Not one word has hitherto been said about the early traditions of either Briton or Gael. No word, either, about their early records. Nothing about the Triads, Aneurin, Taliessin, Llywarch Hen, and Merlin on the side of the Welsh; nothing about the Milesian and other legends of the Irish. Why this silence? Have the preceding investigations been so superabundantly clear as to lead us to dispense with all rays of light except those of the most unexceptionable kind?

It is an unusual piece of good fortune when this happens anywhere; and assuredly it has not happened on British or Irish ground as yet. Or has the evidence of such early records and traditions been incompatible with the doctrines of the previous chapters, and, on the strength of its inconvenience, been kept back? If so, there has been a foul piece of disingenuousness on the part of the writer. But he does not plead guilty to this. He[105] attaches but little weight to the evidence of the early British records; and the contents of the present chapter are intended to justify his depreciation of them.

The writer who asserts that the oldest work in any language is of such antiquity as to be separated from the next oldest by any very long interval—by an interval which leaves a wide chasm between the first and second specimens of the literature which no fragments and no traces of any lost compositions are found to fill up—makes an assertion which he is bound to support by evidence of the most cogent kind. For it is not always enough to shew that no intrinsic objections lie against the antiquity of the work in question. It may be so short, or so general in respect to its subject as to leave no room for contradictory and impossible sentences or expressions. It is not enough to shew that there were no reasons against such a literature being developed; since it is difficult to say what conditions absolutely forbid the production of a work stamped by no very definite characteristics. Nor yet will it suffice to say that the preservation of such a work is probable. All that can be got from all this is a presumption in its favour. The great fact of a work existing without giving this impulse to the production of others like it, and the fact of the same means of preservation being[106] wholly neglected in other instances, still stand over. They are not conclusive against certain positions; but they are circumstances which must be fairly met; circumstances which if one writer overlook, others will not; circumstances which the critic will insist on; and circumstances which, if the dazzle of a paradox, or the appeal to the innate and universal sympathy for antiquity keep them in the background for a while, will, sooner or later, rise against the author who overlooked them.

Neither are arguments from the antiquity of language conclusive. When two works differ from each other in respect to the signs of antiquity exhibited in their phraseology, the inference that the oldest in point of speech is proportionably old in point of time is not the only one. It is an easy thing to say that in the Latin literature the language of Ennius represents a date a hundred years earlier than that of Cicero, and that of Cicero a date 400 earlier than the time of Boethius, and that when we meet elsewhere compositions which differ from each other as the Latin of Ennius does from that of Boethius, there is 500 years difference between them. It is by no means certain that any two languages alter at the same rate.

But an average may be struck, and it may be said that greater antiquity of expression is primÂ[107] facie evidence of a greater antiquity of date. It is: but is only so when we are quite sure that the dialects of the two specimens are the same. There are works printed this very year in Iceland which, if their dates were unknown, would pass for being a hundred years older than the Swedish of the eleventh century.

It is only when the supporter of the authenticity of a work of singular and unique antiquity can begin with an epoch of comparatively recent date, and argue backwards through a series of continuous works, each older than the other, to one still older than any, that he can reasonably accuse the critic who demurs to his deductions of captiousness. In this way the antiquity of the oldest Chinese annals is invalidated: in this way the date of the Indian Vedas (1400 B.C.). But the great classical literatures stand the test, and from the present time to Claudian, from Claudian to Ennius, and from Ennius to Archilochus we trace a classical literature with all its works in continuity; each pointing to some one older than itself. Even this forbids an excessive antiquity to Homer.

Again—the likelihood of forgery must be continually kept in mind; so much so, that even in the unexceptionable literature of the classics, if it could be shewn that any age between the present and the eighth century B.C., were an age in[108] which the Greek drama, the Greek epics, the Greek histories, or the Greek orations could be forged, a great deal would be subtracted from the proofs of their antiquity. I do not say that it would set them aside; because everything of this kind is a question of degree; but the argument in their favour would be less exceptionable than it is.

For it cannot be too strongly urged that the preservation of records of high antiquity, in and of itself, is naturally and essentially improbable. More than half of the antiquities of the world have been lost; and this alone gives us the odds against an instance of survivorship. This has been insisted on by more than one archÆologist—more cautious and candid than the majority of his brotherhood. Whoever doubts this should look around him. How few nations have a literature! How thoroughly is the non-development of a permanent literature the exception rather than the rule! And, even when records come into existence, how numerous are the chances against their preservation. Destruction is the common law: continuance a happy rarity. For extraordinary phenomena we must have extraordinary proofs.

