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8 SCOTTISH ANNALS
and one
bishop and very holy man of the race of the Britons ;
who had been regularly trained at Rome in the faith and the
mysteries of truth. And even now x the English nation obtains
the see of his episcopate, notable for the name and church of
the bishop St. Martin; and there also [Ninian] rests in the
body, along with very many saints. And this place, pertaining
to the province of the Bernicians, is commonly called Ad
Candidam Casam [Whithorn], because he made there a church
of stone, after a custom strange to the Britons. 2
Now Columba came to Britain while Brude, son of Maelchon,
a most powerful king, reigned over the Picts, in the ninth year
3 and he turned that nation by word and example
of his reign ;
to the faith of Christ. And hence also he received in possession
from them the aforesaid island [of lona], to make a monastery.
For it is not large, but as it were of five families, according to
4 the reckoning of the Angles and his successors hold it ;
to this
day ;
and there he himself was buried, when he was seventy-
years from the time when
seven 5
6
years old, about thirty-two
lie came to Britain to preach. 7
But before he came to Britain he had made a noble monastery
in Ireland ; and it is called in the Scottish tongue, from
the abundance of its oak-trees, Dearmach* that is, the plain
jf oaks.
your most holy father, bishop Ninian, who shone with many virtues '
[i.e.
miracles] 'as has been recently brought to my knowledge by some verses
of poetry sent to us by our faithful disciples the scholars of the church of
York. And in them I discovered the learning of a worker, and the holiness
of a worker of miracles.' "
This letter (782 x 804) of Alcuin or Albinus is in
Migne, 100, 511-512 ; H. & S., ii, 8.
1 I.e. shortly before 731 A.D. ; v. infra, s.a. 731.
2
Cf. Finan's wooden church in Lindisfarne ; Bede, H.E., III, 25, infra,
c.a. 651.
3
Cf. the continuation of Marc.
"
Com., in Migne, 51, 948, s.a. 557 : In
Britain Bridus became king of the Picts."
Brude 's father Maelchon may have been the king of North Wales who
.lied in 547. Of him the His. Britt., in M.G.H., AA., xiii, 205-206, says :
"
The great king Maelchon reigned among the Britons, that is to say in the
region of Guenedota ; because his ancestor (atavus), that is Cunedag, had
formerly come with his sons, whose number is eight, from the northern
region, that is to say from the district which is called Manau Guotodin, 146
yoars before Maelchon : reigned and they expelled the Scots with the greatest
slaughter from these districts [of Guenedota] ; and never again did [the
Scots] return to dwell there." For Manau cf. infra, 710x711, note.
4 So A.S.C., u.s. : "Therein are five hides."
5 "
Seventy-six," MS. N.
6 "
Thirty-four," MS. N.
7
Little light is thrown upon the chronology by the His. Britt., in
TiI.G.H., AA., xiii, 158-159.
Columba died on the 9th June, 597 : v. Reeves, Adamnan, 309-312.
8
I.e. Durrow ; in Adamnan, 23, Dairmag.