the first age.

²⁵ On the institution of double monasteries, see Bateson, M., Origin and Early History of Double Monasteries, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society (London, 1899), 137–98Google Scholar. Also see Ryan, J., Irish Monasticism (London, 1931), 141ftGoogle Scholar.

²⁶ Patrick, St., Confessions, c. 49Google Scholar.

²⁷ Ryan, , op. cit., 134Google Scholar.

²⁸ Mcneill, J. T. and Gamer, H., Medieval Handbooks of Penance (N.Y., 1938), 205Google Scholar.

²⁹ That the early Roman clergy was often married is seen from the clerical forebears of St. Patrick himself. A great many of the Irish penitentials speak of married clergy. See Bieler, , The Irish Penitentials, passimGoogle Scholar.

³⁰ Although not an exhaustive list, the following are representative of this literature: Scheffer-Boichorst, P., Zur Geschichte der Syren im Abendlande: Gesammelte Schriften, II, Eberings Hist. Studien 43 (Berlin, 1905), 187–224Google Scholar; James, M. R., Syriac Apocrypha in Ireland, JThS 11 (1910), 290f.Google Scholar; Schlauch, M., On Conall Core and the Relations of Old Ireland with the Orient, Journ. of Celtic Stud. 1 (1960), 152–66Google Scholar; Feist, P., Untersuchungen zur Bedeutung orientalischer Einflüsse für die Künst des frühen Mittelalters, Wiss. Zs.d. Martin-Luthers-Univ. Halle-Wittemberg, II (1952/1953), Reihe 1, 27–79Google Scholar; and Patjlsen, P., Koptische und irische Kunst und ihre Ausstrahlungen auf altgermanische Kulturen (Stuttgart, 1952-1953)Google Scholar.

³¹ Bury, J. B., The Life of St. Patrick and his Place in History (London, 1905)Google Scholar.

³² Chadwick, N., op. cit., 54fGoogle Scholar. Also see the filiations on the map of western monasticism in Daniilou, J. and Marrotj, H., The Christian Centuries: The First Six Hundred Years (London, 1964), 277Google Scholar. On the relations between Visigothic Spain and Ireland, see the articles by Hillgarth, J. N., The East, Visigothic Spain, and the Irish, Studia Patristica 4 (Berlin, 1961), 441–56Google Scholar; and Visigothic Spain and Early Christian Ireland, in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, LXII (Dublin, 1962), 167–94Google Scholar; and the condensation of these articles in Old Ireland and Visigothic Spain, in Old Ireland, ed. Mcnally, R. (N.Y., 1965), 200–27Google Scholar.

³³ Daniélou, J. and Marrou, H., op. cit., 121Google Scholar.

³⁴ Meer, F. Van Der, Augustine the Bishop (N.Y., 1961), 119Google Scholar.

³⁵ Altaner, B., Patrology (N.Y., 1961), 200Google Scholar, considers this a third-century work.

³⁶ Achelis, , op. cit., 35ftGoogle Scholar.

³⁷ Although Lietzmann, H., The Era of the Church Fathers (London, 1958), 74Google Scholar, calls this Manichaeism, the sources of this dualism may be found much earlier than Mani, even in Palestinian Judaism.

³⁸ Lletzmann, , op. cit., 75Google Scholar.

³⁹ James, M. R., The Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford, 1960), 265, 337, 349Google Scholar. On the Epistula Titi and its Pseudo-Cyprianic dependence, see Quasten, J., Patrology, I (Westminster [Md.], 1950), 156fGoogle Scholar.

⁴⁰ Labriolle, P. De, Le “mariage spirituel” dans I'antiquité chréiienne, Revue Historique 136 (1921), 204–25Google Scholar.

⁴¹ For his strange interpretation of Tertullian'S, De Exhortatione, c. 12Google Scholar, see Labriolle, De, art. cit., 210fGoogle Scholar.

⁴² Even Gregory of Tours uses approvingly the encratitic Acts of Andrew. James, , op. cit., 349Google Scholar.

⁴³ Palladtus, , The Lausiac History, trs.Google ScholarMeyer, R. T. in Ancient Christian Writers, 34 (London, 1965), c. 8.1, p. 42Google Scholar.

⁴⁴ Collatio 18.

⁴⁵ Although he does not call them Sarabaites, St. Jerome speaks of this type of wanderer in Epistle 22.34.

