¹ Surveys of Aldfrith's background and career can be found inKirby, D. P., The Earliest English Kings (London, 1991), 142–47; Yorke, Barbara, Rex Doctissimus: Bede and King Aldfrith of Northumbria (Jarrow, 2009); Cramp, Rosemary, “Aldfrith,” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed. Matthew, H. C. G. and Harrison, Brian(Oxford, 2004), 618–19. An important source is stillPlummer, Charles, Venerabilis Baedae Opera Historica (Oxford, 1896), 2:263–64. The following abbreviation will be used throughout: Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum = HE.Google Scholar

² Kirby cogently summarizes Aldfrith's Northumbria as “rich, politically stable and intellectually gifted enough under Aldfrith and his immediate successors to enable that creative synthesis of Celtic, Anglo-Saxon and Mediterranean art — which is so striking a feature of post-conversion Northumbrian civilization — to achieve its maximum expression in the renaissance of the late seventh and first half of the eighth centuries.”Earliest English Kings, 142–43.Google Scholar

³ The anonymous Vita Cuthberti was produced sometime between the translation of Cuthbert's relics in 698 and the end of Aldfrith's reign: Colgrave, Bertram, ed. and trans., Two Lives of Saint Cuthbert: A Life by an Anonymous Monk of Lindisfarne and Bede's Prose Life (Cambridge, 1940), 13.Google Scholar

⁴ The Lindisfarne Gospels were produced at roughly the same time as the anonymous Life of Cuthbert in order to celebrate the saint's translation:Henderson, George, From Durrow to Kells: The Insular Gospel; books 650–800 (London, 1987), 112–18; Neuman de Vegvar, Carol L., The Northumbrian Renaissance: A Study in the Transmission of Style (London, 1987), 170–71; Webster, Leslie and Backhouse, Janet, eds., The Making of England: Anglo-Saxon Art and Culture AD 600–900 (London, 1991), 111–14. But Michelle Brown opts for a later date of 715–720: Manuscripts from the Anglo-Saxon Age (London, 2007), 10.Google Scholar

⁵ The one Old Gaelic (ca. 600–ca. 900) text attributed to Aldfrith under his Gaelic name, Flann Fína, shows no clear linguistic signs of seventh-century dating: Ireland, Colin A., ed., Old Irish Wisdom Attributed to Aldfrith of Northumbria: An Edition of “Briathra Flainn Fhína maic Ossu” (Tempe, AZ, 1999), 34–38. Later texts in Gaelic are also attributed to Flann Fína. For example, seeHull, Vernam E., “The Wise Sayings of Flann Fína (Aldfrith, King of Northumbria),” Speculum 4 (1929): 99–113; Walsh, Paul, “A Poem on Ireland,” Ériu 8 (1915): 64–74.Google Scholar

⁶ There are unresolved chronological problems in the genealogies that name Flann Fína as well as questions about whether Fína derives from his mother's personal name or is intended as an epithet:Ireland, Colin, “Aldfrith of Northumbria and the Irish Genealogies,” Celtica 22 (1991): 64–78, at 64, 68–75. Chronological problems in the genealogy were also noted byKirby, , Earliest English Kings, 143. Others support Aldfrith's Gaelic background through the Uí Néill or, specifically, Cenél nÉogain: seeMoisl, Hermann, “The Bernician Royal Dynasty and the Irish in the Seventh Century,” Peritia 2 (1983): 103–26, at 122–23; Yorke, Barbara, “Adomnán at the Court of King Aldfrith,” in Adomnán of Iona: Theologian, Lawmaker, Peacemaker, ed. Wooding, Jonathan M.(Dublin, 2010), 36–50, at 36–37.Google Scholar

⁷ The most extensive work yet on Cenél Conaill demonstrates the rivalry between them and Cenél nÉogain during the seventh century:Lacey, Brian, Cenél Conaill and the Donegal Kingdoms AD 500–800 (Dublin, 2006), passim.Google Scholar

⁸ Kelly, Fergus, A Guide to Early Irish Law (Dublin, 1988), 6, 15; Eska, Charlene M., Cáin Lánamna: An Old Irish Tract on Marriage and Divorce Law (Leiden, 2010), 20;Ireland, , “Aldfrith and Irish Genealogies,” 76–77.Google Scholar

⁹ “Tempore Finani et Colmani episcoporum”: Bede, , HE 3.27, ed. Colgrave, Bertram and Mynors, R. A. B., Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Oxford, 1969), 312–13.Google Scholar

¹⁰ “Nobilium simul et mediocrium … relicta insula patria, uel diuinae lectionis uel continentioris uitae gratia illo secesserant”: ibid.Google Scholar

¹¹ “Alii magis circueundo per cellas magistrorum lectioni operam dare gaudebant”: ibid.Google Scholar

¹² “Irish Monks and Learning,” in Los monjes y los estudios (Poblet, 1963), 61–86, at 77.Google Scholar

¹³ “Quos omnes Scotti libentissime suscipientes, uictum eis cotidianum sine pretio, libros quoque ad legendum et magisterium gratuitum praebere curabant”: Bede, , HE 3.27, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 312–13.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Charles-Edwards, Thomas, “Review Article: The Corpus Iuris Hibernici,” Studia Hibernica 20 (1980): 141–62, at 159.Google Scholar

¹⁵ The school of Theodore and Hadrian at Canterbury was able to teach both Greek and Latin. The overt knowledge of Greek and classical mythology in contemporaneous Ireland is harder to trace: seeHerren, Michael W., “Literary and Glossarial Evidence for the Study of Classical Mythology in Ireland A.D. 600–800,” in Text and Gloss: Studies in Insular Learning and Literature Presented to Joseph Donovan Pheifer, ed. O'Briain, Helen Conrad, D'Arcy, Anne Marie, and Scattergood, John (Dublin, 1999), 49–67; Howlett, David, “Hellenic Learning in Insular Latin: An Essay on Supported Claims,” Peritia 12 (1998): 54–78; andHerren, Michael, “The Study of Greek in Ireland in the Early Middle Ages,” in L'Irlanda e gli Irlandesi nell'Alto Medioevo (Spoleto, 2010), 511–32.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auctores Antiquissimi (hereafter MGH Auct. ant.) 15, §3, 479–80; Lapidge, Michael and Herren, Michael, Aldhelm: The Prose Works (Ipswich, 1979), 139–40 (introduction), 154–55 (translation). Vivien Law's comments about Aldhelm's attitudes to learning are worth noting:Law, Vivien, Wisdom, Authority and Grammar in the Seventh Century: Decoding Virgilius Maro Grammaticus (Cambridge, 1995), 101–4.Google Scholar

¹⁷ “Ex Hiberniae brumosis circionis insulae climatibus”: Aldhelm, , Epistolae, ed. Ehwald, , MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 489; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 161 (translation). This description implies that Heahfrith has spent at least part of his Irish sojourn with the English monks in Mayo: ibid., 145. For Bede's account of these English monks, seeBede, , HE 4.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 346–49.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 492–93; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 143–46 (introduction), 163 (translation). For a survey of the learning available at the Canterbury school, seeLapidge, Michael, “The School of Theodore and Hadrian,” Anglo-Saxon England 15 (1986): 45–72; Bischoff, Bernhard and Lapidge, Michael, eds., Biblical Commentaries from the Canterbury School of Theodore and Hadrian (Cambridge, 1994), 243–74.Google Scholar

¹⁹ “Cur, inquam, Hibernia, quo catervatim istinc lectitantes classibus advecti confluunt, ineffabili quodam privilegio efferatur”: Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 492; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 163 (translation).Google Scholar

²⁰ Bede, , HE 3.26, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 308–9.Google Scholar

²¹ Seán Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Gearóid Mac, eds., The Annals of Ulster (to A.D. 1131) (Dublin, 1983), 138–39.Google Scholar

²² Bede, , HE 4.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 346–49. See Orschel, Vera, “Mag nEó na Sacsan: An English Colony in Ireland in the Seventh and Eighth Centuries,” Peritia 15 (2001): 81–107.Google Scholar

