“Because those green hills are not highland hillsOr the island hillsThey’re not my land’s hillsAnd, fair as these green foreign hills may beThey are not the hills of home”
The deepest of greens can stir our hearts and though we may not possess the Blarney of our cousins across the Irish Sea, we seek to express ourselves and share the feelings that the sight of rich green hills can evoke….We are…
Today we bring you an 1809 English language edition of Jocelin’s Life and Acts of Saint Patrick. Jocelin of Furness (active 1175-1214) was a Cumbrian Cistercian monk and hagiographer. John de Courcy (1150-1219), an Anglo-Norman lord and conqueror of what is today Northern Ireland, and Tommaltach Ua Conchobair (ca. 1150-1201), archbishop of Armagh, commissioned Jocelin to write a biography of St. Patrick. What at first glance seems to be an unlikely alliance between a foreign Norman knight and a native Irish prelate was in actuality a strategic power move. The territories of Armagh and Dublin were rivals for political and religious dominance in Ireland at the time, and both de Courcy and Ua Conchobair had a vested interest in promoting Armagh as the diocese founded by St. Patrick himself. In fact, Ua Conchobair is listed as one of the coarbs (Gaelic heirs) of the patron saint of Ireland.
Evidently, the Dublin-based Hibernia Press did not take the pro-Armagh/anti-Dublin bent of Jocelin’s hagiography too personally when they reprinted this version in 1809. In fact, they enhanced the Cistercian monk’s text with a re-engraving of an illustration featured in Thomas Messingham’s 1624 Florilegium insulæ sanctorum; the facsimile frontispiece shows three of the principal Irish saints: St. Columba, St. Brigid, and, of course, St. Patrick, who quite literally takes center stage.
As a parting piece of trivia, the legend of St. Patrick’s expulsion of snakes from Ireland can be traced to Jocelin’s version of the saint’s biography (see passage above). This is why Messingham depicted St. Patrick with snakes fleeing at his feet. May the snake-free luck of the Irish be with you today!
Images from: Jocelin of Furness. The life and acts of Saint Patrick … Dublin: Hibernia Press, 1809.
Patrick actually born AD 357 as Maewyn Succat and not in Ireland, but in Britain. He was a slave and pagan until becoming a Christian while in slavery in Ireland. He then started hearing voices that lead him to escape slavery and return to his homeland of Britannia. He rose in ranks of the Catholic Church until becoming a Bishop when he then returned to Ireland to conquer and convert the pagans. This basically became a genocidal campaign, and destruction of the older culture of Ireland. Sacred sites were destroyed and covered over with Catholic churches. The Holiday it self, like most Christian holidays is set around the same time as an older Pagan holiday. Again the tactic of covering over an older sacred thing with the new conquering faith.
So when celebrating this day, think about what your really celebrating, the genocide and destruction of a culture much older than the Christians. Many Pagans have taken to wearing snakes on this day to celebrate the older holiday, and to remind the Christians there are still snakes, Patrick failed to get them all.
