Mec Vannin Make Believe

[Frances]

Blundell, Parr etc merely repeat what they read in Camden (Blundell states as much, Parr is a primary source for the laws not the history which he too repeats out of Camden) - Moore in his text doesn't mention it - stating that events were confused he writes concerning Aufrica's claims :It is not known whether Balliol obeyed the summons, but these claims were not again heard of till twelve years later, in 1305, when John de Waldeboef, grandson of Maria, probably taking advantage of the temporary disgrace of Antony de Beck, Bishop of Durham, who was then owner of Man, petitioned Edward to hear his claim. Edward, consequently, referred the petition to the justices of the King's Bench.

 

In the following year, Aufrica granted all her right in the Isle of Man to " the noble and potent man Simon de Montecuto."It does not appear whether the claim either of Waldeboef or of Montacute obtained recognition. All that is known is that Sir William de Montacute, grandson of Sir Simon, was afterwards in possession of Man.In the meantime, important events, which indirectly affected Man, had been passing elsewhere."

 

giving refs to his claims and thus avoiding any mention of the chronology that had been queried by Cumming some 50 years earlier.

 

The MNH document certainly needs correcting and I will inform the archivist there. Yes I agree that no document states Stanly acquired it because of the Percy rebellion but the grant was immediately after it was crushed and John Stanley had played a major role here.

 

However are you claiming that this error (oft repeated in 17th + 18th C on authority of Camden) is sympomatic - if so maybe you could list a few others but maybe you could explain why this fact is so important to you - Piers even in the list is only shown as briefly holding Man which passed through several hands in those turbulent times (maybe I should have repeated Moore's comments that there were questions about some of the early Lords - mea culpa).

[VinnieK]

Vinnie - from the New York Times Review of 'How the Irish Saved Civilisation' by Thomas Cahill.:

 

'In this delightful and illuminating look into a crucial but little-known "hinge" of history, Thomas Cahill takes us to the "island of saints and scholars," the Ireland of St. Patrick and the Book of Kells. Here, far from the barbarian despoliation of the continent, monks and scribes laboriously, lovingly, even playfully preserved the West's written treasury.

 

Which would be excellent were Cahill a respected author of genuine history, but he's not and "How the Irish Saved Civilisation" is, like a lot of his work, a very poor effort that's wrong on many very basic historical details, and follows a predictable bestseller formula of "How (ethnic grouping) (saved/changed) the (world/way we think/everything). It is, to put it succinctly, sensationalist bollocks. The great body of literature and academic studies was preserved in the great libraries (which dwarfed the meagre attempts at archiving of monastries) of the Byzantine empire, and later the Islamic powers that occupied much of that empire. There they were preserved and new additions of equal importance were made (especially by muslims working in the sciences) - not only did Ireland lack many of the ancient texts, but they most certainly lacked the newer texts and treatises that proved so important in fuelling the renaissance era. Take for example Euclid's elements, one of the most fundamental ancient texts in mathematics, which was translated into Latin from Arabic by Adelard of Bath, or texts by Archimedes and Aristotle also from Arabic sources during the Renaissance. Indeed, during the twelth century it was relatively common for European scholars to travel to Muslim spain to study, or to Sicily (which had been under Muslim control) to search for copies of ancient texts, not Ireland.

 

Almost certainly, the Irish Monks played a part in reestablishing Christian civilization to Europe, but to imagine they are responsible for the Renaissance, for the growth in art and the sciences during that era is ridiculous (especially in the latter case, to whom we owe the ancient Muslim scribes and scientists as great a debt as we do the Greeks).

 

In other words, if you believe Cahill, you'll believe anything.

 

Vinnie K, it is sad you seem to know nothing of this.

 

I rather think it's more sad that you accept this jolly little tale you've been spun and now believe that you do know something of this.

