When we read of such a number of monasteries constructed within a short period, so many of them, too, the work of one saint, we must not suppose that they at all resembled the elaborate stone structures which constituted the monastery of the Middle Ages. The primitive Celtic monastery was a very simple affair, and more resembled a rude village of wooden huts. We find from the Irish Life of Columba that, when he went to the monastery of Mobhi Clairenach, on the banks of the river Finglass, where no fewer than fifty scholars were assembled, their huts or bothies (_botha_) were by the water, or river, on the west, and that there was an _ecclais_, or church, on the east side of the river, which was no doubt, as was usual at the time, made of no better material. Thus it is told of Mochaoi, abbot of Nendrum, that on one occasion he went with seven score young men to cut wattles to make the _ecclais_, or church.[114] When Ciaran of Saighir, who was one of the twelve apostles of Ireland, proceeded to erect his huts and church, he is said to have constructed them of the rudest materials, and when he went into the wood for these a wild boar assisted him by biting off with his sharp teeth the rods and branches for the purpose.[115] Coemgen of Glendalough, too, built his oratory of rods of wood, planks, and moss;[116] and in Conchubran’s Life of Monenna we are told that ‘she founded a monastery, which was made of smooth planks, according to the fashion of the Scottish nations, who were not accustomed to erect stone walls or get them erected.’[117] The church in these early monasteries was thus, as well as the huts or bothies for the accommodation of the monks, frequently built of wood; and the usual name given to this early wooden church was _Duirthech_, or _Deirthech_, of which the Latin equivalent was ‘oratorium.’ Of this word various etymologies are given; but the most probable is that contained in an old glossary which tells us that _Duirtheach_ comes from _Dairthech_, a house of oak, and _Deirthech_ from _Dear_, a tear, that is, a house in which tears are shed.[118]