Weekly Round-Up 19/09-25/09

All the Scottish Saints for this week and one of our archive articles.

No articles to highlight this week but there’s some cracking Saints, their bells and croziers below!

St Lolan, 22nd September

There is a dedication to this Saint in the Kincardine Parish at Menteith - St Lolan’s Church which was known in the 12th Century when it was given to the Canons at Cambuskenneth with the inclusion of the Saint’s bell and staff. The Bell became part of the investitures of the Earldom of Perth in 1675 alongside St Kessog’s bell. Whence the bells have gone, now no one knows. An interesting thing I did find in my research for this Saint was that Saints relics were held by hereditary keepers called ‘deoradh’. It is quite likely Lolan was Pictish but the Aberdeen Breviary relates a legend that he was the nephew of St Serf which would make him from the country around Israel. However, there was a period in Scottish history when many Pictish Saints, Serf included were depicitified and made Irish, continental European or even from the Eastern Mediterranean. We know little about this Saint’s life other than he was a Bishop and Confessor of Kincardine near Stirling.

St Adomnan (Eunan), 23rd September, 704AD

A member of the family of St Columba and ninth Abbot of Iona Abbey, this Saint is most notable for his Life of St Columba which we gain most of our knowledge of St Columba from. It is also an excellent source of information on the Scottish church at the time - especially Gaelic monastic life and of the different Pictish groups. Although it is thought that an earlier Vita of St Columba by St Cummine (Cumin) the White was used or inserted into Adomnan’s history.

St Adomnan is famous is Ireland for the ‘Law of the Innocents’ - agreed in Tara stating that no women, children or clergy could be used in war or taken captive, surely an ancient precursor to the Geneva Convention! He is also well known for his promotion of the Dionysiac Easter dating system seeking firstly to persuade his monks in Iona to drop the older Latercus system - a system that developed in Southern France; and then in Ireland as well. It was on this issue that the famous Synod of Whitby in 664AD had been called to bring clarity to a confusing situation, not least in Northumbria itself where 3 different forms of dating Easter was used! At this time Rome was promoting the Dionysiac as the preferred system for all the Churches.

It might be worth just mentioning here a little of what the controversy was all about. Until the Nicean Council in the 4th Century Christians would date Easter using the Jewish Passover which was was the 14th day of Nisan, the first Lunar month of the Jewish New year. Eventually Christians began to challenge this thinking stating the Jewish authorities had begun to err and they needed their own system with the Resurrection celebrated on the first Sunday after Passover. Various systems developed across the Christian world, the Dionysiac and Latercus being only 2 of many others. Eventually the Dionysiac system would win out, with Ireland, Briton and Iona eventually accepting it. For Adomnan, who had unsuccessfully tried to convince the Ionan monks to change there mind and resulting in him having to leave Iona - he would never see it dying ten years before the full acceptance.

St Adomnan was widely venerated throughout Scotland, no doubt due to the influence Iona had over Christianity in Scotland. Some sources say he spent time near Loch Tay in Dull near Aberfeldy where there was a church dedicated to him and evidence of early monastic community. It is said he died here but we know he was buried originally in Iona before his remains moving back to Ireland. He is also dedicated in the following places and I am quoting here from Michael Barratts OSB book A Calendar of Scottish Saints:

Aboyne and Forvie (parish of Slains) in Aberdeenshire ; Abriachan in Inverness-shire ; Forglen or Teunan Kirk in Banffshire ; Tannadice in Forfarshire ; Kileunan (parish of Kilkerran) in Kintyre ; Kinneff in Kincardineshire ; the Island of Sanda ; Dull, Grandtully and Blair Athole in Perthshire the latter place was once known as Kilmaveonaig, from the quaint little chapel and burying ground of the saint. There were chapels in his honour at Campsie in Stir lingshire and Dalmeny in Linlithgow. At Aboyne are " Skeulan Tree" and Skeulan Well," at Tannadice " St. Arnold s Seat," at Campsie " St. Adamnan s Acre," at Kinneff " St. Arnty s Cell." At Dull a fair was formerly held on his feast-day (old style) ; it was called Feille Eonan. Another fair at Blair Athole was known as Feill Espic Eoin (" Bishop Eunan s Fair " though St. Adamnan was an abbot only) ; it has been abolished in modern times. His well is still to be seen in the Manse garden there, and down the glen a fissure in the rock is called " St. Ennan s Foot mark." There was a "St. Adamnan s Croft" in Glenurquhart (Inverness-shire), but the site is no longer known. Ardeonaig, near Loch Tay ; Ben Eunaich, Dalmally ; and Damsey (Adamnan s Isle) in Orkney, take their names from this saint.

So as you can see he was popular! But if you really want to get close visit Insh Church just South of Aviemore near Kincraig where on top of ‘Tom Eunan’ - Adomnan’s Mound sits a small beautiful church which houses a bell that for many years was attributed to St Adomnan and a basin that is probably an ancient font.

Pictures from Insh Parish Church.

It is thought now the bell is from the 9th or 10th century but there were many colourful stories surrounding it (as befitting an Ecclesial bell!) including how if anyone rang it one of your family would die an unpleasant death; if it was dipped in water the water would save a woman from death after child birth and how when it was taken away once down to Perthshire it came ringing back up through the glens. A most awkward bell anyway!

St Barr or Finbarr, 25th September, 6th Century

It was devotion to this Saint that the Island of Barra took its name. It was said part of his missionary journey from his home in Cork took him to Barra, an Island that a previous missionary had visited to share the faith with but was met with cannibalism. St Barr was more successful and after his departure the islanders carved a log into his likeness venerating him right up until the 1700’s. A Scottish writer of the 17th Century, Martin Martin observed the following:

The natives have St. Barr’s wooden image standing on the altar, covered with linen in form of a shirt; all their greatest asseverations are by this saint. I came very early in the morning with an intention to see this image, but was disappointed; for the natives prevented me by carrying it away, lest I might take occasion to ridicule their superstition, as some Protestants have done formerly; and when I was gone it was again exposed on the altar.

St Barr also laboured in Kintyre with the Island of Davar having been formally named after him.