230 
PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 
greatest interest as being characteristic of the Latin MSS. written by 
Irish scribes, several of which exist in Continental libraries, and which 
are only now beginning to attract the attention of philologers. Dr. 
Eeeves has given in his Preface a valuable table of these peculiarities, 
classifying them under two heads—interchange of vowels, and inter¬ 
change of consonants—and has compared them also with similar peculia¬ 
rities of orthography in the “ Book of Armagh.” 
In the copious notes with which this edition of Adamnan is enriched, 
Dr. Eeeves has collected a vast body of historical and antiquarian jn for¬ 
mation, throwing great light on the constitution, manners, and customs 
of the Scotic or Irish Churches of the seventh and eighth centuries. He 
has also identified, for the first time, the names of a great number of 
places mentioned by Adamnan, which had previously been unknown, 
and were indeed frequently misprinted, and, in some cases, altogether 
omitted by former editors. It will be seen at once what a very impor¬ 
tant evidence of the authenticity of the work may be derived from this 
circumstance; as it would have been impossible for any person not living 
at the period, and on the spot, to have introduced so large a number of 
true topographical names, the greater part of which are now identified 
with existing (although obscure) places in the Scottish islands, to say 
nothing of the names of individuals and families which also may be iden¬ 
tified, and their dates fixed, by references to o ur native Irish genealogies 
and Annals. 
In the Appendix of Additional Notes, which occupies nearly half the 
volume, Dr. Eeeves has given a number of most valuable dissertations 
on subjects requiring a more full illustration. One of these may be 
briefly noticed, although it is by no means the most important in anti¬ 
quarian and historical value; but its subject may be more easily ex¬ 
plained, and it refutes a curious and wide-spread error, which it is now, 
perhaps, hopeless to correct,—I allude to the name of the island Iona, 
the seat of St. Columba’s most celebrated monastery. I have seen ety¬ 
mologies of that word by Scottish antiquaries, making it out to be a 
compound of 1-cona, or “ island of waves,” and I remember exciting 
the wrath of an antiquarian friend in Scotland when I ventured, some 
years ago, to express my doubts of that etymology. It has also been, 
with at least equal absurdity, derived from the Hebrew Iona , a dove, 
and explained as an allusion to the name of its patron saint, Columba. 
The Gaelic etymology, I-shona, or “ the happy island,” has also been sug¬ 
gested ; and all these puerilities are widely circulated down to the pre¬ 
sent day, in the tourist’s guide-books, and in other works of higher pre¬ 
tensions : but Dr. Eeeves has shown that there is in reality no such word 
as Iona, and that the island never was so called in any ancient or authentic 
document. The fact is that the n is a mistake for a u, a circumstance 
that was unknown even to Dssher, and which is now, for the first time, 
established beyond the possibility of a doubt by Dr. Eeeves. The proper 
name of the island, as it is found in all the ancient sculptured monuments 
there still extant, and in all authentic records, is I, or Hy—and I- [or 
Hy-]Columkille, the I, or island, of Columcille—and Dr. Eeeves has fur- 
