An Early Medieval Source, of Interest, about the Irish
Contents:
1. Introduction.
2. Historical Background. Wikipedia Sources
(a) Henry-2 of England Takes Possession of Ireland
(b) Gerald of Wales (c. 1146 - c. 1223)
3. Description of the Irish. Extracts.
Irish Dress; Battle Customs; Husbandry; Mineral Wealth; Industry; Behavior; Crowning an Irish King (Public ceremonial bestiality); Musical Ability
4. The Migrations to Ireland
Daughters of Cain; Caesara; Bartholanus-Partholon-Terah-Serah-the Giants; Nemedius of Scythia, Fomorians; Milesius, Herimon, Hebrew, Gaedel-Gael, Scotta;
Basclenses from Gascony (southwest France).
5. Brit-Am Comments on the Migrations to Ireland
6. Geoffrey of Monmouth on Partholon
7. Partholon from Israel?
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1. Introduction.
Gerald of Wales wrote a description of Ireland which he visited in 1185. This description contains information of interest to us. We are especially interested in the description of Irish society at that time and the summary of Irish history. We only read a few pertinent portions of this work but we found it quite readable, entertaining, and of interest.
Topographia Hibernica (first published 1188, and revised at least four more times) is the account of the journey of Gerald to Ireland.
We have used two sources:
Sources:
(1) Gerald of Wales, History and topography of Ireland,
translated by Thomas Forester revised and edited with additional notes by Thomas Wright (Cambridge, Ontarion 2000)
http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/topography_ireland.pdf
(2) Gerald of Wales, History and topography of Ireland, ed. John J. O'Meara (London 1982),
fragments of pp 100-110
http://historyireland.blogspot.co.il/2009/10/gerald-of-wales.html
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2. Historical Background. Wikipedia Sources
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(a) Henry-2 of England Takes Possession of Ireland
Norman invasion of Ireland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_invasion_of_Ireland
The Norman invasion of Ireland was a two-stage process, which began on 1 May 1169 when a force of loosely associated Norman knights [from England]
[with Norman, Welsh and Flemish forces] landed near Bannow, County Wexford at the request of Diarmait Mac Murchada, the ousted King of Leinster [south center, south of Dublin] who sought their help in regaining his kingdom.
On 18 October 1171, Henry II [of England] landed a much bigger army in Waterford to ensure his continuing control over the preceding Norman force. In the process he took Dublin and had accepted the fealty of the Irish kings and bishops by 1172, so creating the Lordship of Ireland, which formed part of his Angevin Empire
In 1155, Pope Adrian IV, the only English pope, issued a papal bull (known as Laudabiliter) that gave Henry II permission to invade Ireland as a means of strengthening the Papacy's control over the Irish Church.[
In 1185 Henry awarded his Irish territories to his 18-year-old youngest son, John, with the title Dominus Hiberniae ("Lord of Ireland"), and planned to establish it as a kingdom for him.
[John made a trip to Ireland which Gerald of Wales accompanied and wrote his description of the island.]
When John unexpectedly succeeded his brother Richard as king in 1199, the Lordship became a possession of the English Crown.
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(b) Gerald of Wales (c. 1146 - c. 1223),
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_of_Wales
also known as Gerallt Gymro in Welsh or Giraldus Cambrensis in Latin, archdeacon of Brecon, was a medieval clergyman and chronicler of his times. Born ca. 1146 at Manorbier Castle in Pembrokeshire, Wales, he was of mixed Norman and Welsh descent; he is also known as Gerald de Barri.
Gerald became a royal clerk and chaplain to King Henry II of England in 1184, first acting mediator between the crown and Prince Rhys ap Gruffydd. He was chosen to accompany one of the king's sons, John, in 1185 on John's first expedition to Ireland.
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3. Description of the Irish. Extracts.
Gerald of Wales, History and topography of Ireland, ed. John J. O'Meara (London 1982),
fragments of pp 100-110
http://historyireland.blogspot.co.il/2009/10/gerald-of-wales.html
Quotation:
I have thought it not superfluous to say a few things about the nature of this people both in mind and body, that is to say, of their mental and physical characteristics.
Irish Dress
Although they are fully endowed with natural gifts, their external characteristics of beard and dress, and internal cultivation of the mind, are so barbarous that they cannot be said to have any culture. They use very little wool in their dress and that itself nearly always black , because the sheep of that country are black, and made up in a barbarous fashion. For they wear little hoods, close-fitting and stretched across the shoulders and down to a length of about eighteen to twenty-two inches, and generally sewn together from cloths of various kinds, Under these they wear mantles instead of cloaks. They also use woollen trousers that are at the same time boots, or boots that are at the same time trousers, and these are for the most part dyed.
