of Boethius and Fordon as I find this given by Langhorn So much of the Picts And therefore now to my Eighth Note Which as it refers to several places of this Book particularly to page 5. and all other pages indeed where I suppose the Milesians either to have possess'd themselves of Ireland as early as the year of the World 2736. or not to have continued longer a free People under their own Laws and Kings then about 2500 years so it is meerly occasion'd by what I said but now in my Seventh Note concerning the extent of time which the Pictish Kings must have lasted according to the Chronology of Lucius and Vsher In short I must on this occasion tell you here That as to the Milesian Kingdom 's answerable extent of Time Keting and Lucius agree Save only That Keting as himself professes in his Preface following that computation of the years of the World which allows only 4052 years from the Creation to the Incarnation and consequently in this coming short 1138 years of the computation of Eusebius would needs reform the Irish Regnal for so they call the Book of their Reigns by shortning the Reigns of several of their Monarchs by so many years in all as amount to above four hundred that is 491 years and this of purpose to make the whole extent of Time and the several Periods from the first Plantation of Ireland by Partholan to the Reign of Ruaruidh O Conchabhar the Last Irish Monarch of the Milesian Race agree the better with his own foresaid Computation of the years of the World And Lucius on the other side as he follow'd Eusebius's Computation of the same years of the World which is that commonly follow'd by both Greeks and Latins says Sixtus Senensis * Biblioth S. l. 2. page 46. verb. Adae Genealogia so he held stiffly and throughly to the Irish Regnal as to the years of each Milesian Monarch's Reign And therefore the difference 'twixt these two Writers in relation to Ireland or to any period or extent of the periods of Time since its first Plantation is only that of near five hundred years during the Milesian Monarchy In all other points concerning this matter they both agree As for Example That Ireland was first planted by Partholan about three hundred years after the Deluge that his Posterity continued there three hundred years and the next Invaders Clanna Neimheadh 217 more and after them the Nation call'd Fir-bholg thirty six and after these another Nation by name Tuath-De-Danann for 197 years and then immediately the Milesians coming in continued since to the year of Christ 1172. So that Keting and Lucius being throughly agreed in all these points their difference about the whole extent of their several periods mention'd before can be no other than that of Keting's voluntary cutting off from the Milesian Reigns about five hundred years Or rather indeed especially if we consider how Keting himself confesses he did so and for what end he did it even contrary to the Irish Regnall we may conclude there is no difference at all as to the undoubted extent of all those several Periods of Time though Keting place the Milesian Epocha in his year of the World 2736. and Lucius the very same Epocha in his year of the World 3500. For albeit this diversity of placing it argues 1172. years difference between 'em in stating the years of the World and that Keting chose rather to follow the far more likely computation of Augustinus Torniellius in his Annales Sacri Profani * Torniel Sext. M. aetat ad an 4052. ab Orbe condito ad eundem Christi passione redemptum come out a little before Keting's time though he makes no mention of them or him than be led by that of Eusebius who was himself most probably misled by the grand Errour of the Septuagint Version * See Sixtus Senen Biblioth S. â— 2. page 45. but more at large l. 5. page 440. where he shews that the computation of Eusebius as to the years only from the Creation to the birth of Abraham exceeds the Hebrew true computation in One thousand two hundred thirty six years Nay in the former Place he shews that whereas from the Creaation to the Flood Moses counts only 1656 years the Septuagint Interpr exceed him in 786 years So that by their supputation to the Flood only the number of years is 2242. From which diversity the great contention arose betwixt the Hebrews and the Greeks in computing the years of the World So says he l. 2. pag. 45. verb. Adae Genealogia yet no difference at all as to stating strictly the extent of Time or number of years which the Milesian or other former Conquests or Plantations of Ireland had continued can be deduced thence Only it argues that either the one or other was mistaken in the number of the years of the World or in fixing ' em Which is enough to be said on this Subject occasionally And therefore I will only add here what as occasionally comes now to mind That whether in my Title-page by the year of the World 2736 you understand the year accounted such according to the computation of Torniellius and Keting or the other accounted such by Eusebius and Lucius I am neither way my self nor any thing in this Book concern'd Though otherwise I would as to this point much rather hold with those than these retaining nevertheless all due veneration to the name of Eusebius as who had been not only one of the Three hundred and eighteen Nicene Fathers and Bishop of Caesarea in Palestin but worthy as Constantine the Great said of him to be Bishop of the whole Earth The Ninth and last Additional Note has no reference that I can remember to any thing said before in any of my pages However I give it because I see Gratianus Lucius thought it not unconducing to the honour of the Ancient Irish For it is in short That the Warlike Nation of the Heruli who inhabited some Northern Islands and other Tracts near Germany a Nation too well sometimes known to the Roman Provinces harrass'd by them did glory in their two Kings Dathen and Aordon as descended from the Irish and that Suria born of an Irish Lady descended from the Kings of Ireland had the supreain Power of Biscay an 870 as absolute Princess thereof which she transmitted to a long succession of Descendants from her Whereof you may see Gratianus Lucius page 299. where he quotes Wolfgangus Lassin de Migrat Gent. l. 13. And so Reader you have at last an end of all my additional Notes and consequently of all whatever I thought necessary to say according to the design and method of this little Tract of the Ancient Irish as they were a free Nation about 2500 years under their own Laws and Government For indeed my design hitherto as you may easily perceive was either only or at least chiefly to represent them as they appear'd
he lived to finish this Table I know not But I remember to have seen in stead thereof two small Tracts of his in Irish on another Subject annexed to an Irish Copy of his History the one being a Defence of the Mass the other entitl'd in Irish The Three Shafts of Death An other Particular is That which tells how and why he thought it fitting as to the number of years attributed to the several Reigns of some few of their Pagan Monarchs especially Siorna Saoghallach and Cobhthach Caolbhreag to vary from their Book of Reigns where it 's said That the later reign'd fifty years but the former a hundred and fifty and that besides he was a hundred years old when he attain'd the Sovereignty nor died naturally but was murder'd after he had lived two hundred and fifty years in all In the Fifth Particular he speaks only to those who seem rather to admire than believe how it can be at least probable That other Pedegrees than those in Holy Scripture should be truly and in a perpetual Line without any interruption carried up along to Adam and Noah as the Irish Genealogical and Historical Books pretend to do for all their Kings Princes and great Nobles To such admiring incredulous men he answers That the Irishry or Gathelian Off-spring even all along from the time of Gathelus himself whose name gave these Descendants from hinâ— the general appellation of Clanna Gaodhel till their arrival in Ireland had with them a learned sort of men call'd in their Language Draoithe in ours Druids and Magitians whose peculiar Office it was to write and preserve as well their Genealogies as all other Memoirs concerning them or their Travails and Adventures whatsoever good or bad That the more famous Branch of those Gathelians to wit the Clanna Mileadh or Descendents from Milesius the Spaniard after they had conquer'd Ireland from the Nation call'd Tuatha-De-Danann thought fit to continue the same course and accordingly did continue for the 2500 years of their Government and Laws an uninterrupted numerous succession of Antiquaries for the same purpose with large allowance and strict orders to regulate them us has been said afore That besides and particularly to shew the like care among some other Nations for preserving the Genealogies of their great Heroes he instances in the Pedegree of that excellent Saxon King Alfredus and out of Asser Menevensis inserts it carried up through all his Predecessours from Son to Father in a perpetual direct Line to Adam To which Instance alledg'd by Keting I could my self most certainly though without Book add another For about five or six and forty years since travelling in Brabant and within a little English mile to Lovain entring the Choire of the Celestin's Abbey there I saw and for a pretty while did view a Table hung up on the Wall which contain'd the Genealogy of the Illustrious Founders the Dukes of Arscot carried up in like manner through a vast number of Generations to the First of all men Which may be enough to persuade us that the old German Nation how meanly soever for matter of civility or Learning describ'd by Tacitus have been very careful in preserving at least their Genealogical Antiquities And indeed if my memory fail me not I remember to have read in Favins Theatre of Honour much to this purpose where he tells It was from the Germans that all the rest of Europe derived the custom of giving Goats of Arms to shew the Noble Antiquity of their Extraction Though withal I must confess that Keting in the Reign of the Irish Monarch Domhnal mhac Aodh mhic Ainmhire who died in the year of Christ 642. not only demonstrates by a very special Instance That custom of blazoning Arms to have been among the Irish in this Monarchs Reign very common but farther says It had been so in all Ages before among their Ancestours ever since the days of Gathelus himself who deriv'd it from the Israelites at the time of their passing the Red Sea when each of the Tribes had its own peculiar Ensign carried before But to return to my purpose The Sixth and Last of those particulars of Keting's Preface I would acquaint you with is That being his whole History for the matter is only of the Ancient Irish Nation if any Reader shall perhaps apprehend his Relations or commendations or praises of them any where or in any point or as to any matter or Times excessive he desires it be considered That the Author is no Irish man by blood but English though born in Ireland And therefore cannot rationally be suppos'd to magnifie the Old Irish or speak more excellent things of 'em than the very force of Truth and duty of a Historian exacts from him Besides he had immediately before in the same Place declar'd That neither love nor hatred of any People nor hope of any kind of Reward on Earth made him either go through with or indeed at first undergo any part of the toil of so laborious a Work but only those other considerations given before But what his reason was only to write it in Irish I cannot tell Vnless it be That he would not swerve from the custom of that Nation while they were a free People before the English Conquest of transmitting the Authentick Records or publick Acts and Monuments of their Kingdom to after Ages in their own Language only Which as I conceive is the true reason why so little of them has ever yet been known elswhere in the World However you have by this time a sufficient account of Keting the Author I am mostly guided by in the whole Former Part of my Prospect or which is the same thing in my Discourses of the State of Ireland till the beginning of the English Conquest in the year of Christ 1172. I had almost forgotten to prevent your prejudice against Keting's History from his relating about the beginning of it those three unlikely Stories 1. How Seth the Son of Adam and three daughters of Cain in a Company together landed in and view'd all Ireland over 2. How last year before the Deluge three Fishermen of South-Spain by name Laigne Capa and Luasad had been Wind-driven thither c. 3. How Keasar the daughter of Baioth son to Noah with three men viz. Fionntuin Lothra and her said Father and fifty Women to save themselves from the Flood which from Noah they had heard of as impending after they had first by her advice renounc'd the God of Noah taken to themselves an Idol God which the Irish in their Language call Laimbh Dhia and then wandred for seven years by Sea at last arriv'd in Ireland just forty days before the Flood and there nevertheless perish'd by it And indeed I must confess that Keting relates these Stories at large with all their other circumstances But how or why does he relate'em It is manifest he does it of set purpose to explode 'em every one as incredible and meer Poetical