From the present time to the eleventh century we may trace the native Welsh literature continuously; but no farther. If any thing be older than the laws of Hoel Dhu, they must be[109] so by four centuries, with nothing in the interval. This is the measure of the value of Welsh evidence to the events of the fifth century. Writers, however, in Latin existed earlier. Still, this is unsufficient to be conclusive to the validity of a fact in the fourth. Such a statement must be tested by its own intrinsic probability. It cannot come before us invested with the dignity of a historically authenticated event. What this is will soon appear.

If this be the spirit in which we must scrutinize documentary evidence, with what eyes must we look upon traditions—traditions wherein the record, instead of being permanently registered, is transmitted from mouth to mouth, from father to son, from the old man to the young, from generation to generation? The mere etymological import of the word will mislead us. It is not enough for a thing to have been handed down from father to son. A relic may be so transmitted; indeed, written papers and printed books are traditions of this kind. Heirlooms of any sort—whether belonging to a nation or an individual—are such traditions as these.

In a true tradition we must consider the form and the origin. A narrative which has taken a definite shape, either as a formula or a poem, can scarcely be called a tradition. It is a specimen[110] of composition handed down by tradition, but not a tradition itself. It is an unwritten record—as much a record in form and nature as a written document, but differing from a written document in the manner of its transmission to posterity. Many a good judge believes that the Homeric poems are older than the art of writing, and, consequently, that they were handed down to posterity orally. Yet no one would say that the Iliad and Odyssey were Greek traditions.

The fact of a narrative having taken a permanent form, inasmuch as that permanent form both facilitates its transmission, and ensures its integrity, distinguishes an unwritten record from a tradition.

A true account of a real event transmitted from father to son in no set form of words, but told in a way that a nursery tale is told to children, or the way in which a piece of evidence is given in a court of justice, constitutes a tradition; for in this form only is it liable to those elements of uncertainty which distinguish tradition from history—elements which we must recognize, if we wish to be precise in our language.

Such is its form, or rather its want of form. But this is not enough. A tradition, to be anything at all, must have a basis in fact, and represent a real action, either accurately described or[111] but moderately misrepresented. I say moderately misrepresented, because the absolute transmission of anything beyond a mere list of names, and dates, without addition, omission, or embellishment, is a practical impossibility. Hence we must allow for some inaccuracy; just as in mechanics we must allow for friction. But, allowing for this, we must still remember that the event and the account of it, are correlative terms. An opinion—an account of an account—only takes the appearance of a tradition. It is a tradition so far as it is handed down to posterity, but it is no tradition with corresponding facts as a basis.

It is generally a theory—a theory, perhaps unconsciously formed, but still a theory. Certain phenomena, of which there is no historical explanation, excite the notice of some one less incurious than his fellows, and he attempts to account for them. On the two opposite coasts of a sea—for instance—two populations with the same manners and language, are observed to reside. A migration will account for this; and, consequently, a migration is assumed. The view, being reasonable, is generally adopted; and the fact of a migration having absolutely taken place becomes the current belief. The men who speak of this in the fourth or fifth generation, speak of it as an actual occurrence. So, perhaps, it is. But it is no tradition notwithstanding; since the record cannot[112] be traced up to the event. All that posterity has had handed-down from its ancestors, is an inference; which, even if it be as good as the historical account of an absolute event (as it sometimes is), is anything but a tradition in the strict sense of the term. Of course, the existence of the inference itself can be reduced to a fact, and, as such, produce a tradition. But this is not the tradition which is wanted—not the tradition which gives the fact in question.

These ex post facto traditions may be of any amount of value, or of any degree of worthlessness. They may be inferences of such accuracy and justice as to command the respect of the most critical; or they may involve impossibilities. The extremes are the best; the former for their intrinsic value, the latter from their unlikelihood to mislead. The most dangerous are the intermediate. Possibly, plausible, or, at any rate, without any outward and visible marks of condemnation—

What proportion do these ex post facto traditions bear to the true ones? This is difficult to say. A nickname, a genealogy, a tune may well be transmitted by tradition. So may charms, formulÆ, proverbs, and poems; yet when we come to proverbs and poems we are on the domain[113] of unwritten literature, a domain which can scarcely be identified with that of tradition. A local legend, when it is not too suspiciously adapted to the features of the place to which it applies, may also be admitted as traditional. These and but little beyond. Men rarely think about transmitting narratives until it is too late for an authentic account.

