CULUEE8 



CULLEN 



609 



otherwise; tlmt after they became Culdees they 

 wen- forbidden tx have their wives in their house*, 

 or any other \\niii.-ii of whom evil suspicion could 

 ari>e ; that the altar of St Andrew was Irit without 

 a minister, nor was mass celebrated there except on 

 the rare occasion of a visit from the king or the 

 bishop, tin i In- Culdees said their own ollice after 

 own way in a corner of the church. The first 

 attempt to reform this state of matters was made 

 by < t >ueen Margaret, and her efforts were followed 

 ii]> by her sons, Alexander I. and David I.; so that 

 from the time of the appointment of Turgot to the 

 sec of St Andrews, when we are told that ' the 

 whole rights of the Keledei over the kingdom of 

 Si -oil and passed to the bishopric of St Andrews,' 

 the history of the Culdees is simply that of a vain 

 resistance to foes backed by all the weight of the 

 royal power. 



If tradition could be trusted, the first appearance 

 of Culdees in Scotland was later than in Ireland, 

 and should be placed about the middle of the 9th 

 century. A leaf of the Register of St Andrews, 

 written about 1130, relates that Brude, the son of 

 Dergard, the last king of the Picts (who ceased to 

 reign about 843), gave the island, since called St 

 Serf's Inch, in Lochleven, to God, St Servan, and 

 the Culdee hermits serving God there. They were 

 governed by an abbot ; and about the year 1093, 

 during the rule of Abbot Ronan, they gave up their 

 island to the Bishop of St Andrews on condition 

 that he should find them in food and raiment. On 

 this island they remained in peace, receiving grants 

 of lands or immunities from all the kings of the 

 Scots from the time of Macbeth till that of David I. ; 

 but in 1144, Robert, Bishop of St Andrews, gave 

 their island, and all their possessions, including 

 their church vestments and their books (a complete 

 list of which is given in the charter), to the newly- 

 founded Canons Regular of St Andrews, in order 

 that a priory of that rule might supplant the old 

 abbey or Culdees on St Serf's Inch. The bishop's 

 grant was enforced by a charter from King David, 

 in which it was ordered that such of the Culdees as 

 chose to live canonically and peacefully under the 

 new canons should remain in the island. We hear 

 no more of the Culdee hermits of Lochleven. 



The Culdees of St Andrews were of more import- 

 ance than those of Lochleven, and when the Canons 

 Regular were established there, the members of the 

 older body were treated much more considerately 

 than their unfortunate brethren of St Serf's Inch, 

 those who refused to become Canons Regular being 

 allowed to retain a liferent of their revenues. Not 

 only was this so, but they had sufficient influence 

 to manage to remain a distinct community down to 

 the early part of the 14th century, and were even 

 able to assert their right to take part in the election 

 of the bishop till 1273. In that year they were 

 excluded under protest, and in 1332 they were 

 excluded entirely, and thereafter the name seems 

 to have disappeared. 



The Culdees of the church of St Mary at Mony- 

 musk, in Aberdeenshire, appear to have been 

 settled by the Bishop of St Andrews towards the 

 end of the llth century. In the beginning of the 

 13th century they are found making a claim to be 

 regarded as Canons Regular, which was, after an 

 appeal to Rome, settled Ly a compromise. 



Culdees are found at Abernethy, in Strathearn, 

 about 1120. In the end of that century part of 

 their possessions passed to their hereditary lay- 

 abbot (the founder of the noble family of Aber- 

 nethy ), and in 1273 they were transformed into 

 Canons Regular. After a similar division at Brechin, 

 the prior and his Culdees were absorbed into the 

 chapter of the new bishopric, founded by King 

 David I. about 1145, and in less than a hundred 

 yours the name of Culdee disappears. The same 

 143 



silent change of Culdees into Kecular canons took 

 place during the 13th century at Dunblane, at 

 iMinkeld, at Lismore, at KoHemarky, and at Dor- 

 noeli. At Dunkeld, as at Biedlin and at Alx-r- 

 nethy, great part of the Culdee revenues was held 

 by a lay-abbot, whose office was of such mark an to 

 be hereditary in the royal family. The father ol 

 ' the gracious Duncan,' and the son of St Margaret, 

 were Culdee abbots. Culdees are found holding 

 land at Monifieth, near Dundee, about 1200; at 

 Muthil, in Strathearn, in the beginning of the 13th 

 century ; and at lona in the middle of the 12th. 



