ON ST. MODUENNA OR MONENNA, MONYNNA, MONYMA, MONINIA, ONE OR SEVERAL?
A CRITICAL COMMENTARY.
Moduenna or Monenna, called by several names, virgin, in Ireland or in England (S.)
BY THE AUTHORS J. P. AND C. J.
§ I. The Life written by Conchubranus, examined chronologically.
Inscribed in the sacred tables is read on this day St. Moduenna, virgin and abbess, who, besides the various formations of the name set forth in the title just preceding, may also be called Modovena, Modwena, Movena, Mowena. It is asked whether so various names designate only one Saint, Of the first author of the Life or various ones. Before I answer the question, I judge that certain things should be premised, for the explanation of the matter; the material being taken from her Life, written by Conchubranus. For indeed it seems it should be placed among the number of those Lives which, as if on purpose, or rather by the ignorance and unskillfulness of the authors, seem to have grown together so as to create trouble for the hagiophile reader, by obtruding ill-cohering histories, palpable anachronisms, hyperboles, events of things scarcely credible, not to say for the most part fabulous, and the rest of that kind, devised to rack rather than to recreate or feed the mind. To begin, let us set in the midst certain hallucinations of time. The Author of the Life sets forth at number 4, and elsewhere more than once throughout, that St. Moduenna was contemporary with St. Patrick, the great Apostle of the Irish, a pious intercourse of intimacy passing between them on both sides; from whom she herself received the virginal pallium in Ireland, and was led to the pursuit of virginity, as you have at the cited number four.
[2] Which did not happen before the year 432; since at that time St. Patrick, having begun his apostolic labors, gave the beginning to the Irish expedition. a chronological error, Nor further could this have been done after the year 460, in which that bishop put off mortality, as is asserted in his preliminary Commentary on the seventeenth of March. It remains therefore that the pallium or virginal veil conferred on St. Moduenna be placed as given by St. Patrick in Ireland, about the middle of the fifth century. See now how aptly that note of time coheres with the other epoch, which you have in the same Life chapter 2, number 23, where it is narrated that Alfred, son of the King of England, namely of Ethelwulf or Adulph; as, with Capgrave, the authors hand down, having set out into Ireland, and there fallen into sickness, for the sake of his health betook himself to St. Moduenna, and sought from her and obtained his former health. The authors judge that that Alfred flourished only in the ninth century, brought into the light, as Ussher marks in his Chronological Index, in the year 849. It is clear therefore that the Author of the Life stumbled into a base anachronism, when he combined things separated by an interval of four centuries.
[3] Nay, even granting freely that Moduenna and Alfred were contemporaries (not indeed that Moduenna of whom hitherto, wrongly combining but another, following afterward, of whom it will be seen later), our Alford at the year 871, number 35, says that he is much in suspense in giving assent, and confesses that he does not know to what that journey ought to be referred. For why, he says, should Alfred depart before his twentieth year into Ireland? who at home had a physician, St. Guerir, by whom also he was cured. And why afterward, when affairs in his country were in peril, should he desert his country, over whose safety it was incumbent on him, as King of England, to watch; or how could he be cured in Ireland, who is said to have labored with a grave sickness up to his forty-seventh year, at which time St. Moduenna had long since died.
[4] the age of St. Patrick with the age of Alfred. Whatever be the case with this conjecture of Alford, this is certain, that that healing can by no means be combined with a Moduenna contemporary with St. Patrick, the Apostle of the Irish. The same anachronism is committed in Capgrave, both when Alfred, son of Adulph king of the West Saxons (who had contracted a very great sickness for many days, of which no physician could heal him … with a great retinue crossed the sea, and was healed by Moduenna), and when it is narrated that Moduenna, the virgin Athea being taken with her, went to the father of Alfred, whom she had healed, and was honorably received; where it is added that King Athulph commended to Moduenna his sister, a virgin, Editha by name, to be consecrated to Christ, so far as under her discipline and the habit of nuns she might serve God with pious devotion; land being given her by the King, as much as she herself wished. All which things, no otherwise than the former, already mentioned from another Author of the Life, if you wish to adapt them to St. Moduenna contemporary with the Apostle of the Irish, it is manifest that you proceed with erratic step on both sides, and stumble very grossly in the series of time. To the purpose make the words of Ussher, who, after he had said in his Chronological Index page 1127, Darerca, who is also Moninna, sister of blessed Patrick, met her death in the year 518, soon refers the reader to the Primordia of the British Church, where he adds that perhaps by this homonymy of the word Conchubranus was deceived, and confounded Moninna, who lived in the time of St. Patrick, with Movenna or Moduenna, who flourished in later times.