Battle Customs
When they are riding, they do not use saddles or leggings or spurs, Moreover, they go naked and unarmed into battle. They regard weapons as a burden, and they think it brave and honourable to fight unarmed. They use, however, three types of weapons, short spears, two darts, and big axes well and carefully forged, which they have taken over from the Norwegians and the Ostmen. They are quicker and more expert than any other people in throwing, when everything else fails, stones as missiles, and such stones do great damage to the enemy in an engagement.
Husbandry
They are a wild and inhospitable people. The live on beast only, and live like beasts. They have not progressed at all from the primitive habits of pastoral living. While man usually progresses from the woods to the fields, and from fields to settlements and communities of citizens, this people despises work on the land, has little use for the money-making of towns, contemns the rights and privileges of citizenship, and desires neither to abandon, nor lose respect for, the life which it has been accustomed to lead in the woods and countryside.
They use the fields generally as pasture, but pasture in poor condition. Little is cultivated, and even less sown. The fields cultivated are so few because of the neglect of those who should cultivate them. But many of them are naturally very fertile and productive. The wealth of the soil is lost, not through the fault of the soil, but because there are no farmers to cultivate even the best land: 'the fields demand, but there are no hands.' How few kinds of fruit-bearing trees are grown here! The nature of the soil is not to be blamed, but rather the want of industry on the part of the cultivator. He is too lazy to plant the foreign types of trees that would grow very well here.
Mineral Wealth
The different types of minerals, too, with which the hidden veins of the earth are full, are not mined or put to any use, precisely because of the same laziness. Even gold, of which they are very desirous, just like the Spaniards, and which they would like to have in abundance, is brought here by traders that search the ocean for gain.
Industry
They do not devote their lives to the processing of flax or wool, or to any kind of merchandise or mechanical art. For given only to leisure, and devoted only to laziness, they think that the greatest pleasure is not to work, and the greatest wealth is to enjoy liberty.
Behavior
This people is, then, a barbarous people, literally barbarous. Judged according to modern ideas, they are uncultivated, not only in the external appearance of their dress, but also in their flowing hair and beards. All their habits are the habits of barbarians. Since conventions are formed from living together in society, and since they are so removed in these distant parts from the ordinary world of men, as if they were in another world altogether and consequently cut off from well-behaved and law-abiding people, they know only of the barbarous habits in which they were born and brought up, and embrace them as another nature. Their natural qualities are excellent. But almost everything acquired is deplorable.
This is a filthy people, wallowing in vice. Of all peoples, it is the least instructed in the rudiments of the Faith. They do not yet pay tithes or first fruits or contract marriages. They do not avoid incest. They do not attend God's church with due reverence. Moreover, and this is surely a detestable thing, and contrary not only to the Faith but to any feeling of honour , men in many places in Ireland, I shall not say marry, but rather debauch, the wives of their dead brothers. They abuse them in having such evil and incestuous relations with them.
Moreover, above all other peoples they always practise treachery. When they give their word to anyone, they do not keep it. They do not blush or fear to violate every day the bond of their pledge and oath given to others, although they are very keen that it should be observed with regard to themselves. When you have employed every safeguard and used every precaution for your own safety and security, both by means of oaths and hostages, and friendships firmly cemented, and all kinds of benefits conferred, then you must be especially on your guard, because then especially their malice seeks a chance.
From an old and evil custom they always carry an axe in their hand as if it were a staff. In this way, if they have a feeling for any evil, they can the more quickly give it effect. Wherever they go they drag this along with them. When they see the opportunity, and the occasion presents itself, this weapon has not to be unsheathed as a sword, or bent as a bow, or poised as a spear. Without further preparation, beyond being raised a little, it inflicts a mortal blow. At hand, or rather, in the hand and ever ready is that which is enough to cause death.
Crowning an Irish King
Woe to brothers among a barbarous people! Woe to kinsmen! When they are alive they are relentlessly driven to death. When they are dead and gone, vengeance is demanded for them. If this people has any love or loyalty, it is kept only for foster children and foster brothers. There is in the northern and farther part of Ulster, namely in Kenelcunill, a certain people which is accustomed to appoint its king with a rite altogether outlandish and abominable. When the whole people of that land has been gathered together in one place, a white mare is brought forward into the middle of the assembly. He who is to be inaugurated, not as a chief, but as a beast, not as a king, but as an outlaw, has bestial intercourse with her before all, professing himself to be a beast also. The mare is then killed immediately, cut up in pieces, and boiled in water. A bath is prepared for the man afterwards in the same water. He sits in the bath surrounded by all his people, and all, he and they, eat of the meat of the mare, which is brought to them. He quaffs and drinks of the broth in which he is bathed, not in any cup, or using his hand, but just dipping his mouth into it round about him. When this unrighteous rite has been carried out, his kingship and dominion have been conferred.
