260 



feuds with those of the earher invaders, who yet hngered in the mari- 

 time towns, as particularly detailed in the Ulster Annals in 850 and 

 851, all soon coalesced in the cruelty of their nature. Giraldus will 

 have it, and Ranulphus subscribes to his assertion, that this new set- 

 tlement of the Danes was with the consent of the natives, and under 

 the pretext of friendship and commerce,* but the promptitude and 

 continuance of their devastations would induce a contrary conviction. 



In the Easter of 852 Armagh was laid waste by these marauders, -f* 

 In 856 a great battle was fought between them and the Irish. J In 

 857 Cathaldus Albus was routed by the Danes in Munster. In 

 865 the Ulster Annals record the prodigy of a lake turned to blood, 

 which is curiously confirmed by the Chronicon Saxon,§ at the same 

 year,|| and Caradoc of Lhancarvan repeats the prodigy. In 868-9 

 Amlave destroyed and burned Armagh after much slaughter.** In 

 878 Duleek was devastated by the Danes. About the same period, 

 Buchanan states-f-t* a predatory incursion on Scotland by the people 

 of Dublin, as reprisal for damages inflicted on them ; a statement in 

 which Grafton and Cooper concur, while Boethius and Buchanan re- 

 cord a severe retaliation by Gregory, then King of Scotland, in 

 which he committed great havoc on the Irish, and took Dublin. 



In 883 the Danes despoiled Kildare and carried the monks into cap- 

 tivity, ("ad praedatorum naves.")++ In 886 they laid waste Ardbrac- 



* " Sub pads obtentu et quasi mercaturae exercendae praetextu."— Top. Hib. Dist. 3. 

 c. 43. 



f " Ardmacha ipso paschatis die a Danis devastata est" — Ant. Celt. Scand. p. 75. 

 t " Inter Melachlinum et Danos atrox ortum est bellum, quo multi utrinque cecide- 

 runt." — Ware's Ants. Hib. 



§ Cited O'Conor, Rer. Hib. Script, vol. 4. p. 228. 



II " Hoc anno contigit in Britannia sanguinea pluvia, lac item et butyrum con versa fuere in 

 sanguinem." 



«* Annal. Ulton. and Ware's Ant. Hib. ff Rer. Scot. Hist. 73rd king. 



Xt Trias Thaum. p. 629. 



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