58 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



case, gif a man grinds at handmylnes, he sail give the threttein 

 measure as multer ; and gif anie man conti'aveins this our prohibi- 

 tion he sail tine his hand-myleres perpetuallie.' Yet in 1819, 

 il'Culloch [Western Isles., toI. ii., p. 30) states that the quern is found 

 in every house in St. Kilda, and the statistical account of Scotland, 

 published in. 1845, mentions that in the parish of Sandsting in Shet- 

 land, there are ' querns or hand mills Tvithout number.' 



"There seems to be reason, however, for believing that "water-mills 

 were not unknown in Ireland at a very early period. Dr. O'Donovan, 

 in an article in the Dullin Penny Journal^ has quoted several passages 

 from the Brehon laws, which are of great antiquity, stating the 

 damages to which the miller and the millwright shall be respec- 

 tively liable in case of an accident occuning in a raill turned hy 

 water. He also gives references to many of the lives of Irish Saints, 

 in which water-mills are expressly mentioned as having been erected 

 hy ecclesiastics, proving that they were in use not long after the intro- 

 duction of Christianity. 



"Mr. Getty, in his account of Torry Island {Ulster Journal of 

 Archeology, vol. i., pp. 143, 146), mentions the curious circumstance 

 of a veiy ancient stone cross being fastened at its base into a tnill- 

 stone ; and notes the tradition of the islanders, that all ancient 

 buildings there have a millstone in their foundations. 



" In the notes to the translation of the Annals of Ulster (now in 

 course of publication in this Journal) at a.d. 587, it is stated from 

 the Breviary of Aberdeen, that Constantine, a King of Damnonia in 

 Britain, 'having abdicated his throne, repaired to Ireland and 

 became miller to a monasteiy.' It is well known that a mill was 

 i'Jmost always in connexion with religious houses of the Cistercian 

 Order. 



" In the Annals of Tighernach, one of the most trustworthy of oiu' 

 old Irish chronicles, there is a curious passage at the year 561, where 

 mention is made of the slaughter of the sons of Blathmac, King of 

 Ireland, in the mill of Maclodran ; and a verse is quoted from an 

 Lincient poem, in which the Bard fancifully addresses the mill thus : 

 • mill ! what hast thou gi'ound ? precious wheat ? Thou hast 

 ground not oats, but the sons of Cerbhall,' &c. (O'Connor, Eerum. 

 Hibem. Scriptores, vol. ii, 198). The writers of the historical notes 

 to the Ordnance Survey of Londonderry gave quotations from the 

 Book of Kells (MS. Trinity College), and the Registry of Clonraaciioise 

 ^Clarendon IISS., Brit. Museum), in which grants of mills to 

 monasteries in the eleventh century are mentioned; and various 



