334 



come to Armagh, as well from every part of Ireland as from Scotland."* 

 Yet the literary monopoly, which Ireland had so long enjoyed, seems 

 to have ceased ; and it is recorded that Ceallach (Celsus) Archbishop 

 of Armagh in 1106, who was universally skilled in the circle of the 

 sciences, -t* received his education partly at Oxford. J 



Of the historians and annalists of this time, every monastery had 

 its scribe and registry, and notwithstanding the literary ravages of 

 subsequent centuries, some few bf their chronicles are yet extant, 

 which, though modern critics have been so severe in their censures of 

 them, as the Bishop of Down so justly laments,§ yet will be found well 

 worthy of credit and attention. The most remarkable within our 

 present period, are the Annals of Tigernach, a chronographer, not only 

 inviting inquiry as the most ancient annalist in any northern language, 

 (unless the Psalter of Casliel be yet extant,) but also as meriting it for 

 the diligence of his researches and the ingenuousness of his narrative. 

 The antiquity of his chronicles is proved by the remark in Marianus, 

 " hoc autem mihi retulit Tigernach senior meus,"ll and even more by 

 the internal evidence of their own simplicity. They are a naked, 

 honest, unadorned statement of facts, communicated with veracious 

 dryness, and only varied by notices of the changes of the weather, 

 the appearances of the heavens, the visitation of epidemical com- 

 plaints, and the courses of the crops. His pages are, however, fre- 

 quently illustrated by quotations from Latin and Greek authors, as 

 6. g. Horace, Virgil, Phny the younger, Eusebius, Origen, Saint 

 Jerome, Julius Africanus, Anatolius, Bede, &c., whom he not only 

 cites with accuracy, but frequently balances and contrasts their au- 



♦ Ware's Antiquities, p. 241. f Ant. Acad. Oxf. Apol. 1. 2. s. 280. 



I Ware's Bishops. 



§ Defence of the Ancient Irish Historians, Preface, p. vi. 



I Cited O'Conor, Rer. Hib.. Script Proleg. part 2. p. clxxiii. '^^ '"'■ 