²³ Alcuin, , Epistolae, ed. Dümmler, Ernst, MGH Epist. Karolini aevi 2, 4, 19 (§2), 445–46 (§287). For translations, seeAllott, Stephen, Alcuin of York, c. AD 732 to 804: His Life and Letters (York, 1974), 43–45 (§32 = MGH §2; §33 = MGH §287).Google Scholar

²⁴ For location and history, seeCróinín, Dáibhí Ó, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord, and the Earliest Echternach Manuscripts,” Peritia 3 (1984): 17–49.Google Scholar

²⁵ Bede, , HE 3.37, 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 310–15, 474–81.Google Scholar

²⁶ Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. ibid., 478–81.Google Scholar

²⁷ Bede, , HE 5.10–11, ed. ibid., 480–87.Google Scholar

²⁸ Bede, , HE 5.10, ed. ibid., 480–85.Google Scholar

²⁹ Bede, , HE 4.3, ed. ibid., 336–47.Google Scholar

³⁰ Bede, , HE 3.27, ed. ibid., 312–13.Google Scholar

³¹ “Vir in scripturis doctissimus”: Bede, , HE 4.26, ed. ibid., 430–31.Google Scholar

³² “Destructumque regni statum, quamuis intra fines angustiores, nobiliter recuperauit”: Bede, , HE 4.26, ed. ibid., 430–31.Google Scholar

³³ “Aldfrido rege in scripturis doctissimo”: Bede, , Historia Abbatum, §15, Plummer, , Venerabilis Baedae (n. 1 above), 1:380; Grocock, Christopher and Wood, I. N., eds. and trans., Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow (Oxford, 2013), 58–59.Google Scholar

³⁴ “Regi Aldfrido, uiro undecumque doctissimo”: Bede, , HE 5.12, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 496–97.Google Scholar

³⁵ “Vir undecumque doctissimus”: Bede, , HE 5.18, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 514–15.Google Scholar

³⁶ “Et tunc in insulis Scottorum ob studium litterarum exulabat”: Bede, , Vita Sancti Cuthberti, chap. 24, ed. Colgrave, (n. 3 above), 236–37.Google Scholar

³⁷ “Qui non paucis ante temporibus in regionibus Scottorum lectioni operam dabat, ibi ob amorem sapientiae spontaneum passus exilium”: Bede, , Vita Sancti Cuthberti, chap. 24, ed. ibid., 238–39.Google Scholar

³⁸ Bede, , Vita Sancti Cuthberti, chap. 24, ed. ibid., 238–39; Yorke, Barbara, “Aldhelm's Irish and British Connections,” in Aldhelm and Sherborne: Essays to Celebrate the Founding of the Bishopric, ed. Barker, Katherine with Brooks, Nicholas(Oxford, 2010), 164–80, at 171.Google Scholar

³⁹ For a sense of the varieties of recognized marriages and liaisons, seeKelly, , Guide to Irish Law (n. 8 above), 70–75; Eska, , Cáin Lánamna (n. 8 above), 13–24.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ “Aldfrithus rex sapientissimus”: Stephen, , Vita Wilfridi, chaps. 44, 45, ed. Colgrave, Bertram, The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus (Cambridge, 1927), 90–91. The same phrase describing Aldfrith is repeated in both chapters.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Walter Goffart noted that Stephen of Ripon portrays Oswiu, Ecgfrith, and Aldfrith rather benignly despite their contentions withWilfrid, : The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550–800) (Notre Dame, IN, 1988), 289.Google Scholar

⁴² “Rex simul atque magister”: Alcuin, , Versus de patribus regibus et sanctis Euboricensis ecclesiae, line 846, ed. Godman, Peter, Alcuin: The Bishops, Kings, and Saints of York (Oxford, 1982), 70–71.Google Scholar

⁴³ “Qui sacris fuerat studiis imbutus ab annis aetatis primae, valido sermone sophista, acer et ingenio”: Alcuin, , Versus de patribus Euboricensis, lines 844–46, ed. ibid., 70–71.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 61–75 (exordium and treatise on seven), 75–96 (De metris), 97–149 (Enigmata), 150–201 (De pedum regulis), 201–4 (epilogue); Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works (n. 16 above), 12–13, 31–33 (discussion), 34–47 (translation of exordium, essay on seven, epilogue); Lapidge, Michael and Rosier, James J., trans., Aldhelm: The Poetic Works (Cambridge, 1985), 61–69 (discussion), 70–94 (Enigmata), and for translations by Wright, Neilof much of the works on metrics, 183–90 (discussion), 191–211 (De metris), 212–19 (De pedum regulis; partial).Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 32. The most thorough discussion of Acircius “the northwest wind” as a reference to Aldfrith is byWright, Neil, “Aldhelm, Gildas, and Acircius,” in History and Literature in Late Antiquity and the Early Medieval West (Aldershot, 1995), 1–28, at 19–24. For examples of the consensus, seeBlair, Peter Hunter, The World of Bede (Cambridge, 1970), 180;Mayr-Harting, Henry, The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd ed. (University Park, PA, 1991), 195;Kirby, , Earliest English Kings (n. 6 above), 143;Higham, N. J., (Re-) Reading Bede: The “Ecclesiastical History” in Context (London, 2006), 42;Yorke, , “Aldhelm's Irish Connections,” 170.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Aldhelm was aware of this and lists the seven divisions of Church offices in his letter:Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 70; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 41 (translation). The division of church offices into seven is most clearly documented in the eighth-century Collectio canonum Hibernensis:Reynolds, Roger E., “The De officiis vii graduum: Its Origins and Early Medieval Development,” Mediaeval Studies 34 (1972): 113–51, at 126–28, 129–31, 131–33; idem, “‘At Sixes and Sevens’ — and Eights and Nines: The Sacred Mathematics of Sacred Orders in the Early Middle Ages,” Speculum 54 (1979): 669–84, at 672–73; Charles-Edwards, T. M., “The Context and Uses of Literacy in Early Christian Ireland,” in Literacy in Medieval Celtic Societies, ed. Pryce, Huw(Cambridge, 1998), 62–82, at 68–69.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ The seven orders of the Church are highlighted in the law tract Bretha Nemed Toísech (ca. 725–50):Breatnach, Liam, “The First Third of Bretha Nemed Toísech,” Ériu 40 (1989): 1–40, at 12–13 (§9). Vernacular poets were also schematized into hierarchies of seven grades in eighth-century law texts: idem, Uraicecht na Ríar: The Poetic Grades in Early Irish Law (Dublin, 1987), 81–89, passim. An earlier law tract Críth Gablach (“The Branched Purchase”) schematized Gaelic lay society (túath) into divisions of seven, and the justification for so doing was by analogy to the seven orders of the Church. The text, based on Binchy's edition, reads: “Cair: cis lir fodlai for suidib? a .vii. Cid asa fordailtea grád túaithe? A aurlunn grád n-ecalsa; ar nach grád bís i n-eclais is coir cia beith a aurlunn i túath”; “Question: how many divisions are in the latter (i.e., túath)? Seven. How are the ranks of the túath divided? By analogy to the orders of the church; for any order that is in the church it is proper that its corresponding rank be in the túath”: Binchy, Daniel, ed., Crith Gablach (Dublin, 1941), xiv, 1: lines 5–8 (text). This idealization of seven is also found in the eighth-century grammar Auraicept na nÉces: Ahlqvist, Anders, The Early Irish Linguist: An Edition of the Canonical Part of the “Auraicept na nÉces” (Helsinki, 1983), 42–44, 50 (§4.1–9).Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Dempsey, G. T., “Aldhelm of Malmesbury and the Irish,” Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 99C (1999): 1–22, at 11, 20. Aldhelm is not likely to have been taught the significance of seven at the school in Canterbury. The Laterculus Malalianus states that there are six grades of Church office, but it lists seven, apparently following the Gaels: Stevenson, Jane, The “Laterculus Malalianus” and the School of Archbishop Theodore (Cambridge, 1995), 146–49 (§19), 214nn176–77; Reynolds, , “‘At Sixes and Sevens,’” 680.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ These include Priscian, Audax, Donatus, Servius, Sergius, Pompeius, Maximus Victorinus, Diomedes, Nonius, and Julian of Toledo:Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 31–32. For a survey of Aldhelm's intellectual background seeOrchard, Andy, “Aldhelm's Library,” in Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, vol. 1, 400–1100, ed. Gameson, Richard(Cambridge, 2012), 591–605; for a translation and discussion of De metris and De pedum regulis, seeWright, , “Aldhelm's Writings on Metrics,” 181–219.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 97–149. For translations, seePitman, James Hall, trans., The Riddles of Aldhelm (New Haven, CT, 1925); Lapidge, and Rosier, , Aldhelm, Poetic Works, 61–69 (discussion), 70–94 (translation).Google Scholar

