Trent University - Continuing Education

This course examines what we know of the Patrick who came to Ireland from Britain in the fifth century C.E. and claims to have converted “many thousands.” What are the facts about this Patrick, and how do we distinguish the truth from the myths surrounding him, given the different traditions that have come down to us? The course begins by looking at the state of Irish society when he arrived. How was it organized? How was property distributed? What type of legal system, if any, did it have? Were the people literate, and did they have any form of education? Since druids are mentioned in the record, to what sort of religion were they connected, and was it the same as the druidic religion of the ancient Gauls? Finally, what strategies did Patrick use to convert a people who were largely pagan, and what was the nature of Patrick’s Christianity and how was it to be administered? 

Format

The two-hour class period will be divided between lectures and discussion of short readings drawn from extracts of the sources in the Source Kit. Sources include “The Confession of St. Patrick” and Patrick’s “Letter to Coroticus”; Prosper of Aquitaine’s Chronicle; Gildas’ On the Destruction of Britain; the Irish Annals; “The Second Synod of St. Patrick”; a selection of later Lives of the Saint; readings from law tracts and sagas. Illustrations and maps will be provided on PowerPoint. The class is meant to be interactive: questions and comments from participants are welcomed throughout.

Week 1:

The settlement of Ireland by the Celts, the Irish language and its relation to the languages of Europe, the túath (kinship, community), Irish kingship, and the organization of society by class and property. Readings: selections from the law tracts. Slides: artefacts and structures from prehistoric Ireland.

Week 2:

Status of women and marriage laws, druids and pagan religion, the warrior society and cattle raiding, the Fílid and Irish education; the use of the ogham alphabet. Readings: selections from the law tracts and Irish sagas; selection from “The Scholar’s Primer”. Slides: ogham stones. 

Week 3:

The problem of Patrick’s dates and the “two-Patricks” theory; Patrick’s family and his formation in Britain; the question of his education and consecration in Gaul; his enslavement in Ireland and escape to an unnamed country; Patrick’s enemies in Britain; the Pelagian heresy as it affected Patrick’s mission. Readings: “The Confession of St. Patrick”; selected Irish Annals; Prosper of Aquitaine’s Chronicle (dates in the fifth century).

Week 4:

Patrick’s mission in Ireland: dealings with the kings, the education of priests, preaching the life of virginity (“monks and female virgins”); the violent attack on his mission by enemies; his attachment to to the “Gaulish brethren”. Readings: “The Confession of St. Patrick,” “The Letter to Coroticus”.

Week 5:

Patrick and his biographers: the remaking of Patrick in the seventh century: the wonder-worker, healer, prophet, battler of the druids – remodelling Patrick according to the themes of Irish saints’ lives of the seventh and later centuries. Readings: selections from the Lives of St. Patrick by Muirchú and Tírechán.

Week 6:

Problems of evaluating Patrick’s mission: Who were Patrick’s enemies and how successful were they in bringing him down? Were the charges against him real or trumped up? What were likely their real motivations? How many people did he really convert, given that there were already Christians living in Ireland when he arrived? Patrick claimed to be a bishop, but why was a diocesan structure lacking later on? What was the role of bishops and how did they fit into the  monastic communities that developed?  How were monastic communities accommodated in the context of ancient Irish property law, and how were they administered? These questions are very difficult to answer, given the paucity of reliable evidence from the sixth century, but an attempt will be made. Readings: “The Second Synod of St. Patrick”; selections from the “Life of Columba” by Adomnán of Iona.