the Birth of Christ in the Year of the World 5199. as he does in his Reign of the Irish Monarch Criomthan Niadhnair whom he calls in Latin Criomthanius Niadhnarius Whereby 't is evident he follows the computation of Eusebius holding therein with the generality of the Irish Chronologers and consequently differing in so much from Keting as he does also differ from him and hold with the same generality as to the length of Reign or Life attributed to the two Monarchs Cobhthach Caolbhreag Siorna Saoghallach some others In other matters treated by him in his Cambrensis Eversus he seldom varies from Keting otherwise than by addition of more particulars So you have at last my whole Account and I hope a sufficient one of these two Authors whom I must acknowledg to have been my only chief Directors for what concerns those Irish Affairs treated of in the Former Part of this Prospect I say my only chief Directors c. For I am to inform you now a little farther That as to other matters and some Irish too whether purposely or occasionally discours'd I have not seldom in the same Former Part especially in the V. and VI. Section made use of my own reading and Collections out of other Authors some Ancient some Modern As for example out of Tacitus and the Augustan History Writers and Venerable Bede Cambrensis and Polychronicon I have borrow'd some things out of Roderic of Toledo and Polidore Virgil Harpsfield Bodin William Camden and Buchanan other out of S. Bernard the far greater part of my whole discourse of Malachias out of a French Anonimous Author in Messingham and Sir James Ware 's Book de Praesulibus Hiberniae what I write of Laurase O Tuathail otherwise called in Latin Laurentius Dubliniensis out of Rabanus Jonas Abbas Odericus Vitalis Angligena Notkerus and Spondanus those matters you find related by me of Columbanus Gallus and their Associats besides divers other things out of other Authors And these and those are commonly quoted where I make use of them although sometimes they are not because both Margins being so narrow and Pages so little as you see they are I thought it unfitting to croud them with quotations From the Learned Cambden I seldom recede tho almost as seldom made use of by me in the same Former Part. But the acknowledg'd either purity or elegancy of Buchanan's style makes me no admirer of his skill in the Antiquities of that Nation he writes of Much less can I esteem Hector Boethius in his writing at random of those matters what he had never had but from errant Impostors or certainly himself had forg'd And this without question even contrary to what he had found written by that Irish great Furtherer of his whose name was Cornelius Historicus and his Work entitled Chronicon multarum rerum I mean if this Cornelius was indeed no less by education in the Countrey knowledg in the Language than by birth an Irish man and withal so learned as D. Hanmer page 193. out of Bale and Stanihurst represents him to have been under Henry III. of England about the Year of Christ 1230. that is about 200 years before Boethius had written his History of Scotland Of Hanmer or Campion either though each of them entitles his own Work The History of Ireland nay each of 'em ventures on deducing his Narration from almost the very beginning of times after the Flood I scarce make mention but once or twice where the Subject or leads or forces me to oppose their great mistakes Which certainly are very numerous in both especially in Hanmers Work as this is by much the larger of the two Campion's being only a little extemporary Piece written by him in ten Weeks time as himself confesses in his Dedication thereof * 27 May 1571. To this year Camplon brought his History But Hanmer deduc'd his Chronicle for so he calls it no further than to the year 1286. I suppose he intended to bring it to his own time had he not been prevented by death which seiz'd him at Dublin where he died of the Plague Anno 1064. to Robert Earl of Leicester Nor must we much wonder it should be either so brief or so faulty seeing we have his own farther acknowledgment in his Preface to the Reader That he had never so much as seen any of those Irish Books that treat of matters that happen'd before the English Conquest much less could have any person to interpret them A greater cause of admiration Doctor Meredith Hanmer has given us by making his Chronicle of Ireland so large and yet giving every whit as little of the true Antiquities of Ireland for those times preceding the same English Conquest as Campion before him had e'en a few scraps out of Cambrensis but many more additional meer stories from himself where-ever he had ' em Among which stories however I do not rank his pious Relations of several Irish Saints which take up above 20 leaves of his Chronicle That is from p. 33. to p. 104. But for Edmund Spencer in his Dialogue be-between Irenaeus and Eudoxus bound up in the same Volume as it was at first publish'd in print together with the two former Books of Campion and Hanmer at Dublin an 1635. by Sir James Ware I had 〈◊〉 little occasion to quote him as I could have no other exception against him than what is common to Hanmer and Campion too Save only those two Particulars in his 33 46 Pag. whereof Keting has taken special notice before me viz. 1. The two Saxon Kings Egfrid the Northumbrian and Edgar of England to have had the Kingdom of Ireland in subjection 〈◊〉 That the large spread Irish Families or â—epts of the Birns Tools and Cauanaghs in the Province of Leinster were originally Brittish and those other of the Mac Swines Mac Mahoons and Mac Shehies in the Province of Mounster no less originally English In both Particulars how mightily Spencer is out and without any support either from History or Criticism Keting in his Preface has very sufficiently if not abundantly shewn And therefore I will say no more of Spencer than that although in writing his Faerie Queen he had the right of a Poet to fancy any thing nevertheless in the Historical part of his Dialogue written by him anno 1599. he should have follow'd other Rules I say Historical part c. For I am willing to acknowledg that where he pursued the Political main design of this Dialogue which was to prescribe the ways and means to reduce Ireland a design well becoming him as being Secretary to Arthur Lord Grey of Wilton and Deputy of Ireland under Q. Elizabeth none could surpass him no man could except against him save only those that would not be reduc'd But I digress again For my purpose here in mentioning Spencer should only have been to tell you that in all my Former Part I quote him but once Vnto which if I add in the last place
