Of this desire, retreats were called emphatically 'Deserts.' Deoraidh Those who devoted themselves to such a solitary life were Anchorites said to give themselves up to God,39 and the name of Deo- called raidh, literally strangers, was applied to them as 'strangers De or God's and pilgrims' in the religious sense of the term, and Deo- pilgrims. 37 Adamnan, Vit. S. Col., B. i. c. 6. 38 Ib., B. ii. c. 43. 39 A.D. 1007 Muredach mac Cricain do deirgiu Comarbus Columcille ar The third order of raidh De,' or pilgrims of God.40 But their connection with the monastery from which they emerged was not entirely severed; for, as we have seen, when the abbacy became vacant, the Deoraidh De, or pilgrim, was entitled to succeed in the fifth place; and the Brehon Laws provide that if a bishop commit certain offences, 'the Ferleginn, or lector, shall be installed in the bishopric, and the bishop shall go into the hermitage or pilgrimage of God' (Aibilteoiracht no in Deoruighecht De).41 Towards the end of the sixth century this passion for a Irish saints solitary life had increased so much that it tended greatly to Eremitical. break up the monastic system, and became embodied in what was termed the third order of saints; and, while the second order expresses a purely monastic church, this third order which succeeded it, was Eremitical. 'It was,' says the Catalogue, 'of this sort. They were holy presbyters and a few bishops; one hundred in number; who dwelt in desert places, and lived on herbs and water and the alms of the faithful. They shunned private property; they despised all earthly things, and wholly avoided all whispering and backbiting; and they had different rules and masses, and different tonsures-for some had the coronal and others the hair; and a different paschal festival-for some celebrated the Resurrection on the fourteenth moon, or sixteenth, with hard intentions. These lived during four reigns, and continued to that great mortality,' that is, from about 600 to 666. In 634, as we have seen, the church of the southern half of Ireland had conformed to Rome, while the northern Irish were not brought over to the Roman system till the end 40 In the Irish Glosses, edited by Mr. Whitley Stokes, the Latin word advona is glossed by Deorad. Among the Charters of Kells is one founding, in 1084, a Diseart, which is given to God and devout pilgrims; 'no wanderer (Erraid) to have any possession till he surrenders his life to God (do Dia) and is devout; ' and in 1000 Tempull Gerailt is rebuilt for pilgrims of God (Deoradaibh De). 41 Ancient Laurs of Ireland, vol. i. p. 59. of the century. What, therefore, is alluded to, when they are said to have different masses and different tonsures, is that this order consisted of two parties-one belonging to the southern Irish which had adopted the coronal tonsure and the Roman method of calculating Easter; while the other in these respects adhered to the customs of their fathers. They appear at this time not only to have lived. a hermit life in the desert, but to have founded eremitical establishments, where a number of hermits lived in separate cells within the same enclosures. To both the name of Desert or Diseart was usually given; and Colgan mentions. no fewer than ten establishments, and the Annals of the Four Masters fourteen, the names of which commence with the word Diseart.. Among those who belonged to the party who adhered to the customs of their fathers was that 'Beccan Solitarius,' or the Solitary, to whom, along with Segine of Iona, Cumine in 634 addressed his letter regarding the proper time for keeping Easter; and it shows the importance now attached to this mode of life, that he is placed on the same platform with the abbot of Iona. Tighernac records, in the year 677, the death of Beccan Ruimean in an island of Britain;' and he appears in the Martyrologies as 'Becan Ruim.' 42 His hermitage was therefore in one of the Western Isles; and what island that was we learn from his epithet of Ruimean or Ruim, that is, of the island of Rum. The names of seven bishops and eight presbyters who belonged to this order are given in the Catalogue, but they were mainly connected with the party which had conformed to Rome. The first of the presbyters named is Fechin of Fore; he is the Vigeanus of the Scottish Calendar, to whom the church of Arbroath was dedicated, and probably that of Ecclefechan, or Fechan's church, in Dumfriesshire. In an island on the west coast of 42 A.D. 677 Beccan Ruimean qui- 17th March, Beccan Ruim.-Mart. evit in insula Britanniæ.-Tigh. Don. Deicola Ireland Ceile De. Ireland called Ardoilean, or High Island, an uninhabited and almost inaccessible island off the coast of Connemara, is one of the most interesting and best preserved specimens of these Anchoretical or Eremitical establishments, which is attributed to this Fechin. It consists of a Cashel, or uncemented stone wall, nearly circular, enclosing an area of one hundred and eight feet in diameter. Within this enclosure there is an oratory, one of the widest of these ancient structures, measuring internally twelve feet by ten, and ten feet in height. The doorway is two feet wide and four feet six inches high, having inscribed on its horizontal a cross similar to one on the lintel of the doorway of St. Fechin's church at Fore. On the east side of the oratory is an ancient stone sepulchre like a Pagan kistvaen. There are also within the enclosure two clochans, or dome-roofed cells-one externally round, but internally a square of nine feet, and seven feet six inches high. The other is circular, and internally seven feet by six, and eight feet high. The doorways are two feet four in width, and only three feet six in height. On the other side are a number of smaller cells, about six feet long by three wide and four feet high, and are mostly covered with rubbish.48 There are no buildings adapted for a cœnobitical life; and it is probably a good specimen of the eremitical establishments of this third order of the saints. The ancient document termed the Catalogue of the termed in Saints, which affords us such a valuable clue to the main characteristics of the Irish Church during these different periods, leaves us at the period of the great pestilence in the year 666; but we find that after that date the nomenclature of the Continental anchorites begins to appear, in an Irish form, attached to the eremitical class in the Irish Church. In lieu of the term Deicola, which as we have seen, was from 43 Abridged from Petrie's description in his Round Towers, p. 421. See also Proceedings of R. S. A., vol. x. p. 551. the earliest period the designation of those who adopted what they considered the higher form of religious life, peculiarly the cultus' of God and the Father, we find these Irish anchorites having the term of Ceile De applied to them. These terms, though not etymologically equivalent, may be considered as correlative," and intended to represent the same class; and as Christicola becomes in Irish Celechrist, so Deicola assumes in Irish the form of Ceile De.45 There is a poem in the Leabhar Breac attributed to St. Mochuda of Rathen, who died in 636, which gives us a picture of the constituent elements of the Irish Church at this period. It bears this title: 'Here begins the rule of Mochuta of Rathen, inculcating ten commandments upon every person;' and consists of nine sections. Of these, the title of the second 44 Ceile, as a substantive, means literally, 'socius, maritus,' but it has a secondary meaning, 'servus,' and as an adverb it means 'pariter.' Dr. Reeves, in his work on the British Culdees, adopts the secondary meaning, and considers that it is simply the Irish equivalent of Servus Dei, which, he says, was the ordinary expression for a monk, and hence starts with the assumption that the Ceile De were simply monks. This is one of the very few instances in which the author has found himself unable to accept a dictum of Dr. Reeves. This rendering appears to him objectionablefirst, because no example can be produced in which the term Servus Dei appears translated by Ceile De; secondly, that the term Ceile De is applied to a distinct class who were not very numerous in Ireland, while the term Servus Dei is a general expression applicable to religious of all classes, and included, as we have seen, the secular canons as well as the monks. Ebrard rejects the rendering by Servus Dei, and sup poses that it is the Irish equivalent |