[5] Ussher confounds two Darercas; But I do not conceive how the same author, the corrector of Conchubranus, is not himself to be corrected in this, that, where he accuses him of having confounded two Moduennas, he himself is convicted of confounding two Darercas or Moninnas; the one, namely, the mother of numerous offspring and sister of St. Patrick, with the other, who, being childless and having professed the virginal state, is very greatly distinguished from the former; of which former he says, in the place cited above page 825, that she, living in the marriage bed, bore nine holy Bishops and two holy Virgins, and that he had read this in the Tripartite Work. From what has been said it is clear how great a confusion of time is found in the Life written by Conchubranus, how great of persons, how great thence a perturbation of matters. The chronological difficulties Mabillon, volume 2 of the Benedictine Trophies page 910, treating of St. Moduenna, or, as he himself writes, Modvena or Modovena, employs another engine, by which he might extricate those chronological tangles, but whether he does not rack himself in vain, and perhaps entangle the matter more? For after he had said that St. Moduenna about the year of Christ 850 shone in England with sanctity, and built monasteries, feeling here that the water sticks, and that these things do not sufficiently agree with the age of Patrick, he thus proceeds: Either the things which Capgrave writes of her—converted by St. Patrick to embrace the monastic life, and clothed with the habit of nuns—are less true, concerning which matter also the author of our Life so often cited, Conchubranus; or the account of him is to be understood of an altogether different holy Patrick than the Apostle of Ireland, who, namely, after the first, flourished about the year of Christ 800.
[6] But the said author does not thus solve the difficulty: for Patrick is too plainly expressed by Conchubranus as the great Apostle of the Irish; the same seems too pointedly recounted in Capgrave, for anyone aptly to substitute for him some other of a later time. I pass over that he who should be substituted could perhaps never be shown to have existed in the nature of things. Thomas Sirin, to illustrate the Life of St. Moduenna, in a posthumous writing, sent to us not so long ago by the Irish Friars Minor of Louvain, digested some things, racking himself in every direction, that he might explain another anachronism, which you will find in Conchubranus, chapter 4.
[6] It is there narrated that Osid, otherwise Ositha, a disciple of St. Moduenna, The second anachronism having been submerged for three days, was restored to her former life by the work of the same Moduenna, which ought to have happened about the middle of the seventh century; if indeed the aforesaid Ositha be the same as she who is narrated to have dyed the lily of her virginity with the purple of martyrdom several years after the middle of the seventh century, in our Alford volume 2, page 283, number 8; where also he accuses Alberic Verus, John of Tynemouth, Capgrave, Surius, and after them Baronius, because they confusedly cast several things, pertaining to the said virgin, into the one year 653. A brief compendium of the Martyr the said Baronius reports at the same year 653; and we are to treat of her on the seventh of October, sacred to her cult. But, that we may return to Sirin, whence for a while we have digressed; he deduces from the cited Alberic Verus (Weerus he writes) that Moduenna lived in the seventh century, since, in the Life of St. Ositha, whom she had brought up while under age, he gives her as mother Wilteburga, daughter of Penda, king of the Mercians, whom, from Malmesbury On the Deeds of the Kings of the English book 1, chapter 3, in the year 655, he reports to have died nearly an octogenarian, and as father King Frithewald, that Frithewald, namely, the subregulus, by whose help St. Erconwald, bishop of London, filled the monastery of Chertsey with abundance of goods and with monks, notes the Worcester writer at the year 675. But her spouse Sigerus, regulus of the East Saxons, whom Bede book 3, chapter 30, in the year 664, with part of his people, having abandoned the sacraments of the Christian faith, converted to apostasy, but a little after brought back to the way of justice, mentions. And finally her consecrators, from whom she received the religious habit and the veil, Ecca and Badwin, Bishops of the East Saxons, ordained in the year 673, the Worcester writer being witness.
