62 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



literature and the folk-lore of Ireland and of western Europe offered, 

 and shaped all with care to his own purpose. But that purpose was 

 not solely, nor indeed primarily, to describe the wonders of the ocean. 

 As we note the meticulous care with which he elaborates the precepts 

 of Brendan, and the rules of life, the devotions, the method of observ- 

 ing the canonical hours, the psalms sung, the prayers said, the penances 

 observed among the inhabitants, human and superhuman, of the 

 oceanic islands, we come to realise that the author is painting a 

 picture of the ideal monastic life. The Navigatio Brendani is the epic 

 — shall we say the Odyssey — of the old Irish Church. 



The Navigatio Brendani ^ opens with an account of a visit paid to Brendan at 

 Clonfert [in the Vita the voyage is placed before the founding of Clonfert] by an 

 abbot Barinthus [perhaps in Irish Barrfind] who is returning from a visit paid to a 

 disciple of his, named Mernoc, the head of a community of anchorites, on an island, 

 apparently in Donegal bay. He relates how Mernoc had taken him to a wonderful 

 country, the "Land of Promise of the Saints" {terra repromissionis sanctorum). 

 After his departure, Brendan and fourteen chosen monks decide to seek that land. 

 They visit first Enda at Aran and then Brendan's native district in Kerry, where a 

 coracle is built, apparently at Brandon Headland. [Here follows our best description 

 of the construction of these skin-covered ships.] As they are about to depart three 

 monks arrive who have followed from the monastery, and are allowed to come on 

 board. After getting safely beyond geographical control by the device of a night 

 wind that drives them they know not in what direction, they come to a lofty island, 

 on which they are able to effect a landing only after three days. A dog guides them 

 to a town and a wonderful palace where no living person is seen, but a banquet is 

 miraculously set before them each day of their stay. [All this, of course, is part of 

 the stock fairy lore of almost all lands.] When leaving one of the supercargo monks 

 attempts to steal a silver bridle. At Brendan's upbraiding he confesses his fault, 

 the devil is driven out of him in the form\)f a small Ethiopian, and he dies penitent. 

 Next they come to the Isle of Sheep. [The name, at any rate, was doubtless derived 

 from reports of the Faroes.] Here they are met by a man who provides them with 

 food, and continues to do so at regular intervals during the whole period that they 

 are on the sea. Easter eve and morning they spend on a neighbouring island. When 

 they light a fire for the morning meal the island begins to move, and they escape 

 just in time before it submerges. It is Jasconius, the largest of marine creatures. 

 Next they come to the Paradise of Birds, where they ascend a river to its source, a 

 sleep-producing fountain. Here they remain till the octave of Pentecost. Vast 

 numbers of birds sing psalms and hymns to them at the canonical hours. They are 

 fallen angels who, not having shared in sin, are permitted to remain here in this 

 form. [A similar explanation is given by modern Irish folk tales of the origin of 

 the fairies.] i\ext they come to the Island of the Family — that is, the religious 

 community — of Ailbe. On this island are fountains of hot and cold water, and a 

 monastery and church of remarkable construction. Twenty-four brethren have 



^The most important editions of the original Latin text are: Achille Jubinal 

 La Légende latine de S. Brandaines (Paris, 1836), pp. 1-53; Cari Schroder op. cit.; 

 P. F. Moran op. cit. There is a critical examination of the manuscript texts by C. 

 Steinweg, "Die handschriftlichen Gestaltungen der lateinischen Navigatio Brendani," 

 in Romanische Forschungen, vol. VII, pp. 1-48. 



