Christianization

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Christianization. The conversion of the Irish to Christianity was a process and not an event. Christian communities already existed in 431 when their first bishop, Palladius, was papally appointed. Patrick worked apparently in a pagan environment later in the 5th century. His sphere of activity was Ireland's northern half; that of Palladius, it seems, was Leinster. Tradition asserts the pre‐Patrician status of Ailbe, Déclán, Ciarán, and Ibar in Munster and south Leinster, but the chronology of these saints is obscure.

Patrick addressed himself to the whole spectrum of the social hierarchy, referring in his Confession to converts among slaves and among the sons and daughters of kings. But there is no evidence for evangelism other than in the person of Patrick. The early church did not actively evangelize, and the first phase of Christianization must be put down to the influence of immigrants from Roman Britain and to the prestige of imperial institutions. There were numerous lines of communication: the presence of Irish colonists in south Wales and Cornwall in the 5th and 6th centuries is attested by inscriptions in ogam (itself based on the Latin alphabet), and many are Christian in character. No doubt there were contacts with Gaul.

With the exception of Patrick's testimony the conversion of the Irish is unsupported by documentation. Carved crosses based on the chi‐rho (the first letters of the Greek name for Christ) which occur in the south‐west suggest 6th‐century influence from Britain or Gaul. A small shrine from Clonmore, Co. Armagh, and that preserved at Bobbio in northern Italy are the oldest examples of native Christian metalwork; made c.680, they are classical in form but decorated with patterns of pre‐Christian ancestry. Some Irish churches may have been deliberately sited close to pre‐Christian centres, as Armagh and Baslick beside Emain Macha and Crúachain respectively. Some Irish saints—pre‐eminently Brigid—appear to be old deities euhemerized. ‘Holy wells’ throughout Ireland were dedicated to the saints but may have had a prior significance. Festivals and the feasts of the church exhibit, in the vernacular tradition, the assimilation of pre‐Christian practices.

As early as the 6th century Christianity had been embraced by the Irish learned classes—the practitioners in the fields of genealogy, poetry, senchas (history), and law, and contemporary canons issued by the church are no longer thought to indicate the continued coexistence of paganism. Early Latin loanwords in Old Irish denote the institutions, personnel and material accoutrements of the Church. There is thus cumulative evidence to suggest that Christianity was adopted by the Irish with relative ease—bearing out a tradition (which is no more than that) that conversion was achieved without martyrdom.

Bibliography

Bieler, L. , ‘The Christianization of the Insular Celts during the Sub‐Roman Period and its Repercussions on the Continent’, Celtica, 8 (1968)

Cormac Bourke