[8] From which so many notes he concludes, just as the authors rightly deduce that Ositha and her mistress Moduenna lived in that century; set forth from Father Sirin so also that Ussher, page 707, and Bolland, on the first of February in the Commentary on the Life of St. Brigid, § VI, best infer that Ositha suffered martyrdom, not, as in that same Life (probably by a scribe's error) it is said, in the year 653, from the Danes ravaging England, but far later, namely in the year 675, as Ussher in the Chronological Index opines. At last he concludes moreover that, because in the Acts of St. Ositha in Capgrave, the same persons whom he gave above from Alberic are designated as the parents of the said Ositha,
her mistress, her spouse, and her initiators, and the same time of martyrdom; he concludes, I say, that it does not seem credible to him that either of them, in one and the same Life of Moduenna, who in the same is said to have been made a nun by St. Patrick when he had gone into Ireland, namely in the year 432, and to have died in the 130th year of her age, should have written that the same lived in the time of Alvred or Alfred, and of his father Athulph or Ethelwulf, Kings of the West Saxons; but rather in the time of some of the kings of the seventh century, namely Oswy or his son Alfred, who also ruled the West Saxons; in whose place someone else seems to have substituted Athulph and his aforenamed son. He adds that he embraces this opinion of the time of Moduenna dwelling in England, as true, or at least as more probable.
[9] but not solved, But that opinion of Father Sirin does not loose the knot; for besides that the substitution of an Alfred reigning in the seventh century for another who flourished in the ninth does not seem sufficiently founded, there remains, even granting this freely, another difficulty; namely that, according to the higher epoch of St. Patrick and St. Ositha, it does not seem possible to understand that St. Moduenna lived with this woman and with that man, unless we give her more than two hundred years, endowed by St. Patrick with the virginal pallium about the middle of the fifth century, and instructing the said St. Ositha beyond the middle of the seventh century, at least according to those things which we said above from others concerning the time in which she lived, and which the cited Sirin admits; concerning which it can be determined on the seventh of October. That they might fit some thread to that labyrinth, perplexed with windings, by finding a fit way out, the authors made Moduenna a virgin of a most declining age. She is said in Capgrave to have lived 130 years; to which are added three other years in our copy, after the hymn which I find there subjoined to the Life by Conchubranus. There are those who go still further, the aforesaid Sirin being witness in the posthumous manuscript already cited, prolonging her life to 180 years; but by what show of truth?
[10] Ussher wavering. Ussher, treating of the time in which Monenna or Moduenna flourished, although he is a Chronologist otherwise accurate enough, scarcely knows where to plant a firm foot. For after he had reported that Conchubranus affirms that she was in the time of Pope Celestine, who sent St. Patrick to the Irish nations, placed under the mist of sins and ignorance; he adds that the death of Monenna is to be referred rather to the times of Columba, bishop of Dunkeld, than to those of St. Patrick; namely beyond the middle of the seventh century; and this he does not dare to affirm so assertively but that he openly confesses that he proceeds from mere suspicion, which he says is moved in him by the Acts of the virgin Ositha, in which it is handed down that St. Modwenna was her mistress, and so was contemporary. Then the same author mentions Polydore Vergil and Nicholas Harpsfeld, who will have it that Moduenna and Ositha flourished in the ninth century after Christ, following those authors who reported that Alfred, son of the King of the English, healed by Monenna or Modwenna, was that great Alvred, son of King Adulph or Ethelwulf, king of the West Saxons; or that Editha, to whom Ositha as a young girl is read to have been commended by Modwenna, was the own sister of King Edgar. Thus he, proposing the difficulties, not dissolving them. It may be seen from page 75 On the Primordia of the British Churches.
§ II. The origin of the said anachronisms seems to be the confusion of several Saints of nearly the same name. Whence the Life was sent to us; who was its author.