⁵¹ Howe, Nicholas, “Aldhelm's Enigmata and Isidorian Etymology,” Anglo-Saxon England 14 (1985): 37–59.Google Scholar

⁵² Cameron, M. L., “Aldhelm as Naturalist: A Re-examination of Some of His Enigmata,” Peritia 4 (1985): 117–33; Law, , Wisdom, Authority and Grammar (n. 16 above), 102.Google Scholar

⁵³ “Tempore pubertatis nostrae”: Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 62; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 34 (translation).Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Ibid., 32;Howlett, David, British Books in Biblical Style (Dublin, 1997), 104; Lapidge, Michael, “Aldhelm and the ‘Epinal-Erfurt Glossary,’” in Aldhelm and Sherborne, ed. with Brooks, Barker(n. 38 above), 129–63, at 149;Yorke, , “Aldhelm's Irish Connections,” 170–71. Dempsey suggested a time in the first half of the decade of the 660s:Dempsey, , “Aldhelm and the Irish,” 19–20.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 32; Yorke, , “Aldhelm's Irish Connections,” 170–71; Thornbury, Emily, Becoming a Poet in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 2014), 151, 153, 157–58.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ “Tua sagaci eruditione non livescam”: Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 201; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 45 (translation). Thornbury, on the other hand, suggests that Aldhelm hoped Aldfrith would use the epistula to learn quantitative meter from him: Becoming a Poet, 153.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster (n. 21 above), 162–63.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Ossu is well recorded in the Annals of Ulster and is always uninflected in keeping with its foreign origins. Its use must be genitive singular here: Ireland, , “Aldfrith and Irish Genealogies” (n. 8 above), 70n26.Google Scholar

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⁶⁰ Johnston, , Literacy and Identity, 102.Google Scholar

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⁶⁵ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster, 132–33. Cummíne Fota is cited as an authority in many Gaelic texts, both Latin and the vernacular, and many vernacular stories developed about him: Ireland, , “Aldfrith and the Learning of a Sapiens,” 65–66.Google Scholar

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⁸² It was first dated to between 678 and 683 byBinchy, Daniel A., “The Date and Provenance of Uraicecht Becc,” Ériu 18 (1958): 44–54, at 53. In his edition of some of the fragments, Liam Breatnach stated of Binchy's dating of the text, “There can be no objection to this conclusion”: “Legal Tract Cáin Fhuithirbe,” 46. Subsequently, Seán Ó Coileáin argued that, based on the available evidence from a fragmentary text, such a specific timeframe could not be certain. He also localized the place name Fuithirbe to the Muckross Demesne near Loch Léin, confirming the text's Munster associations: “Mag Fuithirbe Revisited,” Éigse 23 (1989): 16–26, at 24, 26.Google Scholar

⁸³ Stokes, , “Annals of Tigernach,” 219(my translation).Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Radner, Joan Newlon, ed., Fragmentary Annals of Ireland (Dublin, 1978), 54–55(my translation). It should be noted that this collection has been called “One of the less reliable compilations of annals”: Sharpe, Richard, trans., Adomnán of Iona: Life of St Columba (London, 1995), 350.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ The poem is discussed byDumville, David N., “What is Mediaeval Gaelic Poetry?” in Explorations in Cultural History: Essays for Peter Gabriel McCaffrey, ed. Smith, David F. and Philsooph, Hushang (Aberdeen, 2010), 81–153, at 126–30.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ For the Hiberno-Latin poem Bennchuir bona regula, seeWarren, F. E., ed., The Antiphonary of Bangor: An Early Irish Manuscript in the Ambrosian Library at Milan (London, 1893–95), 2:28(§95 [fol. 30r–v]); Curran, Michael, The Antiphonary of Bangor and the Early Irish Monastic Liturgy (Dublin, 1984), 82–83. For a modern edition and translation, seeHowlett, David, The Celtic Latin Tradition of Biblical Style (Blackrock, 1995), 189–93.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ Perhaps best known is Riagail of Illaunmore in Co. Galway, who is sometimes confused in the records with a more obscure Riagail of Tyrella (Tech Riagla) located on the coast south of Downpatrick, Co. Down: Pádraig ÓRiain, , A Dictionary of Irish Saints (Dublin, 2011), 535.Google Scholar

⁸⁸ Dumville, , “What is Gaelic Poetry?,” 127n207.Google Scholar

⁸⁹ Colum mac Riagail, listed as a comainm (“cognomen,” “additional name”) of someone named Colum, appears to be a name in religion rather than an example of Riagail as a personal name used as a patronymic: Riain, Pádraig Ó, ed., Corpus genealogiarum sanctorum Hiberniae (Dublin, 1985), 141(707.77). The narrative Immrama Snédgusa ocus Maic Riagla, “The Voyage of Snédgus and Mac Riagla,” contains the name of a religious in the second form listed above: Stokes, Whitley, “The Voyage of Snedgus and Mac Riagla,” Revue celtique 9 (1888): 14–25; hAodha, Donncha Ó, “The Poetic Version of the Voyage of Snédgus and Mac Riagla,” in Dán do Oide: Essays in Memory of Conn R. Ó Cléirigh, ed. Alqvist, A. and Capková, V.(Dublin, 1997), 419–29.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ “Vir bonus et sapiens et scientia scripturarum nobilissime instructus”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 506–7. Bede's positive description of Adomnán is important in our assessment of his relationship with Aldfrith.Google Scholar

⁹¹ “Et in prima post bellum Ecfridi uisitatione, et in secunda interiectís duobus annís”: Adomnán, , Vita Columbae 2.46 (103b), Alan Orr Anderson and Marjorie Ogilvie Anderson, revised byAnderson, Marjorie Ogilvie, Adomnán's Life of Columba (Oxford, 1991), 178–79.Google Scholar

⁹² “In Saxonia regem Aldfridum uisitantes amicum”: Adomnán, , Vita Columbae 2.46 (103b); ibid., 178–79.Google Scholar

⁹³ “De locis sanctis librum legentibus multis utillimum”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 506–7.Google Scholar

⁹⁴ “Qui longius ab eis locis, in quibus patriarchae uel apostoli errant”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. ibid., 508–9.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Adomnán, , De locis sanctis, ed. Bieler, Ludwig, in Itineraria et alia geographica, CCL 175 (Turnhout, 1965), 175–234; Meehan, Denis, ed., Adamnan's De Locis Sanctis (Dublin, 1958). The traditional view has been that Adomnán presented the text to Aldfrith on one of his visits ca. 687. In recent years it has been argued that Adomnán made a later visit to Aldfrith ca. 702/3, and it was during this later visit that Adomnán presented him with De locis sanctis. This has been most thoroughly argued byWoods, David, “On the Circumstances of Adomnán's Composition of the De locis sanctis,” in Adomnán of Iona, ed. Wooding, Jonathan et al. (n. 6 above), 193–204.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ “Ac per eius est largitionem etiam minoribus ad legendum contraditus”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 508–9. Richard Sharpe points out that Colgrave's translation of minores as “lesser” would be more accurate as “younger”: “Books from Ireland, Fifth to Ninth Centuries,” Peritia 21 (2010): 1–55, at 5n16.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ “Scriptor quoque ipse multis ab eo muneribus donatus patriam remissus est”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 508–9.Google Scholar