The Culdees of Armagh, dissolved at the Refor- 

 mation in 1541, were resuscitated for a brief space 

 in 1627. Their old possessions among which were 

 seven town-lands, containing 1423 acres, seven 

 rectories and four vicarages, were in 1634 bestowed 

 upon the vicars-choral of the cathedral. There 

 were at least seven other houses of Culdees in Ire- 

 land viz., at Clonmacnois, Clondalkin, Devenish, 

 Clones, l'n| in II, Monanincha, and Sligo. 



Such is a concise recapitulation of all that is cer- 

 tainly known of the Culdees. Before their history 

 was ascertained, opinions were held regarding them 

 which now find few if any supporters among arclue- 

 ologists. It was believed that they were our first 

 teachers of Christianity ; that they came from the 

 East before corruption had yet overspread the 

 church ; that they took the Scriptures for their 

 sole rule of faith ; that they lived under a form 

 of church-government approaching to Presbyterian 

 parity ; that they rejected prelacy, transubstantia- 

 tion, the invocation of saints, the veneration of 

 relics, image-worship, and the celibacy of the 

 clergy ; and that they kept their simple worship 

 and pure doctrines undefiled to the last, and were 

 suppressed only by force and fraud, when the Roman 

 Catnolic Church triumphed over their older and 

 better creed. For all this it is now clearly seen that 

 there is no foundation. There is no reason to sup- 

 pose that the Culdees differed in any material point 

 of faith, discipline, or ritual from the other clergy 

 of the British Islands and Western Christendom. 



See Reeves, in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish 

 Academy for 1860, and his Culdees of the British Islands 

 ( 18G4) ; and Skene's Celtic Scotland, voL ii., whose views 

 have found acceptance both with Catholics and Presby- 

 terians. The opinions formerly held regarding the 

 Scottish Culdees (controverted by Pinkerton and 

 Chalmers) will be found in Seltien's preface to the 

 Decent Historias Anglicance Scriptores, and Jameson's 

 Historical Account of tlie Ancient Culdees (1811). 



Cu'lenborg, or KUILENBURG, a town of 

 Holland, 11 miles SSE. of Utrecht, on the left 

 bank of the Lek, which is crossed here by a rail- 

 way viaduct 1420 yards long. Pop. 6798. 



Cllliacan', an ancient city of Mexico, on the 

 Rio de Culiacan, 30 miles from the W. coast, and 

 100 SE. of Sinaloa. Pop. 7878. 



Culilawan Bark, also called CLOVE BARK, 

 an aromatic bark, the product of the Cinnumomum 

 Culilawan, a tree of the same genus with the 

 Cinnamon (q.v.) tree, growing in the Molucca 

 Islands. It has an odour resembling that of nut- 

 meg ani cloves, and was formerly employed to 

 some extent for cases of indigestion, diarrhoea, &c. 



4 lllh'll. a fishing-town of Banffshire, on the 

 Moray Firth, 67 miles NW. of Aberdeen by rail- 

 way (*1885). Backed by the conical Bin Hill (1050 

 feet), it has a harbour formed in 1817-34, and a 

 cruciform parish church, which was founded by 

 Robert Bruce, whose second queen died here, and 

 which in 1543 was made collegiate. Cullen House, 

 a seat of the Earl of Seafield, is a Scottish 

 baronial pile, enlarged and remodelled in 1861. 

 Cullen has been a royal burgh since about 1200, 

 and unites with Elgin and five other places to 