⁴⁶ Supra, p. 549.

⁴⁷ Canon 3. It is interesting to see in later canonical collections that prohibitions against wandering clerics and virgines subintroductae were often placed side by side. See, for example, the collection in Paris BN Lat. 3859 (ex IX_s) cited in Theiner, A., Disquisitiones criticae in praecipuas canonum et decretalium collectiones (Rome, 1836), 145fGoogle Scholar. For an extensive list of medieval canons directed against the clericus vagus, see Waddell, H., op. cit., 269–99Google Scholar.

⁴⁸ Supra, p. 549.

⁴⁹ Haddan, and Stubbs, , op. cit., 292Google Scholar.

⁵⁰ The Tripartite Life of Patrick, ed. Stokes, Wh., I (London, 1887), 89Google Scholar.

⁵¹ “At a certain time Patrick was told, through the error of the rabble, that bishop Mel had sinned with his kinswoman, for they used to be in one habitation a-praying to the Lord.” Tripartite Life, 89.

⁵² Olden, T., On the Consortia of the First Order of Irish Saints, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, III (Dublin, 1894), 415–20Google Scholar, holds that the word “suir” came to mean the sister living in consortio. To denote a blood sister, the term “derbhshiur” was used. Professor D. A. Binchy has assured me that Olden's interpretation cannot be maintained. Nonetheless, the virgines subintroductae were often called “sisters.” In the Irish canonical collection of St. Germain (Paris BN Lat. 12444) L. II, c. 31 (fol. 23V) the third canon of the Council of Nicea is paraphrased: “In totum denuntiavit sancta et magna synodus neque episcopo neque presbytero neque diacono… licere adoptivam sororem habere nisi forte sororem veram…” Again on fol. 99r-v the virgines are called adopted sisters.

⁵³ James Carney argues that the poem is written to a psalter which has recently been found by an old ascetic. He holds that the name Crinog really means “old-young” and that the poem is merely a “donnish joke.” O'connor, F., Kings, Lords, and Commons (London, 1961), 61Google Scholar. Carney's view is further expanded in his recent article, Old Ireland and her Poetry, in Old Ireland, ed. Mcnally, R., 154ffGoogle Scholar. He dates the poem ca. A.D. 1100, and implies that this date is so far removed from the Council of Nicea that it could hardly speak of syneisactism. Carney has, however, forgotten the eleventh-century condemnations of syneisactism in the West. Even if it is admitted, moreover, that the poem is written to a psalter, the form of the allegory indicates that the poet was well-aware of the practice of syneisactism. I have Professor Binchy's support in this regard, when he says that Carney's interpretation by no means precludes a reference in the poem to syneisactism. For Kuno Meyer's discussion of the poem, see his An Crinog: Ein altirisches Gedicht an eine Syneisakte, , Sitzungsberichte der königlich preussischer Akademie der Wissensckaften, XVIII (Berlin, 1918), 361–74Google Scholar.

⁵⁴ An English translation of An Crinog may be found in Meyer, Kuno, selections from Ancient Irish Poetry (N.Y., 1911), 37Google Scholar.

⁵⁵ Meyer, Kuno, Selections, 37Google Scholar.

⁵⁶ Ibid.

⁵⁷ M. E. Ernault, in his response to L. Duchesne, Lovocat et Catihern, prêtres bretons du temps de Melaine, St., Revue de Bretagne et de Vendie 57 (1885), I, 5–21Google Scholar, has indicated that the names are Celtic in origin.

⁵⁸ “We have learned that you do not cease from carrying to the huts of your compatriots certain tables on which you celebrate Masses with the aid of women, which you call conhospitae. While you distribute the Eucharist, they presume to take the chalice and administer the blood of Christ to the people. The novelty of such a thing and the unheard-of superstition sadden us not a little, since this abominable sect, which never before has appeared in Gaul, seems in our time to be emerging. The Eastern fathers call it ‘Pepundian’ from the name of Pepundius, the author of the schism, who presumed to have women aiding him in the Sacrifice.” Duchesne, , art. cit., 6Google Scholar.

⁵⁹ Duchesne, , art. cit.Google Scholar, argues that the first abuse to which the bishops object is not the celebration of Mass with portable altars or the partaking of the Eucharist within one's house, but the wandering of the Celtic priests within established diocesan boundaries.

