Lawlor — The Ancient List of the Coarbs of Patrick. 343 



fully legible, but it seems to agree with the statement of the Maityiology of 

 Donegal that he was of the race of Conall Gulban. His descent from that 

 person is, in fact, well known. ^ Neither of these coarbs had any connexion 

 with the Armagh septs. Tlius there was a break in the hereditary succession 

 at least from 888 to 936. 



With these facts in mind we may call in St. Bernard as a witness. His 

 evidence consists of two contradictory statements. We may consider first the 

 passage in which he affirms that the same family "had already for nearly two 

 hundred years possessed the sanctuary of God, as by hei'editary right."- It is 

 important to note that he is not here speaking in his own person. The 

 words are put into the mouth of St. Malachy at the time when he was just 

 about to make an ePfort to dislodge Muirchertach (no. 57) from the abbey, that 

 is, in 1132. Now from 936, the earliest possible date for the establishment 

 of the claim to hereditary succession, to 1132 is 196 years. From 966, wliicli 

 seems to be tlie latest possible date, to 1132 is 166 years. Either of these 

 periods, but more fitly the former, could be described as " nearly two hundred 

 years." St. Bernard's statement is therefore in accord with the result of our 

 researches. 



Elsewhere, however, he tells us that " fifteen jz««st generations had already 

 passed in this wickedness."^ The date from which he reckons the fifteen 

 generations is the year of Gellach's death, within a few days of which 

 Muirchertach was elected as his successor, lie seems to use the phrase "quasi 

 generation" of the period of office of a coarb.* Now Mael Patraic no. 45), 

 before whose accession we have learnt that hereditary succession to the 

 coarbship was not an unvarying rule, was the first of a series of abbots of 

 which Muirchertach was not the tifteenth but the twelfth.' The two state- 

 ments are therefore irreconcilable. How can we account for the contradiction ? 

 A very simple explanation is at hand. The document on which St. Bernard 

 worked probably had tlie words "generationibus xii." If the saint mistook 

 xii for xu, he fell into one of the commonest of scribes" errors, of which there 

 are several examples in the mss. of the I^ist.' 



' See the genealogical table in Reeves, Adamnan, oppo.<!ite p. .342. If the concluding 

 words of the note :ire correctly read A. na hueiitad, "i.e., of the union," tlicy may be 

 interpreted a.s leferring to a union between the Coluniban and Patrician foundations, 

 in virtue of whicli they had a common abbot. 



- Vita S. Midiichine, § 20 : " Qui iam annos ferme duceutos ((Uasi hereditate po.ssedi.-isunt 

 sanctuarium Dei." 



' lb., § 19 : '' Docursis iara in hac malitia quasi generationibus (juindecim." 



* Proceedings, xx.w, C, 235. 



= St. Bernard omits Cummascach. 



^ A diti'erenl explanation was offered in Proeeedintja, I.e., p. 2oG. It must now be 

 abandoned in the light of fuller knowledge. 