Musical Ability
I find among these people commendable diligence only on musical instruments, on which they are incomparably more skilled than any nation I have seen. Their style is not, as on the British instruments to which we are accustomed, deliberate and solem but quick and lively; nevertheless the sound is smooth and pleasant.
It is remarkable that, with such rapid fingerwork, the musical rhythm is maintained and that, by unfailingly disciplined art, the integrity of the tune is fully preserved throughout the ornate rhythms and the profusely intricate polyphony, and with such smooth rapidity, such 'unequal equality', such 'discordant concord'. Whether the strings strike together a fourth or a fifth, [the players] nevertheless always start from B flat and return to the same, so that everything is rounded off in a pleasant general sonority. They introduce and leave rhythmic motifs so subtly, they play the tinkling sounds on the thinner strings above the sustained sound of the thicker string so freely, they take such secret delight and caress [the strings] so sensuously, that the greatest part of their art seems to lie in veiling it, as if 'That which is concealed is bettered, art revealed is art shamed'.
Thus it happens that those things which bring private and ineffable delight to people of subtle appreciation and sharp discernment, burden rather than delight the ears of those who, in spite of looking do not see and in spite of hearing do not understand; to unwilling listeners, fastidious things appear tedious and have a confused and disordered sound.
One must note that both Scotland and Wales, the latter by virtue of extension, the former by affinity and intercourse, depend on teaching to imitate and rival Ireland in musical practice. Ireland uses and delights in two instruments only, the cithara (likely a harp) and the tympanum (perhaps a hammer dulcimer). Scotland uses three, the cithara, the tympanum and the chorus. Wales uses the cithara, tibiae (whistles, flutes) and chorus. Also, they use strings made of brass not of leather. However, in the opinion of many, Scotland today not only equals Ireland, her mistress, but also by far outdoes and surpasses her in musical skill. Hence many people already look there as though to the source of the art.
End Quotes
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4. The Migrations to Ireland
Source:
Gerald of Wales, History and topography of Ireland,
translated by Thomas Forester revised and edited with additional notes by Thomas Wright (Cambridge, Ontarion 2000)
http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/topography_ireland.pdf
pp.63 ff Distinction 3, chapter 1 of the inhabitants of this country.
Summary
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Daughters of Cain
Forrester footnote p.63 no.135 quotes from Keating, first colony of Ireland was of three beautiful women, daughters of Cain, and their husbands.
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Caesara
Ist colony:
Caesara grand-daughter of Noah with three men and 50 women.
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Bartholanus-Partholon-Terah-Serah-the Giants
2nd migration
Bartholanus sun of Terah a descendant of Japheth. 3 sons: Languinus, Salanus, Ruturugus.
n. 136 called Partholan in Irish annals. In some manuscripts of Gerald, Terah is called Serah. Partholan was driven from Greece, passed by Sicily, reached Spain, then Ireland at Kerry.
Bartholanus fought against the Giants who also dwelt in Ireland.
Ruanus alone survived a plague that struck Bartholanus and his followers. Ruanus lived long, until the time of St.Patrick.
n. Ruanus also known as Tuan in Ogygia, reincarnated as a salmon fish son of Carrel king of Ulster.
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Nemedius of Scythia, Fomorians
3rd migration
Nemedius son of Agnominius, a Scythian arrived in Ireland which was desolate at the time. 4 sons: Starius, Gerbaueles, Antimus, Fergusius
Nemedius fought against pirates and died in the south of Ireland.
n.142 pirates identified with Fomorians, powerful sea-rovers from Africa.
Nemedians perished in war against Giants.
n. 143 not giants but Fomorians who drove them from Ireland.
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Dela, Firbolg
4th migration
Sons of Dela, descendants of Nemedians who had gone to Greece and then returned to Ireland.
Five brothers divided Ireland into five parts.
Gandius, Genandius, Sagandius, Rutherrargus, Slanius
n144 sons of Dela identified with Firbolgs.
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Milesius, Herimon, Hebrew, Gaedel-Gael, Scotta
5th migration King Milesius from Spain. 2 sons Herimon and Heber.
Irish (Hibernenses) named after Heber or after the River Hiberus (Ebro) in Spain.
Irish also known as Gaedeli and Scots.
