Lawlor — The Ancient List of the Cnarhs- of Patrick. 339 



Bendu was the first comarba Fc'Uraic. It can li.arcUy be questioned that tliey 

 ai'o riglit. Scchnall and Son I'atraie, if wo accept the dates of their obits, 

 predeceased St. Patrick. Tliey may have been his coadjutors, but not in any 

 true sense his successors. The first coarb of Patrick is the first on the List 

 who outlived him, on the supposition that he died in 462. 



The notes in L and Y are therefore consistent with the Annals. But it 

 follows that the list of names is in conflict, not only with the Annals, but 

 witli tlie notes. If Seehnall and Sen-Patraic were not coarbs of Patrick, they 

 sliould not have appeared in the List. How is the discrepancy to be explained ? 

 Most easily on the hypothesis, already maintained, that the List was copied 

 from the diptychs of the dead, which was a list, not presumably of the abbots, 

 but of the worthies of the church. In such a catalogue, coadjutors of 

 St. Patrick would naturally be named, and in later times they would be 

 assumed to have been his successors.^ 



It must not be supposed that the List wholly abjures the later theory 

 that St. Patrick died in 492 or 493. It is involved in the statement of 

 Y (no. 1), that he was 120 years old at the time of his death. But, more 

 remarkable still, it is implied in tlie note in L (no. 7), which calls Cormac 

 (482-497) " first abbot." He is so described in other early documents.^ And 

 the meaning is clear. Cormac " sat in Patrick's chair " immediately after his 

 death as his first successor. He was, in fact, the first on our List to survive 

 St. Patrick, on the hypothesis that he died in 492 or 493. 



This note is important, because it no doubo suggested to the scribe of Y 

 the insertion of Patraic (no. 6) immediately before Cormac. Tliis Patrick 

 can be no other than the Apostle of Ireland (no. 1), and the name cannot 

 have appeared here in the original List. Why his term of office should have 

 been thouglit to be four years, it is impossible to guess. 



One other feature of this section may be noted before we pass on. All 

 the persons named in the List, from Benen (no. 4) to Ailill II (no. 10), were 

 bishops. Thus, for three-quarters of a centiiry from St. Patrick's death the 

 succession was an episcopal succession. But from 536 we observe a change. 

 Ailill II was succeeded by an abbot, and licnceforth abbots and bishops 

 alternate, abbots being in the majority. Of this curious fact, several expla- 

 nations may be offered. We may suppose, with Ware and many others, that 

 all those who are styled abbots were of the episcopal order. But this is pure 

 assumption; and it cannot be maintained in the later sections of the hist. 



' Compare the remark of Professor J. B. Bury, English Eistorictil Beview. vol. xvii 



(1902), p. 701 f. 



- Annals in the Book of Loinstor ; Cliiiiniiliit;ioal Tract in Le.'ibhiir Breacc (ytukes, 

 Tripartite Life, ii, 513, 553). 



