The Highlanders of Scotland - Clan Strachan Society

CHAP. VIII] OF SCOTLAND 121
church for many centuries after its foundation by Columba ;
but the difficulty has been increased still more by not distinguishing
between the different churches which existed at the
same time in Ireland and in Britain. During the occupation of
Britain by the Romans, that island was inhabited by two races—
the Britons and the Picts, and the latter were divided into
two nations of the southern and northern Picts ; Ireland
at the same period was also inhabited by two races—the
Scots, who possessed the south and west, and the Cruithne, or
Irish Picts, who inhabited the north and east.^ In the fourth
century the Scots brought the whole island under subjection,
and after that period, while their name extended over the whole
of Ireland, we find the two races distinguished by the titles
of the Southern Scots and Northern Scots. The Britons were
the first of these different races who became Christian, and after
them the Scots, both having been apparently converted to
Christianity before the departure of the Romans from the island.
After that event we find, in A.D. 431, Palladius sent from Rome
as Primus Episcopus^ to the " Scotos in Christiun Credentes"
and in the following year Patrick made his mission to Ireland.
It would be unnecessary here to refute the absurd idea formerly
held, that the Scots to whom Palladius was sent were the Scots
of Britain, as there is no point which has been so clearly estab-
lished as the fact that his mission was to Ireland ; but historians
have been much puzzled to reconcile the mission of Palladius
with that of Patrick. Patrick unquestionably converted his
Scots from Paganism, and that for the first time ; Palladius,
it is equally certain, was sent but one year before to Scots
already Christian. Many attempts have been made to
account for this, all of which are equally unsatisfactory. But
when we find, on examining the best authorities, that Saint
Patrick in fact converted the people of the north of Ireland
only, that he founded his archiepiscopal seat at Armagh in
Ulster, and that the jurisdiction of that primate never extended
beyond that part of the island, the inhabitants of which were
See infra.
copus." It most certainly signified
* Much confusion has arisen among first bishop, in respect of dignity, or
our historians by mistaking the mean- primate, not first bishop in order of
ing of the expression " Primus Epis- time.