Records if no knowledg at least of two Thirds of their Countrey if hunting collecting and hudling together the vainest and falsest and most ridiculous hear-say stories and this forsooth of purpose to gain immortal fame by telling stupendious things not heard before if Satyrs of the people in general so virulent and frequent that in very deed the publishing of 'em may be justly suspected to have been at least a great part of the Authors chief design if a licentious humour and immoderate passion transporting him to the strangest exorbitancy either of praises or dispraises or flatteries or injuries as he stood affected in writing even of his own Party and his own King for company among 'em if his acknowledgment in Usher and the Censure of him by Sir James Ware in a word if so many excellent Qualifications as are enumerated here can render him an Author of Credit or to be follow'd or believ'd in any passage of his foresaid Books that is to any degree of prejudice either against the Irish Nation or contrary to their Chronicles or vain or exotick in it self and not warranted by better authority than his only word I say that if the matter be so indeed then for my own part I must be of opinion that no Author at all how idle or vain or unwarrantable or incredible or false or injurious reproachful and satyrical soever his Relations of any People or Countrey are is to be rejected Tho in all contingencies it must be also confess'd that wherever Cambrensis has delivered any thing to the advantage renown or credit of the Irish Nation his testimony is doubtless above all exception for so much For the confession of an Adversary is valid in all Tribunals and both Bodin and Reason requires it should be so in History Thus having sufficiently inform'd you both of Cambrensis and the true original grounds of the Quarrel of Gratianus Lucius to him I return to the finishing my account of Lucius himself And this I shall dispatch by a little farther addition first of those more special considerations that put him on writing his Cambrensis Eversus and then of his performance therein Those himself gives at large but I shall contract ' em 1. He had often consider'd that altho soon after the coming out of Cambrensis in Germany from the Press two Learned Irish Gentlemen Richard White a Jesuit and Philip O Suillevan a Soldier to undeceive the World and right their injur'd Nation had most exactly and convincingly written each of them at large against his impostures yet through ill fortune their several Books on that subject were lost and no body since had put Pen to paper to retrive this loss 2. By daily conversation among Foreigners he had found That because in so many years since that Francford Edition of Cambrensis nothing appear'd against him in Print his very vilest Relations of Ireland were taken for confessedly true 3. Having read a great number of Books and he thinks all whatsoever written of that Kingdom by English other Brittish Authors and observing how as many of 'em at least as came out since the change of Religion were so unjust to the Irish Nation that amongst all there was not so much as any one Individual who does not either report Fictions or conceal Truths or exaggerate the bad or extenuate the good Things of that People he considered at last that Giraldus Cambrensis was their first pattern 4. And which to him was more grievous yet he considered that ever since the aforesaid German Edition there was not a Book written nor a Cosmographical or Geographical Table drawn there was not I mean a Map or a Card as they are call'd describing the customs or manners of Nations come forth in any part of Europe which was not replenish'd with ugly base reflections on the Irish In so much that in all Countreys and Languages they were on all occasions become a Fable to the Vulgar and object of scorn to others These were the considerations that prevail'd with Lucius to exert his zeal for Truth and Love to his Countrey in taking all the foresaid Books of Cambrensis to pieces laying open the most material of his Errors and Calumnies for it had been endless to pursue him in the more immaterial convincing him every where and therefore when he had finish'd his Work publishing it for the satisfaction of Europe in Latin under the Title of Cambrensis Eversus which may be English'd The Cambrian overthrown How justly it deserves this name others may judg seeing the Book is extant and has been since the year 1622. when it was printed For my own part I can do no less than acknowledg what I think of it my self which is That the Author shews himself very conversant in those Letters we call Polite That above all for knowledg in History both Domestic Forein Sacred and Profane he appears excellently well qualified to write on the Subject he undertook That every where and whatever matter is treated he is very exact in quoting his Authors and where the allegation must depend on Irish Books or Writers he never omits to give 'em by name in the Margin among which are the Annals of Inis Fail the Common Annals the Annals of Anonimus the Annals of Tigernacus the Continuer of Tigernacus the Books of Reigns O Duuegan O Donel Colgan Philip O Suillevan Peter Lombard Archb. of Ardmagh Keting Primat Usher Sir James Ware That in a word his performances in this Book against Cambrensis are accurate absolute full and therefore not unworthy the Dedication they bear prefix'd to the Sacred Majesty of Charles II. of Great Brittain our gracious King I say against Cambrensis Because I do abstract wholly from his occasional or incidental Reflections any where on the State of Ireland since the Year 1640. To deliver my thoughts of them is no part of my business here What more concerning Lucius must be directly to the purpose of this place is to let you understand that although Cambrensis Eversus be not a History of Ireland yet because it is in many places fraught with choice Collections out of the Irish Antiquities and in the VIII Chapter occasionally gives together with a Catalogue of all the Monarchs of Ireland under the several Conquests even from Slanius the first of them a brief account of their Reigns and Years of the World or Christ respectively when each King began finish'd his Reign therefore next to Keting I have made the greatest use of him in the Former Part tho no where before page 130. for till I came so far I had him not And out of him particularly it is That in some places I add to such or such Monarchs the Year of the World or of our Saviour Christ's Incarnation Now what Computation is follow'd by him in giving the former Years I mean those of the World albeit he does not himself expresly inform us we may notwithstanding most certainly know by his fixing
years consumed by a Pestilence not one remaining of them A just judgment from Heaven without peradventure on him who had fled thither as it were from Heaven for having in his own Countrey in Scythia kill'd both his Father and Mother to make way for a Brother of his and their Son to come to the Royal Throne How in the end of 30 years more Nemedus another Scythian some of the Irish Chronologists say he was a son to Bartholanus left by him in Scythia when himself had departed thence with his four Sons Starius Gervale Annin and Fergus in a Fleet of 34 Ships and 30 Marriners in each of them arriving in Ireland overthrew in three Battels the remainder of those Affrican Gyants but was overcome in the fourth And how soon after this defeat Nemedus being dead his People rousing themselves put it to the issue of one great Battel sought at the same time both by Sea and by Land they having 30 thousand at Land and so many more at Sea and the Fight proved so mortal that albeit they had the victory yet they could reap no benefit by it the very Air being so corrupted by the stench of the Carcasses which lay unburied every where for they kill'd promiscuously in every place after that Victory Man Woman and Child of their Enemies that all over the Land there was an universal Pestilence which after seven years more made 'em depart and quit the whole Country leaving only ten Captains to defend those of their People that could not have Shipping against the remainder of the Gygantick Affricans How these Children or Posterity of Nemedus Clanna Neimheadh the Irish call 'em to avoid that dreadful and continual Pestilence departing in a thousand Vessels great and small under the Conduct of three Chieftains Simeon Breac Ibaath and Briotan the other two sailing to Greece Briotan with his adherents Landed in the North of that Countrey which we now call Scotland and with his and their Posterity remaining there gave the denomination of Brittain to this whole Island which is now called Great Brittain as holy Cormac the K. of Mounster and Bishop of Cashel in his Psalter of Cashel together with all the Chronologers of Ireland affirm Wherein surely they have at least much more probability of their side than any late Authors have that derive that name from Brutus or his Romantick History either in Galfridus or in any other For if from Brutus besides other reasons why not Brutannia rather than Britannia How the five sons of Dela viz. Gandius Genandius Segandius Rutheragus and Slanius being the 8th Generation from Simeon Breac and calied in Irish Fir-bholg after 217 years compleat from the former arrival of Nemedus there invaded Ireland with 5000 men of all sorts in their company and studing no great resistance won it entirely routed utterly out of it the remainder of that cursed Generation of Cham the Affrican Giants and divided it into five Provinces or Portions which Division continues till this day How they and four of their Children after them were in succession Monarchs of all Ireland after that Slanius who was the youngest of them all had by force and War upon the rest erected it to a Monarchy though he enjoy'd it but one year Death having given him no longer joy of his Conquest over his Brethren How none before them i. e. none of the former Invaders called themselves Kings they being the first Kings and Slanius among them too as I have now said the first Monarch that Ireland ever had Yet the Reigns of all the nine made not above 36 years in the whole How Eugenius or Eoghun as the Irish Books call him and so they have quite other terminations both for all these and all other Names too expressed by us with Latin terminations being the last of them and prosperously Reigning in peace and plenty over Ireland the Nation whom the Irish call Tuath-De-Danann under their King Nuathad Airgidlaimh as descending from the foresaid Nemedus or Nemeus or Neimh which you please to call him and therefore claiming that Kingdom as their right invaded it fought a great Battel in Connaught with Feramh-Bolg the Generation of Simeon Breac and Neimheadh or Nemedus kill'd a hundred thousand of them and thereby and without much loss to themselves conquer'd the whole kingdom the Reliques of Ferramh-Bolg retiring to the small Islands of Arrain I le Rachluinn and many other about Ireland and Scotland where they continued till such time as Ireland came to be govern'd by Provincial Kings under the Milesians How the Posterity of those Reliques of Ferraimb Bolg being forced away by the Picts had their refuge back again to Ireland and first to the King of Leinster turning Tenants to him for such Lands as he was pleased to lett unto them and next from Leinster because of the heavy rent there to Connaught shifting so in the best manner they could for themselves until by Co-Chulain and Connall Cearnach and the Inhabitants of Vlster they were wholly driven away the second time and quite Banish'd for ever only three Families Sur-names or Septs of them excepted which according to the judgment of some Irish Antiqnaries remain still in Connaght and Leinster as Dr. Keting who also names these Septs does write Adding thereunto this further animadversion as a necessary consequence that these three Families are not of Clanna Gaoidhel or Posterity of Gathelus from whom all the Milesians descended long before either Milesius himself or his Predecessors came into Spain Lastly how according to the Book called Psaltuir Chassil the aforesaid Colony or Nation of Tuatha-De-Danann held the Sovereignty of Ireland for 197 years under seven or rather indeed nine Kings for after Fiacha who was the 6th of them reigned the three Sons of Cearmada by turns yearly But neither to prosecute nor so much as to insert any of these Plantations or Conquests of Ireland by Ciocal or Partholan or Neimhe or Feara Bolg or Tuatha Dee Danann as the Irish names of them are can be much if any thing at all to my main purpose here And though perhaps it might be in some sort material to tell you what a famous man in his Generation nay in a great part of the World Milesius himself otherwise called Galathus in Latin but in Irish Galamh had been Or to tell you 1. Of his first adventuring from Spain to Scythia and serving there as General of the Army under his Kinsman Refloir the great Monarch of that Countrey 2. Of his marrying this Refloir's Daughter and Refloir's growing jealous of his greatness and preparing therefore to dispatch him and his preventing the King by taking away his life and then his quitting Scythia and passing to Egypt by Sea with a Fleet of sixty Sail and his being there employ'd by Pharaoh as General against the King of Ethiopia's Forces warring at that time on Egypt 3. Of the many over-throws given by him to them and Pharaoh's so great favour to him thereupon that
Reign of Niall the Great surnamed also Naoighiallach Likewise to say nothing how this very Niall not only went himself in Person with a powerful Army thither partly to confirm and partly to enlarge those â—â—antations made there by his Predecessors but was himself the first of Mortals that by his own Authority and at the instance of those Plantations gave the name of Scotia Minor or Scotland the Lesser to that Northern part of Great Britain ordaining all his Subjects to call it so Besides to pass by as well the Invasion as the extraordinary great and famous Plantation made therein by the six sons of that Vlster King Muiredbach whom Cambrensis calls in Latin Muredus either in the Time of Lapghaire the II's being Monarch of Ireland when St. Patrick conquered that Kingdom to Christian Religion or at least somewhat later To pass I say all these matters in silence though otherwise both great in themselves and no less attested by sufficient Authority that I think is very great and very true which Cambden a Title Scots page 26. and before page 128. in his Britannia writes That the Scots come from Ireland after a long War at last in the year of Christ 740. and in one great Battel destroyed the Picts so as there was scarce one of them left alive whereby that whole Nation and very name of the Picts was utterly extinguish'd 6. That besides the Irish Chronicles without contradiction from any tell us how the foresaid Niall the Great surnamed Naoighellach from the nine Hostages taken by him five from the five Provinces of Ireland and four from the Picts and other Inhabitants of Scotland or Albuin not only made the other parts of Great Britain even so far as the South of it tributary but with a mighty Force of Irish Scots Picts and Britons in one Army pass'd the Sea to France landed in Armorica and march'd so far as the River Loyre Where being encamped hewas treacherously kill'd by Eochae King of Leinster whom he had formerly so punish'd and plagu'd that he forc'd him to fly even out of all Ireland and who therefore studying still revenge followed him unknown to France and finding there an opportunity took it For standing one day by chance on the bank of the foresaid River and seeing Niall at the same time on the other Bank not far off he bent his Bow presently and with all his might letting fly at him shot him dead in the place by piercing his head through both scull and brain 7. That moreover Fergus the Great King of all Ireland as Buchanan calls him enter'd Scotland with a puiffant Army gave Battel to Coilus King of the Britons who invaded both the Picts and Irish Plantations together fought him kill'd him overthrew his whole Army was thereupon himself both declar'd and receiv'd the first King of the Scottish Nation inhabiting the North of Great Britain and after this being gone for Ireland as he was returning back again to Scotland was drown'd hard by the Rock which from his fate before it hath ever since been called by the Irish Carig-Fherus now Knock-fergus by the English and that all this Rerum Scoticar l. 1. happened says Buchanan about the time that Alexander the Great enter'd Babylon For albeit the Irish Books agree not with Buchanans relation of this Fergusius the Great not either I say as to his quality of being King of Ireland or as to this time of his Adventure in Scotland or elsewhere mentioning him only as a Brother to Mairchertach Mor mhac Ercha Monarch of Ireland and then fixing both his life and death immediatly after Saint Patricks death that is about 530 years after the Incarnation of our Lord yet since they agree with Buchanan in all other material points related by him of this famous Fergus especially that