330 



Mr. PETRIE'S Inquiry into the Origin and 



As a specimen of the triplicate, pear-shaped ornament already described, I 

 annex the following outline of the lower side, or bottom, of the same case : 



I should remark, that the ornaments on this case are all in a kind of basso 

 relievo, produced by stamping the leather, a fact which may account for the 

 irregularities which appear in their forms, and which would be produced by 

 the unequal contraction of the leather in drying, after it had been in a moist 

 or soft state when stamped. 



The history of the very remarkable and interesting manuscript, of which 

 this leather bag, or satchel, was the external case, is, I am aAvare, sufficiently 

 known to many of my readers, and particularly those of the Academy, for 

 whom I especially write ; but for others, it may not be unnecessary or uninte- 

 resting to state, that this manuscript was that celebrated book of the Gospels 

 called the Canoin Patraic, or Patrick's Canons, which was considered of 

 such inestimable value, that its safe stewardship became an hereditary office of 

 dignity in a family connected with the church of Armagh, who derived their 

 name, Mac Moyre, or son of the Stewart, from this circumstance, and as a 

 remuneration for which they held no less than eight townlands in the county, 

 still known as the lands of Bally Mac Moyre, or Mac Moyre's Town. So great, 

 indeed, was the veneration in which this book, together with the crozier of 

 Patrick, were held by the Irish, that, as St. Bernard tells us, in his Life of St. 

 Malachy, it was difficult to persuade the people to receive or acknowledge any 

 one as the rightful Archbishop of Armagh but the possessor of them. 



" Porro Nigellus videns sibi imminere fugam, tulit secum insignia qujedam sedis illius, textum, 

 scilicet Euangeliorum, qui fuitbeati Patritij, baculumque auro tectum gemmis pretiosissimis ador- 

 natum : quern nominant baculum lesu, eo quod ipse Dominus (vt fert opinio) eum suis manibus 

 tenuerit atque formauerit. Et haec summse dignitatis et venerationis in gente ilia. Nempe notis- 

 sima sunt celeberrimaq ; in populis, atque in ea reuerentia apud omnes, vt qui ilia habere visus 

 fuerit ipsum habeat Episcopum populus stultus et insipiens." Vita Malac/iice, cap. v. 



The subsequent history of this book is comprised in the following account 