On the other hand, the very mental activity which employs itself upon the attempt to account for an unexplained phenomenon is a sign of attention; and where there is the attention to speculate, there is likely to be the desire to transmit. If so, it is probable that the proportion of transmitted speculations to true traditions is immeasurably large. But there is an other reason for ignoring the so-called traditions. When there is a tradition, and a true historical record as well, the tradition is superfluous. When a tradition stands alone, there is nothing to confirm it. What can we do then? To assume the fact from the truth of the tradition, and the truth of the tradition from the existence of the fact, is to argue in a circle. Two independent traditions, however, may confirm each other. When this happens the case is improved; but, even then, they may be but similar inferences from the same premises.

If, then, I allow no inference which I feel myself[114] justified in drawing to be disturbed by any so-called tradition; and, if instead of seeing in the accounts of our early writers a narrative transmitted by word of mouth in lieu of a record registered in writing, I deal with such apparent narratives as if they were the inferences of some later chronicler, I must not be accused of undue presumption. The statements will still be treated with respect, the more so, perhaps, because they rest on induction rather than testimony; and, as a general rule, they will be credited with the merit of being founded on just premises, even where those premises do not appear. In other words, every writer will be thought logical until there are reasons for suspecting the contrary. For a true and genuine tradition, however, I have so long sought in vain, that I despair of ever finding one. If found, it would be duly appreciated. On the other hand, by treating their counterfeits as inferences, we improve our position as investigators. A fact we must take as it is told us, and take it without any opportunity of correction—all or none; whereas, an inference can be scrutinized and amended. In the one case we receive instructions from which we are forbidden to deviate; in the other we act as judges, with a power to pronounce decisions. Nor does it unfrequently happen that our position in this respect is better[115] than that of the original writer; since, however, many may be the facts which he may have had for his opinion beyond those which he has transmitted to posterity, there are others of which he must have been ignorant, and with which we are familiar. Changing the expression, where there is anything like an equality of data, the means of using them is in favour of the later inquirer as against the earlier; in which case he understands antiquity better than the ancients—presumptuous as the doctrine may be. With a bon fide piece of testimony, however traditionary, documentary, or cotemporaneous, the case is reversed, and the modern writer must listen to his senior with thankful deference. And this it is that makes the distinction between inference and evidence so important. To mistake the former for the latter is to overvalue antiquity and exclude ourselves from a legitimate and fertile field of research. To confound the latter with the former, is to raise ourselves into criticism when our business is simply to interpret.

Proceeding to details, we find that the Historia GildÆ and the Epistola GildÆ are the two earliest works upon Anglo-Saxon Britain. For reasons which will soon appear, these works are referred to A.D. 550. The class of facts for which the evidence of a writer of this date is wanted, is that which contains the particulars of the[116] history of Britain during the last days of the Roman, and the beginning of the Anglo-Saxon domination. Amongst these, the more important would be the rebellion of Maximus, the Pict and Scot inroads, the earliest Germanic invasions, and the subordination of the Romans to the Saxons. But all these are deeds of devastation, and, as such, unfavourable to even the existence of the scanty literature necessary to record them. Again, there were two other changes, equally unfavourable to the preservation of records, going on. Pagan or Classical literature was becoming Christian or Medieval, whilst the Latin or Roman style was passing into Byzantine and Greek. Ammianus Marcellinus, the last of the Latin Pagan historians, was cotemporary with the events at the beginning of the period in question. Procopius, one of the last Pagan writers of Byzantium, died about the same time as Gildas.

Hence, the 150 years—from A.D. 400 to 550—for which alone the history of Gildas is wanted, is an era of excessive obscurity. Are the merits of the author proportionate? Is the light he brings commensurate with the darkness? What could he know? What does he tell? He tells so little that the question as to the value of his authorities is reduced to nearly nothing; and, of that little which we learn from his wordy and[117] turgid pages, the smallest fraction only is of any ethnological interest. Indeed, Gildas is most worth notice for what he leaves unsaid. The rebellion of Maximus he mentions; but he is not answerable for the migration from Britain to Brittany, on which (as already stated) so much turns. The Saxons, too, he mentions, and the name of Vortigern—but he is not answerable for the derivation of the name from the word Sahs=dagger. In regard to the important question as to the date of the invasion, and the number of the invaders, he fixes 150 years before his own time, and gives three as the number of their vessels (cyulÆ). Aurelius Ambrosius and the Pugna Badonica are especially alluded to, the date of the latter event being the date of his own birth. As this is an event which he might have known from his parents, and as the later Roman writers are our authorities until (there or thereabouts) the death of Honorius, it remains to inquire upon what testimonies Gildas gave the few events which he notices between the years 417[12] and 516. Is there anything which by suggesting the existence of native cotemporary documents should induce us to consider his evidence as conclusive? I think not. Such may or may not have existed,[118] the presumption being for or against them, according to the view which the inquirer takes respecting the literary and civilizational influences of the expiring Paganism of the Romans, and the incipient Christianity of the early British Church, combined with the antiquity of the earliest British and Irish records—a wide and complex subject, if treated generally, but if viewed with reference to the specific case before us (the authorities of Gildas), a narrow one.

