338 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Acadcrny. 



were probably mere episodes in a system of general plunder. JSTo 

 better evidence of toleration can be afforded than the existence of 

 Mungret, an important college, with 1-500 inhabitants, near the chief 

 Norse settlement of the west. Limerick.^ It was not destroyed after 

 843, and was in high efficiency sixty years later. We read of no 

 Christian chnrch in Limerick City till the later eleventh century. The 

 Eddie religion borrowed many hints from Christianity ; probably 

 Kingsley is not far astray when he makes the Ostdane Tving of Water- 

 ford swear to Here ward, "By the White Christ, and by Sleipnir, 

 Odin's eight-legged horse." Torgeis and his wife Odda seized Armagh 

 and Clonmacnoise, rather for policy than anti-Christian motives. In 

 the fierce wars of the Norse with the Irish princes doubtless great 

 destruction fell on the religious centres ; the clergy sulfered with the 

 laity, but any deliberate persecution of them for their religion has yet 

 to be proved.^ 



The first blow fell on Mungret Abbey, which was plundered in 

 802. Then in 834 a great fleet sailed up the Luimneach," and 

 armed bands wasted Corcovaskin and Tradree, in Clare, and burned 

 and plundered Mungret. Drunk with success, they raided the western 

 districts to Senati (Shanid), and were met by the Ui Chonaill, rein- 

 forced, none too soon, by the Ui Fidgeinti, who defeated the foreigners 

 with such loss that the slaughter could not be counted." Again, in 

 840 and 843, Mungret was plundered ; and two years later a " sea-cast 

 flood" of foreigners swept over the border, and plundered St. Ita's 

 Convent, at Killeedy and Cuil Emhni ; on they marched till a second 

 swarm, which had landed at Limerick, joined them, and Emly and 

 the Martini, the last Firbolg state, fell before them. In this raid 

 Eorannan, the coarb of Armagh, who had fled for safety to the remote 

 Cluain Comairdi, or Colmanswell, was captured, taken to Limerick, and 

 the shrine of St. Patrick broken ; probably only the golden mountings 

 were torn off, for, after the death of Turgeis, the coarb returned unhurt 

 to Armagh, and repaired the shrine — further proof of the moderation of 

 his captors. Numbers of churches, however, perished, " much indeed 

 of evil .... did they (the Norse) receive, and much was received by 



^ This has been noticed by FitzGerald and MacGiegor in their History of 

 Limerick," a book of deeper thought and wider views for its age than many a 

 recent county history. 



~ In none of the districts infested by the Norse are there fewer traces of their 

 power than in Ireland. No undoubted runic inscriptions on stone, and only one 

 on metal ; no undoubted remains of churches, and only one castle ; no undoubted 

 " Danish forts ; " few \indoubted burial-places. 



