Uses of the Round Towers of Ireland, fyc. 335 



rated among the ecclesiastical presents given to Fiac, bishop of Sletty, when 

 Patrick conferred the episcopal dignity upon him. The passage is as follows : 



" Oubbepc 5pao n-eppcoip poip, Comoe eppcop mp in cirap uoipcneo la Ccnjniu, 7 oubbepc 

 pacpicc Cumcach ou PIQCC, aoon clocc 7 menpcip 7 bachall 7 poolipe; ec pacab moppepep 

 laip oia muinnp." 



" He [Patrick] conferred the degree of bishop upon him [Fiacc], so that he was the first bishop 

 that was ordained among the Lagenians, and Patrick gave a Cumtach [a box] to Fiacc, viz. [i. e. 

 containing] a bell, and a menstir, and a crozier, and a poolire; and he left seven of his people with 

 him." 



This same passage occurs in the MS. H. 3, 18, p. 526, glossing the word 

 meinifcip by nnnna atpcip, travelling relics, but omitting, probably through 

 an error of the transcriber, the word bacall; thus : 



" t)o bepc can pacpaic cumcac oa piacc, .1. cloc, meimpcip, .1. mmna aiptip, polaipe 7 

 popaccaib mop-peipep oia mumncip leip." 



" Patrick then gave Fiacc a citmtach, i. e. a bell, a meinistir, i. e. travelling relics, a polaire, and 

 left seven of his people with him." 



And here I may remark, that the learned Colgan has committed an egre- 

 gious oversight in his translation of the original Irish of this passage in the 

 Tripartite Life, in which these articles are enumerated, namely, in rendering 

 the word minipcip as if it were an adjective in connexion with cloc, and, 

 still worse, rendering the word poolaipe as the Epistles of St. Paul. 



" Ecclesiam sedificauit primo S. Fiechus in loco, qui ex eius nomine Domnach-Fiec, .i. Ecclesia 

 Fieci postea appellata est : eique reliquit sacram supellectilem, cymbalum nempe ministeriale, 

 Epistolas Paulinas, et baculum pastoralem." Pars 3, cap. XXII. Trias T/iaum., pp. 152, 153. 



And I should remark that these words, menstir and poolire, in the original 

 passage in the Annotations of Tirechan, have received an equally blundering, 

 though different, interpretation in the Antiquarian Researches of Sir W. Betham, 

 in which the first is rendered " a mitre," and the second " a cloak (pallium)." 

 I am not, of course, so unreasonable as to expect that the author ofiheJEtruria 

 Celtic a should have any acquaintance with historical facts of this late period ; 

 these do not lie in the way of his researches : but my late ingenious friend, 

 Mr. Edward O'Reilly, who translated this passage for him, should have known 

 that no allusion to the use of the mitre at this period, or for some ages after, is 

 found in any of our ancient authorities, for Archdall's statement as to the mitre 

 of St. Ailbhe, which, he says, was burned in 1123, is founded on an erroneous 