enjoyed the Sovereign Power of Albain The other two were Mac Con otherwise called Lughae and Criomthan mhac Fiodaigh 4. There went also thither about the year of Christ 150. on his own account with considerable Forces Cairbre Riadfadae Son to the 106. Monarch of Ireland by name Conaire mhac Mogha Lauae who Conquer'd large Dominions for himself in the more Northern parts of that Kingdom and left his Posterity after him there who are those or at least a great and the more ancient part of those called by â—â—da Nistor Eccles l. 1. c. 1. Venerable Bede Dal-Rheudini as being the Inhabitants and first Irish Planters of Dal-Rheuda or as the Irish call it Dal-Riada in Scotland Whether it be not called so from that Cairbre Riadbfadae that is from this surname of his Riadfadae being changed by V. Bede to Rheuda as it might easily be I know not But this I know that Dal which is prepos'd in the composition signifies Part or Lot And so the whole word Dal-Rheuda or Dal-Riada signifies the Part of such a man who was the chief in Conquering it 5. The foresaid Mac Con alias Lughae within a few years more at least within less than thirty purfuing the same examples Landed in Scotland with a power of his Country-men Adventurers For it was from thence he returned back into Ireland to fight the Battel called Maigh Mhuchruimhe wherein being Victorious and killing the Monarch Art Aoinfir he made himself Sovereign in his place 6. This Mac Con's Grand-Son Fiachae Ceanann entring likewise Scotland not only gain'd large possessions but left his Posterity after him to give a beginning to Mac Allin and his Family there who are all descended from him 7. Colla Vais who had been four years tho by Usurpation the 115. Monarch of Ireland when he was by the lawful Heir his own Cousin German Muireadhach Tiriogh defeated in Battel and forc'd to flie adventuring over to Scotland with the two other Collaes his Brethren and rest of his adherents and acquiring great scopes of ground there became the Grandsire of the Clan Ndomnaills both in Scotland and Ireland For all of this Surname in either Kingdom in their several generations or branches derive their extraction in a direct line from this Colla Vais and consequently neither from Herimon or Heber but from i the a Cousin of theirs who was the Son of Breoghuin mhic Bratha of the same stock with Milesius 8. Next after that Colla did Criamhthan mhac Fioda the 120. King of Ireland with a Royal Army invade Albain I mean Scotland He had in his company another very powerful Noble man called Earc mhac Eocha Muingreahar mhic Aongussa And from him the Septs not only of Clann Eirc and Cineall Gabhrain but those of Cineall Conghvill Cineall Naonghussa and Cineall Conriche Anile with their distinct propagations and Families in Scotland ever since to this present are descended 9. Corck mhac Luighdhioch is the next in order that deserves mention Because that by the false and wicked surmises of his Step-mother upon his refusal to consent to her incestuous Lust she was Daughter to Fiachac mhac Reill King of Ely falling into his Fathers displeasure and thereupon forced to seek his fortune in Scotland and arriving there accompanied with such armed Troops as he could raise and then by his own deserts coming into such extraordinary favour with the Scottish King Fearradhach Fionn otherwise called Fionn Chormac that he obtain'd his Daughter call'd Muingfionn to Wife he had issue by her besides other Sons Manie Leambna from whom the Sept of Leambnuidh in Scotland and Cairbre Cruithnioch from whom the Families of Eoghanacht Muighe Geirghin in the same Kingdom were propagated 10. Soon after him Niall Naoighiallach the 121. and most powerful indeed of all the Irish Monarchs that were at any time before or since entred Scotland with so great a force that there was no resisting him But having said enough of him before I need not add to it here 11. In the last place and year of Christ 493. much about ninety three years after the said War-like Prince Niall the Great surnamed also Naoighiallach had been kill'd in France and in the 20. year of Lugha the 125 Monarch Son to Laogirius his Reign the six Sons of Muireadhach * So says Keting in the Reign of Niall Naoighiallach yet formerly in the Reign of Oilioll Molâ— he calls them the six Sons of Eirc mhic Eachae Muinreamhair mhic Eoghuin Mhic Neill King of Vlster being six Brothers of Mairchiartach Mor that soon after came to be Monarch of Ireland namely to the two Fergusses the two Aongussaes and the two Loarns together with other Septs or Families of Dal-Riada in the same Province of Vlster adventur'd for Albain and whether or no they gave the denomination of Dal-Rheuda or Dal-Riada to the Country there mostly possessed by them tho at least for a great part of it planted before as we have seen by the Progeny of Cairbre Rioghfadae †Eochae Muinreamhar of the Progeny of Cairbre Ridhfadae had two Sons Earcha and Elchon From the former the the Families of Dal-Riada in Scotland were descended From the later those of Dal-Riada in Ulster So Keting soys in the Reign of Art Aonsir where he further says that the two Dal-Riades or Families of them have been distinguished by the surname or nick-name of Russach given those of Dal Riada in Ulster the Irish Chronicles are plain and positive herein that they gave to themselves and all their Country-men the Scots of Albion the first King that ever they had of the name of Fergus who was one of those six Brothers And it is he that both the Irish and English Scots have since for his honor surnamed the Great as likewise Fergus I. Not that he was indeed the first Irish or Scottish King of Dal-Rheuda wherein Buchanan and all the rest of his Fellow-Historians that were English Scots are extreamly out for long before that very Fergus there have been many Scottish Kings of Irish descent in Dal-Rheuda but that he was greater than any of the former and the first of his own name that ruled there To conclude so many were the Invasions and so great the Plantations made in that Country by the Irish Milesians and other Gathelians in their time of Paganism that as they Conquer'd so they planted it throughly at last having quite expell'd the Picts And so they kept it possess'd intirely by themselves as Lords thereof for some Ages That is until after the Norman Conquest of England very many of the Saxons retiring thither under their protection others invited in and accompanying William the Scottish King and both of them multiplying mightily they not only made the other Nations which are now called English Scots but by degrees gained from them as we see even all other the better parts of that Kingdom besides the Lowlands I say accompanying William the Scottish King For Stow in his Chronicle tells That
