175 



confirms.* In this year too, was held the celebrated conference at 

 the nunnery of Whitby, concerning the Paschal question, and some 

 other matters of ecclesiastical discipline, at which Colman with his 

 Irish clergy attended. -f All the circumstances here stated as of this 

 year, are also referred by Hermannus Contractus to the same time.|. 



In 673, according to Eddius,§ Dagobert, prince of Austrasia, 

 after an exile of eighteen years in Ireland, was restored to his throne 

 and native country. (The Abbey of Slane was that in which he is 

 supposed to have resided. )|| According to Dupin,** part of Ireland 

 was about this time overrun by the troops of Gurmond, from Africa, 

 who afterwards passed into Engknd ; and the same author imme- 

 diately after mentions the melancholy devastation of Ireland by Bert, 

 the general of King Egfrid, which Bede referring to, A. D. 6'84, not 

 only pathetically laments as perpetrated on an unoffending people, 

 and as charactered by unrestrained sacrileges in churches and monas- 

 teries, but even attributes adversities, that soon after befel the English, 

 to the crying guilt of this expedition. -f-f- 



* " HsRC plaga Hiberniam quoque insulam pari clade premebat. Erant ibidem eo tem- 

 pore multi nobilium simul et mediocrium de gente Anglorum, &c." — Eccl. Hist. lib. .3. c. 27, 

 See post, fourth section of this Period. 



t See Bede, Eccl. Hist. lib. 3. c. 25. + See Biblioth. Patr. vol. 18. p. 367. 



§ " Daegberth in juventute sua, ab inimicis regnantibus perditioni pulsus, navigando insu- 

 lam Deo juvante pervenit. Post annorum circulum amici et propinqui ejus viventem el in 

 perfecta aetate florentem a navigantibus audientes, misere nuntios suos ad beatum Wilfridum 

 Episcopum, petentes ut eum de Scotia et [aut] Hibernia ad se invitasset, et sibi ad Regem emi- 

 sisset; et sicsanctus Pontifex noster perfecit, suscipiens eum deHibernia venientem, « * * * 

 magnifice ad suam regionem emisit,"— Vita Wilfridi, in Gale's Collection of ancient British 

 Historians. 



II Camden's Britannia, v. 3. p. 567. •* Hist. Profan. v. 4. p. 133. 



ft " Anno Dom. Incarn. 684. Ecgfridus Rex Nordan-Humbrorum, misso in Hibemiam 

 cum exercitu duce Berto, vastavit misere gentem innoxiam et nationi Anglorum semper ami- 

 cissimam ; ita ut nee eoclesiis quidem aut monasteriis manus parceret hostilis. At insulani et 

 quantum valuere armis arma repellebant, et invocantes divinse auxilium pietatis, &c. * * * 