⁶⁰ Supra, p. 549.

⁶¹ See n. 58, supra.

⁶² Augustine, , De haeresibus, c. 27Google Scholar, PL 42: 30-31.

⁶³ Eptphanius, , Panarion, c. 49Google Scholar.

⁶⁴ These two early sixth-century bishops probably used as their direct source the Praedestinatus, c. 27, a work composed in Gaul ca. A.D. 450, which copies St. Augustine, De haeresibus. See Duchesne, art. cit.

⁶⁵ Pseudo-Clement, De virginitate.

⁶⁶ Supra, n. 51.

⁶⁷ On investigation St. Patrick finds that the accusations are untrue.

⁶⁸ Duchesne, , art. cit., 6Google Scholar.

⁶⁹ Vitae Sanctorum Hiberniae, I, 205f.

⁷⁰ Gougaud, , Christianity in Celtic Lands, 89Google Scholar.

⁷¹ Vitae Sanctorum Hiberniae, I, CXXi.

⁷² The Martyrology of Oengus the Culdee, ed. Stokes, Wh. (London, 1905), 43Google Scholar.

⁷⁵ Ibid., 45. The Christ-child is either fondled or nursed by nuns in Félire hUi Gormáin, The Martyrology of Gorman, ed. Stokes, Wh. (London, 1895), 65Google Scholar, and in the story of St. Ite, cited by Carney, J., Poems of Blathmac, Son of Cu Brethan, in Early Irish Poetry, ed. Carney, J. (Cork, 1965), 51Google Scholar.

⁷⁶ An early example of this appears in Todd, J. H., St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland (Dublin, 1864), 91Google Scholar, n. 1.

⁷⁷ Martyrology of Oengus, 41.

⁷⁸ William, of Malmesbury, De gestis pontif. Angliae, VGoogle Scholar, PL 179:1633f.

⁷⁹ Infra, p. 563.

⁸⁰ Bishop Marbode, , Epistola viGoogle Scholar, PL 171:1481. “Mulierum cohabitationem, in quo genere quondam peccasti, diceris plus amare, ut qui antiquae iniquitatis contagium, novae religionis exemplo circo eamdem materiam studeas expiare. ‘Has 560 etenim solum communi accubitu per noctem, ut referunt, accubante simul et discipulorum grege, ut inter utrosque medius jacens, utrique sexui vigiliarum et somni leges praefigas.’ Has peregrinationis tuae loquuntur esse pedissequas, et disputanti tibi jugiter assidere.”

⁸¹ Similitude, c. IX. 10f.

⁸² Tripartite Life, 91.

⁸³ Supra, p. 559.

⁸⁴ This passage from Sermon XLI of CAESARIUS of Aries (ed. G. Morin, I [Turnhout, 1953], 179ft.), has gone unnoted by scholars dealing with syneisactism. Dom Morin found this sermon in a number of mss attributed to Augustine. It is significant, perhaps, for the continued existence of the practice of syneisactism that this sermon is actually inserted into the eleventh-century canonical Collection of Tarragone, L. VI, c. 218 (Vat. Lat. 6093, fol. 127V-129V). It is, to my knowledge, the only canonical collection in which this sermon appears.

⁸⁵ Olden, T., art. cit., dates this story ca. A.D. 839Google Scholar.

⁸⁶ Borderie, A. De La, Les trois vies anciennes de St. Tudual, Histoire de Bretagne, I (Paris, 1887), 112Google Scholar.

⁸⁷ Unsigned Review of Borderie's, A. De La work, in Revue Celtique 10 (1889), 254Google Scholar.

⁸⁸ Borderie, A. De La, art. cit., 113Google Scholar. “Jamque tamen temos precesserat ordine sanctus/ Eximios istos Tutgualus nomine clarus/ Cum meritis monachus multorum exemplar habendus/ Cuius cumque sinu caperet cum vestibus ignem/ Non tetigit lamina sed leni rore madescit/ Sed cum coelitibus vitam turn forte gerebat.”

⁸⁹ Workman, H. B., The Evolution of the Monastic Ideal (London, 1913), 64Google Scholar.