of his entring Scotland with a great Army being the first King of Scots in Britain I think the allegation of what they so agree upon is mightily to purpose 8. That therefore it is easie to be understood whatever Cambden's admiration be how the Milesian Irish Race were those In his Britannia Tit. Picts p. 115. daring men that having the assistance of the Picts their Tributaries and some few Britons withdrawn to them for protection from the Roman yoke drew forth at one time thirty thousand armed men against Agricola and gave Severus the Emperour so much trouble that of Romans and Associats he lost in one expedition against them fifty thousand men And were yet the men against Dio. whose incursions into the Roman Province here first the Fence was built by Adrian from Edinborough Frith to Cluyd fourscore miles Spartianus in length the foundation of it being laid deep within the ground of huge piles or stakes fastned together like a strong hedg or mound then the work of Turff and Earth by Severus across the Island from one Sea to another then under Honorius the Wall of stone running the same extent eight foot broad and twelve foot high and last of all the Towers and Bulwarks all along the Southern Coast of Britain at convenient distances raised against their landing on that side out of their plundering Fleets 6. That a further argument yet and such as of all hands must be confess'd to shew abundantly their Martial spirit and fortitude in those days of old was their brave defence of their own Countrey at home against the manifold powerful and almost continual Invasions of it from abroad by the Heathen Danes Norvegians and Easterlings at least 200 years For I pass wholly over those little short and inconsiderable Invasions of them either by Egfrid the Saxon King of Northumberland in the year 640. according to Cambden c Britannia Tit. Ireland or rather indeed by his General Berthus in the year 684. as Beda d l. 4. c. 26. has it or by some other Brittish Commanders joyn'd with the Picts at two or three several times in the seventh Century after Christ Of none of these do I take notice because they signifie not much save only the preying and burning at two several times and places a part of the Countrey by the Sea-side and three inconsiderable Fights as they are related in the Irish Books The first under the Sovereignty of Blathmhac and Diarmuid Ruannigh two Brothers ruling peaceably together as Kings of Ireland wherein the Saxon King and thirty of his Nobles were kill'd say the Irish Chronicles without mentioning other loss or any at all of the other side The second under the Sovereignty of Fionachta Fliadhach whereof all the account they give is that Comghusgach King of the Picts and a great many of the Irish were slain in it The third after a few years more under the Monarchy of Loionsiogch mhac Aonghussa fought against the men of Vlster by the Brittons but to their own loss And this is all the Irish Chronicles in Doctor Keting have of these matters So that neither the loss nor Victory
monuments of Antiquity their Genealogies Cronicles and Records should have nothing foisted into them nothing at all inserted but what was true and certain by the approbation of a special Committee of the most skilful in such matters That all such and only such National Concerns Annals or other matters which they approv'd after their diligent search and examination of them should be there in publick written in the Kings or Monarchs book of Royal Records called the Psalter of Taragh and whatever was repugnant to that Book should have no credit That in prosecution of this great care of their National Monuments it was that when they became Christians a Parliament of all their Estates both Temporal and Spiritual held under the Monarch Laogirius at the same Royal Habitation of the Monarchs Taragh deputed three Kings three Bishops and three of their most singular Antiquaries even Saint Patrick himself there present being one of these Bishops as the other two were Benuin and Caraioch and the three Kings the foresaid Laogirius Monarch of Ireland tho never converted Daire King of Vlster and Cork mhac Luighioch King of Mounster the Antiquaries also being Dubthach Fergus and Rosse mhac Trichim to review and reduce into order all their National Chronicles That this Committee of Nine having done so with great pains and industry they reduced all into one Book fairly written That the keeping of this original Book was intrusted after by the Estates to the Prelats and those Prelats for its perpetual preservation caused several authentick Copies of it to be fairly engross'd whereof some are extant to this day and several more faithfully transcribed out of them their Names taken from the places where they were for many Ages kept being the Book of Ardmach The Psalter of Casshell The Book of Gleann da Loch c. Whereunto I may add as not very impertinent in this place That the Irish Nation were all along from the beginning so addicted to and had so great an esteem of the knowledg of their own Genealogies Histories that Keting in his Preface anciently there have been in Ireland above two hundred chief Annalists or Historians by place and office such who had Estates in Land set apart and assign'd them and to their Issue after them in perpetuity for attending wholly that Calling and study of it every great Lord having a peculiar Sept of them to record and transmit to Posterity what especially concern'd him and those deriving from him besides what concern'd the Nation in general yet all continually subject to the foresaid Triennial Scrutiny in Parliament A care of Antiquity and History I think not to be match'd by any other Nation in Europe And as they took that care to provide for their Antiquaries so they did also as Cambden Britannia tit Ireland p. 140. hath observed the like for their Poets Physicians and Harpers by assigning them Estates in Land to live independently of others only the duty they owed their great Lords excepted still In the two other Councils of Eumhna and Cruachain the matters principally debated by the Nobility Gentry and other members of them were the concerns of all the Artificers Tradesmen and Handicrafts-men of Ireland Smiths of all sorts Carpenters Masons c. whereof a great number was summon'd to be at each Assembly Out of which number these two Councils did cull out sixty the most eminent in their professions and gave them authority all over the Kingdom allowing them distinct jurisdictions to reform all the abuses of their several Callings and suspend such as they thought fit from exercising them So that none could set up or continue any Mechanical occupation but with their Licence after they had examined and made trial of the sufficiency or insufficiency of the party concern'd These Masters so authorised they call'd in their Language Goldannuigh which imports omniscient or skilful in all Mechanicks So much of their Councils and Government as to Civil Affairs in the more ancient times both of Paganism and Christianity Of their Judicatures and Judges whom they call Brehons he that please may see very singular and wonderful things related of them in D. Keting a Reign of Laoghaire the Monarch in St. Patricks days even when they were Pagans But if you desire to know the several degrees of their Nobility or the different Titles of Honour among those Irish Noblemen who sat in their Parliaments or Councils I can only answer besides what is said already that in Ireland until the English Conquest they had none of our Titles that is not those either of Duke or Marquess Earl Viscount Baron or Knight only such Knights as they called Niadha-Nask and may be called by us in English Knights of the Chain or in Latin Milites Torquati from a certain kind of Chain put about their Necks as no more in truth had Scotland any such Titles before the year of Christ 1074. when Malcolm III. Reigned there and William I. surnamed the Bastard and Conquerour had subdued all intirely here in England Concerning which custom of not using any such Titles of Honour in Scotland particularly as likewise concerning the other of the Language spoken till that time in the very Court of Scotland though as well the one as the other may seem foreign to this place this following Note in Samuel Daniel's words may give you further satisfaction As in the Court of England the French Tongue became more generally spoken viz. in William the Conquerours Reign for of that time this Author speaks here so in that of Scotland did the English by reason of the multitude of this Nation attending both the Queen and her Brother Edgar and daily repairing thither for their safety and combination against the common Enemy Of whom divers abandoning their Native distressed Countrey were by the bounty of that King preferred and there planted spread their off-spring into many Noble Families remaining to this day The Titles for distinguishing degrees of Honour as of Duke Earl Baron Rider or Knight were then as is thought first introduced and the nobler sort began to be called by the title of their Seigneuries according to the French manner which before bare the name of their Father with the addition of Mac after the fashion of Ireland Sam. Dan. in the Reign of William I. pag. 34. Where in the Margin he hath this further observation that Scotland before this time generally spake a kind of Irish 12. As to their constant ordinary Militia what it was in their times of peace we find in the Reign of Cormock Vlfada the Son of Airt King of Ireland a little after the Birth of Christ For then it consisted of three Battalions or Divisions of equal number each in all nine thousand men under several Commanders and Fionn mhac Cuual their General who was neither Gyant nor Dane nor other Foreigner as no more were any of his Commanders Captains or Souldiers He was himself but of the ordinary stature of other men though
Year of Christ 743. not as Cambrensis has it biâ—nnio ante Topog. dist 2. c. 10. adventum Anglorum two Years only but 424 Years before the first landing of Fitz Stephens in Ireland So far is Cambrensis out in his relation of the very time of this matter it happening that a prodigious Whale with three golden Teeth stianded at Carlingford within his jurisdiction each Tooth weighing fifty ounces of Gold he gave one of them to the chief workman-builder of the foresaid Bridges the other two he dedicated to the making of Shrines in the Monastery of Beannchuir for those holy relicks there on which the Countrey people did use to take their most solemn Oaths for ending all Controversies arisen Felim mhac Criomthain alias in Latin Feidlimidius that most famous King though not of Ireland wherein also Cambrensis as in most his other Relations concerning Ireland has most grosly err'd but of Mounster having prosperously reigned 27 years and within that time what by harrassing what by fighting Leath-Cuinn humbled them mightily at last resign'd his Crown retired from all secular Employments all earthly joys pleasures vanities withdrew to a Wilderness turn'd a poor Hermit there continued so the rest of his life devoting himself wholly to God till death call'd him away under the Monarchy of Niall Caille in the Year of Christ 845. For then it was that he departed hence with the Opinion both of a great Saint and of as excellent a Writer too as that Age might have says Lucius The Irish Book call'd an Leabhar Irsi or as Keting expounds it the Book of their Annals has in short this Elogy of him Optimus Sâ—piens Anachoreta Scotorum quievit Contemporary to him was Fionachta-Luibhne King of Connaght who in the same manner exchang'd his Royal Robe for an Hermits Coat and all the attendance wealth delights pomp gayety of a Palace for the laonliness poverty silence obscurity of an uncouth naked solitude to prepare himself for the last day of his life which he ended there Anno 846. Next to this Fionachta in order of time the King of Leinster Dunling mhac Muireadhach retired both from his Kingdom and all worldly things else into the Monastery of Kildare professing Monk and continuing there in the exercises first of an Underling then of an Abbot till in the Year 867. he finish'd happily his course And after him Domhnal son to the Monarch of Ireland Aodh Fionnliach devoted himself to the service of God in the habit and profession of a most godly mortified Ecclesiastick In which condition he received without any fear at all the King of terrours Death in the Year of our Saviour 911. Him although at a great distance of time followed Ruaruidh O Conchabhair King of Connaght I mean the Father of Toirghialiach mor O Conchabhair Monarch of Ireland who in the 20th year after that O Flaithâ—â—iortach had put out his eyes enter'd the Order of Canon-Regulars and among them rendred his Soul to his Redeemer An. 1118. And so did the King of the Dublinian Danes and Leinster Irish Domhnal O Brien son to Muirchiortach O Brien King of Ireland renounce his Kingdom profess Clerk at Lismore and accordingly there continue a life of pennance to his death which happened Anno Dom. 1135. Lastly the religious Devotion of Cathal Cruddhearg King of Connaght Lucius calls him in Latin Cathaldus à rubro Carpo is very much celebrated amongst his Countrymen in all their Histories He after the death of his Wife gave up his Kingdom profess'd Cistercian Monk in the Monastery built by himself at a place in Connaght call'd the Hill of Victory and in the Year of Christ 1224. breath'd out his last in the same religious Cloister The great liberality of this Provincial King to the Church and particularly the large extent of Lands bestowed for ever by him upon that Cistercian Abbey de Colle Victoriae when he built it may perhaps be elsewhere in this Treatise reflected on At present and because I have now done with all the most singular patterns of Piety recorded among the Provincial Kings of that Nation I proceed to those of the most celebrated memory in that respect among their Lesser Kings Such were Damhin mhac Dambinghoirt King of Orghillae departed this life Anno Dom. 560. and Ferrhadhach mhac Duacha parted in the Year 582. whose Souls are said by the Irish Writers to have been shew'd to Columb-Cille ascending to Heaven absque poenis purgatoriis Such was Brian Boraimh's Ancestor in the seventh degree of ascent by name Toirrghiallach by Title or Dignity King of Dal-Gheass or rather indeed says Keting of North-Mounster who in the Year 690. or thereabouts after he had bestow'd all the Islands in his Kingdom on poor strangers to be inhabitâ—d and cultivated by them put on a Monks Cowl at Lismore and for his daily employment either polish'd stones for the building of Churches there or mended High-ways So that he was never idle but discharging continually with his own hands the part sometime of a Stone-cutter at other times that of a poor ordinary Mason or meanest Day-labourer Such Maol-bressal mhac Cearnaigh King of Mogh dornuigh who after quitting the World professing Monk and living in that profession many years like a Saint was kill'd at last by the Danes Anno 847. Such Maolduin King of Oiligh son to Aodgh Ordnigh the Monarch that forsook all whatever was desireable on earth took the same course of a profess'd religious Life in a Monastery for many years never look'd back never took his hand off the Plough till death seiz'd him in the Year of Christ 865. Such also were Maolbride King of Cineal-Gonail and Domhnal King of Cineal-Laoghaire who trampling underfoot all worldly temptations assumed the Monastic habit retired into Cloister'd Cells and for the remainder of their lives which was of many years continued their station there practising only the methods of dying to themselves and living to Christ till the blessed hour came when he call'd them to himself the former Anno 897. the later Anno 882. And after them Donochadh the son of Ceallach and Son-in-law to Donochadh mhac Floinn the Monarch King of Ossory is next recorded as a man of exceeding piety and godliness though never so profess'd Monk nor at all retir'd in outward appearance from the duties of his secular Employment His care of the poor was such that in his time every house in Ossory had three several Bags for daily Collections of Victuals to feed them One that receiv'd the tenth part of every persons meal none at all of the Family no not even of the servants excepted Another design'd for the portion of Saint Michael the Archangel as they call'd it And a third was under the peculiar charge of the good Wife to see all the scraps gathered into it Besides he was himself exceeding bountiful to them And then his devotion at Church frequentation of the Sacrament watch over his own senses delight in all
