786 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



in tlie great religious centres abroad in consequence of the remote 

 situation of this country. Eut even in Ireland we have a very early 

 instance of the round kind in the Mias Tigernain which is described by 

 Sir William Wilde in Yol. xxi. of the Academy's Transactions. It 

 is popularly known as "St. Tigernan's Dish," but as he says, more cor- 

 rectly, " St. Tigernan's paten." It was found in St. Tigernan's grave 

 at Errew, a promontory in Lough Con, and consists of a circular disk 

 of copper slightly dished, one-eighth of an inch thick, thirty-four in 

 circumference, with a silver cross in front. The class of ornament on 

 it belongs to an early period of Celtic art, and resembles that found 

 on pagan monuments. St. Tigernan's date is not recorded, but it has 

 been inferred from his pedigree that he flourished at the close of the 

 fifth century. If the angular patens had then gone out of use or were 

 ceasing to be made at this early date, we seem in this to have some 

 evidence of the truth of Nennius' account of St. Patrick's having come 

 to Ireland in 405, and the further inference that he died about 465. 

 For we cannot suppose the pattern he used was superseded during his 

 lifetime, but this would be so if he were alive when the Mias Tiger- 

 nain was made. However this may be, we have proof that St. Patrick 

 gave away many of these angular patens, for in the annonymous note 

 following the life of S. Patrick, by Muirchu Maccu Machtheni in the 

 Book of Armagh, it is stated that when he went across the Shannon he 

 took with him and gave away many presents to new congregations, 

 and amongst them " fifty patens " which of course must have been of 

 this angular shape. 



They were evidently manufactured in considerable numbers by 

 his artists, and the question arises, what became of them, as none 

 have been found in Ireland as yet. The depredations of the North- 

 men cannot be held responsible for their disappearance, as even in 

 650, when Tirechan is supposed to have written, he knew of only 

 three remaining. This was more than a century before the first 

 inroad of the Northmen. 



There is, however, a passage in the Additions to Tirechan, which 

 appears to me to throw some light on this question. It refers to 

 the purchase of land, and mentions the consideration given. This, 

 according to Mr. Stokes's translation, was " a necklace of three ounces 

 of silver with a circlet of gold with old dishes with old vessels." 

 But the translation requires to be amended, for the word here 

 rendered dishes, is mesaib miasa, and must be translated patens, and 

 airotib "vessels" should be "covers," the paten, being used as a 

 cover for the chalice, so in modern Irish mullach means both a paten 