⁹⁰ For purposes not particularly ascetic, Findchua de Bri Gobann habitually took baths in a vat of cold water. Betha Fhinnchua Bri Gobhann, in Lives of the Saints from the Book of Lismore, ed. Stokes, Wh. (Oxford, 1890), 237f.Google ScholarGou-Gaud, L., Dévotions et pratiques ascétiques du moyen âge (Paris, 1925), 158Google Scholar.

⁹¹ Palladius, , op. cit., 113Google Scholar; and Chadwick, N., op. cit., 104Google Scholar.

⁹² St. Scothine.

⁹³ This was the practice of Evagrius in the Nitrian desert.

⁹⁴ Infra, n. 101.

⁹⁵ St. Scothine.

⁹⁶ Gougaud, , Dévotions, 160Google Scholar.

⁹⁷ Ibid.

⁹⁸ Vita Kentigerni, ed. Forbes, (Edinburgh, 1874), 185Google Scholar, cited in Gougaud, L., Mulierum Consortia: Étude sur le syneisaktisme chez les ascètes celtiques, Eriu 9 (1923), 148Google Scholar.

⁹⁹ Meyer, K., The Hermit's Song, Eriu 1 (1904), 39Google Scholar.

¹⁰⁰ Gougaud, L., Devotions, 163Google Scholar, holds that in his rule for recluses, St. Aelred is actually speaking of himself.

¹⁰¹ Gougaud, , Divotions, 160Google Scholar.

¹⁰² Infra, p. 563.

¹⁰³ Betha Coluimba Chille, trs. Kelleher, A., Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 11 (1917), 125CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁰⁴ Workman, , op. cit., 71Google Scholar.

¹⁰⁵ Giraldus, Cambrensis, Gemma ecclesiastica, II, 15Google Scholar, ed. Brewer, T. S., Rolls Series, p. 235Google Scholar, cited in Gougaud, L., Mulierum consortia, 149Google Scholar.

¹⁰⁶ Bouyer, L., The Spirituality of the New Testament and the Fathers (London, 1963), 312Google Scholar. Here Bouyer is following Heussi, K., Der Ursprung des Mönchtums (Tübingen, 1936), 111Google Scholar.

¹⁰⁷ Patrick, St., Confessions, c. 44Google Scholar, speaks of the striving with the flesh. In the Loricae of the early Irish the military theme is quite clear.

¹⁰⁸ Supra, p. 559.

¹⁰⁹ Athanasius, St., The Life of St. Antony, c. 46, trs. Meyer, R. T. (London, 1950), 59Google Scholar.

¹¹⁰ Ibid., c. 5.

¹¹¹ Also see Waddeix, H., The Desert Fathers (Ann Arbor [Mich.], 1960), 18Google Scholar.

¹¹² Leclercq, , et al., op. cit., 57Google Scholar.

¹¹³ Gougaud, , Divotions, 209Google Scholar.

¹¹⁴ Geoffrey, of Vendôme, Epistola 47Google Scholar, PL 167:182. A similar reference to syneisactism as martyrdom is found in CAESARTUS of Aries, supra, n. 84.

¹¹⁵ Williams, G. H., Wilderness and Paradise in Christian Thought (N.Y., 1962), 46Google Scholar.

¹¹⁶ Bouyer, , op. cit., 304Google Scholar, discusses this theme for the pre-history of monasticism.

¹¹⁷ Seymour, ST. John D., The Book of Adam and Eve in Ireland, in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, Sect. C., XXXVI (1922), 121–33Google Scholar. On the Saltair na Rann, see also Greene, D., The Religious Epic, in Early Irish Poetry, ed. CARNEY, J. (Cork, 1965), 78fGoogle Scholar.

¹¹⁸ Meyer, K., Eve's Lament, Eriu 3 (1907), 148Google Scholar.

¹¹⁹ Meyer, K., Selections, 34Google Scholar.

¹²⁰ Seymour, , op. cit., 129Google Scholar.

¹²¹ Ibid., 128.

¹²² For the ancient Syriac parallels, see Quispel, G., The Syrian Thomas, 235Google Scholar.

¹²³ Bieler, L., Ireland, Harbinger of the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1963), 25Google Scholar.

¹²⁴ Bouyer, , op. cit., 521Google Scholar, actually makes this statement concerning Irish monasticism, but in the early Middle Ages Irish monasticism and Irish Christianity were almost synonymous. It is somewhat difficult to see why BOUYER makes this statement in light of his comments on p. 517.