in like manner Claudius the Roman Emperour though come in person with a mighty power of Legions and Auxiliaries into Brittain found it his safest way to run away in two great Battels from the victorious Army of Guiderius and Arviragus the Lxvii and Lxviii Brittish Monarchs one after another in so much that Claudius was content at last ' een fairly to capitulate for Peace with Arviragus by sending to Rome for his own Daughter Gennissa and giving her in marriage to him nay and leaving him too the Government wholly of all these Provincial Islands for so Geoffrey calls them in this place That Severus how great soever both a Souldier and Emperour he was found it a desperate business to fight in Great Brittain against the Brittons when he saw himself receiving his death's wound from Fulgenius in that Battel whence he was carried dead and buried in York That under Vortigern their Lxxxvi Monarch Hengistus the Saxon invited in by him landed the second time in Great Brittain with an Army of three hundred thousand Heathen Foreigners and yet Aurelius Ambrosius the next Brittish King after Vortigern fought him in the head of all his formidable Forces and in a plain Field overthrew both him and them all nay pursued them in their Flight till he reduced them to nothing and the whole Island of Brittain to its native liberty from any Foreign Yoak Nor had his Victories a period here but over-run Ireland also where he took Prisoner in a great Battel the Monarch of that Countrey Gillomar and then brought away Choream Gigantum the Giants Monument of stones from the Plains of Kildare in that Kingdom which he set up on Salisbury Plains in England That Arthur who was likewise save one the next King of Great Brittain for he was son to Vter Pendragon that Reign'd immediately before him subdued all England Scotland Ireland the Isles of Orkney Denmark Norway Gothland along to Livonia France and as many Kingdoms in all as made up XXX Yea moreover i. e. after so many great and mighty Conquests and besides the killing too of Monsters and Giants fought even Flollo and Lucius the two Lieutenant Generals of the Roman Emperour Leo kill'd them both in France and the later of them I mean Lucius in the head of a dreadful Army consisting of four hundred thousand men all which he overthrew and ruin'd That although by occasion of some unhappy quarrels among the Britons themselves under Catericus their Lxxxxvi King a bad man the Saxons to be reveng'd on them wrought King Gurmundus the late African Conqueror of Ireland to come from thence into Great Britain with an Army of a hundred sixty six thousand Heathen Africans and burn spoil and destroy the better parts thereof and after put and leave the Saxons in possession of all he could which was that whole Countrey then called Loegria now England as distinguish'd both from Scotland and Wales meaning by Wales the ancient Kingdom of Cambria which comprehended all beyond the Savern and that notwithstanding the Saxons had by such means got possession of all Loegria and held it for several years they were beat out again so soon as the Britons agreed amongst themselves meeting at Westchester and chusing there Caduallo for their King who bravely recovered the whole Island every way round even to the four Seas and kept both Picts and Scots and such of the Saxons as were left alive or permitted to stay in perfect obedience to the British Crown during his own Reign which lasted forty years in all and that so did Cadwallador after him during his In short that as the progeny of Frute continued free independent successful glorious in the first period of their Monarchy under sixty six Kings of their own during at least a thousand years and forty from the landing of Brute till the Invasion of Julius Caesar and as for the next period which took up five hundred and nine years more till the landing of Hengistus the Saxon albeit the Roman power and glory did sometimes lessen sometime ecclipse theirs yet they preserved still their freedom and Laws and Government under twenty other Kings of their British Nation successively reigning over them and paying only a slight acknowledgment of some little tribute to the Roman Emperours nay and this same but now and then very seldom so in the third or last period of it containing somewhat above two hundred and fifty years from the said landing of Hengistus to the twelfth year of Cadwallador they upon the Romans quitting them not only restor'd themselves under Aurelius and Arthur by their own sole valour to the ancient glory of their Dominion but maugre all the opposition of the Confederated Saxons Picts and Scots now and then rebelling against them enjoyed it under the succession of seven Brittish Kings more from Arthur to Cadwallador yea Malgo the fourth of this very last number when the six foreign Provincial Countreys as Geoffrey calls them viz. Ireland Island the Orcades Norway Denmark and Gothia had rebell'd anew was so fortunately brave as by dint of Sword to have reduced them all again to their old subjection under Great Brittains Empire Add moreover that Cadwallador himself albeit the last of this Trojan Race wielding the Sâ—â—pter of Great Brutus enjoyed the same Glorious Power that his Predecessours had before him over the whole extent of this Noble Island That the total change and utter downfal of the Brittish Government happening after in his days proceeded only from an absolute Decree of Heaven and mighty Anger of God incensed against the Brittons for their sins but neither in the whole nor in part from any Power of the Saxons or other Enemies or men upon Earth That the immediate visible means which God made use of to destroy them irrecoverably were 1. A most bloody fatal Division after some years of this Cadwallador's reign happening among them yea continuing so long and to such a degree that between both sides all the fruitful Fields were laid waste no man caring to till the ground 2. The consequence of this waste a cruel Famine over all the Land 3. A Plague so prodigiously raging that the number of the Living was not sufficient to bury the Dead That the Almighty's hand lying so heavy on them by so dreadful a Pestilence was it alone that forc'd Cadwallador in the twelfth year of his Reign to retire for some time into Little Britanny in France That after ten years more when this Epidemical Plague had been wholly over and Cadwallador prepared to ship his Army and return a voice of Thunder by Angelical Ministery spake to him from Heaven commanding him aloud to desist from his Enterprize and telling him in plain terms it was decreed above unalterably The Race of Brutus should bear no more sway in Great Brittain till the time were come which Merlin had prophecied of to King Arthur And to conclude all That in pure obedience to this Voice of God it was that Cadwallador giving
