124 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



e. That, long afterwards, the silver outer case was added. It was not till 

 this was done that the shrine could be called Domnach Airgid ; it follows 

 that it cannot be the shrine referred to under that name in the Vita 

 Tripartita Patricii, which is a document much older than the outer case of 

 the reliquary. 



/. That in time (probably after the Beformation) the true nature of the 

 contents of the Clones shrine became forgotten, and it was then popularly 

 credited with being the receptacle of the far more important and impressive 

 • whirl, the lost Clogher shrine had contained. 



The main point in this very interesting criticism is Professor Macalister's 

 contention that Petrie wrongly identified the shrine found at Brookeborough 

 in 1832 (the Academy shrine) with the Domnach Airgid mentioned in the 

 Tripartite Life (the Clogher Bhvine). It gives me the opportunity of supply- 

 ing a defect in my paper, in which I have adopted Petrie'a assumption without 

 argument The evidence may be stated as follows: — 



1. The word •• Domnach " is very rarely used as Bynonymous with "shrine." 

 It was applied to the Academy and Clogher shrines, and, so far as I know, to 

 no otl 



2. The epithet airgid, which was used of the Clogher shrine, suits the 

 inner metal ease of the Academy shrine : it was in appearance a silver box. It 



true that this shrine had in strictness no title to the epithet 

 before the silver-gilt plates had Keen added. But it must not be assumed thai 



the name DomiUV A d was de\i.-od by the maker of the shrine to which it 

 was applied, or by others who knew the details of its structure. It is much 

 more likely to have been a popular designation of later days. That ordinary 

 folk should have supposed that the Academy shrine was made of silver is not 

 surprising. Till Mr. Armstrong told us that its coating was of tin, all inves- 

 tigators held that it was of silver. To he sure, they recognized that it was 

 only a coating : hut then they saw the bronze plates which it covered. ISefore 

 tie worn off, and while the inside of the case was not in view, 



the Bhrine might quite naturally he dubbed "of silver." But when the gilded 

 cov - made, that description became obsolete. If after that date it 



had ■ might !. a called Uorrmach uir. On Petrie's 



hypothesis it is easy to see why in later centuries the epithet airgid was 

 dropped, and it came to be known simply as ' the Domnach.' 



3. We have little evidence about the material of which shrines were 

 made in early times. Shrines are frequently mentioned in the Annals; hut 

 apart from those of St. Conlaed and St Ronan, "of gold and silver," con- 

 structed about 800, and the golden cumdach of the Book of Kells, stolen in 

 1006, on account of which the book " was the principal relic of the western 