⁹⁸ Kenney, , Sources, 285–86 (§112). Marina Smyth stated that the text showed “independence from purely religious motivations in favour of simple intellectual curiosity”: “The Physical World in Seventh-Century Hiberno-Latin Texts,” Peritia 5 (1986): 201–34, at 211.Google Scholar

⁹⁹ O'Loughlin, Thomas, “The Exegetical Purpose of Adomnán's De locis sanctis,” Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 24 (1992): 37–53. Rodney Aist has argued that the matter is quite complex, as it can be shown that sometimes Adomnán prefers to emphasize textual witnesses over what must be a contemporary eyewitness (i.e., Arculf himself) in his accounts: “Adomnán, Arculf and the Source Material of De locis sanctis,” in Adomnán of Iona, ed. Wooding, Jonathan et al., 162–80. For the argument that Arculf was not an eyewitness source for Adomnán, seeWoods, David, “Arculf's Luggage: The Sources for Adomnán's De locis sanctis,” Ériu 52 (2002): 25–52.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁰ O'Loughlin, Thomas, “The De locis sanctis as a Liturgical Text,” in Adomnán of Iona, ed. Wooding, Jonathan et al., 181–92.Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ The text helps broaden our view of the library at Iona:O'Loughlin, Thomas, “The Library of Iona in the Late Seventh Century: The Evidence from Adomnán's De Locis Sanctis,” Ériu 45 (1994): 33–52.Google Scholar

¹⁰² “De cuius scriptis aliqua decerpere ac nostrae huic historiae inserere commodum fore legentibus reor”: Bede, , HE 5.15, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 508–9. For the chapters devoted to abbreviated excerpts, seeBede, , HE 5.16–17.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ Bede, , De locis sanctis, ed. Fraipont, J., in Itineraria et alia geographica, CCL 175, 245–80. For a translation, see Bede: A Biblical Miscellany, trans. Trent Foley, W. and Holder, Arthur G.(Liverpool, 1999), 5–25.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁴ Blair, , World of Bede (n. 45 above), 185–86. Bede would have been about thirty years old at the time and recently ordained priest by John of Beverly.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁵ “Plura uoluminis illius siqui scire delectat, uel in ipso illo uolumine uel in eo, quod de illo dudum strictim excerpsimus, epitomate requirat”: Bede, , HE 5.17, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 512–13.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁶ The context is a discussion between St. Cuthbert and Abbess Ælfflæd of Whitby, Aldfrith's half-sister, in which she asks the saint who will succeed her brother Ecgfrith to the Northumbrian throne. Cuthbert's answer was that it may be someone on an island beyond the sea and “she quickly realised that he had spoken of Aldfrith who now reigns peacefully and who was then on the island which is called Iona.” (“Illa iam cito rememorauit de Aldfrido qui nunc regnat pacifice fuisse dictum, qui tunc erat in insula quam Ii nominant”): Vita S. Cuthberti anonyma, 3.6, ed. Colgrave, , Two Lives (n. 3 above), 104–5. The subject of their exchange is political. It is likely that Aldfrith's presence at Iona was political as well, in anticipation of the succession.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ For example, Moisl, , “Bernician Royal Dynasty” (n. 6 above), 122. Máire Herbert speaks of the “Iona-educated Aldfrith”: Iona, Kells, and Derry (Oxford, 1988), 48. Michael Richter bases his arguments for Aldfrith's influence in Northumbria on his presumed Iona education: Ireland and Her Neighbours in the Seventh Century (Dublin, 1999), 94–97. Vicky Gunn presents the “Iona-trained Aldfrith” (p. 58) as a reconciler of the two poles of English ecclesiastical politics, with Iona and Lindisfarne at one end and Wilfrid and Canterbury on the opposite end of the axis: Bede's Historiae: Genre, Rhetoric, and the Construction of Anglo-Saxon Church History (Woodbridge, 2009), 55–60; Orchard, , “Aldhelm's Library” (n. 49 above), 595;Thornbury, , Becoming a Poet (n. 55 above), 149, 153.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁸ Their extended families had relationships, and it is likely that Aldhelm and Aldfrith were related by blood, at least distantly:Lapidge, Michael, “The Career of Aldhelm,” Anglo-Saxon England 36 (2007): 15–69, at 22–26; idem, “Aldhelm and ‘Epinal-Erfurt’” (n. 54 above), 149 and n86; Yorke, , “Aldhelm's Irish Connections” (n. 38 above), 170–71.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁹ This has been noted in his octosyllabic verse:Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm,” 27–29; idem, “Aldhelm and ‘Epinal-Erfurt,’” 150–52.Google Scholar

¹¹⁰ Orchard, Andy, The Poetic Art of Aldhelm (Cambridge, 1994), 54–60; Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm,” 45–47; idem, “Aldhelm and ‘Epinal-Erfurt,’” 154–56.Google Scholar

¹¹¹ Yorke, Barbara, however, expresses the contrary opinion that Aldfrith and Aldhelm are more likely to have met somewhere in Ireland, not at Iona: “Aldhelm's Irish Connections,” 172–73; see also comments by Dempsey, G. T., “Aldhelm of Malmesbury and High Ecclesiasticism in a Barbarian Kingdom,” Traditio 63 (2008): 47–88, at 50n13.Google Scholar

¹¹² Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm,” 22–30, 47–48; idem, “Aldhelm and ‘Epinal-Erfurt,’” 147–57.Google Scholar

¹¹³ For a survey of poetry both in Latin and in the vernacular, and an overview of the library at Iona, seeClancy, Thomas Owen and Márkus, Gilbert, Iona: The Earliest Poetry of a Celtic Monastery (Edinburgh, 1995), 211–22 (Iona's library); and see O’Loughlin, , “Library of Iona” (n. 101 above), 33–52.Google Scholar

¹¹⁴ Blume, Clemens, “Hymnodia Hiberno-celtica,” Analecta hymnica Medii Aevi 51 (1908): 257–365, at 271–83; Bernard, J. H. and Atkinson, R., The Irish Liber Hymnorum (London, 1898), 1:68–83. For discussion of style, content, and dating, seeStevenson, Jane, “Altus Prosator,” Celtica 23 (1999): 326–68. For discussion and facingpage translation, seeClancy, and Márkus, , Iona, 39–68. For an edition with translation and arguments that it is the work of Virgilius Maro Grammaticus, seeHowlett, David, “The ‘Altus Prosator’ of Virgilius Maro Grammaticus,” in Clerics, Kings and Vikings: Essays on Medieval Ireland in Honour of Donnchadh Ó Corráin, ed. Purcell, Emer et al. (Dublin, 2015), 363–88.Google Scholar

¹¹⁵ Meehan, Denis, ed., Adamnan's De Locis Sanctis (Dublin, 1958). This text provides us a window into the Iona library: O'Loughlin, “Library of Iona.”Google Scholar

¹¹⁶ Anderson, and Anderson, , Life of Columba (n. 91 above). Adomnán drew on the earlier work of Iona's seventh abbot Cuimméne Ailbe (Cummeneus Albus) (657–69) for certain episodes about Columba: ibid., 188–91 and n214.Google Scholar

¹¹⁷ Kelly, Fergus, “A Poem in Praise of Columb Cille,” Ériu 24 (1973): 1–34; idem, “Tiughraind Bhécáin,” Ériu 26 (1975): 66–98. Translations of these poems, with additional discussion, are also found inClancy, and Márkus, , Iona, 129–63. Beccán belonged, apparently, to the Cenél nÉogain:Kelly, , “Poem in Praise,” 3. This Beccán may have been the Beccanus solitarius who received, along with Abbot Ségéne of Iona, the paschal letter from Cummian:Walsh, and Cróinín, Ó, Cummian's Letter (n. 69 above), 7–9. But it has been argued that Beccán of Rhum, north of Iona, is more likely to have been the solitarius who received the paschal letter: ÓRiain, , Dictionary of Irish Saints (n. 87 above), 93.Google Scholar