Hector Boethius makes him a Giant of 15 Cubits high and he was an Irish man both by birth and descent lineally come of his Mothers side in the fifth Generation from Nuatha Neacht King of Leinster and so upward all along from Herimon whatever is reported by D. Hanmer a Page 24. to the contrary in his History of Ireland Hanmer might as well have made the Cappadocian Knight a Saxon as Fionn the son of Cuual a Dane And so might Hector Boethius have as well turn'd Huon of Burdeaux or Amadis de Gaul or the Knight of the Sun or the Seven Champions of Christendom and such like Romances into the very truest Histories as the Fables written of Fionn mhac Cuual and the Captains under him called Fiona Erionn only to entertain leasurable hours and Fancy For the Irish had their Romances too for divertisement They had Bruoidhuin in Chaorhuinn and the Battel of Fionthraghadh or Fentra as Hanmer calls it and the story of Gilladeackuir's Jade and many other such and so among these some also of Fionn mhac Cuual and his Commanders Which yet every one of common sense among the Irish could distinguish from their Chronicles and other Monuments of real story In short these Gentlemen Fionn mhac Cuaal and Fiona Erionn were the stoutest and bravest fighting men of their time in Ireland And they were kept in constant pay by the Monarch Princes and people of that Kingdom to guard the Coasts from abroad and keep all at home quiet With power nevertheless that if the case required it either to suppress a Rebellion or withstand an Invasion or succour Dal Riadac in Scotland the said General Fionn mhac Cuual might make up the standing Forces to seven Battalions that is one and twenty thousand men in all And this is the naked truth concerning these Fiona Erionn so famous in their Generation On which truth many fabulous stories have been superstructed To them may be added those other brave Warriors whether of a later or earlier Generation but as to the reality of things for ought I know of as much bravery and Valour called Dal-Gheasse These were the standing Militia of those fortunate successful Kings of Mounster Ceallaghan and Brian Boraimhe in the second Danish War and the only Gens d'Armes about their persons and continued to be so to the succeeding Kings of Mounster and Leathe Mogh who were Monarchs of Ireland at least bore that Title three of them in succession after the death of that Maolseachluin who immediatly succeeded Brian Boraimhe What number these Valiant men Dal-Gheasse did make I cannot find But see them all along represented for incomparable Warriors till being over-power'd at last by the King of Connaght and Leathe Cuinn and presumed Monarch Torlagh More O Connor they were utterly destroyed a little before the English Conquest and with them the Kingdom of Mounster extinguish'd For this by that Monarch was divided in two and continued so till the English abolish'd them both 13. Of their Learning Historians make no mention till after their conversion to Christianity Which Conversion if we speak of it as to the generality of Ireland was begun by Saint Patrick their Apostle as we have seen before early in the fifth Century that is in the year 431. upon his second landing in that Countrey and compleated by him within threescore and one years more For so long he lived carrying on that holy Work though he had been full threescore and one aged upon this second landing of his when he began it About this time all the Western and Southern parts too of the Roman Empire being over-run by the Goths Vandals Huns Franks and oâ—her barbarous partly German partly Scythick Nations and consequently all kind of Learning for the matter destroyed by them where ever they set footing and the little remainders of the learned Contemplative men retiring still from the noise of Arms and finding themselves no where on the Continent and as little in Great Britain at rest or in safety many of them at last passed over to Ireland That is to a Countrey where as they were told for certain and so it was indeed the Romans never challeng'd any right and consequently neither could the Barbarians on account of such right pretend any quarrel to it and yet a Countrey to admiration religious and holy This of all likelihood was one of the causes or means whereby Ireland began suddenly to flourish above any Countrey of Europe at that time in Learning Besides and to speak without likelihood but by the authority of good Authors for matters of Fact their blessed Apostle St. Patrick himself at his coming thither to convert them in the aforesaid year brought with him besides other Clerks in his own Company thirty Bishops whom himself had in his Journey through foreign parts gathered together and before his shipping for Ireland and for that mission of purpose consecrated because he foresaw the Harvest would be very great and therefore he needed many Workmen So affirmeth an ancient French Author of good repute Henricus Altisiodorensis c Vitae S. Germani cap. 168. who flourish'd in the Emperour Carolus Calvus's Reign Moreover the Irish Chronicles tell us that he also brought along with him all those of Ciniodb Scuit or Scottish that is Irish Nation whom he met abroad any where that were Christians So here you may clearly see between these Bishops Clerks and other Christians the first Seminary of that great Learning in Ireland then when all the other Western Kingdoms and Provinces were grown illiterate barbarous rude However or whatever the causes or the Teachers of that Learning in Ireland were besides these Bishops and Clerks who no man will doubt but they were at least the Chief Instructors in holy Scripture and all matters of Divinity as were also next unto them those other Bishops consecrated by S. Patrick at home in Ireland during the time of his Apostleship even 355. in number says Nennius that is one for every two Churches founded by him in that Countrey and those 3000 Priests Jocelin says 5000 likewise that were not Bishops all of them every one consecrated by himself in this Kingdom it is confessed of all hands and venerable Bede a Histor Anglic l. 3. c. 4 5. 19. l. 4. c. 25. of old and Cambden b Britan. pag. 730. edit London in Fol. an 1607. of late are sufficient vouchers for it That in those dayes the Saxons flowed over into Ireland as to the Mart of good Literature And that when any was wanting here from home it came to be a Proverb He is gone to Ireland to be bred Pursuant hereunto is that Distich in the life of Sulgenus who flourish'd about 700 years since Exemplo patrum commotus amore legendi Ivit ad Hibernos sopbia mirabile claros Besides all the Irish Chronicles tell us of the four great Universities in Ireland Ardmagh Cashel Dun-da-Leathghlass and Lismore not to mention many other Colledges of
