The Cult of Relics in Early Medieval Ireland by Niamh Wycherley

Author:Niamh Wycherley [Wycherley, Niamh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9782503551845
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Amazon: 250355184X
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Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5

it still merits discussion here in order to place it within the wider context of the cult of relics as a whole in early Irish history.

Relics and Oath Taking

The end of the seventh century and the beginning of the eighth appear to have been a particularly difficult period in Irish society, characterized by famine, disease, and political upheaval.2 Against this backdrop, the Church may have promoted the cult of saints partly to provide comfort and hope during tumultuous times. As Doherty has pointed out, both the cult of relics and the production of hagiography were well underway by the end of the seventh century, reflecting the development of an organized cult of saints at this time.3 Saints acted on their community’s behalf. This is evident in a seventh-century Old Irish hymn attributed to Colmán of the moccu Chluasaig, in response to the Yellow Plague.4 The poem beseeches the saints of the Bible for protection against plague and famine:

Itge Abéil maicc Adaim, Hele, Enoc, diar cobuir: ronsoerat ar diangalar sechip leth fon mbith foguir. Noe ocus Abraham, Isac in macc adamrae immuntísat ar thedmaim náchantairle adamnae […] Iohain Baptaist adsluinnem rop ditiu dún rop snadud! Ísu cona apstalaib rop diar cobuir fri gábud!

May the prayer of Abel son of Adam, Enoch, Elias help us; may they save us from swift disease (?) on whatever side, throughout the noisy world! Noah and Abraham, Isaac the wonderful son, may they surround us against pestilence, that famine may not come to us! […] John the Baptist we invoke, may he be a safeguard to us, a protection! may Jesus with His apostles be for our help against danger!5

Scholars have explored how the generation of hagiography (and the associated cult of relics) was key to facilitating the creation and promotion of saints’

cults.6 Very often vested interests fuelled the effective growth and advertise-2 Ó Corráin, ‘Ireland c. 800’, pp. 580–84; Doherty, ‘Exchange and Trade’, p. 71.

3 Doherty, ‘Use of Relics’, p. 94.

4 Thes. Pal., ii, 298–306; MacNeill, ‘A Pioneer of Nations’, p. 438, seems to accept Colmán’s authorship although the last part of the hymn is attributed to Diarmait úa Tigernáin, coarb of Armagh in the mid-ninth century. Kenney, Sources, pp. 726–27, dates the language to the first half of the ninth century.

5 Thes. Pal., ii, 300–01.

6 For a useful overview of the scholarly developments in this area, see Howard-Johnston and Hayward, The Cult of Saints.

The Formal Use of Relics in Early Ireland

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ment of these cults, and it is in this enterprise that we can gain an interesting insight into the interactions between ecclesiastical and secular authorities in medieval Europe. For example, social anthropologist Mary Douglas elucidates the ways in which hierarchical societies use times of difficulty and suffering to uphold the moral law and reinforce social discipline.7 In the Irish context, the eighth-century sabbatarian ordinance Cáin Domnaig implies that maintenance of the law of the Sabbath would prevent the wrath of God and pestilence on the fields: ‘Ar is ar tairmthecht Domnuig do-beir Día

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