crest of another Irish crosier is entirely zoomorphic, and

Fig. 85.-Irish Crosier of Bronze, in the
Museum.

composed of four lacertine or dragonesque animals, with their limbs, tails, and crests intertwined in a most elaborate pattern of interlaced work. At the upper extremity of St. Fillan's crosier, where the end of the crest overhangs the pendent portion, there is a small bust of an ecclesiastic, probably intended to represent St. Fillan. Underneath the bust there is a peculiar ornamentation, consisting of a wavy ribbon pattern with a pellet in each loop, which suggests an indication of the date of this part of the work, because the same ornament occurs

on the privy seal of David II., the successor of King Robert Bruce. I have not observed it on any other of the great seals, or other metal-work in Scotland.

The result of this examination of the work upon the outer case of the crosier is to show that the filigree-work is distinctly separable into two varieties, one of which is greatly inferior to the other, and is used to patch up deficiencies in the plaques along the sides of the crook, while it composes the sole ornament of the front plaque that contains the crystal.

1 The Lismore crosier figured in Miss Stokes's Christian Inscriptions of Ireland, pl. xlvii.

We may safely assume that the inferior style, which thus patches up the deficiencies, is the later of the two, and that it probably corresponds in date with the time when the body of the crook was bound together by the addition of the crest and strap with the socket to which they are attached, which a comparison of the style of the ornament underneath the bust with the ornamentation of the privy seal of David II. assigns to the fourteenth century. That this binding together of the several parts of the body of the crook really implies the construction of the outer case as it now exists, I think is capable of demonstration.

The meaning of the binding together of the several parts of the outer case became instantly apparent on its being taken to pieces. It was then found that the case had been constructed to contain an older crosier. This venerable relic (Fig. 86), which had been deemed worthy of such an enshrinement, was thus restored to view, and it was also seen that not only had the outer case been constructed over it, but that the filigree plaques, which are now the chief ornaments of the outer case, had been originally the ornaments of the older crosier of copper thus enclosed within it. They fit the spaces between its nielloed straps exactly, and the pin-holes at the corners correspond to the pin-holes in the copper. Their secondary use also explains the reason why their deficiencies were made up with filigree-work of an inferior kind, because in the reconstruction of the crosier by stripping the enclosed crook of its plaques of filigree-work, and fixing them on the outer covering, it was necessary to make the worn-out work correspond in completeness with the altered appearance of the relic encased in its new shrine. Before the older crosier was thus stripped of its filigree plaques it must have been a work of art of no common order. In style and execution its filigree patterns greatly resemble those on the cover of the prayer-book of Charles the Bald, preserved in the Louvre

and dating from the first half of the ninth century. It still bears strips of niello-work running down the centre of the raised bands which separate the lozenge-shaped spaces for the insertion of the plaques of filigree-work, and the contrast

Fig. 81.

of the bright silver with the red of the copper and the dark lustrous bands of niello must have produced a pleasing effect. There is in the Museum a fragment of another Scottish crosier of copper or a coppery bronze, consisting of the pendent. portion attached to the crook in front, which is also richly

ornamented with chased work and inlaid with patterns in niello. It is a mere fragment of what had been in its day a splendid work of art, studded with settings of coloured stones or enamels of which the sockets now only are left. We know nothing of its history beyond the fact that it was in the col

Fig. 87.-Portion of a Scottish Crosier in the Museum.

lection of Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, by whom it was stated to have been found at Hoddam Church, an ancient foundation of St. Kentigern. Whatever may be its history, it is manifestly of the same form as the crosier of St. Fillan, and the style of its decoration is undoubtedly Celtic.

Before leaving the description of the crosier of St. Fillan, I have to call attention to its peculiar form-a form quite as peculiar and differing as remarkably from the form of the crosier of the European type, as the bells which I have described differ from the bells of the church with which we are now familiar. I have shown that the early bells which

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are of this peculiar flattened and four-sided type, were the bells of the Celtic Church. I have now to show that this peculiarly curved form of crosier, with the pendent portion at the end of the curve, was the crosier of the early Celtic Church. Its buildings, its books, its bells, and its crosiers were all of types that are peculiar to itself. I might even go farther and trace the evidences of its strong and persistent individuality in almost every feature of its institutions; but I am not dealing with that question at present, and it is sufficient in the meantime to demonstrate the fact that this particular form of crosier was distinctive of the Celtic Church, equally with its buildings, its books, and its bells.

Only one other Scottish crosier is known to exist, though there are incidental notices of several which have not been preserved.1 The Bachul More or "great staff" of St. Moluag of Lismore 2 is now in the possession of the Duke of Argyll. It is a plain staff of wood, 2 feet 10 inches in length, retaining in some parts the plates of gilt copper with which it had

1 The crosier of St. Ninian is referred to in his Life (Scottish Historians, p. 19). The crosier of St. Serf is mentioned by Wyntoun (Cronykil, vol. i. p. 120), and in the Breviary of Aberdeen (Pars Estiv., fol. xvi.) The crosier of St. Kentigern is described by Joceline as a plain staff with a curved head. The crosier of St. Fergus was preserved at the parish church of that name in Aberdeenshire when Bishop Elphinstone compiled the Aberdeen Breviary (Pars Estiv., fol. clxiiii.) The crosier of St. Lolan of Kincardine-on-Forth is noticed in a charter to the Abbey of Cambuskenneth (Cartulary of Cambuskenneth, p. 166). The crosier of St. Donnan was kept at the church of Auchterless till the Reformation (Collections on the Shires of Aberdeen and Banff, p. 505). The crosier of St. Mund (who is called in the Irish calendars St. Fintan Munnu) had its hereditary keeper's croft of land at Kilmun. The crosier of St. Maelrubha was kept by its Dewar in the isle of Kilmolrue in the parish of Muckairn in 1518 (Proceedings Soc. Antiq. Scot., iii. p. 258); and the crosier of St. Duthac was borne before King James IV. at Tain in 1506.

2 A small freehold in the island of Lismore was held for centuries by a family named Livingstone (locally styled the Barons of Bachuill), as the hereditary custodiers of the Bachul More. In 1544 we learn from a grant to one of the "Barons" that part of the lands had the name of Peynabachalla.