In the case of Gildas it is perfectly unnecessary to assume anything of the kind. The only material facts which he gives us are the letter to Ætius for assistance, and a notice of the place which Vortigern finds in the downfall of the Romano-British empire. The first of these points to Rome rather than to Britain; the second is from the life of a Gallic missionary—St. Germanus of Auxerre. To this may be added the high probability of Gildas' work having been written in Gaul; a fact which, undoubtedly, subtracts from the little value it might otherwise possess.

The next is an author of a very different calibre, the venerable Beda; concerning whom we must remember that he stands in contrast to Gildas from being Anglo-Saxon rather than British. Now, his history is Ecclesiastical and not Civil; so that ethnological questions make no part of his inquiries, and, as far as they are treated[119] at all, they are treated incidentally. Whatever may have been the records of the Romano-British Church, or the compositions of Romano-British writers, they form no part of the materials of Beda. The most he says that, from writings and traditions along with the information derived from the monks of the Abbey of Lestingham, he wrote that part of his work which gives an account of the Christianity of the kingdom of Mercia. For the other parts of the kingdom he chiefly applied to the Bishop of the Diocese; to Albinus for the antiquities of Kent and Essex; and to Daniel for those of Wessex, the Isle of Wight, and Sussex. For Lincolnshire he had viva voce information from Cynebert, and the monks of the Abbey of Partney; and for Northumberland he made his inquiries himself. Now as Christianity was first introduced into Anglo-Saxon England by Augustine, A.D. 597, the era of the Germanic invasions lies beyond the evidence of either Beda or his authorities. Gildas, and the sources of Gildas he knew; but of access to native records of the fifth century—the century for which they are most wanted—or of the existence of such, no trace occurs in the Historia Ecclesiastica, except in the two doubtful cases which will appear in the sequel.[13]

In Nennius, more than in any other writer, do[120] we find it necessary to assume the existence of any previous historians, upon whose authority the facts of the times between the cessation of the Roman supremacy, and the consolidation of the Anglo-Saxon power may be received; and in Nennius we must, for many reasons, admit it. In the first place, he mentions more than one circumstance which he could not well have got from any other source; in the next, the preface says that what has been done has been done "partim majorum traditionibus; partem scriptis; partim etiam monumentis veterum BritanniÆ incolarum; partim et de annalibus Romanorum. Insuper et de chronicis sanctorum Patrum, Ysidori, scilicet Hieronymi, Prosperi, Eusebii, necnon et de historiis Scotorum Saxonumque, inimicorum licet, non ut volui, sed ut potui, meorum obtemperans jussionibus seniorum, unam hanc historiunculam undecunque collectam balbutiendo coacervari." But, it should be added that the authenticity of the preface is doubtful.

Nennius, then, most introduces the question as to the value of the narratives of the events of the fifth century. I cannot but put it exceedingly low. Of any historian, properly so called, there is not a trace. Neither is there of regular annals, a point which will soon be considered more fully. Nor yet of any of even the humbler forms of narrative poetry; though this is a point upon[121] which I speak with hesitation. I base my opinion, however, upon the notices of the two chief epochs—that of Vortigern and that of King Arthur. The first is from the life of St. Germanus, the second is an unadorned enumeration of three campaigns, with as little of the appearance of being derived from a poetic source as is possible.

Several genealogies occur in Nennius; and it often happens that genealogies are useful elements of criticism. British ethnology, however, is not the department in which their value is most conspicuous.

