Celtic Scotland : $b A history of ancient Alban. Volume 2 (of 3), Church and cultureSkene, W. F. (William Forbes)
History
Celtic Scotland : $b A history of ancient Alban. Volume 2 (of 3), Church and culture
Skene, W. F. (William Forbes)
Celts -- Scotland; Civilization, Celtic; Scotland -- Antiquities, Celtic; Scotland -- History -- To 1603
Now these two forms of the legend are in very striking contrast to each
other, especially in the part which Regulus plays in each. In the former
and older legend, he makes his first appearance when he meets the king
at the gate called _Matha_ with the relics. In the latter he is
introduced into the history of the removal of the relics from Patras,
and reserves a portion to be conveyed to a distant land; and thus, along
with him, the whole history is removed back to the fourth century. His
character too, and that of his foundation, is quite different in the two
legends. In the older he is presented to us as a monk and abbot. He and
all his people follow a monastic life at St. Andrews, and he founds
abbacies or monasteries. He possesses the third part of all Scotia, and
devotes it to the foundation of abbacies or monasteries throughout the
whole of it. In the later legend he appears as a bishop. He has two
presbyters and two Deacons among his followers, and he founds churches
and oratories which are dedicated to St. Andrew. In the one we have a
purely monastic foundation; in the other a church with secular clergy.
The older legend, therefore, takes us back for Regulus to the Monastic
Church which had been founded among the southern Picts by Columba
towards the end of the sixth century, and to it we must look for the
Regulus of this form of the legend. Now, we find it stated in the Acts
of Farannan that, after the great synod of Drumceitt in the year 573,
which was attended both by Columba and by Aidan, king of Dalriada, the
former, before he returned to Britain, founded a church in the Region of
Cairbre. This was the church of Drumcliffe, situated a little to the
north of Sligo, in the barony of Cairbury and diocese of Elphin, the
foundation of which is attributed to Columba in the old Irish Life. We
are then told that on this occasion he was met by the leading
ecclesiastics of the neighbourhood, with the men and women most noted
for sanctity, who accompanied him in some of his wanderings. Now, among
these ecclesiastics we find recorded the name of Regulus, or Riagail, of
Muicinis, an island in the lake formed by the river Shannon called Loch
Derg;[493] and this Regulus appears in the old Irish Martyrologies on
the 16th day of October. In the Felire of Angus the Culdee there is
commemorated, on that day, ‘Riagail, gifted was his career;’ and the
gloss is, ‘that is, Riagail of Muicinish, in Loch Derg.’[494] Regulus of
St. Andrews, however, is commemorated in the Scottish Calendar on the
17th of the same month; and we find that there is usually a confusion in
the celebrations on these two days, when the 16th day of the month is
also the 17th day before the kalends of the next month.[495] We also
find that, while the name of the Irish Regulus’ foundation is
_Muicinis_, or the isle of swine, the name of St. Andrews, before it
received that of Chilrymont, is said in the second legend to have been
_Muicross_, or the promontory of swine.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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