few That in the most famous place call'd Degsestan i. e. the stone of Degsa almost his whole Army was slain That nevertheless in the same Fight Theobaldus Brother to this Ethelfride with all the Force headed by him was in like manner kill'd And that from that time forward to this very day says Bede meaning the day when he writ this none of all the Scottish Kings had been so daring as to give Battel to the English Nation Which being the words of Bede truly rendred in English and the years of his Age being 59. when he ended all his Works and consequently this History as himself says and seeing also that he was born Anno Dom. 677. it follows That so long at least as 136 years after Degsestan Fight the Scots engag'd not against the English But whether after this term expir'd they attack'd them again before they had ruin'd the Pictish Kingdom and at the same time seiz'd so great a part of the Northumbrian I know not 54. What you might have perus'd already page 129 as derived either from Cambrensis or Cambden or both viz. of the original eruption of the great Vlster Lake call'd in Irish Loch Erne and cause thereof is abundantly refuted by Gratianus Lucius in his Book entitled Cambrensis Eversus page 132 and 133. Which having not seen before my own foresaid 127 page had been wrought off the Press makes me give now this other which as it is much fuller so I doubt not a much better and truer account in every respect of that matter The Relation of Cambrensis Topograp Hib. d. 2 c. 9. may be rendred thus in English There is in Vlster a Lake of vast extension thirty miles long and fifteen broad unto which as they say a wonderful chance gave beginning In that Countrey which is now the Lake there was in very ancient times a most vitious Nation but chiefly and incorrigibly above all other People of Ireland given over to that sin we call Bestiality And there was amongst them a Prophetical saying That so soon as a certain Well of that Countrey were at any time left uncovered for out of reverence to it proceeding from barbarous superstition it had both a covering and signature or lock it should presently overflow so prodigiously as to drown the whole Countrey thereabouts Which accordingly happen'd on this occasion One of the Countrey Women having open'd it to bring Water home it chanc'd that before she had throughly done she heard her Child a little distance off crying and going in haste to still him she forgot to cover the Well Whereupon it overflow'd on a sudden so strangely that not only the Woman her self and her Child with her but all the People universally and all the very Cattel too of the whole Countrey for very many miles were as by a particular and Provincial Deluge covered overwhelmed perished utterly in the Waters As if the Author of Nature had judg'd that Land unworthy of Inhabitants which had been conscious of such enormous turpitude against Nature And indeed that such had been the original of this Lake it is no improbable argument that the Fishermen upon it do manifestly in fair serene weather see under them in the Water Church Turrets which according to the fashion of those in that Land are not only narrow and high but round withal and that they often shew them to passengers wasted over this Lake who are strangely astonished at the sight and cause You are also to note That the River which abundantly flows out of the same Lake being one of the nine Principal Rivers of Ireland namely the Ban did even from the beginning that is ever since the time of Bartholanus though in a much smaller stream flow from the foresaid Well all along that Countrey other Waters falling into it still as it went farther off Hitherto Gerald of Wales But to this Relation of his it will not be amiss to add what Cambden says applying it and interpreting and making this nameless Pool to be the famous Loch Erne of so many miles in length and breadth and the People destroy'd to have been some Hebridians got thither Beyond Cavan says he Cambden's Ireland in Hollands Translation of it page 106. West North Fermanach presenteth it self where sometimes the Erdini dwelt a Countrey full of Woods and very boggish In the midst whereof is that famous and greatest Meere of all Ireland Loch Erne stretching out forty miles bordered about with shady Woods and passing full of inhabited Islands whereof some contain a hundred two hundred three hundred acres of ground having besides such store of Pikes Truots and Salmons that the Fishermen complain oftner of too great plenty of Fishes and of the breaking of their Nets than they do for want of draught This Lake spreadeth not from East to West as it is describ'd in the common Maps but as I have heard those say who have taken a long and good survey thereof first at Bel Tarbet which is a little Town farthest North of any in this County of Cavan it stretcheth from South to North fourteen miles in length and four in breadth Anon it draweth in narrow to the bigness of a good River for six miles in the Channel whereof standeth Iniskellin the principal Calste in this Tract which in the year 1593. was defended by the Rebels and by Dowdal a most valiant Captain won Then coming Westward it enlargeth it self most of all twenty miles long and ten broad as far as to Belek near unto which is a great downfal of Water and as they term it that most renowned Salmon's Leapue à common speech among the Inhabitants thereby is That this Lake was once firm ground passing well husbanded with Tillage and replenish'd with Inhabitants but suddenly for their abominable buggery committed with Beasts overflown with Waters and turn'd to a Lake Though Almighty God says Giraldus Creator of Nature judg'd this Land privy to so filthy Acts against Nature unworthy to hold not only the first Inhabitants but any other for the time to come Howbeit this wickedness the Irish Annals lay upon certain Islanders out of the Hebrides who being fled out of their own Countrey lurked there So he Against these Relations the one of Giraldus Cambrensis and the other of Cambden though the later as to the original of this Lake is wholly grounded on the former Gratianus Lucius opposes many Reasons 1. That all the Irish Annals and Histories who treat of Loch Ern attribute the original of it not to the overflowing of any Well or River but to a meer eruption of Waters out of the very entrails of the Earth without any kind of mention of Bestiality or other sin of the Inhabitants which might at all any way deserve it 2. That this Eruption happened in the Reign of Fiacha Lauranne * But Keting says it happen'd under the Reign of Tighermhais alias Tightermhuir forty six years before Fiacha Labhraina came to be King King of Ireland
A PROSPECT OF The State of IRELAND FROM The Year of the World 1756. TO The Year of Christ 1652. Written by P. W. Printed for Johanna Broom at the Gun in St. Pauls Church-Yard 1682. TO THE KING SIR I Appear before Your Majesty with the ill grace of a Man who comes for a Pardon and confesses he did the fauâ—t in hopes of it For 't is undeniably a guilty presumption in me to make bold with Your Royal Name and that to a slight Argument or at least made so by ill handling such as will give People too much reason to say Your Name is the only thing which shews handsom in the whole Prospect Neither have I any but the sorry excuse of defenceless guilt I was drawn in though not by others by Counsellors as dangerous and deceitful as my own thoughts I considered that This in the original design was part of a Book which has the honour to be made Your's and thought my altering the Method did not alter Your Majesties Property neither could I conceive when Your Name appear'd on the one half any but Yours could shew well on the other I considered that 't is an account of part of Your People and contains an account of part of Your Pedigree To the King and to the Head of the Family Justice I thought appropriated both For it is the glory of the Irish Nation to have contributed to Your Sacred Blood as well as the rest under Your happy Government and when they shed their own in Your defence to know they spend an inconsiderable part for preservation of the most Noble and most Precious a sweeter and sometimes a stronger tye than the Duty of Subjects As reciprocally Nature with its secret allurements of propension towards a Country from whence we are derived and where our Ancestours have lived great and glorious joyns with the common care of a King and Father of all his People to move Your Majesty to cherish them with the rest Thus much I beg leave to say by the by in behalf of my Native Countrey because every Writer has not been either so curious to observe or so kind to publish it But leaving that matter these reasons persuaded me I might find at least Companions in my fault and where Your Sacred Name has been made bold with as improperly Yet what wrought most was a strong temptation and which I could the less resist because it came in the disguise of gratitude to appear as little unworthy as I could of many and signal effects of Your Goodness Every body knows I am deeply in Your Debt and I thought it but just every body should know I own it with the â—ense which becomes me though I have not hitherto said so much as bare I thank you no not to Your Majesty Your self sometimes The thoughts of Death which it concerns a man of my age to entertain would be too terrible to me if it should carry me away with the imputation of an insensible or ungrateâ—ul man As I have always thought the best return a Subject can make to the favours of his Prince is by his service to deserve them I have indeed the comfort that I cannot reproach my self with not having done my best But alas I must say to You as to God after all I have to my great grief been but an unprofitable servant That thought is a misery which I am ill able to support Should Ungrateful be added to Useless it would certainly and soon sink my gray hairs to the Grave Fear of this as fear sometimes produces boldness has cast me into that of which I am now guilty and in which my ill Fate still pursues me For I am useless now too having with much pains got a Present to make You for which neither Your Majesty nor any body else perhaps will be the better and I know not whether worth more than just so much Paper But yet 't is all I can do For we of the Scribling Trade are like Merchants who trade upon credit and pay altogether in Bills Besides that in truth there lives not perhaps the man whose stock or luck in managing it is great enough to answer the mighty sum I owe You. These were the thoughts which slatter'd my presumption with hopes of Pardon to which all even Your Mercy will yet be needful For I am an unrepenting Sinner and who far from sorrow glory in the fault which gives me an occasion to tell all the World I have lived and mean to die Your Majestie 's most Loyal most obedient and most humble Subject Peter Walsh THE PREFACE READER You may well imagine by the Title and Method of this Treatise the Author was very far from intending it should pass for a History of Ireland And for the Bulk I can assure you that although considering the extent of Times and variety of Matters treated of therein it be but little yet according to his first design it should have been far less at least by five parts of six The truth is I never had a thought of writing a word on this Subject before the Earl of Castlehaven desired nor only desired but importun'd me a twelve month past when his Lordship's Memoir's had been a working off the Press that I would draw an Appendix to be publish'd with them which might in short represent the original Cause of the Rebellion broke out in Ireland on the 23d of October 1641. and consequently somewhat of the State of that Kingdom and Fatal Feud betwixt the two Nations there since Henry II's time What little inclination I had to the Subject it will be to no purpose I should tell being you see I was at last persuaded though nevertheless I must acknowledg it was only the power this Nobleman has and can justly challenge over me * See Castle-Haven's Memoir's pag. 87. wrought my acquiescence to his desires But laying aside that matter what I would next inform you of are these particulars 1. That although eight or nine sheets in the Whole was the most I had first design'd to write because a larger Tract could not so well suit the Title of an Appendix to his Lordship's Memoir's yet when I was once enter'd on the Subject so great a variety of matters offer'd themselves to consideration as took up more time and paper than I first intended 2. That in the mean while some Copies of the said Memoir's chancing by some unexpected accident to be given out by the Book-seller my Lord considering he could not otherwise prevent a sinister interpretation of his meaning by them in the main as they were seen thus imperfect found himself necessitated not only not to stay my leisure but instead of such an Appendix as he expected from me to change his former Preface and write and print another with an Appendix also of his own though upon another Subject and with such both amendments and accomplishments as he thought necessary to order the free exposing of his Book to