How far were the traditions of Nennius of any worth? The following is a specimen of them. "The Britons were named after Brutus; Brutus was the son of Hisicion, Hisicion of Alanus, Alanus of Rea Silvia, Rea Silvia of Numa, Numa of Pamphilus, Pamphilus of Ascanius, Ascanius of Æneas, Æneas of Anchises, Anchises of Tros, Tros of Dardanus, the son of Flire, the son of Javan, the son of Japhet. This Japhet had seven sons; the first Gomer, from whom came the Gauls; the second Magog, from whom came the Scythians and Goths; the third Aialan, from whom came the Medes; the fourth Javan, whence the Greeks; the fifth Tubal, whence the Hebrews; the sixth Mesech, whence the Cappadocians; the seventh Troias, whence the Thracians. These are the sons of Japhet, the son of Noah, the son of Lamech.[122] I will now return to the point whence I departed.

"The first man of the race of Japhet came to Europe, Alanus by name, with his three sons. Their names were Ysicion, Armenon, and Neguo. Ysicion had four sons, their names were Frank, Roman, Alemann, and Briton, from whom Britain was first inhabited. But Armenon had five sons. These are Goth, Walagoth, Cebid, Burgundian, Longobard. Neguo had four sons, Wandal, Saxon, Bogar, Turk. From Hisicio the first-born of Alan, arose four natives, the Franks, the Latins, the Alemanns, and the Britons. From Armenon, the second son of Alan, came the Goths, the Vandals, the Cebidi, and the Longobards. From Neguo, the third, the Bogars, Vandals, Saxons, and Tarinci. But these nations were subdivided over all Europe. Alanius, however, as they say, was the son of Sethevir, the son of Ogomnum, the son of Thois, the son of Boib, the son of Simeon, the son of Mair, the son of Ethac, the son of Luothar, the son of Ecthel, the son of Oothz, the son of Aborth, the son of Ra, the son of Esra, the son of Israu, the son of Barth, the son of Jonas, the son of Jabath, the son of Japhet, the son of Noah, the son of Lamech, the son of Methusalem, the son of Enoch, the son of Jareth, the son of Malalel, the son of Cainan, the son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of the living God."[123]

Surely this is but a piece of book-learning spoilt in the application. Yet what says the author?

"This genealogy I found in the traditions of the ancients, who were the inhabitants of Britain in the earliest times."—Historia Britonum, cap. xiii.

The next two works are chronicles, so-called; one British and one Anglo-Saxon; the Annales CambriÆ and the Saxon Chronicle.

The notices of the Annales CambriÆ are remarkably brief and scanty. It has scarcely one for every second year, and what it has is short and unimportant.

It begins with A.D. 447, and ends with the Norman Conquest. It is closely confined to the events of Wales.

The date and authorship are uncertain. Of the three MSS. which supply the text, one is said to be as old as A.D. 954.

When the entries began to be cotemporary with the events registered is uncertain; indeed, there is no proof that they are so anywhere. On the other hand, they cannot be earlier than A.D. 521, since the event registered there is the birth of St. Columba. Now the entry of the birth of an illustrious personage is not likely to be a cotemporaneous entry; since his greatness has yet to be achieved, and it is only the spirit of prophecy and anticipation that such a record[124] would be made at the time he merely came into the world.

The year 522, then, is the earliest possible cotemporary entry, and this is, most likely, much too early.

But the work has not the appearance of being a register of cotemporaneous events at all. In such a composition the idlest chronicler would find something to say under each year, and notices of either local events, or the great events of general interest, could scarcely fail to be entered. No one, however, will say that such a series of entries as the following from A.D. 501 to A.D. 601, can ever have constituted cotemporary history.

The notices between the brackets are not found in the Harleian MS.—one of three.

The years are counted from the commencement of the Annals, which, from circumstances independent of the text, is fixed A.D. 444. Hence,[127] lvii and clvii, coincide with A.D. 501, and A.D. 601, respectively. It is not until the last quarter of the tenth century that the entries notably improve in fulness and frequency; during which period the table was probably composed,—the earlier dates being put down not because they were of either local or general importance, but because they were known to the writer. Such, at least, is the inference from the style. Lives of Saints may have furnished them all. They agree more or less with the Irish Annals, and, probably, are to a great extent taken from the same sources.

The Annales Cambrenses contain few or no facts directly bearing upon the ethnology of Great Britain, except so far as the existence of a literary composition, of a given antiquity, is the measure of the civilization of the country to which it belongs.

One of its entries, however, has an indirect bearing. The value of Gildas depends upon the time at which he wrote. We have already seen that a small piece of autobiography in his history tells us that he was born in the year of the Bellum Badonicum. Now the date of this is got from the Annales Cambrenses, A.D. 516. There is no reason to believe it other than accurate.