¹¹⁸ Meyer, Kuno, ed., Cáin Adamnáin: An Old-Irish Treatise on the Law of Adamnan (Oxford, 1905); Dhonnchadha, Máirín Ní, “The Law of Adomnán: A Translation,” in Adomnán at Birr, AD 697: Essays in Commemoration of the Law of the Innocents, ed. O'Loughlin, Thomas(Dublin, 2001), 53–68; Néill, Pádraig Ó and Dumville, David, eds., Cáin Adomnáin and Canones Adomnani (Cambridge, 2003).Google Scholar

¹¹⁹ These difficulties were noted bySmyth, Alfred P., Celtic Leinster: Towards an Historical Geography of Early Irish Civilization A.D. 500–1600 (Dublin, 1982), 118; and byHerbert, , Iona, Kells, and Derry (n. 107 above), 47–48.Google Scholar

¹²⁰ Ibid., 47.Google Scholar

¹²¹ Smyth, , Celtic Leinster, 94.Google Scholar

¹²² Herbert, , Iona, Kells, and Derry, 48.Google Scholar

¹²³ Eadem, , “The World of Adomnán,” in Adomnán at Birr, ed. O'Loughlin, Thomas, 33–39, at 36.Google Scholar

¹²⁴ “Enuntiate mihi, utrum maior est Columcillae an Petrus apostolus in regno coelorum?”: Vita Wilfridi, chap. 10, Colgrave, , Life of Bishop Wilfrid (n. 40 above), 22–23. Note that although Colgrave translates the passage using the Latin form Columba, both manuscripts of the vita give the Gaelicized form of his name, Colum Cille.Google Scholar

¹²⁵ Herbert, , Iona, Kells, and Derry, 44.Google Scholar

¹²⁶ For example, Yorke, , “Court of King Aldfrith” (n. 6 above), 44, 49. But see Vicky Gunn's interpretation of Aldfrith's stance: Bede's Historiae (n. 107 above), 55–60.Google Scholar

¹²⁷ The letter to Wilfrid's abbots could have been written after any of his expulsions (ca. 678; 692; 703), but the first seems most likely:Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works (n. 16 above), 150–51.Google Scholar

¹²⁸ This would have been written after Aldhelm became abbot of Malmesbury, but when after that is difficult to determine: ibid., 140–43.Google Scholar

¹²⁹ Anderson, and Anderson, , Life of Columba (n. 91 above), 24–25(14a), 56–57 (31ab), 88–91 (50a), 96–97 (54a), 162–63 (92b), 202–3 (115ab).Google Scholar

¹³⁰ Smyth, , Celtic Leinster, 118–21. Against this argument, Máire Herbert points out that subsequent literature about Adomnán does not associate him with Durrow, and literature about Durrow does not mention Adomnán: Iona, Kells, and Derry, 48n4. Richard Sharpe expresses doubts about Durrow, but does not discount it, as the location for Adomnán and Aldfrith to have spent time: Adomnán of Iona (n. 84 above), 351.Google Scholar

¹³¹ Smyth, , Celtic Leinster, 94.Google Scholar

¹³² Dhonnchadha, Máirín Ní, “Birr and the Law of the Innocents,” in Adomnán at Birr, ed. O'Loughlin, , 13–32, at 13–15.Google Scholar

¹³³ Among the churches named in Cummian's letter are Emly (Imblech Ibair), Clonmacnois (Cluain moccu Nois), Clonfert (Cluain Ferta Brénainn) (but perhaps Birr [Birra]), Mungret (Mungairit), and Clonfertmulloe (Cluain Ferta Molua):Walsh, and Cróinín, Ó, Cummian's Letter (n. 69 above), 90–91; Charles-Edwards, , Early Christian Ireland (n. 59 above), 251. Since it is the founders of the churches and not their locations that are named there is ambiguity, at least in the case of Brénann, as to which churches are intended.Google Scholar

¹³⁴ Bede gave Dearmach as the Gaelic form of Durrow and knew that it meant Campus Roborum (“field of oaks”):Bede, , HE 3.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 222–23.Google Scholar

¹³⁵ Anderson, and Anderson, , Life of Columba, 20–21(11b), 46–47 (26a), 158–59 (90a).Google Scholar

¹³⁶ Brian Lacey traces what can be reconstructed of its early history and who the likely founder was: “Columba, Founder of the Monastery of Derry? ‘Mihi manet incertus,’” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 129 (1998): 35–47.Google Scholar

¹³⁷ The later history is outlined byHerbert, , Iona, Kells, and Derry, 109–23; Lacey, Brian, “Derry, the Cenél Conaill and Cenél nÉogain,” in The Modern Traveller to Our Past: Festschrift in Honour of Ann Hamlin, ed. Meek, Marion(Dublin, 2006), 65–69.Google Scholar

¹³⁸ Lacey, , “Columba, Founder of the Monastery of Derry?” 46.Google Scholar

¹³⁹ Smyth, , Celtic Leinster, 118.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁰ Lacey, , Cenél Conaill (n. 7 above), 163, 211–14.Google Scholar

¹⁴¹ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster (n. 21 above), 106–7.Google Scholar

¹⁴² Lacey, , Cenél Conaill, 162–65, 222, 228.Google Scholar

¹⁴³ For discussions of Cenn Fáelad and his legend in a larger context, seeIreland, , “Aldfrith and Learning of a Sapiens” (n. 59 above), 68–71, 68n56 (for past scholarship about Cenn Fáelad); Johnston, , Literacy and Identity (n. 59 above), 34 (Auraicept na nÉces), 57–58, 102–5, 111, 145–46.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁴ Byrne, Francis J., Irish Kings and High-Kings, 2nd ed. (Dublin, 2001), 112–14, 256–58. There is evidence of interaction between Cenél nÉogain and Uí Thuirtri, including marriage alliances, in this region and at this time: Ailbhe Mac Shamhráin, “The Making of Tír nÉogain: Cenél nÉogain and the Airgialla from the Sixth to the Eleventh Centuries,” in Tyrone: History and Society, ed. Dillon, C. and Jefferies, H. A.(Dublin, 2000), 55–89, at 61, 63–66.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁵ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster, 138–39.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁶ Text and translation are byMurphy, Gerard, “St. Patrick and the Civilizing of Ireland,” Irish Ecclesiastical Record 79 (1953): 194–204, at 200.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁷ Ailbhe Mac Shamhráin has shown that by the early seventh century Cenél nÉogain had begun to impose themselves into Uí Thuirtri territory: Shamhráin, Mac, “Making of Tír nÉogain,” 61, 64–66.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁸ The following series of essays helps place the Airgíalla in context:Bhreathnach, Edel, “The Airgíalla Charter Poem: The Political Context,” in The Kingship and Landscape of Tara, ed. Bhreathnach, Edel (Dublin, 2005), 95–99; Charles-Edwards, Thomas M., “The Airgíalla Charter Poem: The Legal Content,” in The Kingship and Landscape of Tara, 100–123; Bhreathnach, Edel and Murray, Kevin, “The Airgíalla Charter Poem: Edition,” in ibid., 124–58.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁹ For example, seeBlair, Peter Hunter, Northumbria in the Days of Bede (London, 1976), 52–53; de Vegvar, Neuman, Northumbrian Renaissance (n. 4 above), 258;Sharpe, , Life of St Columba (n. 84 above), 350.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁰ Winterbottom, Michael, although arguing for continental influence in Aldhelm's prose style, accepts that he was first taught by the Gael Máeldub: Winterbottom, Michael, “Aldhelm's Prose Style and Its Origins,” Anglo-Saxon England 6 (1977): 39–76, at 46. Jane Stevenson outlined various ways that Aldhelm may have acquired his Gaelic learning: “Altus Prosator” (n. 114 above), 362–64; see also Orchard, , “Aldhelm's Library” (n. 49 above). Aldhelm's learning was broad. Nevertheless, little evidence remains to show how extensive the library at Malmesbury may have been:Lapidge, Michael, The Anglo-Saxon Library (Oxford, 2006), 34.Google Scholar

¹⁵¹ Bede, , HE 3.7, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 232–33.Google Scholar