But now I seem to have shown to enough people that the Life of Moduenna, written by Conchubranus, labors under a manifold chronological slip. From the confusion of three Moduennas It remains that we inquire into the origin, its source being detected; and that at last we bring, so far as can be done, remedies to that evil. We have already said, from Ussher, that the author of the Life of Moduenna, Conchubranus, perhaps deceived by the homonymy of the word, confounded Moninna, otherwise Darerca, contemporary indeed with St. Patrick, but not his sister, with Movenna or Moduenna, who flourished afterward. To Ussher's opinion James Ware, On the Writers of Ireland book 1, page 57, gives assent, affirming that two Lives were confounded by Conchubranus, namely the one of Moninna, who is also Darerca, who died at Kilsleve, otherwise Kilslevecuilin in the county of Armagh, on the third of July, in the year of our Christian era 518, to others 516; the other of Moninna or Monenna, who, far later, lived about the year 640. But he errs, in that he writes that that Darerca was the sister of St. Patrick. For since she was married and the parent of many children, as we said above against Ussher, and Moninna or Movenna, another, of whom here we inquire, was a virgin, it is now clear that both are distinguished more than that author thought, nor does the Life of Moninna seem to have been confounded by Conchubranus with the Darerca of others, sister of St. Patrick, but with another, whose feast is celebrated on the sixth of this month.
[12] Our Alford, Annals volume 3 page 125, about to emend the anachronism, rightly observed that the illustrious virtues of two virgins, into one alone, seems to have arisen the confusion of time, the reckoning of time being too confused, are referred to one, by the similarity of the names. And he adds that Monenna indeed could have been taught by the great Patrick; that she instructed Ositha and other virgins in Britain, and did other things proper to the earlier centuries, but he warns that she is to be distinguished from her who lived in the ninth century, in the time of Alfred, and is commonly called Moduenna, and is written to have died in the preceding year, that is 870. But if only a confusion of two Moduennas be established, as the root of the whole anachronism, it does not seem able to be understood here any more than in the opinion of Sirin, set forth above, how one and the same Moduenna could pass from the time of Patrick to the times of Ositha, that is from about the middle of the fifth century to the middle of the seventh century and beyond; unless we grant her about two hundred years, as before I argued against Sirin, adhering to the chronological computation of St. Ositha, as it is commonly determined, which can be examined on the seventh of October.
[13] by the substitution of three Moduennas That therefore in this matter, far most intricate, I may set forth what I think, by a probable conjecture at least, it seems that the threefold anachronism committed in the Life written by Conchubranus cannot be corrected otherwise than by substituting three Moduennas, Monennas, or Moninnas; one contemporary with the great Patrick, another with St. Ositha, the third with Alfred; which three, because from the affinity of the name, as I think, he fused into one; not distinguishing the persons, he also did not distinguish the reckoning of time, but confounded the deeds, separated by many intervals of time. Occasion may have been given by the Life of Darerca the Virgin, who was also called Monynna, committed to letters by an uncertain author, bearing a greater antiquity than the Life published by the oft-named Conchubranus; as far as appears from the greater and more native simplicity, brevity, and the omission of many superfluous things. For it lacks anachronisms, it lacks ill-cohering narratives, it lacks exaggerations, composed in a manner for ornament, and, as to many things, unless I am mistaken, uncertain, not to say fabulous; it lacks prologue and epilogue. From which indications, as from so many characteristic marks, I conclude that this anonymous Life is older than that of Conchubranus; that this was compiled and augmented from that; and that from the Lives of three Movennas, distant from one another by a long space of time, the deeds of one Movenna were written, which were the deeds not of one, but of several. For each Life, both that more recent one which we said was composed by Conchubranus, and the older one of the anonymous author, agree very much with each other as to substance, and not rarely even in words are entirely consonant; which I shall demonstrate below at greater length, about to give a specimen from the comparison of a few passages.