that Nation as written by their own most select Antiquaries and believed by themselves I am absorpt in admiration at the wonderful patience of God with them in particular above all other People that I have read of expecting their amendment so long that is well nigh 3000 years compleat before he would quite destroy them A period so large that within a far less extent of time his wrath subverted utterly the Assyrian Chaldean Median Persian Macedonian Roman Empires and all the Republicks of Europe and Affric and all other Kingdoms or Dominions how great or how little soever any where on earth whereof we have but the least competent knowledge out of ancient History or other authentick book And yet he continued still the Irish Nation and Monarchy beyond that extent of time And yet 't is no less apparent in their own Chronicles that according to the judgment of man they had as little deserved the mercy of God as any of their Neighbours or other the destroy'd Nations For to lay aside their Idolatry and all the appendants of it which yet among them in their time of Paganism were as great and horrible and provoking of Heaven as any where else in the world and to pass over also those other Immoralities of theirs how enormous soever in the sight of God which were nevertheless but common to them with other Nations reputed the most civil among men certainly if not among Cannibals or Lestrigons or such other Monsters unworthy to be called men or at least to be brought in comparison with any People that make use of reason live in society and approve Government never has any other Nation upon Earth anneer'd the Milesian race inhabiting Ireland in the most unnatural bloody everlasting destructive Feuds that have been heard or can well be imagin'd Feuds so prodigiously bloody that as they were first founded so they still encreased and continued in blood even along from the first foundation of the Irish Monarchy in the blood of Heber shed in Battel by his Brother Herimon until the slaughter of Muirchiortach mhac Neill the last reputed Monarch saving one by the hands of Fearrnibh Fearrmhaighe and O Brian or even until the death of Diarmuid na Ngall the last King of Leinster at his Town of Ferns And yet such Feuds as not only had for necessary concomitants the greatest pride most hellish ambition and cruellest desires of revenge but also had for no less necessary consequents the most horrible Injustices Oppressions Extortions Rapins Desolations of the Countrey Perfidiousnesses Treasons Rebellions Conspiracies Treacheries Murders and all this from time to time for six and twenty hundred years only a very few lucid intervals of the frenzy excepted These prodigious provocations of Heaven to that excessive degree wherein they were National and peculiar to that People only and the contemplation thereof is it that upon return of it suspends my soul in admiration at the patience of God bearing so long with them in particular above all other Nations far less guilty for ought appears to us in History and much sooner utterly subverted by his revenging hand of justice Never have we read of any other People in the World so implacably so furiously so eternally set upon the destruction of one another as first The Progenies of Heber and Herimon then those two or three other descended from Ire and i the and Breoghuin all of the same Milesian stock or kinred and then again the two former and then last of all the descendents of each apart among themselves contending for the sovraignty of the whole Island were To say nothing now of those no less bloody contentions of others of them very often about Provincial or even lesser Kingdoms and Rights after that either these or those petty Kingdoms came up Never have we heard of any other Countrey on Earth so frequently so miserably beyond almost all belief afflicted harassed wasted turn'd into a Wilderness by the accursed Pride of her Nobles Tyranny of her Princes Rebellion of their Subjects Fury of her Men at arms and other Souldiers Preying Sacking Burning all that stood over ground in the Provinces invaded by them Never has either book or man told us of any Region besides Ireland that beheld so many of her beauteous Fields turn'd ruddy all cover'd with the bloody gore of above 600 Battels fought on 'em so cruelly and unnaturally by her own Children of the same Language Lineage Religious rites tearing out the lives of one another partly for dominion and often for meer revenge Never has the Sun bestowed his light on any other Land to behold a hundred and eighteen Monarchs slaughter'd by the hands of their own disloyal Native Subjects four and twenty of them in Battel and the rest by downright Assassination and Murder And which is yet more hideous fourscore and six of them succeeded immediately in their Regal Thrones by those very men that so villanously had dispatch'd them Nay and a Brother and a Son also to be in this number besides a wicked Sister too that by the priviledge of her Sex more finely indeed but I am sure no less impiously adding one more to the former number of Royal Victims and this of purpose to make way for her own Son to mount the Throne bereav'd of life the Monarch Criomhthan mhac Fiodhuigh her own Brother with a cup of Poyson ministred by her own hand to him I say nothing of Lughac Riamh-Ndearg murder'd by himself Nothing of Aodh Ruadh Diahorba Niall Caille those three destroy'd by water Nothing of Roithsoigh mac Roain Dathi Laoghaire mhac Neill or Lugha mhac Laoghaire all four struck dead by Thunderbolts Nothing of Cormuck Vlsada that was choak d by the evil spirits for not adoring them Lastly nothing of Tighernmbuir long before any of the former by either good or evil Angels on a sudden destroy'd on Magh Sleachta in Letrim and together with him three parts of the People of Ireland on the same Field and same night which was our All-Souls Eve and the night of the day we name All-Saints or All-Hallows for their adoring on that very day and place the devillish Idol set up by him there to be adored as the only God Of none of all these however strangely kill'd either by their own hands or by water or thunder or invisible Demons or other miraculous means do I take notice here because none of them was taken away by any other man Yet I cannot pass over without special note either Sedhna Jonnarruydgh or Simeon Breaâ— two of the number dispatcht by the hands of men their own Subjects Whereof the former was in a most barbarous manner even that of straining his members asunder tortur'd to death by the later who nevertheless did succeed him next and this later again in the very same manner bereaved of life by Duach Fionn the formers Son succeeding now by a cruel retaliation in the Soveraignty and so transmitting to others this particular feud which tho