¹⁵² “Exin coepere plures per dies de Scottorum regione uenire Brittaniam atque illis Anglorum prouinciis, quibus regnauit Osuald, magna deuotione uerbum fidei praedicare”: Bede, , HE 3.3, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 220–21.Google Scholar

¹⁵³ Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm” (n. 108 above), 22; but, regarding the genealogy, see the cautious note adopted byBrooks, Nicholas, “Introduction,” in Aldhelm and Sherborne (n. 38 above), 1–14, at 4 and n14.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁴ Oswald married the daughter (Cyneburh?) of the Wessex king Cynegisl, and Aldfrith's wife Cuthburh was the sister of the Wessex king Ine:Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm,” 22–26; Yorke, , Rex Doctissimus (n. 1 above), 9–10.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁵ “Sed tunc legendarum gratia scripturarum in Hibernia non paruo tempore demoratus”: Bede, , HE 3.7, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 234–35. See furtherHammer, Carl I., “‘Holy Entrepreneur’: Agilbert, a Merovingian Bishop between Ireland, England and Francia,” Peritia 22–23 (2011–12): 53–82, at 61–66.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁶ Sims-Williams, Patrick, Religion and Literature in Western England 600–800 (Cambridge, 1990), 106–8.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁷ Bede, , HE 5.18, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 514–15. See furtherOrchard, , Poetic Art of Aldhelm (n. 110 above), 4, 58–59; Dempsey, , “Aldhelm and the Irish” (n. 48 above), 5–9.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁸ Sims-Williams, , Religion and Literature, 108–9.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁹ Bede provided a brief description: HE 4.2, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 332–37.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁰ Lapidge, , “School of Theodore” (n. 18 above), 45–72; Bischoff, and Lapidge, , Biblical Commentaries (n. 18 above); Stevenson, , “Laterculus Malalianus” and School of Theodore (n. 48 above).Google Scholar

¹⁶¹ Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works (n. 16 above), 8, 31, 137, 138–39, 146; Lapidge, , “Career of Aldhelm,” 31–34; Bischoff, and Lapidge, , Biblical Commentaries, 60–61, 82, 138, 173, 181, 249, 266–69.Google Scholar

¹⁶² Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 492–3; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 142–43 (discussion), 163 (translation).Google Scholar

¹⁶³ Bede, , HE 3.29, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 318–23.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁴ “Domino excellenti filio Osuiu regi Saxonum Uitalianus episcopus seruus seruorum Dei”: Bede, , HE 3.29, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 318.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁵ “Quia nimirum Osuiu a Scottis edoctus ac baptizatus, illorum etiam optime inbutus, nil melius quam quod illi docuissent, autumabat”: Bede, , HE 3.25, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 296. Jane Stevenson has suggested that Aldfrith may have taken advantage of the learning at Canterbury: “Altus Prosator” (n. 114 above), 366.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁶ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster (n. 21 above), 138–39; Bede, , HE 4.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 346–47. Bede knew the Gaelic form of this name, Inisboufinde, and its meaning, insula uitulae albae, “island of the white heifer”: ibid., 346–47.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁷ Ibid., 346–49. This move must have taken place early in the 670s, as Colmán's obit is given as 676:Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster, 142–43.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁸ Bede knew the Gaelic form of this name, Mag éo “plain of the yew trees,” although he did not give its meaning:Bede, , HE 4.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 346–49. The Gaels recognize its historical associations by adding na Saxan “of the Saxons.” For a full history, seeOrschel, , “Mag nEó na Sacsan” (n. 22 above).Google Scholar

¹⁶⁹ Alcuin corresponded with the English community there, which had continued to thrive:Alcuin, , Epistolae, MGH Epist. Karolini aevi 2, 4, 19 (§2), 445–46 (§287). For translations, seeAllott, , Alcuin of York (n. 23 above), 43–45 (no. 32 = MGH §2; no. 33 = MGH §287). See furtherOrschel, , “Mag nEó na Sacsan.”Google Scholar

¹⁷⁰ “Et conuersis iamdudum ad meliora instituta”: Bede, , HE 4.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 348–49.Google Scholar

¹⁷¹ “From the wintry regions of the northwest part of the island of Ireland” (“Ex Hiberniae brumosis circionis insulae climatibus”): Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 489; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 161 (translation). See alsoWright, , “Aldhelm, Gildas, and Acircius” (n. 45 above), 23.Google Scholar

¹⁷² “Uber sofiae sugens”: Aldhelm, , Epistolae, MGH Auct. ant. 15, §5, 489; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 161 (translation). Aldhelm would have derived the metaphor “teat of wisdom” from the Gaels: SeeBayless, Martha and Lapidge, Michael, eds., Collectanea Pseudo-Bedae (Dublin, 1998), 122–23 §1, 199n1; Richter, , Ireland and Her Neighbors (n. 8 above), 159–60; Orchard, Andy, “The Hisperica Famina as Literature,” Journal of Medieval Latin 10 (2000): 1–45, at 30–32.Google Scholar

¹⁷³ Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 478–81.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁴ Bede's “better Rule” is vague. It is not clear whether it refers to the Paschal controversy that caused these English monks to leave Northumbria in the first place, or if it refers to Bede's concerns about how abbots were chosen:Orschel, , “Mag nEó na Sacsan,” 95.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁵ Bede provides what appears to be an accurate form, Rathmelsigi, for this Gaelic place name. However, it is infrequently recorded in Gaelic records, so it is not clear what its component parts are and what they mean. The first part, ráth/ráith, is a fortified location, often in the form of a ringfort, which many early ecclesiastical sites occupied. The second half, Melsigi, is almost certainly a personal name, but one not previously recorded. The first element of this name, as suggested in later preserved forms of the name, may be máel “bald; tonsured” and, hence, “devotee; one devoted to (a saint).” It is common enough in Gaelic names. It would typically be followed by the name, in the genitive, of a saint or holy person. Sigi looks like the genitive singular of a masculine or neuter io-stem name Sige. But no such personal name is recorded with certainty. Pádraig Ó Riain plausibly suggested to me a feminine name ending in -sech which, in the genitive singular, would have the form -sige: see examples in Dictionary of Irish Saints (n. 87 above), 106 (Bigseach), 129 (Broicseach), 165–66 (Céillseach), 166 (Céirseach). Unfortunately, no name Me(i)lse(a)ch has been recorded. However, his suggestion that the name is based on a feminine form may be supported by the form Maoilside recorded in later martyrologies: seeStokes, Whitley, Félire hUí Gormáin: The Martyrology of Gorman (London, 1895), 238(Ráith Maoilside; 14 December); andO'Donovan, John, The Martyrology of Donegal, ed. and trans.Todd, J. H. and Reeves, W.(Dublin, 1864), 336 (Ráth Maoilside; 14 December); these forms were cited by Ó Cróinín, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord” (n. 24 above), 22n3. These later forms in maoil-, however, can also be used to argue that we take Bede's mel- as Old Gaelic máel-, “devotee.” Bede recorded many Gaelic names with reasonable accuracy, but the form and meaning of this place name, based on a personal name, have not yet been confirmed.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁶ For the likely location just a few miles south of Carlow town along the Barrow River, and field monuments associated with this place discussed in an appendix by Thomas Fanning, see Ó Cróinín, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord,” 23, 23nn, 43–49 (appendix). Subsequent surveys of the area suggest that archaeological remains are more extensive than previously thought: seeBarrett, Gillian F., “The Archaeology of County Carlow: An Aerial Perspective,” in Carlow: History and Society; Interdisciplinary Essays on the History of an Irish County, ed. McGrath, Thomas (Dublin, 2008), 31–51, at 46–48. I thank Dan Mc Carthy for directing me to this last reference.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁷ Bede, , HE 3.27, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 312–15.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁸ Bede, , HE 3.4, 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 224–25, 478–79; Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster (n. 21 above), 172–73. Ecgberht is not specifically named in the Irish annal at the conversion of Iona to the Roman Easter in 716, although Bede informs us that it was so. He is named in the annals at his death in 729.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁹ For Boisil's Gaelic background, seeIreland, Colin A., “Boisil: An Irishman Hidden in the Works of Bede,” Peritia 5 (1986): 400–403.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁰ Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 476–79.Google Scholar