It were well if such a composition as the Annales CambriÆ were called (what it really is)[128] a list of dates; since the word chronicle has a dangerous tendency to engender a very uncritical laxity of thought. It continually gets mistaken for a register; yet the two sorts of composition are wholly different. That the habit of making cotemporaneous entries of events as they happen, just as incumbents of parishes, each in his order of succession, enter the births, deaths, and marriages of their parishioners, should exist in such institutions as religious monasteries or civil guild-halls, is by no means unlikely. But, then, on the other hand, there is an equal likelihood of nothing of the sort being attempted. Hence, when a work reaches posterity in the shape of a chronicle or annals, its antiquity and value must be judged on its own merits, rather than according to any preconceived opinions.

In mechanics nothing is stronger than its weakest part, and it would be well if a similar apothegm could be extended to the criticism of such compositions as the Annales CambriÆ, and the Saxon Chronicle. It would be well if we could say that in chronological tables nothing was earlier than the latest entry. In common histories we do this. The common historian is always supposed to have composed his work subsequent to the date of the latest event contained in it—a few exceptions only being made for those authors whose works treat of cotemporary[129] actions. So it is with the annalist whose Annals, more ambitious in form than the bare chronicle, emulate, like those of the great Roman historian, the style of history. But it is not so when the notices pass a certain limit, and become short and scanty. They then suggest a comparison with the parish register, or the Olympic records, and change their character altogether. No longer mere chronological works, emanating from the pen of a single author, and referrible to some single generation, subsequent, in general, to a majority of the events set down in them, they are the productions of a series of writers, each of whom is a registrar of cotemporary events. By this an undue value attaches itself to works which have nothing in common with the register but the form.

Now, if genuine traditions are scarce, real registers are scarcer. In both cases, however, the false wears the garb of the true, and, in both cases, writers shew an equal repugnance to scrutiny. This is to be regretted; since with nine out of ten of the chronicles that have come down to us, it is far more certain that their latest facts are earlier in date than the author who records them, than that the earliest possible author can have been cotemporary with the first recorded events. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle may illustrate this. It ends in the reign of Stephen; yet[130] the writer of even the last page may have been anything but a cotemporary with the events it embodies. It begins with the invasion of Julius CÆsar. A cotemporary entry—the essential element of registration—is out of the question here.

The general rule with compositions of the kind in question is, that they fall into two parts, the first of which cannot be of equal antiquity with the events recorded, the second of which may be; and we are only too fortunate when satisfactory proofs of cotemporary composition enable us to convert the possible into the probable, the probable into the certain—the may into the must. Even when this is the case, the proportions of the cotemporary to the non-cotemporary statements are generally uncertain—a question of more or less, that must be settled by the examination of the particular composition under consideration.

Whatever may be the other merits of the Annales CambriÆ, it has no claim to the title of a register during the sixth century—and, a fortiori none during the fifth.

Neither has the Saxon Chronicle. We infer this from the extent to which it follows Beda. We infer it, too, still more certainly from the following passage—a passage which, if made in the year under which it is found, would be no record but a prophecy.[131]

A.D. 595.—"This year Æthelbriht succeeded to the kingdom of the Kentish men, and held it fifty-three years. In his days the Holy Pope Gregory sent us baptism. That was in the two-and-thirtieth year of his reign; and Columba, a mass-priest, came to the Picts and converted them to the faith of Christ. They are dwellers by the northern mountains. And their king gave him the island which is called Hi. Therein are fine hides of land, as men say. There Columba built a monastery, and he was abbot there thirty-two years, and there he died when he was seventy-seven years old. His successors still have the place. The Southern Picts had been baptized long before; Bishop Ninias, who had been instructed at Rome, had preached baptism to them, whose church and monastery is at Hwithern, hallowed in the name of St. Martin; there he resteth with many holy men. Now, in Hi there must ever be an abbot and not a bishop; and all the Scottish bishops ought to be subject to him, because Columba was an abbot, not a bishop."

Similar notices, impossible, without a vast amount of gratuitous assumption, to be considered cotemporaneous, are of frequent occurrence until long after the consolidation of the Anglo-Saxon power in England; but as the events of the fifth and sixth centuries are the[132] only events of ethnological importance, the notice of them is limited.

The Welsh poems attributed to the bards of the sixth and seventh centuries, contain no facts that will make part of any of our reasonings in the sequel. Their existence is, of course, a measure of the intellectual calibre of the time (whatever that may be) to which they refer. But this is not before us now.