improving by a fervent zeal for truth and generous love to his Countrey made Father Keting undergo the laborious task of writing the History of Ireland at large from the very first Plantation of it after the Deluge to Hen. II's time and 17th year of his Reign being the year of Christ 1152. And this History besides which there is no other full compleat or methodical one extant of all the Ages Invasions Conquests Changes Monarchs Wars and other considerable matters of that truly ancient Kingdom be lived to finish in his old Age that is a little after Charles I. of glorious memory had been proclaimed King Nor did he only finish it but prefix unto it a very judicious large and learned Preface to the Reader It is in this Preface he declares those two special motives of his writing which you have seen already Where also he declares who those Authors are that gave him the occasion and refutes them one after another at large namely Strabo Solinus Pomponius Mela S. Hierom against Jovinian Cambrensis Stanihurst Campion Hanmer Cambden Hector Boethius John Barclay Morison Davies Buchanan All these in particular as to some passages of theirs he disputes against in the same Preface with the clearest evidence of Authority matter of Fact and Reason grounded on both As likewise he does in the Body of his Work against other passages not only of some of these same Authors especially Cambrensis Hector Boethius and Buchanan but Nicholas Sanders too in his First Book de Schismate Anglicano Besides in the same Preface he discourses five or six other Particulars which I think worth the while not to pass over wholly in silence The first is That although in his History he has not seldom made use of some Collections out of Foreign Writers yet the main Body of it all along is compos'd out of the most undoubtedly ancient and authentick Monuments of Ireland viz. Psaltuir Ardemach Psaltuir Chaâ—sil Psaltuir na Rann written by Aonghuis Ceile De and then Leabhar na Huacongmhala Leabhar Chluaino Huighnioch Leabhar Fiontain in Leix Leabhar Ghlinne Da-Loch Leabhar Bâ—idhe Mholing Leabhar Dubh Mholaige Leabhar na Gceart written by S. Benignus and Ubhdir Chiarrain writ at Cluain-mhac-Noise in all Thirteen Books For you are to understand here not only that Leabhar signifies a Book and Psaltuir we call it Psaltor a Book in Verse but as he says That from the beginning it was the custom of the Irish to have their Chief Antiquities done into the choisest severest strictest Meeter without any redundance or want as to sense and point of truth and this as well for the more safe preserving of them from corruption as the more easie getting them by heart And consequently you see the true reason why their chief Records of Tarach Cashel Ardmagh c. are called Psalters But if you would further know the heads of these thirteen Books he answers in the same place They are these 1. The several Invasions and Conquests of Ireland 2. The Division of its Provinces and lesser Countreys 3. The Reigns of their Kings 4. Their Annals 5. Their Computations and Concordances of Times 6. The Genealogy of their Male Gentry 7. The Pedigree of their Females 8. Their Vocabulary Where also is a large account of the great School in the Plain of Sennaar and three first Teachers of it soon after the Confusion of Tongues at Nimrod's Tower 9. The Visions of Columb-Cille with sundry other Antiquities of Ireland The Second Particular gives in effect four Reasons or at least one compos'd of so many Heads to persuade the credibility and truth of these Irish Books It tells us of above two hundred chief Chronologers together from very early times conttinuing a Succession in the same Families and all Ages in that Nation while their Kingdom stood whose peculiar and only Office it was to record faithfully all memorable Concerns It tells us how these Antiquaries had sufficient Estates in Land entail'd on themselves and Issue for ever on that Condition It tells us of the publick Schools they had purposely and continually kept for the Education of their Youth in the knowledge of their Antiquities and how these Schools were kept in the Countrey of Breifthne as they call in Irish That which now we call the County of Letrim It tells us of a Triennial search into and Revision of all their Records by a select Committee in the Publick Assembly of all the Estates of that Kingdom And lastly it tells us of the Deposition of fair Copies of the same Records in the hands of the Bishops from time to time ever since the Nation believed in Christ 1200 years since Whereof you may see more at large in my 46. page following in this Former Part. A third Particular answers the Objection of some discordance among the Irish Books concerning the number of years from the Creation of the World to the Birth of our Saviour It desires the Objectors to consider the far greater discordance * Because I was not sure that my Copy of Keting was right in every of the particulars or Discordances noted here I consulted of purpose the most learned Sixtus Senensis l. 5. Bibl. S. pag. 440. Imp. Colon. an 1626. whither I remit you to see many more discordances that is Six and Twenty in all in stead of these 15 here given by Keting though most of these are among ' em betâ—ixt as well the Hebrews as the Greek and Latin Chronologers each apart on the same Subject How for Example 1. among the Hebrews Paul Sedecholim counts 3518. years the Talmudists 3784. the New Rabbins 3760. Rabbi Naasson 3740. Rabbi Moses Germidisi 4058. Josephus 4192. Among the Greek Authors Metrodorus 5000. Eusebius 5199. Theophilus 5476. And among the Latins S. Hierom 3941. S. Augustin 5351. Isidorus 5270. Orolius 5190. Beda 3952. Alphonsus 5984. Now says Keting if so great a discordance on this very Subject impair not in other matters the credit of either Greek Hebrew or Latin Authors why should it the Irish Where also he acquaints his Reader that because himself is of opinion that such Irish Antiquaries or Books as count for this Period from the Creation to the Incarnation 4052. * This is the Computation follow'd by Augustinus Tornlellius in his Annales Sacri ab Orbe Condito ad Christum passum Sext. M. Aetat ad an 4052. whether Keting had him for his Master though I know not yet I know he might because Torniellius came out in Print at Francford an 1611. come nearest the Truth he follows them in his History or computation of times therein either precedent or subsequent to the Birth of Christ And farther in the some place he acquaints us with his purpose to give at the end of his History an Appendix or a Table of Synchronism shewing what Monarchies Monarchs Great Kings of the World in other parts and since Christianity what Popes and general Councils were contemporary with the various Revolutions and Kings of Ireland Whether
so small a tract of time and circumstances of Ireland I think he would not judge amiss that took it for one of the very last warnings from Heaven to this Nation that the Anger of God was now on the point of overcoming all his patience and his rage and fury at hand since nothing else would do * And indeed it ought the rather to be taken so because that much contrary to Ketings relation so good an Author as Tigernacus many hundred years before his time has told us that the shower of Blood fell in the Reign of this Niall and that the three showers fallen at his Birth were one of Honey one of Silver and one of Wheat Certainly the sequel did soon evince it to have been so 26. For not long after that Prodigious Thunder and Lightning which hapned in the Reign of Aodh Ordnigh the patience of God being wearied and his justice inrag'd by the unreclaimable contumacy of that People he call'd out of their Northern Enclosures his exterminating Angels the Heathen Danes Norvegians and other Easternlings and in the same Reign of Aodh Ordnigh pour'd them in on Ireland to execute on the Christian Irish those very heaviest of Judgments that either such former Warnings would have prevented or such later Prodigies had predicted or that any People in the World for so many years after did suffer Except only those if any such have been whom God design'd to extinguish totally root and branch or the incredulous Jews that must be still preserv'd though still dispers'd among all Nations to be a living Monument of Gods Vengeance on the unpardonable sin of their Ancestors But the sin of the Irish how heinous soever was not of that kind nor was it the design of God to extinguish or extirpate them yet And yet this first War of the Danes upon them besides its having fully paid all their old scores to God that is abundantly punish'd them for above 40 years at least in the very same methods they had offended him and therefore covered all their Provinces with blood and ashes and horrors of death without any discrimination of People or Professions or Parties it reduced them at last to a bondage and slavery far surpassing the Egyptian Circassian or any other I have read of any where on earth For to pass over the life worse than death that those of their Church-men that escaped the Sword were forc'd unto and in particular how Foranan with a few more of the Clergy of Ardmagh * Gracianus Lucius p. 328. relates this matter otherwise He says that Turgesius having taken the City of Ardmagh in the year 843. or 848. made Foranan and all the Clergy and Religious men and all the rest of the Students too of that University Prisoners and Ship'd them all for Limmeric which his People held in their possession at that time What became of them there or any where else after that time we have no account having fled so far as Cashel first and together with the Archbishop of that See and his Clergy too thence again to the horrible habitation of Bogs Woods Rocks and Subterranean Caves about or not far off Jomlaigh Jobhair must have been content to hide themselves there and even to luâ—k for several years like wild Beasts But I say to pass over this condition of their Church-men only wherever any of them did scape the Sword who cannot but be astonisht at the particulars of their bondage in general These particulars I have omitted before and therefore give them now for better satisfaction to the Reader 1. Every Canthred or Division of ground containing one of our Baronies had a Danish King every Tuath or Seigniory a Chieftain every Church a Lay-Danish Heathen Abbot every Town a Serjeant every House a Souldier Cess'd the Irish call'd him a Sairioch or Buanna all of 'em Danes and each commanding absolutely within his own Precinct only subordinate respectively to the higher till they came to the Supream who was Turgesius himself 2. The very Buanna did so command the House wherein he was Cess'd that not so much as an Egg or cup of Milk could be disposed of till he had been serv'd though in the mean time a Sucking Babe did perish for want of it And if his Host had but one Cow in the World he must have kill'd her upon demand to give him flesh Or failing therein or in any other thing demanded of him he was presently taken and lead away Prisoner to the next Danish Rath where he was sure to be detain'd in Fetters till he had fully satisfied all the Buanna ' s demands either of Victuals Money or any thing else whatever 3. Every House-keeper must have yearly paid into the Treasury an ounce of Gold the Irish call'd it Vinghe Oir and failing have his Nose cut off which made them call this kind of Tax Nose-rent 4. Neither Lord nor Lady much less an inferior person suffer'd to wear new Cloaths but only the Cast-cloaths of the Danes 5. None to keep School or be taught any kind of Learning not even in their own Houses 6. None to enter any Monastery Church or Chappel for they were all possess'd by the Danes 7. None to have either Clergy-man or any other Learned man Philosopher Poet Lawyer or other Artist whom they call Sruithe 8. None suffer'd to have any kind of Book but all Books the Danes could light upon either burn'd or taken away by them 9. Neither Lords nor Princes nor even Kings Daughters permitted to embroider in Gold or Silver or so much as work in any kind of Silk 10. Nor even Kings Sons to learn or use any feats of activity 11. None of what quality soever permitted to give or take any kind of entertainment not even from or with his private Familiars but all of 'em must e'â— have contented themselves with the Leavings of the Danes I say nothing of that other barbarous Imposition forc'd on every Bridâ— at her first Marriage to lye the first night with the Danish Captain of the Precinct before she had Bedded her Husband if the Captain desired it but if he did not or dislik'd her in either case to pay him a certain Tax in Money How much this Money was I cannot say Tho I have known a custom derived thence to have been continued in my own time by a Christian Landlord of English extraction one Mr. Scurlog who was commonly call'd Scurlog the Poet a Gentleman of two or three hundred a year in the County of Wexford To whom every Maid living upon his Land when she was Married was bound to pay and accordingly did pay half a Crown English money if he did not remit it However I pass over that Heathen Danish Original of this Un-christian custom because I find nothing of it in Doctor Keting Those other manifold particulars of the Irish bondage undoubtedly true besides all their riches lost and all their best blood spill'd and all their Provinces and Countries laid
Beeves and twelve Hogs Add further yet as part of this heavy Leinster Fine says Lucius 30 either white or red Cows with their Calves of the same colour 30 brass Collars for those Cows to keep them quiet in their stabling and 30 other brazen ties for their feet also to keep them gentle at their milking Where nevertheless I must take notice that Lucius in this Account does much vary from Keting and that whatever may be thought of all other particulars of it surely the number of 15000 Cauldrons or Coppers as we call them now of that capacity seems to me somewhat incredible But leaving this to the Readers indifferency what is more proper here may be read in the same Author Lucius where he tells us next of this Monarchs port and magnificence in House-keeping which though very great indeed is however I think credible enough He had eleven hundred and fifty Waiters that serv'd him ordinarily at Table in his great Hall at Tarach And this Hall was by himself built of purpose to answer in its capacity the entertainment and attendance of a great King It was 300 Foot long 30 Cubits high and 50 Cubits broad with fourteen Doors opening into it And the daily service of Plate the Flagous and Cups of Gold Silver and precious stone at his Table there consisted of a hundred and fifty pieces in all What is besides delivered of this Monarch is That which among the truly wise must be more valuable than any worldly magnificence or secular glory whatsoever He was to all mankind very just and in his later days through the mercy of God very pious also religious towards him That so strangely powerful on a sudden were his inward illuminations That in plain terms he now refus'd his Druids any more to worship their Idol Gods That soon after he openly professed he would no more worship any but the only true God of the Universe the Immortal and Invisible King of Ages as the great Apostle calls him And finally that those Priests of the Devil by their Necromantical adjurations and ministery of damned Spirits raised from Hell God permitting it wrought his destruction by choaking him as I have said before For in such manner and for such a cause died this great and happy King of Ireland An. Christi 266. But whether he may or may not therefore be rank'd among the true Christian Martyrs I leave others to judge And the same question might peradventure be rationally put though not I confess with the same advantage of the circumstance of violence from an external cause concerning Connor the first Provincial King of Vlster made by the