¹⁸¹ Bede, , HE 3.27, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 314–15; Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster, 182–83, but Iona may not have been explicitly named in the annal; seeCharles-Edwards, T. M., trans., The Chronicle of Ireland (Liverpool, 2006), 201 and n4.Google Scholar

¹⁸² Bede, , HE 3.4, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 224–25. For the same phrase applied to King Aldfrith, see nn. 31 and 33 above.Google Scholar

¹⁸³ Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 478–81. Based on paschal tables used by Willibrord's mission, it is possible that Wihtberht's mission was begun before 684: Ó Cróinín, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord,” 30.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁴ “Suis amplius ex uirtutum exemplis prodesse curabat”: Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 480–81.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁵ Dhonnchadha, Máirín Ní, “The Guarantor List of Cáin Adomnáin, 697,” Peritia 1 (1982): 178–215, at 180, 193–94 (§29), where he is mistakenly identified as Ecgberht, but Ó Cróinín correctly identified Wihtberht: “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord,” 25 and nn.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁶ Stokes, Whitley, Félire Óengusso Céli Dé: The Martyrology of Oengus the Culdee (London, 1905), 250(my translation). For a comparison of this description of Wihtberht with the Old English Seafarer, seeIreland, Colin A., “Some Analogues of the Old English Seafarer from Hiberno-Latin Sources,” Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 92 (1991): 1–14, at 9; also appears inWooding, J., ed., The Otherworld Voyage in Early Irish Literature: An Anthology of Criticism (Dublin, 2000), 143–56, at 154–55.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁷ Stokes, , Félire Óengusso, 256–59. See the cogent discussion by Ó Cróinín, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord,” 26n1. Another place in Ireland where the scholia place Wihtberht is Tullylease, Co. Cork. For a discussion of the English names appearing on stones there, seeHenderson, Isabel and Okasha, Elisabeth, “The Early Christian Inscribed and Carved Stones of Tullylease, Co. Cork,” Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 24 (1992): 1–36.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁸ “Solito in silentio uacare Domino coepit”: Bede, , HE 5.9, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 480.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁹ We tend to assume that after Whitby in 664, relations between Northumbria and Iona were severed. But Adomnán's and Aldfrith's relationship in the 680s belies this. The success of the English monks who settled at Mag nÉo na Saxan also demonstrates a continuing link through Iona. And the influence on Ecgberht of Boisil, prior of Melrose, through the dreams of a monastic brother, suggests that relations with Iona continued to exert an influence at some level. The spread of the cult of Oswald, who introduced the “schismatic” mission from Iona into Northumbria, is another likely source of continuing ties:Thacker, Alan, “Membra Disjecta: The Division of the Body and the Diffusion of the Cult,” in Oswald: Northumbrian King to European Saint, ed. Stancliffe, Clare and Cambridge, Eric (Stamford, 1995), 97–127.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁰ Bede, , HE 3.13, 5.10–11, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 252–55, 480–87.Google Scholar

¹⁹¹ For a survey of his career, seeLevison, Wilhelm, England and the Continent in the Eighth Century (Oxford, 1946), 53–69.Google Scholar

¹⁹² “Filius eius, Inhripis nutritus”: Stephen of Ripon, Vita Wilfridi, chap. 26, Colgrave, , Life of Bishop Wilfrid (n. 40 above), 52. It should be noted, however, that despite Stephen's claims for Wilfrid's and Willibrord's relationship, Wilfrid does not appear in Willibrord's Calendar:Wilson, H. A., The Calendar of St Willibrord from MS Paris. Lat. 10837 (London, 1918).Google Scholar

¹⁹³ Cróinín, Dáibhí Ó, “Pride and Prejudice [review article],” Peritia 1 (1982): 352–62, at 358–62; Ó Cróinín, “Rath Melsigi, Willibrord,” 26–42.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁴ Pelteret, David A. E., “Diplomatic Elements in Willibrord's Autobiography,” Peritia 22–23 (2011–12): 1–14; Howlett, David, “Wilbrord's Autobiographical Note and the ‘Versus Sybillae de Iudicio Dei,”’ Peritia 20 (2008): 154–64, at 154–61.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁵ Warntjes, Immo, “The Computus Cottonianus of AD 689: A Computistical Formulary Written for Willibrord's Frisian Mission,” in The Easter Controversy of Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, ed. Warntjes, I. and Cróinín, D. Ó (Turnhout, 2011), 173–212.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁶ The year of his death is still disputed. The Chronicles are probably relying on Bede, who gives the year as 705:Bede, , HE 5.18, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 512–13. See discussions fromPlummer, , Baedae Opera Historica (n. 1 above), 2:305–6; Levison, , England and the Continent, 274. Gaelic annals favor 704:Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster, 162–63.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁷ This annal entry is from the Laud MS (E) version of the Anglo-Saxon chronicles:Plummer, Charles, Two of the Saxon Chronicles Parallel (Oxford, 1892), 41; Irvine, Susan, ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, vol. 7, MS E (Cambridge, 2004), 24. The entry is also found in MS D: Cubbin, G. P., ed., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, vol. 6, MS D (Woodbridge, 1996), 9.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁸ For examples of differing dates for English persons between the martyrology of Willibrord and Bede, seeRiain, Pádraig Ó, Anglo-Saxon Ireland: The Evidence of the Martyrology of Tallaght (Cambridge, 1993), 6–7. See furtherFarmer, David Hugh, The Oxford Dictionary of Saints, 5th ed. (Oxford, 2003), 36 (Augustine of Canterbury), 48 (Bede), 51 (Benedict Biscop), 114 (Colmán of Lindisfarne), 117 (Columbanus), 118 (Comgall of Bangor). A perusal of Farmer will find many more examples.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁹ Stokes, , Félire Óengusso (n. 186 above), 251(my translation).Google Scholar

²⁰⁰ Stokes translated the original Faustus as Faustinus, whom he identified as an African martyr:Stokes, , Félire Óengusso, 260–61, 421.Google Scholar

²⁰¹ “Comgellum scilicet, Latine Fausti nomine illustrem”: Balbulus, Notker, Martyrologium, PL 131, cols. 1025–164, at col. 1103B; Walker, G. S. M., ed., Sancti Columbani Opera (Dublin, 1957), 69n1; Sharpe, , Life of St Columba (n. 84 above), 314n205;Picard, Jean-Michel, “Adomnán's Vita Columbae and the Cult of Colum Cille in Continental Europe,” Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 98C (1998): 1–23, at 9n36.Google Scholar

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²⁰³ Warren, , Antiphonary of Bangor (n. 86 above), 2:33(§129 [fol. 36v]); Curran, , Antiphonary and Liturgy (n. 86 above), 82. For a modern edition and translation, seeHowlett, , Celtic Latin Tradition (n. 86 above), 187–89.Google Scholar

²⁰⁴ Stokes, , Félire Óengusso, 424.Google Scholar

²⁰⁵ For a discussion of the term imperium in its Gaelic context that also takes in examples from Northumbria, seeByrne, , Irish Kings (n. 144 above), 259–60.Google Scholar

²⁰⁶ Fanning, Steven, “Bede, Imperium, and the Bretwaldas,” Speculum 66 (1991): 1–26, at 19.Google Scholar

²⁰⁷ “Anglorum subiecit imperio; sextus Osuald, et ipse Nordanhymbrorum rex Christianissimus, hisdem finibus regnum tenuit; septimus Osuiu frater eius”: Bede, , HE 2.5, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 150–51. For discussions of Anglo-Saxon imperium, see Levison, , England and the Continent, 123–24; Wormald, Patrick, “Bede, the Bretwaldas and the Gens Anglorum,” in The Times of Bede: Studies in Early English Christian Society and Its Historians, ed. Baxter, Stephen(Malden, MA, 2006), 108–34, at 111;Fanning, , “Bede, , Imperium, and Bretwaldas,” 17–21; Higham, N. J., “Imperium in Early Britain: Rhetoric and Reality in the Writings of Gildas and Bede,” Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History 10 (1999): 31–36, at 33–35.Google Scholar