In respect to the value of the Irish annals, the civil historian has a far longer list of problems than the ethnologist; since the latter wants their testimony upon a few points only, e.g., 1. The origin of the proper Irish themselves; 2. the affinities of the Picts; 3. the migration (real or supposed) of the Scots. These, at least, are the chief points. Others, of course, such as the details concerning the Danes, can be found; but the ones in question are the chief.

In respect to the first, whoever reads Dr. Prichard's[14] account of the contents of the earliest chronicles, consisting, amongst other matters, of an antediluvian CÆsar; a landing of Partholanus with his wife Ealga, on the coast of Connemara, twelve years after the Deluge, and on the 14th of May; the colony of the Neimhidh, descendants of Gog and Magog; the Fir-Bolg from the Thrace; the Tuatha de Danann from Athens;[133] and, above all, the famous Milesians, amongst whom was Nial, the intimate of Moses and Aaron, and the husband of Scota the daughter of Pharaoh, will soon satisfy himself that, with the exception of a little weight which may possibly be due to the prominence which the Spanish Peninsula takes in the several legends, the whole mass is so utterly barren in historical results, that criticism would be misplaced.

But the Pict and Scot questions are in a different predicament. Like the Roman and Anglo-Saxon conquests of Britain, the events connected with them may have occurred within the Historical period—provided only that that period begin early enough.

How far this may be the case with the Irish annals is a reasonable question.

That any existing series of Irish annals anterior to the time of the earliest extant annalist, Tigernach, who lived in the eleventh century, is cotemporary with the events which it records, so as to partake of the nature of a register, is what no one has asserted; and hence their credit rests upon that of such earlier records as may be supposed to have served as their basis.

These may be poems, genealogies, or chronicles; all of which may be admitted to have existed. How long? In a more or less imperfect form from the introduction of Christianity. Is this the[134] extreme limit in the way of antiquity? Probably; perhaps certainly. Out of all the numerous pieces of verse quoted by the annalists, one only carries us back to a Pagan period, and even this is referred to a year subsequent to the introduction of Christianity. An extract from the annals of the Four Masters is as follows, A.D. 458, twenty-seven years after the first arrival of St. Patrick "after Laogar, the son of Nial of the Nine Hostages, had reigned in Ireland thirty years, he was killed in the country of Caissi (?) between Eri and Albyn, i.e., the two hills in the country of the Faolain, and the Sun and Wind killed him, for he violated them; whence the poet sings—

The genealogies are generally contained in the poems.

As to annals partaking of the nature of registers the language of the extant compositions is unfavourable. They are mentioned, of course; but it is always some one's collection of something before his time—never the original cotemporary documents. Now the compiler is Cormac McArthur, now St. Patrick. The manner of their mention in the Four Masters is as follows:—

"A.D. 266 was the fortieth year of Cormac[135] McArthur McConn over the kingdom of Ireland, until he died at Clete, after a salmon-bone had stuck in his throat, from old prophecies which Malgon the Druid had made against him, after Cormac turned against the Druids on account of his manner of adoring God without them. For that reason the Devil (Diabul) tempted him (Malgenn) through the instigation, until he caused his death. It was Cormac who composed the precepts to be observed by kings, the manners, tribute, and ordinations of kings. He was a wise man in laws, and in things chronological and historical, for it was he who invented the laws of the judgments, and the right principles in all bargains, also the tributes, so that there was a law which bound all men even unto the present time. This Cormac McArthur was he who collected the Chronicle of Ireland into one place, Tara, until he formed from them the Chronicles of Ireland in one book, which was called (afterwards) the Psalter of Tara. In that book were the events and synchronisms of the kings of Ireland with the kings and emperors of the world, and of the kings of the provinces with the kings of Ireland."

A work of this kind, possible enough in Alexandria, is surely in need of very definite and unexceptionable testimony to make it credible as a piece of Irish history. The truly historical fact contained in the extract is the existence of a book,[136] at the time of the Four Masters, with a Christian title, and Pagan contents.

To assume anything beyond the existence of early biographies of the early propagators of Irish Christianity is unnecessary. These had an undoubted existence; sometimes in prose, sometimes in verse; and it is these that the annalists themselves chiefly refer to; the character of whose notices may be collected from the following extracts relating to the first arrival of St. Patrick.