a single Person must evince the same truth So for Spain Alphonsus III. by putting out the eyes of all his Brethren save one that was kill'd Alfonsus IV. with the like cruelty us'd by his own Brother â—aymirus Peter the Legitimat Son of Alphonsus XI depos'd and kill'd by his Bastard Brother Henry Garzias by Sanctius then Sanctius by Vellidus and after so many retaliations all Spain under King Roderic betray'd to the Moors by a natural Spaniard a Subject to that King Count Julian Prince of Celtiberia as Bodin calls him yea seven hundred thousand Spaniards kill'd in the short space of fourteen months next following that hideous treachery must evince mightily the self-same truth So for France those horrible Feuds Combustions Devastations cruelties inhumanities barbarous sacriledges of the late Civil Wars there continued 40 years against four Kings whereof you may read at large in D'Avila and the Holy Ligue and both Henry III. and Henry IV. one after another so vilely murder'd by those devoted Assassins of Hell Jacques Clement and Ravilliac evince it still Lastly and to come nearer home tho in an earlier time even so for England 1. Those eight and twenty Saxon Kings of the Heptarchy part by one another kill'd part by their own Subjects murder'd besides many other depos'd and forc'd to fly away for their lives For as Matthew of Westminster l. 1. c. 3. writes of the very Northumbrian Kings alone four were murder'd and three more deposed within the little time of one and forty years only And therefore it was that Charles the Great of France when the news of the last of them by name Ethelbert being murdered came to his hearing not only resolv'd to stop the presents he was before on sending to England nor only to do the English in lieu of sending them gifts all the mischiefs he could but said to Alcuinus an English man his own Instructor in Rhetorick Logick and Astronomy that indeed That was a perfidious and perverse Nation a murderer of their Lords and worse than Pagans Nay therefore also it was that many of the Bishops and Nobles fled out of this Northumbrian Kingdom and no man dared for 30 years next following venture on being their King but all men declined it and so left them a prey to the Irish Scâ—ts and Danes who by the just judgment of God over-run them and destroy'd them at last on that very occasion principally 2. Since the Norman Conquest besides the horrible rebellion of Henry the 2d's own Children against him and many other particulars which I pass over not only all the calamities miseries cruelties unspeakable evils of the Barons Wars on both sides under King John Henry III. and Edward II. nor only the deposition and murder too of this poor Edward even his own Wife Queen Eleanor and his own very Soâ—thâ—e Prince of Wales having both of them concurr'd in the deposing him and usurping his Crown but the most prodigiously mortal dissentions of Lancaster and York began with the rebellion against deposition and murder of Richard the II. and so bloodily prosecuted for thirty years under Henry VI. and Edw. IV. that besides eleven main Battels fought with infinite slaughter of English men on either side nay even twenty thousand men kill'd besides the wounded in one of them which Polydore calls the Battel of Touton a Village of Yorkshire the excellent Historian Philip Comines tells us of 80 of the Blood Royal destroyed in them and among this number Henry VI. a most vertuous innocent holy King most barbarously murder'd To say nothing of Richard the Third that Usurping Tyrant so justly dispatch'd in the Battel of Bosworth by the Earl of Richmond who thereupon succeeded King by the name of Henry VII and by marrying the Daughter of Edward IV. and thereby most happily uniting in himself and his Queen and Issue the right of the two Houses ended those fatal dissentions of Lancaster and York Dissentions indeed so fatal to England that besides all her best blood at home as we have seen by their long continuance from the year of Christ 1393. to the year 1486. lost Her not only the Kingdom of France but even the more ancient Inheritance of our Kings in the Dukedoms of Normandy Aquitane and whatever else belong'd to the English Crown on that side of the Sea only the Town of Calais with its little Appendages excepted Were it necessary Buchanan could furnish out of the neighbouring Kingdom of Scotland a very large addition of more examples to the purpose of this place But more than enough has been already said to conclude that notwithstanding any thing or expression in either of the two former Sections my meaning could not be to make those bloody Feuds in Ireland or consequents of them so peculiar to the Milesian Race or Irish Nation as if no other People on Earth had been at any time guilty of the like or as horrid The truth is I mean'd only to say That in respect of their long duration perpetual return from time to time for almost five and twenty hundred years compleat and their excessive degree at very many times within that long Succession of Ages especially considering the small extent of Ireland those cruel bloody Feuds were both National and peculiar to that People only Which I think is true notwithstanding that other Nations either much greater or much lesser might have been in some few Instances of time as high nay peradventure much more horrible transgressors in the very same kind than those antient Milesians were at any one time since their Conquest of Ireland from Tuath-Dee-Danan 33. The second point is to do those ancient Milesians the right as to acknowledg what their Histories have at large That amidst all the Feuds and fury of their Arms how bloody or how lasting soever they had several both Monarchs and after the Pentarchy was set up lesser Kings yea some of those too in their time of Paganism and many more as well of those as these after Christianity establish'd that were of great renown among them for other excellent Qualifications becoming their dignity than those only of Martial Vertue and Fortitude In time of Paganism they had their XXII Monarch Ollamh Fodhla so called from his great Knowledg that very name given him importing in Irish as Gratianus Lucius hath observ'd a great master in Sciences and Teacher of all Knowledg to his People It was he that divided the Lands of Ireland into Hundreds call'd by them Triochae-chead and placed a Lord over each Hundred and over each Town of the Hundred a Bailiff an Applotter of Duties and receiver of Strangers to provide Entertainment for them They had their XCI Monarch Conair mor mhac Eidirsgceoil so great a Justiciar so zealous a Prosecutor of all Malefactors that although with great pains industry hazard to himself yet he forc'd at last all kind of Robbers Thieves Vagabonds and Idlers to fly the whole Kingdom and after this during his Reign
