Westropp — Ancient Churches in Co. Limerich. 329 



system where a bishop was (like the Abbey cook or carpenter) a 

 subordinate to an abbot, or even abbess (as at Kildare), and where 

 bishops with no fixed residence wandered over the country performing 

 episcopal functions everywhere and anywhere, and even intruded on 

 the territorial bishopricks on the Continent. In the case of Limerick, 

 the bishoprick was of foreign origin, and was, most probably, formed 

 out of districts once within the episcopal influence of Iniscatha and 

 Emly — influence, rather than authority, for the territorial bishoprick 

 was long undeveloped. St. Senan, if we may receive the statement in 

 the "Life of St. Ita," was patron of Hy Chonaill, or O'Connello, 

 which, probably, reached nearly to the Maigue. It is, therefore, 

 probable that to the chief deanery of that district, Rathkeale,^ was 

 allotted his sacred island, whose round tower and churches overlook 

 the great estuary of the Shannon. This may have been done to avoid 

 jealousy between Killaloe and Ardfert Sees, to which the bulk of the 

 tribes which reverenced the coarb of St. Senan were assigned by the 

 Synod of Rathbreasail. Doubtless, the long occupation of the island by 

 the Norse, and its desecration when Brian expelled them, facilitated 

 the breaking up of its bishoprick. 



When the J^^orsemen of Limerick bowed at last before the " White 

 Christ " in th(^ ancient church of St. Munchin, national prejudice kept 

 them aloof from the Irish Church, They looked to Canterbury for the 

 ordination of their bishops.^ Still the great importance of the 

 "Danish " bishopricks forced their recognition by the Irish, the more 

 easily that the former had not trenched on any pre-existing territorial 

 boundaries of other bishopricks. When, for the first time, in 1116, the 

 Synod of Rathbreasail fixed the limits of the first " landed bishopricks " 

 in Ireland, Limerick got the fullest recognition.^ Ignoring Iniscatha, 

 but respecting Killaloe and Imleach lubhair, the synod laid down the 

 bounds of Limerick , these extended from the Maolcearn River, west- 

 ward to Ath coinn lodain (Luddenbeg), to Lough Gur, Lathach mor. 



^ See Journal R. S.A.I, xxxiv., p. 126, Avhicli bears out the statements of Arch- 

 bishop Ussher. 



-See Ussher's "Yeterum Epistolarum Hibernicarum Sylloge " (1632) for 

 correspondence between Limerick and Canterbury, p. 120. 



"Keating's History," vol. ii. He copies from the original record in the Book 

 of Clonenagh. The Munster Sees established Avere Cashel, Lismore, or Water- 

 ford, Cork, Rathmoigh-deisgirt, Limerick, Killaloe, and Imleach lobhair. At the 

 Synod of Kells, in 1152, the Munster Bishopricks, beside Cashel, Emly, Limerick, 

 Killaloe, Waterford, and Lismore, include Cork, Cloyne, Ross, Roscrea, Iniscatha, 

 and Ardfert. 



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