Although the system of ecclesiastical government Patrick introduced into Ireland would have been the episcopal one he grew up with, Ireland quickly departed from the European norm by having a significant number of monasteries. The fledgling Irish Church adapted to the particular needs of the local community rather than imposing its institutions from above. Less than a hundred years after Patrick’s death new monasteries had eclipsed the older Patrician foundations as the key religious and education centres. In Armagh, for example, which claimed a unique position with Patrick, the abbot of Armagh had as a subordinate member of his community a bishop – whose function was to administer the sacraments for which episcopal orders were necessary.
Many of the founders of Irish monasteries had been moulded by outside influences. St Enda had been trained under Ninian in ‘the White House’ (because of the exceptionally bright sheen on the walls) or Candida Casa in Galloway. Although St Enda’s monastery in Aran, noted for its school of asceticism, was very influential, St Finnian of Clonard soon surpassed it. Finnian was heavily influenced by the Welsh reformers, Cadoc and Gildas, and placed a new emphasis on sacred study as an integral part of the monastic life. He earned the nickname the ‘teacher of the saints of Ireland’ and his twelve famous disciples were known as ‘the twelve apostles of Ireland’. Each in turn founded their own monastery, i.e. Colum Cille in Durrow, Derry and Iona; Ciarán in Clonmacnoise; Brendan in Clonfert; Molaisse in Devenish; Cainnech in Aghaboe; Mobhi in Glasnevin.
As would be expected, monasteries which shared the one founder tended to have close ties. To us today, the high numbers of monasteries at the time is not that remarkable, but what is surprising is that whereas today the diocesan clergy happily co-exist with the religious orders; in early Christian Ireland, the monks effectively replaced dioceses altogether.
An additional feature which gave Irish monasteries a distinctively Celtic texture was that in many of them they choose their abbots from the founder’s family. Accordingly, ten of the first twelve abbots of Iona, came from the Cenél Conaill from which Colum Cille descended. This trend had the effect of consolidating the power base of the ruling families in their local area.
The early Irish monks were a formative influence on Irish cultural and religious identity. Architecturally, they have bequeathed a magnificent legacy to the Irish nations, as is evident from even a cursory glance at Clonmacnoise or Glendalough. This was one of those very rare times when Ireland exerted a real formative influence on European civilisation as many people came to study here from Europe.
Over the last thousand years Irish history has been scarred by division and conflict, but the monastic tradition is part of our shared history as Christians on the island of Ireland before the divisions set in. In Nendrum, Strangford Lough, County Down, there is a monastic site which was neglected for most of the Middle Ages. It was only discovered in relatively modern times. Whereas monastic sites in Clonmacnoise developed through the centuries, Nendrum still remains virtually as it was. The outline of the old monastic settlement, the old monk’s grave and even the pathway to the grave remains and none of this has been overlaid with subsequent development and civilisation. This is part of the history of the whole island.
There were great differences in the types of monastic settlement. Glendalough called itself a city while others were very small. Some were comprised of men, some of women and some were, in contemporary parlance, co-educational. Some were very important as centres of learning. Some were important centres of local devotion.
The monastic sites were normally surrounded by a ráth, an enclosing circular bank with a ditch outside it. Within this enclosure were the main buildings of the monastery; i.e. the church, the monks’ cells, the guest-house, the refectory and the schools. In the early years, the churches tended to be made of hewn oak planks and a roofed thatch of rushes. As a consequence of the lack of timber on the islands off the west coast, the monastic buildings were constructed of stone. Gradually this became the norm on the mainland also. To the contemporary eye, the monastic buildings, particularly the churches, were very small. Even when the monasteries grew in size, the monks tended to build several small churches rather than one large one. The monks were self-sufficient. They adhered to a very strict regime and did severe penance for even the tiniest offence. Columbanus summed up the daily life of the monk:
‘Pray daily, fast daily, study daily, work daily.’
Sense and Sensibility
The monasteries were simultaneously centres of learning and piety. Novices were taught how to read and write Latin. Their chief textbook was the Bible, particularly the Psalms, which they learned by heart. Latin grammar was another area of special study, though Greek received less attention. In addition they learned the commentaries of the Fathers of the Church, the lives of the saints, the works of the Christian authors and even some of the classic authors like Virgil, Horace and Ovid. Individual monks such as Columbanus, who studied at Bangor in the sixth century, show a great familiarity with Latin authors like Virgil and Horace. As a result of the strong cultural connections between Ireland and Spain in the sixth and seventh centuries, Spanish writings like those of Isidore of Seville were read in Ireland and subsequently brought by Irish monks to central Europe. The monks were the first chroniclers of local history, as can be seen in the various annals they compiled.
The copying of manuscripts, particularly of the gospel texts, was an important duty for the monks. The copyists worked in the scriptorium or writing room of the monastery. The monks wrote on vellum, the skins of calves which were cured, pared, rubbed and made suitable for writing on. The completed texts were preserved in leather satchels and hung on the walls of the scriptorium.