had so unchristianly used it was therefore in the last place unanimously decreed That immediately all English slaves wheresoever throughout the whole Kingdom should be manumised and set at full Liberty So says Cambrensis in his First Book de Expug Hibern c. 28. Where he further says That the People of England i. e. the Saxons while their Kingdom flourish'd before the Norman Conquest had this vitious custom among them generally That rather than suffer any the least want they set their children to publick sale and sent both children and Cousins too over Seas to be sold in Ireland And then he gives his own judgment on the whole concluding It may be probably believed That as God in his Justice had already punish'd with servitude under a forein Yoak the Saxon Sellers so the Irish Buyers were justly fallen at this time into the like severity of Gods avenging wrath But whether also that horrible violation of the Sanctuary of God for fifteen Generations and the most hideous corruption of Manners flowing thence and overflowing well nigh the whole Kingdom whereof we have seen before so much out of St. Bernard might not be another special and peradventure more exaspâ—rating cause Or whether the exemplary punishment fallen so suddenly under Malachias upon the whole Race of those nesarious men that for so long were the chief Authors of that sacriledg and corruption did or did not satisfie the Justice of God as to that matter And whether the Reformation wrought by Malachias in his own days continued any while after his death Nay whether so great a number of incontinent Priests within so little a time of his death and under the superintendency of so blessed a man as St. Laurence was might not argue a third or fourth special motive Or whether at least it might not evince a very just ground to suspect e'en a very great Apostacy among the Clergy themselves in some places and by consequence a much greater a-mong thepeople in the same places from that holy Reform of them by Malachias I must confess I know not what to answer these Queres as being for one part of them enveloped in the darkness of God's secret determinations and for the rest or matter of Fact observable by man past over without any mention of it in History Only this I can with much probability aver That they are much out who grounding themselves on that number of Priests convict of Incontinency by St. Laurence would thence conclude this of Incontinency to have been a general Vice infecting the Irish Clergy and People of Ireland at this time and consequently one of the special causes that brought the heaviest of their judgments The English Conquest upon them 1. Gratianus Lucius p. 319. tells us That Albinus O Moliny Abbot first of Baltinglass then Bishop of Ferns under Henry II. when Laurence was Archbishop of Dublin and those Priests convict in a Midlent Sermon of his treating at large of the continency of Clerks and inveighing bitterly as to that point against the wicked Example given by those Welsh and English Ecclesiasticks come to Ireland with Fitz-Steven Strongbow c. declared in very ample manner how extraordinary pure the Chastity of the Irish Clergy had been before they mix'd with those Foreiners and were corrupted by their Example 2. Cambrensis himself how unfavourable soever he be in other matters to that Nation is in his Topography dist 3. c. xxvii a witness beyond exception as of other great Virtues so in particular of the Chastity of their Ecclesiasticks Est autem terrae istius Clerus satis Religione commendabilis inter varias quibus pollet virtutes castitatis praerogativa praeeminet atque praecellit The Clergy of that Land says he as to Religion are commendable enough and among their many Virtues Chastity has in an excellent degree the prerogative of all And then he goes on telling their assiduity in reading and praying and singing Psalms and keeping within the precincts of their Churches and Abbeys and never tasting any thing all day until they had ended Completorium or Complin as they call it the very last of the canonical Hours in the dusk of the Evening 'T is true he censures their indulging themselves at night more freely both in meat and drink But it is withal no less true That therefore he wonders at their Chastity holding it for a Miracle that Wine and Venus should not meet And yet after all I know not what to think of his charging them so grievously in these two particulars 1. That inter tot millia vix unum invenies c. among so many Thousands scarce one might be found that notwithstanding their continual instance in praying and fasting all day did not at night enormously exceed in Wine and other drinks 2d That albeit their Bishops as having been generally assumed out of Monasteries perform'd most diligently all the duties of Religious Monks for according to the ancient custom they even after their assumption to the Episcopal Order continued still their abode within the precincts of their Abbeys wholly given to Prayer and contemplation yet withal they no less wholly neglected preaching to their people or inveighing against their wickedness or using the severity of Episcopal disciplin to extirpate their Vices and plant those Virtues in their stead which became Christian Professors And indeed if Cambrensis as he is often in other matters of Ireland be not extreamly out or extreamly byassed in these particulars especially the second of them we may peradventure justly conceive that here is an other special cause of that very heaviest of Gods judgments impending at this time over the Irish Nation But whatever may be thought to have either been or not been any of the special causes and although as I ought so I do acknowledg that not even my own supposition all along hitherto viz. of their mortal Feuds and bloodshed among themselves to have been their greatest most special and most peculiar provocation of Heaven must be obtruded on the Reader as a certainty but only represented to him as the most probable and pious conjecture that may be grounded as well on the Prophetical predictions of the Irish Saints as upon the nature and merit of things in themselves taken as they are recorded so fully and particularly in Doctor Ketings History yet I may confidently affirm they were in general very great and very grievous and enormous sins without question either of the Clergy or People or their Bishops or of their Kings Princes Nobles and other men of War or of all together that brought so heavy so everlasting a judgment on that Nation as to their Being in this World For although particular persons have been sometimes grievously afflicted only for the trial of their Virtue as Job and Tobias sometimes only for the manifestation of the Power and Works of God without any demerit of theirs or their Parents either as the Blind Man in the Gospel never has a whole Nation or