Gaidelus a grandson of Phaenius married Scota daughter of Pharoah.
n150 Phaenius King of Scythia invented Ogham script. Nial grandson of Phaenius went to Egypt, married Scota, begat Gaedel from whom came the name Gael.
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Basclenses from Gascony (southwest France)
6th Migration?
Gurguntious son of Belinus son of Brennus king of the Britons whose father had conquered Denmark met at the Hebrides a fleet of Basclenses from Spain.
Gave them Ireland which was then almost deserted or thinly populated
Basclenses from Gascony. Basclonia (Biscay) from whence the Irish came.
n.152 Henry-2 of England ruled over the whole of the southwest of France.
Gerald describes the Irish as a pastoral people holding agriculture in contempt, hardly any land sown.
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5. Brit-Am Comments on the Migrations to Ireland
Terah father of Bartholanus has the same name as the father of Abraham.
Genesis 11:
27 Now these are the descendants of Terah. Terah was the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran was the father of Lot.
The other name of Terah, Serah, sound like a name given to Israel. In Assyrian inscriptions the northern Ten Tribes are referred to as Sirila.
This may have been a name they applied to themselves.
Other Irish sources mention Isra which is short for Israel.
The Basclenses take their name from the Basques. The Basques are found in both northwest Spain and in Gascony of southwest France. There may be links between the Basques and the Irish as has been claimed by some modern scholars.
There was also a claim that DNA shows such a connection but this claim has since been discounted.
In general the male YDNA of the basques may show some similarity to that of the British Isles but the female mtDNA is different.
The editor, Thomas Forester, says the information about the Basclenses is taken from Geoffrey of Monmouth, book 3;12.
Thomas Forester says:
n.151, "The Basclenses are evidently the Basques but this colony does not appear to be admitted by Irish writers".
Henry-2 whom Gerald served ruled over Gascony and claimed suzerainty over Ireland. By emphasizing the claim that the Irish came from Gascony Gerald may somehow have been trying to strengthen the claims of Henry to rule Ireland.
This account as well as others of the Irish mentions the presence of Giants, Pirates, Fomorians from North Africa, etc, but few details are given.
It may be that it became fashionable to ignore their presence but nevertheless they seem to have been there.
There are also periods in which the accounts say Ireland was depopulated.
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6. Geoffrey of Monmouth on Partholon
The Source.
Histories of the Kings of Britain, by Geoffry of Monmouth, tr. by Sebastian Evans, [1904], at sacred-texts.com
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/gem/gem04.htm
CHAPTER XII
At that time, when he was returning home after the victory by the Isles of Orkney, he fell in with thirty ships thronged with men and women, and when he made inquiry as to the reason of their coming thither, their Duke, Partholoim by name, came unto him, and, doing him much worship, besought pardon of him and peace. He had been banished, he said, from the parts of Spain, and was cruising in those waters in search of a land wherein to settle. He made petition, moreover, that some small share of Britain might be allotted unto them wherein to dwell, so as that they need no longer rove the irksome highways of the sea. Wherefore, when Gurgiunt Brabtruc had learnt that they came out of Spain and were called Barclenses, and that this was the drift of their petition, he sent men with them to the island of Hibernia which at that time was desert without a single inhabitant, and made them a grant thereof. Thenceforward they did there increase and multiply, and have held the island even unto this day. But Gurgiunt Brabtruc, when that he had fulfilled the days of his life in peace, was buried in the City of Legions which after his father's death he had made it his care to beautify with public buildings and walls.
Geoffrey here identifies the People of Partholoan with the Barclenses who came out of Spain. Forrester says these are the same as the Bascenses ,mentioned by Gerald.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, c. 1100- c. 1155, overlapped Gerald of Wales (c. 1146 - c. 1223). Geoffrey would also have been influenced by court policy of wishing to strengthen
Norman-English claims to Ireland.
Geoffrey on many points is similar to Nennius (800s CE).
Nennius (who like Gerald, and Geoffrey, was also Welsh) also traced the Britons to Scythians who had been expelled from Egypt, went to Spain ,and from there came to Britain.
See:
The Israelite and Scythian Origins of the Scots in Early British Tradition.
http://www.britam.org/Nennius.html
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7. Partholon from Israel?
The chief source however of Geoffrey of Monmouth as that of his friend Walter of Oxford (died 1151), also known as Walter Calenius, archdeacon of Oxford .
There is a Welsh version derived from, or parallel, to that of Geoffrey.
This source according to Raymond McNair (1973) says that Partholon before going to Spain had originally arrived from the Land of Israel.
In 1581 Vincenzio Galilei (father of the astronomer, Galileo Galilei) wrote that the Irish believed themselves descended from David, King of Israel, and that was why they used a harp as their symbol.
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