[14] Conchubranus therefore, having obtained the Life of Darerca or Monynna, and thinking that the Monennas, Movennas, or Moduennas who followed in later times were one and the same virgin abbess, perhaps, as is not rarely wont to happen among biographers, deceived by the homonymy of the words, applied to one the things which he found written elsewhere of several, to be corrected. uniquely secure, or rather ignorant, how unskillfully these were divided among their times, how ill-cohering. Unless it be very pleasing to suspect that by the fault of interpolators not a few things were added, confused, and mixed together wrongly and viciously. Now I free the credit given at once, and from the comparison of a few passages of the one with the other I show to the eye that the Lives of the Anonymous and of Conchubranus are similar to each other, culling certain fragments, by which the asserted confusion of the more recent or Conchubranian Life may be established.
[15] The source of the Conchubranian Life is shown In the Life of the Anonymous therefore, at number 1, Darerca or Monynna is said to have been born in the borders of the Conallei, her father being Motteus. Conchubranus has thus at number 3: Of the people of the Conallei St. Movenna had a father, by name Mauchteus. The Life of the Anonymous thus mentions the virginal pallium given to Movenna or Monynna by St. Patrick: A blessing being given by St. Patrick, and fitting admonitions, she herself received the virginal habit, consecrated near Brius, a fishpool, which translated into Latin sounds "of largess" or "of abundance"; by which it was given to be understood that she should be a living fountain of spiritual waters, from which many should draw the cup of life. The aforesaid Bishop therefore, having exhorted her by salutary admonitions to the dignity of the virginal life, commanded her to associate to herself other virgins whom she should teach the fear of God; supported by whose help also, and gladdened by their solace, she might the more easily complete the good which she had begun. Hear now how exactly the Conchubranian Life agrees, at number 4: After these things also she deserved to receive the holy virginal pallium, St. Patrick blessing, near the little fishpool of Briugis, which in Latin sounds "of largess." That in the pool of water, near which St. Movenna received the virginal pallium, an abundance of graces and virtues with the blessing of the Bishop should proceed, from which all should draw daily the grace of healings and the streams of the waters of life. After these things, the commendation of the virginal state being premised, St. Patrick added that she should associate to herself other virgins, whom she should nourish with her from adolescence in the fear of the Lord, so far as, supported by their solace, she might the more easily fulfill and complete the good which she had begun.
[16] The anonymous Life at number 2 narrates the following: To a certain religious presbyter St. Patrick committed the care of guarding her and of teaching her the psalms. the anonymous author of the Life Then, a very few things being interjected, at number 3, concerning the memory, genius, and progress of Monynna, Eight virgins, and one widow with her little infant by name Luger, are said to have been joined to her, whom Darerca herself adopted as a son; then, imbued with ecclesiastical manners, she raised him to the honor of the pontifical order. Who, good manners requiring it, presiding over his whole nation, namely of the Conallei, built the church of Ruschah in the field of Cualgme to the honor of God. Compare these with the things which Conchubranus narrates on the same subject at number 5. Movenna therefore was commended by the bishop Patrick to another religious presbyter, that he might in the first place teach her the psalms; then, a very few things being interposed concerning her genius, memory, and progress, there are narrated as joined to her eight virgins and one widow with a little infant, who is agreed to have been afterward made a famous bishop of his nation,
that famous man, that is, the Lord of Conalla, by name Luger, who without doubt first had founded the church of Ruscana in the little field of Colgus. This man deserved to receive the privilege of the dignity of sanctity through the blessing of St. Movenna, whom she adopted for herself in the place of a son from infancy in the first rank. Nor less is the identity of both Lives proved from the following, by which the journey of the virgin Movenna to the bishop Ibar is signified in these words, at number 4: The Virgin of Christ therefore, trusting in the Lord, with the aforesaid eight virgins and the aforesaid widow, and certain others, took her way to the reverend pontiff, Ibar by name, dwelling in the islands of western Ireland, desiring to come, and coming also … to the Man of God. Which Conchubranus expresses very similarly, at number 7: In the name of God, with her girls and the one aforesaid widow, the little infant being dismissed, and with other companions, journeying for Christ, she sets out, as they hand down, to the holy bishop Ibar, in those times dwelling in three islands set beyond Ireland in the western ocean.