and gloriously in twelve great Battels victorious over the Saxons That he took at last even York and London from them and after this again overthrew them in very Essex and Kent where they were strongest and placed their last reserve That he forc'd the remainders of them either to fly the Kingdom or submit to his pleasure In a word That he restored his whole Countrey and perfect peace unto it And that this happy effect of his pious and victorious Armes continued until the ambition anger and which you please to call it either treacherous rebellion or just indignation and resentment of his Nephew Modroedus for being put by the right of Succession gave too great a turn to his fortunate successes chiefly by the Scottish i. e. Irish Army's falling from him and their conjunction with Modroedus against him For this also I must here particularly note that during their confederacy and sideing with him which had early begun and always continued from the very beginning of his Wars until this unlucky difference about the succession and second unlucky Battel of Humber that followed thereupon he also continued perpetually successful But so soon as they joyn'd against him fortune deserted him and together with him his Countrey But whether so or no or whether indeed any of those other particulars related of K. Arthur by Buchanan himself as true History be or be not such as he would have us believe I think enough return'd in answer to Hanmer and Campion's making the Kings of Ireland Tributary to King Arthur of Great Brittain However because I believe it not very forrein nor much beside the matter I do on this occasion add That Polidore Virgil found so little satisfaction to his mind nay so great certainty of untruth in the relations written of this so much celebrated King Arthur that although in his History l. 3 he sums up in brief that is in seven or eight lines all the Wonders of them yet as he calls them so he reputes them no other than Vulgar stories Which to have been his inward sentiment of those relations may be further seen by his telling us That although King Arthur died in the very flower of his youth yet because of his exceeding great strength of body and no less vigorous heroick bravery of Soul Posterity has reported almost the very same Wonders of him which in our own time are among the Italians Romantickly sung of Rowland Nephew to Charles the Great And this without so much as mentioning any years at all of his Reign is all that Polidore has of this great Brittish Heroe Save only that he was the son of King Vter-pendragon That if he had lived a while i. e. his just age longer he had at last restored his perishing Countrey And that but a few years before the Reign of Henry VIII there was in Glastenbury Cloyster a very magnificent Tomb erected to his memory of purpose that after Ages might be thereby persuaded he had been a Prince adorned with all whatever ought be reputed most excellently great and stupendious and that this Tomb as if it had been erected soon after his death had certainly been design'd a memorial of his glory whereas indeed the Cloister it self wherein it stood was not in being then So this Author Polydore Virgil. And yet after all I cannot but acknowledg that so great a concurrence of other Authors together with the general vogue of King Arthur even all along to our time in these Nations of England Scotland and Ireland especially considering that all sides are agreed about his having existed or been and been also about the year of Christ five hundred King of Great Brittain must argue of necessity some great extraordinary exploits of his against the Saxons Nor truly do I see how otherwise Polydore himself cou'd say That if he had lived longer a while he had enfranchiz'd his Countrey Neither is it a valuable argument to the contrary at least if we believe the judicious impartial Cambden That the Saxon Chronologie or other Saxon Authors have nothing of him and his brave atchievements against them I am sure I have my self read in Cambden this very day to this purpose That he has observ'd the Saxon Writers defective in this particular viz. That they pass over in silence what was bravely done against their own Nation and only care the recording what redounded to their glory or concern'd their own People The conclusion of all is That the Romantick stories made of King Arthur by idle Wits in part and part by others who as they were equally ambitious to magnifie their Nation and ignorant or heedless how easily they might be disprov'd out of the known undoubted Histories of the times brought his true deeds into question so far that no man knows which or what to believe of them 51. To ruin the Romantick Fable indeed of Hanmer's three incredible Armies * In my 26 page my memory fail'd me when relying upon it as having not had the Hiâ—â—ory of Hanmer by me then or at hand I suppos'd those truly incredible and false numbers of men related by him to have been really poured into Ireland by the Danes in the first true War made by them on that Countrey Whereas indeed upon review of Hanmer himself I found he related those very incredible Numbers as landed there long before that is when truly there was neither Invasion nor any kind of Number either of Danes or any other forein Enemies troubling that Kingdom invading Ireland by combination at the same time and this the very time when Constantine the Great was Emperour of Rome Cairbre Laoffachair Monarch of Ireland and Conn Ceadchathach one of the Princes of Vlster c the Irish Analists are unanimous in furnishing us abundantly with particulars Out of them it is clear and manifest that Conn Ceadehathach was not one of the Princes of Vlster as Hanmer says he was but Monarch of Ireland That he came to the Monarchy in the year of the World 5324. of Christ 122 and continued Monarch thirty five years till he was murthered by Assassines employ'd on that Errand by Tibraid Tiriogh King of Vlster which happened at least a hundred and twenty years before Constantine the Great was Emperour of Rome That as he was called or surnamed in Irish Ceadchatach in Latin Centimachus from the hundred Battels which he had fought so he fought not any of them or other soever against any Foreiner but all against his own Countrey-men the native Irish nor in all his Reign as neither indeed for some Ages before and after it did any Foreigners invade the Irish That although Cairbre Lissechaire was Monarch of that Kingdom begun his Reign Anno Mundi 5456 Christi 267. and continued it twenty seven years and so perhaps might have been contemporary for some part of his Reign with Constantine the Great of Rome yet during his Reign there was no other Battel fought in Ireland but the Battel of Gowra I am sure