[Frances]

Freggyrag please give a ref for the comment re 'education of kings' - it sounds as if taken from Waldron (that archpurveyor of fable) along the lines of his history of Castle Rushen:

they had a fierce encounter with the little people, and having got the better over them, possess'd themselves of Castle Russin, and by degrees, as they received reinforcements, of the whole Island. These new conquerors maintained their ground some time, but were at length beaten out by a race of giants, who were not extirpated, as I said before, till the reign of Prince Arthur, by Merlin, the famous British enchanter. They pretend also that this Island afterward became an asylum to all the distress'd princes and great men in Europe, and that those uncommon fortifications made about Peel Castle were added for their better security:

 

Now I agree that the Irish monestaries did keep some aspects of learning alive (but the Irish also wandered throughout Europe at this time so it wasn't quite as you suggest - there was an active interchange) - there was a Celtic Monestry at Maughold but how big in terms of inhabitants or how important is not clear - and yes Rushen Abbey would have had a scriptorum (equivalent to today's xerox machine) and it was no doubt where the Chronicle was written.

[Skeddan]

knowledge and learning was kept in IoM and Ireland in the Dark Ages and spread to Europe through monasteries, bringing art and culture to France and Italy

 

This does not say 'Renaissance' - VinnieK is just using playground tactics by shooting down an argument of his own making.

[VinnieK]

knowledge and learning was kept in IoM and Ireland in the Dark Ages and spread to Europe through monasteries, bringing art and culture to France and Italy

 

This does not say 'Renaissance' - VinnieK is just using playground tactics by shooting down an argument of his own making.

 

So what exactly is the flourishing of art and culture in France and Italy (as if for the entirity of the Dark Ages they had no concept whatsover of those) after the Dark ages but the beginning of the Renaissance?

 

You're making a fool out of yourself, Skeddan. Your interpretation of history is based on the mistaken beliefs that:

 

a. Ireland was the only place where monastries preserved classical texts and went on to share them with the world

 

b. That western civilization disappeared when the Western Roman Empire was overwhealmed by germanic tribes such as the Visigoths and Vandals.

 

In actual fact the barbarians left much of their new territories remarkably intact, and civilization continued. Furthermore classical texts were preserved not only in Ireland, but also in England, France, and Italy (and outstripping all in terms of preservation and progress were the previously mentioned Islamic and Byzantine civilizations). Your view that Europe lived in a kind of artless, cultureless limbo, entirely cut off from its past before being liberated from ignorance by Irish monks is an immature, if not downright childlike corruption of the past.

[Freggyragh]

I know you won't like this Vinnie, but could you refute any particular point in Cahill's book? Or, have you just googled the name and pretended to have read the book? Why don't you get on to Wikipedia and tell them how incensed you are - here is the Wikipedia article:

 

How The Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland's Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe is a non-fiction historical book written by Thomas Cahill.

 

Cahill argues a case for the Irish people's critical role in preserving Western Civilization from utter destruction by the Germanic tribes (Visigoths, Huns, Franks, Angles, Saxons, Ostrogoths, etc.). The book retells the story from the collapse of the Roman Empire and the pivotal role played by members of the clergy at the time. A particular focus is placed upon Saint Patrick and retells his early struggles through slavery; basically retelling portions of The Confession of Saint Patrick (see also, Confession). Early parts of the book examine Ireland before Patrick and the role of Saint Augustine of Hippo. Particular focus is placed upon Saint Columba and the monks he trained and the monasteries he set up in the Hiberno-Scottish mission. In a sense, these holy men salvaged everything possible from the destruction of the Roman Empire.

How the Irish Saved Civilization was first published in March 1995 and appeared on the New York Times Bestseller List for almost two years.[1]

[Freggyragh]

Frances - I will get back to you with a reference to the education of kings sons, but it may take me a while to dig it out. The source is almost definately in Gaelic - certainly not the one you mention.

[Frances]

I've seen the quote before but I too can't immediately recall it (legend of Bran ?) - there was another 'popular' book that claimed the Isle of Man was the land of apples of Arthurian legend (written by some american teacher of English Literature who had obviously never seen the Irish sea or the Island).

But to return to the Irish monks (unfortuneately my main ref books are in Peel where I'm not at present) but in Adomnan's lefe of Columba the key document was written in an Irish hand early 8th C (? Iona) but had migrated to Switzerland by late 8th or at latest early 9th C - thus indicating ready movement between Celtic church and Rome at this period - Adomnan travelled readily between Iona, Northumberland and possibly wider afield somewhat earlier

[VinnieK]

I know you won't like this Vinnie, but could you refute any particular point in Cahill's book?