[17] There follow next in the anonymous Life, and conduce especially to our purpose: existed; After these things the aforesaid pontiff Ibar, transferring himself from the aforesaid islands, approaching the southern region of Ireland, came to the Island which they call Little Ireland, in which at last he died. But the sheep of Christ follow their shepherd. Who, when he came to the region of the Lagenians, they heard the fame of the holy Virgin, St. Brigid, dwelling there. The very same things the Life of Conchubranus reports, at number 29: But the aforesaid holy bishop Ibar, the Lord being the guide of his journey, proceeds from the Islands into the southern part of Ireland; approaching there a small island, which they call Little Ireland, in which also afterward, after a glorious life, he was laid away. The sheep of Christ follows the shepherd, St. Movenna with the Virgins follows the Bishop and master of saving doctrine. Coming into the land of the Lagenians, on whose southern part also the aforesaid island lies, the fame of St. Brigid being heard, St. Movenna with the girls belonging to her, the Bishop permitting, turned aside to visit her. Let these suffice for a specimen to prove the similarity, agreement, and identity of the anonymous and the Conchubranian Life. He for whom these do not suffice, let him run through both Lives, and compare them with each other, and he will everywhere detect very many most manifest indications, by which he may most undoubtedly be convinced of the asserted identity. Both Lives will be published in print on the sixth of this month, on the occasion of Monynna, whom we have mentioned, or Darerca, whose feast is then celebrated.
[18] Then the hagiophile reader will be able to discern by his own effort, but by the same Conchubranus by how many degrees the anonymous Life excels the Conchubranian; whether you consider the coherence of time, places, and persons; or the native simplicity of style; or the absence of many things, which I think will displease not a few readers. Of this kind are: first, that Conchubranus narrates that she three times set out on a journey to Rome; and the last time indeed when, if we believe him, she was a hundred and ten years old. The author in Capgrave goes further, and says that altogether three times, with bare feet, in a hair-shirt, the virgin Lazara accompanying her, Moduenna set out for Rome, no mention of even one journey recurring in the Life of the Anonymous. 2. That Conchubranus, from number 72, mentions a contention arisen among the Irish, English, and Scots for the possession of the body of Moduenna after her death, and wonderfully composed by the effort of St. Columchille the bishop; the deed the author in Capgrave also recounted in few words; the Anonymous having no jot of the pretended contention. 3. That Conchubranus, as well as the author in Capgrave, express, besides the name of the father, also the name of the mother of St. Moduenna; it is a wonder whence they received the name of the mother; especially since in the Life of the Anonymous I see it passed over. 4. That the history, related in the Life of Conchubranus at number 9, which is also read in Capgrave (whose sum is that a certain girl Orbila, appointed to the guard of some place, but fearing for her own beauty lest it should harm her integrity, was disfigured by Moduenna, and changed into an old woman)—that this history, I say, seems thrust in here without sufficient foundation, not to say fabulously, of which in the Anonymous there is no memory. 5. In what sound-minded writer would not the credit of the history at number 15, narrated by Conchubranus, waver, concerning the wonderful vision exhibited to the tyrant and robber Glumelath; as well as concerning his stupendous conversion, together with another, to the faith and to amendment, and his afterward being raised to the episcopate? The deed is also described in Capgrave. Not a syllable of it did the Anonymous set down in writing.
[19] augmented with many things What shall I say of the two cows, taken by theft, had not the heat of the river stood in the way, as you have in Conchubranus at number 6? What of the adjuration of the swineherd, to whom, compelling Moduenna and her companions to a fast of seven days, the said pigs are narrated to have been preserved by her, from number 10? What of the little pig killed and cooked, and again restored to life, of which at number 12? What of Chevin, vexed by the devil, whom, meditating and threatening dire things, Movenna led by the sign of the Cross to saner things? as is set forth from number 19. What of the waters blessed by the staff of St. Moduenna and drawn up to the summit of a mountain, at number 21? What of the wolf, called to Moduenna, supplying the place of a calf it had before devoured, and, in the calf's stead, loved by a cow, from number 22? What of Alfred, son of the King of England, of whom above enough and to spare, healed by Moduenna in Ireland from a grave infirmity, as is said at number 23? What of the intended plundering of the monastery of St. Moduenna, first turned back upon its authors, then perpetrated; which calamity put into her mind the purpose of crossing over into England, whither she is mentioned to have been carried in so wondrous a manner, a piece of land torn away supplying the office of a ship? See, if you please, from number 24. What of the sister of the King of England instructed; what of the church restored by Moduenna, the liberality of the said King of England seconding her, after she had returned into Ireland, as is read at number 27?