Monarch Eochuidh Feilioch himself the Author of the Pentarchy about 400 years before the Birth of Christ This Connor's Druyd or Magitian which you please to call him having it seems the spirit of Prophecy as you see in the Book of Judges that Baldam though otherwise a Heathen wicked Idolater had the like on a day speaking his Raptures to Connor and among other things delivering much of the Son of God that was to come down from Heaven to save mankind and was nevertheless to suffer the most cruel death of the Cross from his own beloved Countrymen the Jews whom he came to save before any others Connor says Keting on the hearing of all became so affected first with the stupendious mercy of God to Sinners and then presently so transported against the ungrateful Jews that being in a great Wood at the time of this Discourse he drew his Sword fell a slashing and cutting the Trees about him on every side with the greatest fury could be imagining he had before him still those cruel men that put our Saviour to death and continued so long in this passionate action of transport till by over-heating himself and the opening thereby of some old wounds he had in his shull he died What the Reader may answer to the foresaid Quere in relation to either of these two Kings I know not But think nevertheless what St. John Chrysostom would have answer'd it very consequently at least in reference to the former had the case been debated by him when he wrote his Three Books de Providentia Dei to Stargirius a holy Monk that notwithstanding his holiness was through the permission of God either possess'd or obsess'd or both by the power of the Devil It was also in the time of Ireland's Paganism that Niall the Great surnamed Naoighiollach in Latin Noui-obses in English Niall of the Nine Hostages because says Colgan in his Trias Taumatorge from Vlster Connaght Mounster Leinster the Britons Picts Dal-Rheudans and Morini a People of France in all nine Nations he had Hostages did reign the CXX or CXIX Monarch of the Irish Of whose great cruelty in his judgment given against Eochuidh King of Leinster because I have so particularly spoken before I will not conceal now what I have since observ'd in Gratianus Lucius of the extraordinary favour of God unto him For such we must undoubtedly acknowledg it to have been seeing it was no less than a heavenly illustration of his mind with the beams of Christianity to that degree as turn'd him wholly to a new man of perfect holiness Nor yet less than that above a hundred years after his death his Body on the opening of his Shrine or Tomb which I take to have been on Cruach Phadruig in Connaght whither the Army brought his Body from France was found entire without any corruption Nay nor a jot less than that a Christian Bishop namely St. Cernachus infected with the Leprosie was perfectly cured by visiting and lying down in that very Shrine of this Great Niall Naoighiallach So writeth Gratianus Lucius quoting for his Author Colgan And so I have done with those few of the Kings of Ireland in the time of Paganism that besides many more of that very time and their Catalogue have been for several great Excellencies other than those of warlike bravery or success renown'd in that Nation 34. But after Christianity had been among the people of Ireland universally preach'd and establish'd yea and all along from time to time in the succeeding Ages not even those very Ages following the horrible desolations by the Danish Wars excepted they had questionless notwithstanding all their intestin Feuds many more both Monarchs Provincial Kings and other lesser Kings too famous in their generation as well for other great Vertues especially those peculiar to Religion as for those of Martial fortitude and Valour Yet because I perceive this little Book to swell insensibly beyond my design I pass over much of that which otherwise I would have willingly mention'd in this place And therefore what I can briefly on the present Subject observe is First in general the wonderful Devotion Zeal Religious Liberality of the first Christian Monarchs Provincial Kings and other great Lords of Ireland who upon their first conversion not only parted so readily with the whole Tenths of their Estates real
Kingdom been destroy'd but for the enormity of their sins Whereof whoever pleases may see proofs at large in Fitz-Herberts Policy and Religion Part 1. chap. 21. 22. 23 c. yea Jesus the son of Syrach for he may be more easily consulted in every Bible at hand may give to a sober man assurance enough where he says First cap. 10. 8. that the Kingdom is translated from Nation to Nation because of unjust dealings injuries calumnies and various deceits Secondly c. 40. 10. that death and bloodshed strife and the sword oppression famine contrition and scourges were all of them created for the wicked and for them the deluge was made Nay if we consult the Books of Kings read the Prophets run over the Books of Josuah Judges Deuteronomy Chronicles and the rest of the old Testament examine all the Histories of Christendom we shall not find any whole Kingdom or Nation destroy'd but for grievous and horrible sins either of the Rulers or People or Priests or all together Yea we shall commonly find the very quality and species of those transgressions mentioned that brought the vengeance on them However and notwithstanding that further yet we know that bloodshed is one of those four sins that cry to Heaven Gen. X. 11. for vengeance the Voice of thy brothers blood cries to me from the earth said God himself to Cain and that the very second of the Gen. IX 6. Laws he gave to Noe was that whosoever did shed the blood of man his also should be shed after all I dare not affirm positively that either those very Feuds of the Irish how unparallel'd soever in blood or those other transgressions in specie be they what you please were the sins that moved God to pronounce this final doom against them but only in general That their great sins compell'd him to it And how should I indeed For who was the Counsellor Esay XL. 13. Rom. XI 39. of God or who knows any thing of the secrets of his Providence except only those to whom himself was pleased to reveal them Nevertheless I dare acquaint the Reader that although I give but little credit generally and sometimes none at all to the Relations of Cambrensis where he seems rather to vent his passion and write a Satyr against that People than regard either Modesty or Truth yet I will not call in question what he relates l. 2. de Expug Hib. c. 33. of the Prophetical predictions made so many Ages before by the four Prophetical Saints of that Nation Moling Brachan Patrick and Columb-Cille and written by themselves says he in their own Irish Books extant yet in Ireland concerning the final Fate of their Countreymen the old Milesian Race viz. That the people of Great Brittain shall not only invade them but for many Ages continue a sharp cruel and yet doubtful War upon them at home in Ireland sometimes the one and sometimes the other side prevailing That although those Invaders shall be often disturb'd worsted weakned especially and according to the prophecy of Brachan by a certain King that shall come from the desert Mountains of Patrick and on a Sunday-night seize a Castle in the Woody parts of Ibh Faohlain and besides force them almost all away out of Ireland yet they shall continually maintain the Eastern Sea-Coast in their possession That in fine it will be no sooner than a little before the day of judgment and then it will be when they shall be throughly and universally victorious over all Ireland erect Castles every where among the Irish and reduce the whole Island from Sea to Sea under the English Yoak And verily those Prophetical predictions five hundred years since delivered us by Cambrensis as he received 'em from the Irish themselves are the more observable That by consulting the History of after-Ages from Henry II. of England to the last of Queen Elizabeth and first of King James we may see them to a tittle accomplish'd Unless peradventure some will unreasonably boggle at the circumstance of time express'd in these words Paulò ante diem Judicii a little before the day of Judgment Which yet no man has reason to do Because we know not how near this great day which shall end the World may be to us at this very present As for that King foretold as coming from the desâ—rt Mountains of Patric there may be occasion and place enough to speak of him again that is hereafter in the Second Part of this Treatise But whether from this Irish Prophesie either had as for the substance not the exact words of it from Cambrensis for he pretends not to give to us the exact words or had perhaps at least for some part of it from the Irish themselves resorting to Rome in those days the famous Italian Prophet of Calabria Joachimus Abbot of Flore did foretell in his time the utter destruction and eternal desolation that Joachimus Ab. post Tract super cap. X. Isaiae Part 1. de Oneribus sexti Temporis was to come upon the Irish Nation I cannot say This I know 1. That in all his predictions all along in his several Commentaries on Jeremy Esay the Apocalyps c. he pretends to divine Revelation 2. That he lived several years after the Writings of Cambrensis on Ireland had been publick For Cambrensis dedicated one part of them to Henry II. himself who died in the Year of Christ 1189. and the rest to his Son Richard when yet but Earl of Poicton And Joachim was in Sicily with Richard now King of England and Philip Polydore Virgil. in Ricardo primo King of France both wintring there with their Fleets An. 1190. in their way to the Invasion of the holy Land Nay I have my self read his submission of his Works to the See Apostolick dated by himself ten years after which was the Year 1200. of our Saviours Incarnation 3. That being ask'd what the success of this great expedition to the holy Land against Saladine should be his Answer was it should prove unsuccessful and that the time of recovering Hierusalem was not yet come 4. That this prediction of his was punctually true as appear'd ere long 5. That his Prophecy of the old Irish Nation is in these genuin words you read in the Margin * Ex rigoribus horribilis hyemis glacialis flatibus Aquilonis parit Hibernia Incolas furibundos Sed si sequentium temporum terrores praenoscerent internos impetus cogitarene à facie spiritus Domini ferreum pectus averterent se à sempiternis opprobriis liberarent Sed ex quo invicem vertitur furor aspideus involvit tam Clerum quam populum par insultus non video quod superna Clementia ulterius differat quin in â—os exactissimum judicium acuat in stuporem perpetuae desolationis impellat Omnes istos populos Cathedra Dubliniensis astringit Sed Darensium enormis iniquit as totum defaedat ordinem charitatis Et ideo
in among so many other mostly too bare names of other pretended Brittish Kings Neither has he any more of the very Second Coilus than that he was the son of King Marius and the Father of King Lucius the First Christian King of Great Brittain and that having in his youth been bred at Rome he continued after e'en all along his Reign both devoted to the Roman State and in Peace with all his Neighbours And therefore the rest of the story in Buchanan either of this or any other Coilus must be a later additional Invention and in reference to the real true Records of Antiquity as ill contrived as might be though answerably enough to the foundation laid for such a superstructure of the new History of Brute and his Descendants But since we are occasionally return'd again to this famed Work of Galfridus Monumetensis whereof you have elsewhere so lately had from my own reading it over a pretty just Summary give me leave here to let you see out of others as just a censure of it Give me leave to tell you that Alanus Copus has compared it with Ovids Metamorphosis and Lucians Tales That William Neubrigensis has spent even three whole Leaves in Prooem Hist to demonstrate by instance of particulars how it is wholly compos'd of the most improbable incredible and ungrounded Lyes that ever were invented That Cambden also in his Britannia relates to others who stick not to say it is all patch'd up of untunable discords and jarring absurdities yea compos'd of such Milesian Fables such intolerable meer inventions of the Authors own brain that the Roman Church at last thought fit to enroll it in the Index of Prohibited Books Yea that Cambrensis himself though a Britton by birth and blood and as desirous of the glory of his Countrey-men as any could be gives it nevertheless the Character of a fabulous History as you may see in his Description of Wales cap. 7. Nay that in his Itinerary of Wales l. 1. c. 5. he tells us that and the occasion and manner how the Devils were seen leaping and skipping and dancing on it However and though it be manifest that as well these Censures as the Summary aforesaid are sufficient even each of them apart to ruin the story of Coilus and Fergus in Buchanan which derives originally from Galfridus and ultimately relies on his invention I shall nevertheless give now another Argument shewing more peculiarly how little Faith ought to be given him in his Catalogue of Brittish Kings and consequently none at all to his naming of Coilus among them In his Seventh Book Chap. V. where he so confidently relates the mighty Battel fought and overthrow given by King Arthur in France to those four hundred thousand Romans and their Auxiliaries mentioned before part Europeans part Asians and the rest Affricans under many Kings come to assist the Roman Emperour against Arthur he has also the brazen brow to invent not only those three names of the Emperour himself and his two Lieutenant Generals which we have seen before but many more of the Auxiliary Kings viz. Epistrephus King of Greece Mustemphar King of Parthia Aliafatina King of Spain Hirtacus King of Affric Boetus King of the Medes Sextorius King of Libya Teucer King of Phrygia Xerxes King of the Itureans Pandrasus King of Egypt Misipsa King of Babylon Politetes Duke of Bithynia Teucer Duke of Phrygia Evander of Syria Ethion of Boetia sure it should be Beotia Hippolitus of Creet c. whereas indeed there were no such names or men and most of these Countreys named by him in the last place were but Provinces then under the Roman or Constantinopolitan Empire and no Kings nor Dukes but only Presidents ruling them under the Emperour Wherefore if he could so boldly invent such a list of Kings abroad in the World for the sixth Age of Christianity wherein he could be so easily disproved by a thousand arguments we have no reason to think that for home and those early Ages of the World wherein he could not be disproved by any Records he did otherwise than meerly forge his Catalogue of Brittish Kings And these are the Reasons that moved me to this Reflection upon that story of Coilus and Fergus in Buchanan as related out of him in my foresaid 19th page And the same reasons or at least a sufficient part of them makes me likewise not insist now upon the name of Notium which you have seen before page 13. given to Breoghuin's Tower in Gallicia It was I doubt not borrowed by Keting from Hector Boethius who says in express terms that place was called first Brigantia but after Notium and last of all Compostella I know there is a Promontory in Dâ—smond the South of Mounster which is by Cambden in his Map of Ireland called Notium but whether from any of that name in North Spain or elsewhere I know not 54. But what is more material to be noted occasioually in this place is Buchanans account of Fergus and the rather because he seems to give it from the Scottish Historians in general He says that this very Fergus pretended by him to have been the over-thrower of Coilus and by Hector Boethius to have also been the son of Ferchardus King of Ireland was the Founder of the Scottish Kingdom in Albania and first of all the Kings of the Scots inhabiting Great Brittain That he came to Albania or Scotland about the time of Alexander the Great 's taking Babylon almost 331. years before the Birth of Christ And that within twenty four years more having reign'd in all so long in his return from Ireland whither he had gone back from Scotland to quiet some disturbances there he perish'd at Sea in a Tempest near that Rock in the North of Ireland which from his wrack hard by is ever since call'd in Latin Rupes Fergusii in Irish Carrig-Fhearuis by us Knock-Fergus So says Buchanan and so said before him Hector Boethius and some others of his Countreymen Historians both he and they either seeming to know nothing at all of those Annals and Books whence only the real true History of their Antiquities could be known or else wittingly and willingly to have taken up a fabulous story of purpose to establish a glorious succession of a hundred and seven Kings of the same Nation reigning one after another from that Fergus I. to James VI. even for above 1900 years Whatever the cause might be the one or the other or perhaps which is likely enough both together it is plain out of the antient Annals and other Histories of Ireland which are indeed the only Fountain of all such truly real Scottish Antiquities as concern at least the Irish Invaders and time of their Invasion of any part of Great Brittain that Buchanan and those follow'd by him have created the said Fergus I. King of the Scots in Albania even 819 years before he landed from Ireland in Brittain For those Irish Monuments fix on the year of