At the top of the academic hierarchy was the scribe. The first two abbots of Iona, Colum Cille and Baíthín, pioneered the use of scribal art, which subsequently evolved into illuminative elements, which represent the high point of Irish monasticism. Colum Cille’s own hand is said to be responsible for the Cathach, a fragmentary copy of the psalms. Written about 600 AD, it has features which later became commonplace in Hiberno-Saxon manuscripts. In it the scribe provides headings with a series of decorated initials which diminish in size until they are interwoven into the body of the text. This can also be seen in manuscripts from Bobbio Abbey, Italy. While the Cathach manuscript had some ornamentation, as time passed the decoration and illumination of these texts became ever more stylish and captivating.
As was the case during the Renaissance in Italy, as the church began to acquire more power and wealth, it became a great patron of the arts, particularly in the area of metalwork. The relics of the saints and the priceless texts of the monasteries were enclosed in reliquaries and shrines of the finest metalwork. Two of the great achievements in this era were the Tara Brooch and the Ardagh Chalice. Both are distinguished by their delicate workmanship and their intricate spirals. The Tara Brooch is made of cast bronze and lavishly ornamented with interlacing animal patterns. Dating from about 700 AD, it was discovered on the seashore, near Drogheda. The Ardagh Chalice, a large silver chalice, decorated with gold, glass and enamel, dates from around 750 AD and was found at Ardagh, Co Limerick.
The animal patterns furnish us with a revealing insight into the spirituality of the monks. They were very close to nature and have bequeathed a vast canon of tales and legends about their love of animals, which have engrained themselves in the popular mind. One story relates how three monks who were going on a pilgrimage to an isolated island, vowing to take nothing with them and to eat nothing only water cress. However, out of compassion for a fellow monk, they took his cat along. Once on the island the cat provided the monks with fresh salmon to eat every day. This tale shows the close bond between monks and animals. Even though legends like these are very romanticised, they show the close connection between the monks and the natural world as a common part of God’s creation. Their belief system was such that a monk should love God above all, and their neighbours as themselves. They saw God in the little, everyday things of life particularly in nature.
In the pre-Christian era the file was an esteemed member of the community because of his learning. These men passed on their poems through the oral tradition. The coming of Christianity to Ireland slowly changed that. As the poets became Christian, they learned the art of writing from the monks and they wrote down their traditional knowledge. This made for a fascinating cross-fertilisation of Irish and Latin learning. St Colum Cille was a poet and is traditionally referred to as the protector of poets.
Discipline was very strict in Irish monastic life. It is interesting to note that in the rule of Columbanus corporal punishment was introduced, even though it was not part of Irish civil law at the time. Slaps with a leather strap could vary from six to one hundred strokes. Other forms of punishment included extra silence, fasting on bread and water, expulsion and exile. When Irish monks went abroad, the severity of some of the punishments did not nestle comfortably with the continental temperament and were quietly shelved.
This excerpt from a seventh-century sermon captures the spirit of mortification of the time:
‘It is right that every one of us should suffer with his fellow in hardship, and in his poverty and in his infirmity.’ We see from those words that fellow suffering is counted as a kind of cross.
Service was very prominent from the earliest days of the Irish monastic tradition. In later centuries, it was arguably a contributory factor in the failure of the Reformation to take off in Ireland, because the monks were catering for the material needs of the marginalised as much as the spiritual needs.
The Irish embraced the monastic ideal with enthusiasm. Lands were granted to the monasteries and they grew in number and in power. Many monasteries founded daughter-houses throughout Ireland and in Britain and throughout the continent.
English scholars arrived in their droves to study in the famous Irish schools and the great historian, the Venerable Bede (672–735), said they were received kindly by their Irish hosts, often given board and lodgings without charge, and a free education too. Bede has provided us with much information about the Irish monks in England, but we have less detailed sources about the works of the Irish monks on the continent.
The monks visited these places and brought and received new perspectives. This included their tradition of a festival of Samhain, which was critically important as it signified the end of one year and the beginning of the next. It should be noted, though, that the Irish at this time, like the Welsh, did not consider themselves Celts. That description was used about them by the Romans and the Greeks.
The Celts believed that the soul did not die but lived on, and for that reason they did not fear death. They had a number of traditions. One was of the moruadh who were mermaids or sirens who lured people to their death. The Celts considered their gods not as remote entities living in a far-off heaven, but as magic people who lived in a hill or underground and who would contact mortals if they wished. Later this pagan cult of the dead would be Christianised.
Rudyard Kipling was the youngest winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. The second youngest was the French philosopher, Albert Camus (1913–1960). Among his most famous quotes is perhaps, ‘In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.’ These words are classic Celtic wisdom – though the Celts would have discarded the ‘finally’ – because conclusions were not ends but prisms to new beginnings. Nothing really ended but was merely re-invented in the rhythm of the never-ending cycle of the seasons.
In winter, the Celts closed a door on the past and opened a door to the future. While there is a sadness in letting go of the past, this is subsumed by a joy because the dark days of winter are lit up by light dappled in shadow from the sacred, opening us to the deeper mystery of life. The dark days bring greater opportunities to be attuned to our interior lives.