ON ST. COLMOC OR COLM,
BISHOP IN SCOTLAND.
A Notice from the Breviaries and Scottish writers.
ABOUT THE YEAR 1000.
CommentaryColmoc, or Colm, Bishop in Scotland (St.)
G. H.
In the Breviary of the Episcopal Church of Aberdeen among the Scots, on this sixth day of June, is set forth the veneration of St. Colmoc, or Colm, Bishop and Confessor in Scotland, Sacred cult. commonly St. Colm, under King Kenneth III in the year one thousand. And this Collect is added. Infuse into our minds, almighty God, the glory of thy praise, that while we keep the festivity of Blessed Colmoc thy Confessor and Bishop, we may, by his intercession, be transferred into eternal refreshments. Thus there concerning the sacred veneration of St. Colmoc.
[2] Hector Boethius in book 11 of the History of the Scots, and John Leslie Bishop of Ross in book 5 on the Deeds of the Scots chapter 80, set forth Kenneth the third King, and assert that he reigned from the year 978 until the year 1000, and that there flourished at that time in Scotland the most holy Bishops Moveanus, Medanus, Blaanus, Englatius, and Colmoc. Thomas Dempster, citing the Calendar, whether of Adam Regius or of another, on this 6th of June, celebrates St. Colm, the Apostle of the Orkneys, Whether Bishop of the Orkneys, at Kirkwall. The same Dempster in book 3 of the Ecclesiastical History of the Scottish Nation chapter 267, citing the Scottish Breviary, composed this Elogium for him: St. Colm shone before his own by the incomparable sanctity of his life, a most learned Bishop of the Orkneys: who, consecrated at Rome, intimate with Benedict VII, dedicated to him his works… He flourished in the year one thousand and ten, with a certain special religion: he dedicated various temples to God under his own invocation. On the 6th day of June. Now Benedict VII presided over the Church from the year 965 to the 82nd year of the said century. But David Camerarius, on the day of the 9th of March, celebrates St. Colm, Bishop of the Orkney Islands: and bids the Scottish Annals be consulted. But which? Surely those of the said Dempster, who had published the cited books before him? Or perhaps he means the said Leslie, and Hector Boethius related above? These are followed by George Conn in book 1 on the twofold state of religion among the Scots page 52, and John Spotswood, Archbishop of St. Andrews, in book 2 of the Church of the Scots page 27.
[3] The Episcopal See of the Orkneys is indicated as Kirkwall, by the inhabitants sometimes Kirckwal, in the city of Kirkwall? where most beautiful buildings, in the time of Queen Mary, built by Robert Reid Bishop of the Orkneys, Robert Gordon indicates in his
new description of Scotland. These things we set forth to the reader, as sufficiently probable. I add that there seem to be understood of the same Bishop the things which the same Dempster in book 3 of the Ecclesiastical History chapter 255, as of a different one, has: St. Colmoc the Bishop, with the highest integrity of life, censured the vices of his fellow-citizens with admirable freedom: and when they would not come to their senses, nor return to good fruit; his threats obtained a most grievous effect, a cruel civil war breaking out between Constantine the King and Malcolm son of King Kenneth… He died about the year 1010. That he is inscribed in the Roll of the Saints, the Scoti-chronicon writes, and the temples erected to him testify. He is venerated on the 4th of May, translated on the 5th of February.
[4] whether the same is venerated at Banff? The same Dempster in the Scottish Martyrology on the 4th of May says: At Banff, of Colmoc the Bishop, a wonderful preacher, and cites the Scottish Breviary and Hector Boethius. Banff is in transmontane Scotland, whence the prefecture of Banff is so called there. It was possible that there, one and the same Saint, under the name of Colmoc, had a cult; just as at Kirkwall among the Orkneys, under the name of Colm. The books which Dempster ascribes to each we have omitted to enumerate; because he himself seems, for the sake of his homeland, to have invented them; and on that account concerning such things his faith wavers among learned men. We confess further, that, while we treat of Scottish matters, very many obscure things occur, which we are altogether not confident can be illustrated by us. And such seems to be the Life which is appended to this Saint in the Aberdeen Breviary, distinguished into nine Lessons. For in this the Saint himself is transferred to the Bishopric of Dromore in Ulster, where in James Ware the Bishop is called Colman; and by an old Scholiast of the Aengusian Martyrology is called Mocolmoc; and stupendous miracles are fastened on him, from the Life of St. Colman the Bishop: but since this man is said to have flourished in the sixth century of Christ, he ought to be reckoned different from St. Colmoc or Colm, of whom we here treat.
According to the order of age and the Catalogue of Saints prefixed to this day, there ought to follow the Commentary on St. Norbert; unless other reasons advised both to crown the day and the Tome with so illustrious a subject.