call'd Leabhar na Geart i. e. the Book of Rights or Dues a Book beginning with these words Dligh gach Riogh O Riogh Cassil and a Book written wholly by S. Benignus himself 1200 years since that the particulars of that stately Progress are set down as here they follow Bestow'd by him that is by the King of Cashel when he went that Progress on the King of Cruachain a hundred Swords a hundred Cups of Plate a hundred Horses and a hundred Mantles Receiv'd from this Cruachain or Connaght King half a years entertainment and the Rising out as they call it of all the Countrey waiting on him to Tirconail Bestow'd by him on the King of Cineal Gonuill twenty Rings twenty pair of Tables which they call'd Fithchioll and twenty Horses Received a months entertainment and the rising out of that Countrey along with him to Tir-oghain Bestow'd by him on the King of Oileach fifty Silver Cups and fifty Swords Receiv'd a months entertainment and the waiting of the Countrey on him to Tullenoge Bestow'd by him on the Lord or Chieftain of Tullenoge thirty Silver Bowls and thirty Swords or Lances Receiv'd twelve days entertainment and waiting on as elsewhere to Oirgialluibh Bestow'd by him on this King I mean of Oirghialluibh eight shirts of Mayle sixty Coats and sixty Horses Receiv'd a months entertainment at Eambaine with the rising out into Vlster against Clanna Ruidhruidh Bestow'd by him on the King of Tarach 30 shirts of Mayle thirty Rings a hundred Horse and thirty Harpers Receiv'd there a months entertainment and the four chief Families accompanying him thence to Dublin Bestow'd by him on the King of Dublin ten Women ten Ships and ten Horses Receiv'd a months entertainment and this Kings Company into Leinster Bestow'd by him on the Leinster King thirty Cows thirty Ships thirty Horses and thirty young Maids which they termed Cumbhall Receiv'd two months entertainment i. e. one months from Vpper Leinster and another from the Lower which they call Jachter Laighion Finally to the Tanist of the same Low-Leinster thirty Horses thirty shirts of Mayle and 30 Swords And this was the costly splendour of that general Progress of the Mounster Kings over Ireland in former Ages when they thought fit to make or undertake it Which Feidlimidius alias Felim mhac Criomthain King of that Province did in his Reign and this no longer since then the 845 year of Christ for he enter'd upon that Kingdom An. Dom. 818. and retir'd from it to lead an Eremitical Life in the 27th yearafter What the Original or Rise of it was or what right a Provincial King of Mounster could pretend to such a Progress I do not find Nor do I know what moved Keting to desire the Reader not to account him the Author of the Relation Or why so contrary to his custome elsewhere generally throughout his whole Chronicle he quotes here the Author It had been indeed very well and much to be wish'd that he had done so all along for his other Relations But here perhaps he thought fit to do it of purpose to decline the invidious Censure of those of other Provinces for magnifying so much his own Province of Mounster without so good a warrant as Benuin's Book Whatever his motive was the Relation it self puts me upon some occasional observations here which shall be in all three First Observation That Dublin must have been a considerable place in the days of Benuinn seeing it had then or at least before his time a King and was a Kingdom of it self different from that of Leinster And therefore that however or whenever it was first after that time destroy'd yet surely none of those three Norvegian Brethren Amelacus Sitaracus Juor was the first Founder but only the Repairer and Fortifyer of it a little before the second Danish War In which persuasion I 'am fix'd by considering that in the Chorographical Tables of Ptolomy who flourish'd under the Emperour T. Aurelius Hadrianus Antoninus Pius in the year of Christ 153. the People Eblani and the City Eblana is placed where Dublin has always been And therefore Eblana in Ptolomy is the very self-same Town we now call Dublin the Latin Writers Dublinium and Dublinia the Welsh Britons Dinas Dulin the English Saxons in times past Duplin and all from one of the two original Irish names of it The first of them was Dubh-linn which imports a black Depth of Water that was there And the second not only was but is still among all sorts of Irish not as Cambden has it Bala-Cleigh but Bala-Ath-Cliath importing not the Town upon Hurdles but the Town of the Ford of Hurdles Which nevertheless is consistent enough with the Tradition that when Dublin was first built the foundation was laid upon Hurdles by reason the place had been deeply moorish I could here add out of Cambden not only that Saxo Grammaticus writes how it was pitifully rent and dismembred in the Danish Wars but also that in the Life of Griffith ap Synan Prince of Wales 't is read that Harald of Norway when he had subdued the greatest part of Ireland built Deuelin I could likewise add my own animadversions on both the one other passage viz. That the Irish Chronicles make no mention of any Harald either conquering any part of Ireland or building or so much as repairing Dublin That neither does the Author of Polichronicon agree in the one or other point deriv'd from that Life Nay that according to him Sitaracus or Sitric was the Noruegian Builder of Dublin And yet I could further add that what Cambden has next out of the foresaid Life may be very true For after telling us his own opinion of the above Harald to be That he was Harald surnamed Harfager i. e. of the Fair Locks or Tresses who was the first King of Norway he adds that his Lineal descent goes thus in that Life Harald begat a Son named Auloed alias Abloicus Aulafus and Olauus Auloed begat another Auloed this had a Son by name Sitric King of Dublin Sitric begat Auloed whose Daughter Racuella was Mother to Griffith ap Synan born at Dublin whilest Tirlough reign'd in Ireland And all these matters and much more relating to them I could dilate upon were they to my purpose here But they are not because my purpose here is only to trace up the antiquity of Dublin as far as I can And this I have done before out of Ptolomy by shewing that City to have been famous in his time which was above 1510 years since But how long before is a thing wholly buried in oblivion for want of Records And therefore I pass to my Second Observation Which is to give the original of those Clanna Ruidhruidgh against whom the King of Oirghillaedh alias Vriel with his People was bound to wait on the Mounster Kings in their Progress And this I do because their name is very frequent both in the Irish Histories and in all the Provinces of Ireland among the
a Roman Council Much less would their fierceness and resolution in that matter have been so unalterable as to occasion the slaughter of eleven hundred and fifty of their Brethren Monks of the very same Bangor Abbey at one time and place Whereof you may see the particulars in Venerable Bede l. 2. Eccl. Histor c. 2. and in Whelock's Notes upon this Chapter So that Yepez in making Beannchuir a Benedictin Abbey knew not what he said or at least what could be objected against him 65. Why the Staff of Jesus mention'd in my 273. page was so called you may read in Jocelinus an English Monk that five hundred years since at the instance of two Irish Bishops and Sir John Curcy whom he calls Prince of Vlster because as I suppose he was the first Conqueror of it under the English Crown digested the Life of St. Patrick out of many former Lives written of Him by several Authors but written by them in such manner and stile as did not invite Readers It is therefore this Jocelinus that in his Life of St. Patrick cap. 24. gives a pretty large account of that Staff of Jesus Which is in substance That when St. Patrick after a long abode of many years with St. German Bishop of Altissiodorum in France had with his leave at last departed towards Rome in his journey thither he either by divine instinct or Angelical instruction diverted to a certain Island in the Tirrhene Sea of purpose to visit a certain holy Anchoret of great same living there whose name was Justus 2. That upon his arrival after holy salutes and spiritual conference Justus gave him a Staff saying he had receiv'd it from the very hand of our Lord Jesus Christ himself but to be given him 3. That after this St. Patrick discoursing with other men who lived in the same Island at some little distance from the Cell of Justus whereof some appeared brisk and young others old even to decrepit age and understanding that those extream old men he saw were the very genuin sons of those other that appear'd young and enquiring how that could be One of the same young men both to remove his admiration which was great and to satisfie his demand gave him this answer We says he from our childhood through the mercy of God have been always given to works of mercy and our door was open to every Traveller that for Christ's sake desired either Victuals or Lodging On a certain Night we received a stranger with a Staff in his hand and according to our best ability treated him with all necessaries and kindness Next Morning upon his departure he blessed us nor only blessed us but moreover spake these words unto us viz. I am Jesus Christ whom in person you have this Night receiv'd into your House who so often before have receiv'd me in my servants And then he delivered the Staff he had in his hand to the man of God our spiritual Father commanding him to keep it for a certain Pilgrim by name Patrick who after many days should arrive here and upon him to bestow it Which command given he presently ascended into Heaven and we have ever since remained in the same state of youthful countenance briskness and vigour of body we were in at that time But our sons that were but little children then are now according to their age come to be decrepit as you see them 4. That when St. Patrick had heard all he gave God thanks and after a few days longer conversation with Justus proceeded on his Journey carrying in his hand that holy Staff appointed by God himself to be an instrument for his servant Patrick to work therewith prodigious things in Ireland as the Rod of Moses had formerly been for effecting the famed Wonders in Egypt the greatest difference betwixt them being that this of Jesus brought health and life to the Irish Nation but that of Moses death upon the Egyptian So in effect Jocelinus mostly concerning the original of that Staff Unto which he addeth cap. 170. concerning also the powerful Virtue of it That by lifting it up on high and threatning with it St. Patrick after a long Fast of forty days and forty nights join'd with continual fervent Prayer forc'd together out of all parts of Ireland all venomous Animals whatsoever to the Mountain call'd in Irish Cruachain Ailge in the West of Conaght and from thence precipitated them into the Western Ocean lying under this Mountain and this with such a blessed riddance to the whole Island as to have left or have rendred it ever since incapable of harbouring any creature alive that were Poisonous though brought into it from other Countreys How Keting understands this later point we have seen before And for Gerald of Wales though he acknowledg both the Vertue and name of that Staff calling it Virtuosissimum baculum Jesu the most powerful Staff of Jesus yet he says withal that the Origin of it is as uncertain as the Virtue is most certain Adding immediately in the same place That in his own time and by his own Countrey men the Brittish Conquerours that noble Treasure for so he calls it was translated from Ardmagh to Dublin What became of it since I cannot tell But this I find in St. Bernards Life of Malachias that this Staff of Jesus and the Text of the Gospel that was St. Patrick's own Book or that used by himself were the two most precious Jewels not only of the Church of Ardmagh but of any in the whole Kingdom of Ireland That they were held by all the Irish in the greatest veneration above all other holy Reliques whatsoever but more especially the Staff as being that which our Saviour Christ himself had both carried in his own divine hand fram'd by his own peculiar workmanship and recommended in such a special manner to be given to his Apostolical servant Patrick I find moreover in David Rooth the late Roman Catholick Bishop of Ossory's Elucidations upon Jocelin whatever may be objected by Criticks against this History of the Staff of Jesus answer'd For if their Exception be against our Saviour's appearing on Earth after his Ascension to Heaven from Mount Olivet he remits then to St. Ambrose where he tells in his Oration against Auxentius how very long after that time our Lord appeared to S. Peter at a Gate in Rome entring that City And if it be against any such Wonder-working power in the Staff it self though by divine Ordinance or consecration of it for such uses he desires them to consider not only the Rod of Moses in Egypt and brazen Serpent in the Desart nor only the brazen Statue of our Saviour erected at Caesarea Eusebius l. 7. Hist c. 18. and Sozomen l. 5. c. 21. Philippi otherwise called Paneas by the Woman in the Gospel cur'd by our Saviour of an Issue of blood but also the torn Cloak and poor Staff of the Egyptian Anchoret Senuphius wherewith Theodosius the Great arming himself