 

What part of it? I'm refuting the very title, the very suggestion that Ireland is the saviour of western civilization. Not that I'm not denying that Ireland played a part in spreading Christian Civilization across Europe (although I do question how much of a role was played by the Island in this, perhaps you can clear that up, since that was the original point of this), but I am contesting the idea that they did it largely alone, or that they "saved" civilization - how could they when the large majority of our scientific knowledge at the period was transmitted by Muslim nations, as were texts on medicine by Galen and Hippocrates, when the roman laws were preserved in the Byzantine Empire during the 9th century Digest and rediscovered in Italy during the 11th century, or when the works of authors such as Cicerro were found in Byzantium?

 

Yes the monastries and Christian establishment (everywhere, not just Ireland) preserved some classical texts (although they were also as guilty of letting large numbers of valuable texts disappear through neglect and a deliberate policy of closing academies and destroying libraries that largely went untouched by the so called "barabarians"), but they tended only to keep those they viewed as compatible with Christian doctrine (such as Plato, Homer, and Aristotle), and even then the Irish were not in a unique position in holding these.

[Frances]

there has been many new books with excellent academic pedigrees looking at early Irish history coming out of the now buoyant Irish Universities - would it not be possible to acquire some of these rather than rely on Cahill. It's definitely outside of my period of interest so I've only seen them as an outsider and at some academic book fests.

[Freggyragh]

No, Frances, I'm not referrig to Bran, who's island of apples was to the West of Ireland as I recall (although the Manannan connection is interesting), or to Cuchulain's training in Skye. I'm referring to a modern Gaelic history book.

[Freggyragh]

there has been many new books with excellent academic pedigrees looking at early Irish history coming out of the now buoyant Irish Universities - would it not be possible to acquire some of these rather than rely on Cahill. It's definitely outside of my period of interest so I've only seen them as an outsider and at some academic book fests.

 

Really? But Vinnie is so sure that nobody is teaching this. Maybe he means no one in Norfolk?

[VinnieK]

Really? But Vinnie is so sure that nobody is teaching this. Maybe he means no one in Norfolk?

 

No... I said no school would teach that, in Skeddan's own words, Ireland and the Isle of Man reintroduced art and culture to France and Italy after the dark ages. Of course there's tonnes of scholarship on Ireland during the middle ages, but unless you want to be disappointed, I'd suggest you stick with candy floss history like Cahill.

 

By the way, what's with the obsession with me living in Norfolk? You do know that those backwards/incest jibes (such as Normal for Norfolk) only tend to work if:

 

a. The person you're aiming them at is actually from there;

b. You're from a place bigger, more metropolitan, and less cut off (hence my comment in response to the last time you brought it up, which, judging your pouty little comment of "true colours", you didn't seem to get).

[Frances]

Freggyragh:

The basis of the quote re Education of Princes is from Hector Boethius's history (and if you give credence to that then you will believe anything?) - anyway not even Oswald in his Vestigea reprinted the section saying: "We have omitted Hector Boethius, as he evidently confounds the Isle of Man with Anglesey. " as the education of the sons of Kings is by the Druids (and as I'm sure you know the hard information about these can be written on the back of a postage stamp being mainly based on Caesar's political 'history' and some events in Gaul) - however it is hinted at in Ward's book of 1836 (see www.manxnotebook.com/fulltext/wd1837/p001.htm - this book is a crazy mismash of misunderstood history written by Ward's son to help oppose the abolition of the Diocese of Sodor & Mann - but it makes a good story!

[staaue]

Really? But Vinnie is so sure that nobody is teaching this. Maybe he means no one in Norfolk?

 

No... I said no school would teach that, in Skeddan's own words, Ireland and the Isle of Man reintroduced art and culture to France and Italy after the dark ages. Of course there's tonnes of scholarship on Ireland during the middle ages, but unless you want to be disappointed, I'd suggest you stick with candy floss history like Cahill.

 

By the way, what's with the obsession with me living in Norfolk? You do know that those backwards/incest jibes (such as Normal for Norfolk) only tend to work if:

 

a. The person you're aiming them at is actually from there;

b. You're from a place bigger, more metropolitan, and less cut off (hence my comment in response to the last time you brought it up, which, judging your pouty little comment of "true colours", you didn't seem to get).

 

Because you seem to have some rather strong views on Manks issues, when all the evidence - that I can see - is that you're English.

 

It might be something you should clear up mate; the reasoning for this is so we know how to better understand where you're coming from!!!!