[20] I forbear to speak of the girl Ositha, submerged in the waters for three days, by narratives of suspect credit, and then restored to life by the aid of St. Moduenna, as you have at number 40; concerning whom abundantly in the preceding, where we said that history was unskillfully transferred hither by the author, not without anachronism and confusion; of which in the oft-mentioned anonymous author no mention is made; no more than of another boy raised up, number 46, of the glass flask found, number 58, of the three Roman journeys, numbers 39, 55, 66, of which likewise above. To this is added that there is a great diversity in the anonymous author from Conchubranus in expressing the persons who are narrated to have come to see Moduenna toward the last time of her life, at number 36 in these words: King Eugenius Conayl, who at that time presided over three provinces, namely Morceyne, Cuailgne, and Coba, and other elders of the peoples with a great multitude came unanimously to visit her up to the place near her monastery. And all these sent the bishop Herbeus … to the virgin Darerca herself. But Conchubranus recounts the deed thus at number 67: There came to visit her Congal, who was king of Scotia at that time, and Rotheri and Cobo and Bolla and Choili and all the elders of the people … They sent therefore the bishop to Rome, the brother of Movenna. It is a wonder if here too Conchubranus, after his manner, has not wrongly confused certain things.
[21] Concerning the translation of the body of St. Moduenna into England, not to say corrupted. as well as the controversy arisen and quieted about having it among the English, Scots, and Irish, I read nothing in the Anonymous, I noted above. Let the reader now consider whether the indications are numerous enough to judge that the Life written by Conchubranus, foully corrupted and unskillfully confused, labors under more than one fault of time, and teems with other narratives; to which, as I said, the confusion of three Moduennas into one probably gave occasion; which if they be distinguished in this manner, so that one be established to have flourished in the fifth century, another in the seventh century, the third finally in the ninth century, the Life published by Conchubranus can seem tolerable in some measure, although not a few things will still remain over, which may be recalled to a saner scale. And these are the chief things which I thought should here be examined. Let the reader meanwhile remember that the Conchubranian Life in most points coincides with that which exists in Capgrave, and so that most of the things which militate against the one also militate against the other.
[22] Concerning the Life in Capgrave; In passing I would have it here observed that some things are narrated in Capgrave which I do not read in Conchubranus; namely the history of two virgins, absorbed in the bottom of the river with their little boat, and afterward preserved; so that the waters are said to have been divided on either side, in the likeness of a twin wall, and to have afforded St. Moduenna a dry passage through the midst of the river. Likewise of a certain nobleman, who is narrated to have laid waste the monastery of Burton, seized and choked by a demon; of a fire, invading the bier of Moduenna, but extinguished; finally of a certain Viscount, shut up in the closest custody, and freed at the invocation of the same holy Virgin; concerning which Conchubranus has nothing.
[23] concerning the copy And these things at sufficient length concerning the perturbation and confusion of the Life published by us; it remains that I subjoin some things concerning its author. To the margin of the copy published by us Papebroch wrote that we ought to attribute it as received to D. Dugdale, who sent it in the year 1678; that same man, unless I am mistaken, William by his first name, most well known to the republic of letters by the Monasticon Anglicanum. But the primeval source, of which chiefly we here inquire, is designated there in the margin by these words, added either by the hand of the praised Dugdale or of another, by which it is noted to have come from a manuscript codex in the Cottonian library under the effigy of Cleopatra A 2. The same source Ware indicates.