That upon this success at least not long after it the Picts looking big growing unruly and even aspiring to the Command of that whole Province of Leinster but the Monarch Herimon made acquainted with it drawing together a greater Power then they dared fight they were compell'd to accept of his Terms and hye them away out of hand with his directions and assistance for the Northern parts of Great Brittain 6. That nevertheless before their departure they obtain'd of Herimon three Irish Ladies by name Beanbhreasi Beanbhuais and Beanbhuaisdhne who had been the Widows of three of Herimons Commanders and taken these names from 'em kill'd in the late War with Tuath-De-Danann and these were all the Women they could obtain at least then though upon that very condition told us by Bede The first of 'em married to Cathluan the chief Commander now of the Picts for it seems his Father Gud was before this time departed the World the other two married to two more of their Nobles Nor could any of them obtain leave to stay in Ireland but only six viz. Trosdan the foresaid Magitian Soilean Vlpre Neachtan Nar Aongus and Leatan who had possessions given them for ever by Herimon in the Countrey of Breagh Mhoigh now call'd by us East and West Meath 6. That the foresaid Cathluan was the first King of the Picts in Cruithin-Tuath or Tuath Chruinigh for by both these compound names indifferently the Irish Books call that Countrey in the North of Brittain which the Picts erected to a Kingdom and call it so properly enough as importing in English the Lordship Lordship or Dominion of the Picts the simple word Tuath signifying in Irish a Lordship and Cruinigh the Picts themselves 7. That after him in a succession reign'd in the same Countrey at least in some part of it and of the same Pictish Nation Threescore and Ten Kings more to Constantine the last of ' em And these being the Heads of those particulars that concern them in the Psalter of Cashel written by the Holy Cormock O Cuilenain Arch Bishop and King of Mounster eight hundred years since and by consequence written either immediately before or immediately after I am sure much about the time of their last fatal overthrow by his Countrey men the Irish and their Issue in Scotland we need no longer question either the time of that Pictish Nation 's first appearance or the Countrey they came from to the Western parts of Europe As neither indeed whence they deriv'd the custom of painting themselves They might have learn'd this from the Agathyrsi in Thracia if themselves had it not before yea they might be the first that us'd it in Great Brittain and the Brittons might have only had it from them for any thing said to the contrary And they came as early to Ireland and Scotland both as the Reign of Herinton the first Milesian Monarch of Ireland after he had kill'd his elder Brother Heber to whom he was but joyn'd in Sovereignty while Heber lived Nay we need not question how long this Pictish Kingdom lasted For seeing it began at least as early as Herimon's death I mean by this account in the Psalter of Cashel and that by Primat Vshers account it continued to the year of Christ 840. then we must conclude that according to Gratianus Lucius's computation of the years of the World and years also of all the several Irish Monarchs Reigns the Pictish Kingdom lasted 2623 years in all For this Author fixes the death of Herimon in the year of the World 3516. and the Birth of Christ in the year 5199. as Eusebius Caesariensis one of the Fathers of the first General Council of Nice did long before him What more I have to say in reference to the Picts their Kingdom or Kings is That as I was writing this Reflection Mr. Langhorn's Introduction to the History of England being brought me by chance and looking it over I observ'd That altho the ingenious Author gives no more light therein concerning the Countrey whence those Picts came first to Ireland and thence to Scotland nor of their Leaders name nor of the time of their arrival amongst us than other late Writers especially Campion and Hanmer did before him who call that Leader King Roderick and say this Roderick came to Ireland from Scandia alias Scandinavia which goes under the name of Scythia Germanica or the German Scythia yet he gives therein page 197 a Catalogue of the Brittish Kings and years of their several Reigns partly out of John Fordon's M. S. Scoto-Chronicon and partly out of Hector Boethius who adds to the 76 Kings in Fordon five more So that both numbers put together make just the very same number of Pictish Kings which the Psalter of Cashel has Though I must confess there is no other agreement in any point between that Psalter these Authors either as to the names of those Kings or years of their Reigns or total sum of these years Neither is there in that whole Catalogue any Roderick either as first or last or any at all of them nor any thing near his name The very same you may assure your self of Cathluan whom nevertheless you have seen before out of the Psalter of Cashel to have been the first Pictish King As for the total sum of the years of their Reign which by casting it up out of the several Reigns every body may see is 1165. it plainly comes short by 1452 years of the former account derivable from the Psalter of Cashel and Vsher Lucius Besides it necessarily must suppose the Pictish Kingdom began in Scotland e'en four hundred years full before any Picts landed in Scotland or came from Scandinavia to Scotland or Ireland which does not stand with the time of their coming set down by our new Historians and last of all by Langhorn himself As for the names express'd in that Catalogue all I can say is that if we give credit to Nennius a Brittish Author that liv'd as himself writes an Christi 830. under Anaraugh King of Anglesey and Guinech if besides we suppose his Book rightly translated into Irish in O Duvegans Miscellanies and if withal we believe that Gratianus Lucius quoting both would not impose upon us nor I on you or my self what follows must be That we give no kind of credit to the foresaid Catalogue drawn out of Fordon and Boethius not even I mean as to those names of the Pictish Kings contain'd therein For the same Gratianus Lucius after letting us know in his Cambr. Evers page 93. That himself had a Copy of those Miscellanies and among 'em the Catalogue of all the Pictish Kings written by the said Nennius then presently though upon another occasion names five and forty of 'em and I am sure that of this very number tho only a part of Nennius's Catalogue there are at least six and twenty names that have no affinity with no resemblance at all nor imitation of any in the whole Bedâ—oll
in the World before the loss of their freedom or their subjection to a forein Power Nor had I any farther if it be a farther end in the matter then That of your understanding throughly at least sufficiently who or what kind of People were the former of those two Nations whose Posterities I have before i. e. in the very beginning of the first Section page 5. observ'd like the Twins of Rebecca contending these last five hundred years in the bowels of Ireland But who the later Nation were and how and by what degrees and means they not only for many Ages got the better of the former but subdued them utterly at last in the memory of our Fathers and what besides happen'd in our own days to the Issue as well of these Conquerours as of those conquer'd by 'em in that Country will be the subject of the Second Part. FINIS Additions 1. AFTER the Fourth Observation on the Catalogue of Kings add what follows here viz. That although it be no part of my business in this Place to speak in particular of any of those Kings other than what I have already of a few of 'em and that only for thy better understanding the said Catalogue yet because I considered that peradventure the Relation of Siorna Saoghall-ach's See the Catalogue Numb 27. long extent of Life and Beign is the only extraordinary of all whatsoever delivered anywhere in the whole Irish History concerning any of so great a number of Monarchs or Kings and Sovereign Princes of Ireland some Readers will boggle at or scruple the truth thereof by objecting How it seems at least improbable that he should be a hundred years old when he came to be Monarch or should reign a hundred and fifty years after or should be in all two hundred and fifty years of Age when he was kill'd by Roitheachtsigh alias Roithsigh mhac Roain therefore to shew that this Relation of him is not improbable I give here those arguments that convince my self And to say nothing of his Surname Saoghalach which attributed to him alone among all other Irish Kings whereof notwithstanding some had reigned 60. others 70 years must import him to have been of extraordinary Long Life and even a man of Ages what convinces me is 1. That not only the Irish Book of Reigns besides many other ancient Monuments and Historians of that Nation who speak of this Subject and after them Gratianus Lucius in our own time have deliver'd it so but Keting himself though he be the chiefest of all the Historians of later days that to reduce the Irish Chronology to an agreement with his own Computation of the years of the World would consequently needs reduce those hundred and fifty years of Siorna's Reign to 21. confesses they did so 2. That very good Historians both ancient and modern of other Countreys tell us how in later Times then Siorna Saoghallach's Reign there have been many that lived as long and some longer then he And yet I 'le lay no stress on Xenophon's writing That a certain Maritim King lived 800. and his son 600 years Nor on Ravisius giving the very same or at least the like Relation of one Impetris King of the Plutinian Islanders and his Son Nor on Pliny recording the five hundred years life of Dondonius a Sclavonian Nor on Homer or his Followers speaking Nestors age to have been 300 years Neither on Hellanicus a most ancient Writer saying That in the Province of Aetholia some lived 200. others 300 years Nor on Onesicritus neither though attesting the same age of two and three hundred years even as very ordinary in the Island of Pandora All these I pass over because I am not certain of the Age of the World they lived in that is whether it was not of earlier Date than Siorna Saoghalach's reign who was kill'd An. M. 4â— 69. according to Lucius My instances are in Servatius Bishop of Tongres and Joannes de Temporibus and Xequipir an Ethiopian and the Nameless Indian living in the same Time and Kingdom of Bengala with Xequipir The first of these four died in the year of Christ 403. after he had lived 300 years as Sigebert in his Chronicle and others write The second took his denomination or surname de Temporibus from those 336 years he had lived under many Emperours whereof one was Charles the Great of whose Life-guard he had sometimes been and another was Conrad III. in whose Reign he died in France An. D. 1139. as not only Petrus Messias in the said Conrad's Life but the Author of Fasciculus Temporum and many more Writers affirm The third I mean Xequipir was yet alive so near our own time as the year of Christ 1536. after having lived till then 300 years For so Hernandus Lopez à Castagneda â— 8 Chronici has written of him The Last or the Nameless Indian had in the foresaid year of Christ 1536 come to the year of his own age 335. says Joannes Petrus Maffeius â— XI Histor Indic and before him the above Lopez both the one and the other telling us many more particulars of Xequipir and Lopez som of this Anonimus Indian but neither being able to recount or give us any light to see how many years more either of 'em lived nor when they died Of all which you may read more at large in Augustinus Torniellius's Annales Sacri c. ad an M. 1556. n. 4. 5. And so I have given the two arguments which convince my self that from the Relation of Siorna Saoghalach's Life of 250 years c. nothing can be derived to make any Reader at all scruple the truth of the Irish History of that Kingdoms Monarchs or Kings Nor by consequence any thing against the Catalogue of them which you have in the beginning of this Book or the long extent of Time which in all they reign'd according to the Title of that Catalogue 2. After the Last Inference from the same Catalogue add this here as an other viz. That notwithstanding any thing said hitherto as it is confess'd that the former sixteen of those 23 of the English or Fourth and Last Conquest of Ireland never assum'd the Stile or Title of Kings of Ireland for Henry VIII was the First of this Conquest that assum'd it altho nevertheless all the same former sixteen Kings of England were Sovereign Lords of Ireland too at least by Title every one in his turn since the 17th year of Henry the II's reign over England so it must be confess'd That properly speaking none of those Irish Kings who rul'd in Association with any other could be called Monarchs while their Association lasted And we see by this Catalogue that such were in all at least for some time 29 among those of the former Three Conquests whereof One and Twenty were Milesians Which is the reason that Cambrensis where he tells us of 181 Monarchs of the Milesians must be corrected as to that appellation or Title of Monarch attributed so indistinctly by him to them all and so must I wheresoever in this Former Part of my Prospect I have in this particular follow'd him The Irish Historians in their own Language speak more properly giving 'em all the Title of Kings of Ireland Errors in the Matter where and where they are corrected THE First in Page 4. and 16. concerning Eoghun Mor and Aonghus Ollbhuodhach but corrected p. 89. and 435. The second p. 67. about Dearmach corrected p. 181. Third in p. 18. concerning Muâ—rieadhach's Six sons c. and corrected p. 93. Fourth p. 19. about the nine Hostages corrected p. 359. Errors in Words and Letters to be corrected by this following Table wherein the first Number signifies the Page the second the Line a add d dele and r read First in the Dedicatory 2. 7. d. as Secondly in the Preface 7. 18. d. his 35. 16. r. 1662. p. 39. 31. r. 1604. Thirdly in the Former Part 35. 5. d. the Monarch 71. r. Tighernmhais 99. 16. d. to 107. 29. d. of 137. 6. r. theâ— and again 8. r. the. 180. 14. for Diarmuid r. Dombnall 221. 7. Taumaturga 272. 5. for him r. bâ— and 24. r. or any 317. 13. d. to 319. â— a. as 351. 14. r. Monmouth 354. 13. r. understood 382. 21. r. Aetius 385. 26. r. other 387. 8. r. 51. 389. 19. r. Language and 29. r. Niull 395. 7. d. was and for kill'd r. died 413. 9. r. Trouts 414. 1. r. Leap and 8. for though r. the. 434. â— 26. r. 219. 459. 2. r. Notkerus 461. 26. r. To and in the Note â— penvâ—t r. Books Lastly observe that the Orthography of all the proper Irish Names and Surnames of the Kings throughout this whole Book must be corrected by that in the Catalogue where any variation appears