²⁰⁸ “Acircio Aqvilonalis imperii sceptra gvbernanti”: Aldhelm, , De metris et enigmatibus ac pedum regulis, MGH Auct. ant. 15, 61; Lapidge, and Herren, , Aldhelm: Prose Works, 34 (translation); Wright, , “Aldhelm, Gildas, and Acircius” (n. 45 above), 19–21.Google Scholar

²⁰⁹ “Totius Brittanniae imperator a deo ordinatus”: Adomnán, Vita Columbae 1.1 (9a), Anderson, and Anderson, , Life of Columba (n. 91 above), 16.Google Scholar

²¹⁰ Stokes, , Félire Óengusso, 174.Google Scholar

²¹¹ Etchingham, Colmán, Church Organization in Ireland A.D. 650 to 1000 (Naas, 1999), 71–73. Etchingham developed his arguments from evidence in texts such as Cáin Adomnáin, Uraicecht Becc, and the monastic Rule of Mochutu.Google Scholar

²¹² Etchingham, , Church Organization, 68. T. M. Charles-Edwards saw the sapiens as suited for fulfilling such duties, particularly with regard to exegesis. He states, “Scriptural scholarship thus had an even more central position in the early Irish church than in other churches at the time. Not merely was knowledge of the Bible the accepted goal of the higher levels of education, but the expertise of a sapiens entitled him to sit in authority alongside bishops and the abbots of the greater monasteries”: Charles-Edwards, , “Context and Uses of Literacy” (n. 46 above), 68.Google Scholar

²¹³ Byrne, , Irish Kings, 211–15; Jaski, Bart, Early Irish Kingship and Succession (Dublin, 2000), 221–25.Google Scholar

²¹⁴ Byrne, , Irish Kings, 200, 202–3, 211–14.Google Scholar

²¹⁵ Hughes, Kathleen, “The Irish Church, 800–c. 1050,” in A New History of Ireland, vol. 1, Prehistoric and Early Ireland, ed. Ó Cróinín, Dáibhí (Oxford, 2005), 635–55, at 642–43. See further examples in ÓRiain, , Dictionary of Irish Saints (n. 87 above), 225–26 (Cormac mac Cuilennáin), 312 (Fedlimid mac Crimthainn), 330–31 (Fínsnechta mac Colcan), 346–49 (Flannán mac Tordelbaig). Charles-Edwards stressed the mobility of qualified persons within the parallel hierarchies of secular nobility, the church, and the ranks of trained poets, and used Aldfrith as one historical example:Charles-Edwards, , “Context and Uses of Literacy,” 73–74.Google Scholar

²¹⁶ Walker, , Columbani Opera. Lapidge, , ed., Columbanus: Studies on the Latin Writings (n. 202 above), contains essays on letters, sermons, monastic rules, a penitential, computistical works, and poems by Columbanus.Google Scholar

²¹⁷ Cróinín, Dáibhí Ó, “Mo-Sinnu moccu Min and the Computus of Bangor,” Peritia 1 (1982): 281–95; also appears in Early Irish History and Chronology (Dublin, 2003), 35–47. See alsoHughes, Kathleen, The Church in Early Irish Society (Ithaca, NY, 1966), 133; Howlett, David, “Five Experiments” (n. 63 above), at 1–3; idem, “Music and the Stars in Early Irish Compositions,” in Music and the Stars: Mathematics in Medieval Ireland, ed. Kelly, Mary and Doherty, Charles(Dublin, 2013), 111–28, at 113–15 (Sillán [Mo-Sinu]) and 115–19 (Mo Chuaróc).Google Scholar

²¹⁸ Warren, , Antiphonary of Bangor (n. 86 above); Kenney, , Sources (n. 62 above), 61–62 (§89, devotional hymns), 395–96 (Bangor), 706–12 (§568, antiphonary); Lapidge, and Sharpe, , Bibliography of Celtic-Latin (n. 62 above), 138–39 (§532, antiphonary), 146–47 (§§572–77, hymns). In the context of liturgy, seeCurran, , Antiphonary and Liturgy (n. 86 above). For translations and discussions of some of the poems and hymns, seeHowlett, , Celtic Latin Tradition (n. 86 above), 138–56, 187–93.Google Scholar

²¹⁹ Stevenson, Jane, “Bangor and the Hisperica Famina,” Peritia 6–7 (1987–88): 202–16. For an edition and translation of the A-text, see Herren, Michael, The Hisperica Famina, vol. 1, The A-Text (Toronto, 1974), 78–81 lines 190–231, 84–85 lines 62–84 (descriptions of students). See arguments that certain episodes in the Hisperica Famina have been based on widely circulating oral narratives:Carey, John, “The Obscurantists and the Sea-Monsters: Reflections on the Hisperica Famina,” Peritia 17–18 (2003–4): 40–60.Google Scholar

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²²¹ Airt, Mac and Niocaill, Mac, Annals of Ulster (n. 21 above), 112–13.Google Scholar

²²² These texts are discussed in editions byWhite, Nora, Compert Mongáin and Three Other Early Mongán Tales: A Critical Edition with Introduction, Translation, Textual Notes, Bibliography and Vocabulary (Maynooth, 2006). The tale Compert Mongáin (“The Conception of Mongán”) involves events in Britain and the wars of Áedán mac Gabráin against the English, reminding us that the Irish Sea acted as a highway, not a barrier, and that we must think of the region as the “Irish Sea culture-province”:Cana, Mac, “Mongán and Immram Brain,” 105.Google Scholar

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²²⁶ If this Old Gaelic identification is accepted, it contravenes David Dumville's frequently cited insinuation that the equation of Aldfrith with Flann Fína is a Middle Gaelic invention:Dumville, David N., “Two Troublesome Abbots,” Celtica 21 (1990): 146–52, at 149–52. Dumville's reliance on the disputed ‘Chronicle of Ireland’ also calls into question the chronology of his objections. See, for example, the review article by Daniel Mc Carthy of the translation of the “chronicle” byCharles-Edwards, Thomas M., trans., The Chronicle of Ireland, 2 vols. (Liverpool, 2006), in Peritia 20 (2008): 379–87. The dating of Félire Óengusso has always been accepted as being Old Gaelic with recent opinions centering ca. 830: Riain, Pádraig Ó, “The Tallaght Martyrologies, Redated,” Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 20 (1990): 21–38. However, David Dumville, while conceding the text's Old Gaelic status, has argued that the dating criteria are to be questioned and that its composition may be later in the ninth century:Dumville, David N., “Félire Óengusso: Problems of Dating a Monument of Old Irish,” Éigse 33 (2002): 19–48. Nevertheless, Liam Breatnach has supported the earlier dating (797×808) established by Rudolf Thurneysen as still reliable:Breatnach, Liam, “Poets and Poetry,” in Progress in Medieval Irish Studies, ed. McCone, Kim and Simms, Katharine(Maynooth, 1996), 65–77, at 74–75 (§4.4). More recently Pádraig Ó Riain has reasserted the arguments for dates from 829×833 for the Tallaght martyrologies: Feastdays of the Saints: A History of Irish Martyrologies (Brussells, 2006), summarized at 97–98, 118.Google Scholar

²²⁷ Walker, , Columbani Opera (n. 201 above), xii; Bullough, Donald, “The Career of Columbanus,” in Columbanus, ed. Lapidge, (n. 202 above), 1–28, at 2.Google Scholar

²²⁸ Ó Cróinín, “Mo-Sinnu and Computus of Bangor,” 286.Google Scholar

²²⁹ Ibid., 286.Google Scholar

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²³¹ Hammer, , ‘“Holy Entrepreneur’: Agilbert” (n. 155 above), 62. Bede stated about Agilberht's time in Ireland: “Sed tunc legendarum gratia scripturarum in Hibernia non paruo tempore demoratus”: Bede, , HE 3.7, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , 234–35. It was noted above how Agilberht may have served as a conduit for Gaelic learning into Wessex during his bishopric there in the 650s.Google Scholar

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