[24] and concerning the Author of the Conchubranian Life. That the name of the author of the Life was Conchubranus, we have now by repeated turns intimated throughout this Commentary; who is perhaps the same as him of whom Colgan treats, volume 2 page 632, column 2, weaving him into the catalogue of the schoolmen of Ireland, in these words: Conchouranus, schoolman of Gleaunussem, whom in the same place he reports to have met his death in the year 1082. Ussher mentions him more than once, and says that he had not yet seen an older writer of the Life of Moninna. Most distinctly of him Ware, book 1 On the Writers of Ireland, among those born in Ireland, speaking thus: Conchubranus wrote the Life of St. Movenna, otherwise Modwenna the Virgin, in 3 books. At the end of the work, or of the Life, in our copy at number 78, he discloses his name thus: "Of these virtues I adjure the reader and the hearer alike by the Lord, that for me, the very wretched servant of the Lord, Conchubranus, oppressed by the burden of sin, they intercede with pious prayers to the Lord." Then, these words of Conchubranus being cited, Ware goes on again: Conchubranus moreover wrote two alphabetic hymns in the
praise of Moninna. But since there were two Moninnas, one commonly called Darerca, of St. Patrick, who died at Kilsleve, otherwise Kilsleve-Cuilin in the county of Armagh, on the third of July (the manuscript Annals of Ulster being cited in the margin), in the year of our Christian era 518, to others 516; the other far later, who lived about the year 640: the Lives of these Conchubranus confounds; in which he hallucinates as much as Ussher, whom above at number 5 we said confounded Darerca the sister of St. Patrick, the parent of much offspring, with Darerca the virgin; to which could be added that which the cited Sirin left noted in his posthumous writing; namely, that the sister of St. Patrick was a nun, yet not a virgin, but the holy mother of much offspring, and was never called Moninna, nor dwelt on Mount Culenn, nor reached the sixth century, having preceded Patrick himself both in birth and in great age.
[25] But let us return to Ware. There is held, he says, an autograph of the Life of St. Moduenna in the Cottonian library (whence I have a copy), but at the beginning, in a more recent hand, The same copy, it is falsely ascribed to Geoffrey the monk of Burton, who wrote on the same subject. However that may be, the autograph, by the antiquity of the character, indicates that the author lived before the end of the twelfth century. Whence you may gather it is no wonder if the aforesaid author, whether he died in the year 1082, as it pleased Colgan, or later, separated by so great a distance of times from the age of the Saint whose Life he committed to letters, hallucinated in various points, the error, as far as I suspect, arising from this, that he confounded holy Virgins homonymous in name, three in number, into one, as we noted above; unless the fault seem in part to be laid upon an unskillful interpolator, who afterward added certain things of his own. Too truly therefore did our Bolland long since foretell in the preliminary Commentary on St. Brigid: The Life of Monenna needs correction by no means light. He promises there that he will give this from Capgrave, about to give perhaps the Conchubranian, if he had had it at hand; which he confesses he had not seen. Neither could he give, the bulk of the work, formed too far beyond the idea and design conceived at the beginning concerning it, growing, so that the praised beginner of the work could reach the month of July.
[26] to be corrected in many things. It pleases us to publish the Conchubranian Life rather than that which is read in Capgrave; since this is already printed; that, as we think, has thus far been unpublished. And it matters little which is given to the press, since both are of nearly the same bran, as we have already said. It, divided into three books and various chapters in our manuscript, we have divided otherwise after our manner. There are added in the copy two alphabetic hymns, composed in praise of St. Moduenna; which I hardly think worth the trouble to print. Hence it is clear that our copy, whether you regard its source, or its matter, or its division, coincides with that which we saw a little before designated by Ware. Finally, it is worth remembering that Pits, in the Appendix of the illustrious writers of England, affirms from Leland that the Life of Movenna was written by Geoffrey of Burton, who flourished in the year 1216; but it has thus far not been permitted us to see it. Having said these things by way of preface, I ought now to subjoin the Life itself in the manner usual with us; but I judged it should rather be deferred to the sixth of this month, when the Life of St. Monynna or Darerca will be given, so that the reader may the more conveniently compare the one with the other, and inspect how true are the things which have thus far been said.