"A.D. 430.—The second year of Laogar. In this year Pope Celestine first sent Palladius, the bishop, to Ireland, to preach the faith to the Irish, and there came with him twelve companions. Nathe, the son of Garchon, opposed him. Going onwards, however, he baptized many in Ireland; and three churches, built of wood, were built by him, the White Church, the House of the Romans, and Domnach Arta (Dominica Alta). In the White Church he left his books, and a desk with the relics of Paul, Peter, and many other martyrs. He left, too, in the churches after him these four, Augustinus, Benedictus, Silvester, and Solonius, whilst Palladius was returning to Rome, because he found not the honour due to him, when disease seized him in the country of the Picts (Cruithnech), and he died there."—Annals of the Four Masters.[137]

Again—

"A.D. 431. The fourth year of Laogar. Patrick came to Ireland this year, and imparted baptism and blessing to the Irish, men, women, sons, and daughters, except those who were unwilling to receive baptism or faith from him, as his life relates (ut narrat ejus vita). The church of Antrim was founded by Patrick, after its donation from Felim the son of Laogar, the son of Nial, to him, to Loman, and to Fortchern. Flann of the monastery has sung—

In the Books of the Schools on Divine Things the rest of this poem is to be found, i.e., De Mirabilibus FamiliÆ Patricii Orationum.

The value due to a series of Lives of Saints may be allowed to the Irish Annals subsequent to A.D. 430; and isolated events, without much reference to their importance, is what we get from[138] them. As soon as Christianity introduces the use of letters, we see our way to the preservation of the records, and the dawning of history begins.

If the annals of the Christian period rest almost wholly on Christian records, what can be the authority of the still earlier histories? Separate substantive proof of the existence of early historians, or early poets there is none. We only assume it from the events narrated. We also assume the event from the narrative; and, so doing, argue in a circle. The fact from the statement, and the statement from the fact. Such is too often the case.

An additional century of antiquity may be gained by admitting the existence of an imperfect Christianity in Ireland anterior to the time of St. Patrick—though the evidence to it is questionable. The annals anterior to A.D. 340 will still stand over. They fall into two divisions; the impossible, or self-confuting, and the possible. The latter extend over seven centuries from about B.C. 308 to A.D. 430. The former go back to the Creation, and are given up as untrustworthy by the native annalists themselves.

The early annals of the class in question which give us possible events, if they existed at all, must have been in Irish. They must also have been more or less known to King Cormac McArthur. They imply, too, the use of an alphabet. St. Patrick,[139] too, must have known them; as is implied by the following extract:—

"The tenth year of Laogar. The history and laws of Ireland purified and written out from old collections, and from the old books of Ireland which were brought together to one place at the asking of St. Patrick. These are the nine wise authors who did this. Laogar, King of Ireland, Corcc, and Daire, three kings; Patrick, Benin, Benignus (Benin), and Carnech, three Saints; Ros, Dubthach, and Fergus, three historians, as the old distich—

The Welsh antiquarian may, perhaps, observe that this likeness to the Triads is suspicious, a view to which he may find plenty of confirmation elsewhere.

Neither is it too much to say that such old poems as are quoted in respect to the events of the second and third centuries, are apparently quoted as Virgil's description of Italy under Evander might be quoted by a writer of the Middle Ages.

The events recorded are, as a general rule, probable; but they cannot be considered real until we see our way to the evidence by which they[140] could be transmitted. The probable is as often untrue, as the true is improbable. The question in all these points is one of testimony.

The most satisfactory view of that period of Irish antiquity, which is, at one and the same time, anterior to the introduction of Christianity, and subsequent to the earliest mention of Ireland by Greek, Latin, and British writers, is that the sources of its history were compositions composed out of Ireland, but containing notices of Irish events; in which case the Britons and Romans have written more about Ireland than the Irish themselves. This is an inference partly from the presumptions of the case, and partly from internal evidence.

Prichard, after Sharon Turner, has remarked that the legend of Partholanus is found in Nennius.

The Welsh name Arthur, strange to Ireland, except during the period in question, is prominent in the third century.

The Druidical religion, which on no unequivocal evidence can be shewn to have been Irish, has the same prominence during the same time.

The Fir-Bolg and Attecheith are also prominent at this time, but not later. Now the BelgÆ and Attacotti might easily be got from British or Roman writers. The soil of Ireland, as soon as its records improve, ceases to supply them.[141]

This is as far as it is necessary to proceed in the criticism of our early authorities of British, Irish, and Saxon origin, since it is not the object of the present writer to throw any unnecessary discredit over them, but only to inquire how far they are entitled to the claim of deciding certain questions finally, and of precluding criticism. It is clear that they are only to be admitted when opposed by a very slight amount of conflicting improbabilities, when speaking to points capable of being known, and when freed from several elements of error and confusion. The practical application of this inference will find place in the eleventh chapter.

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