Having thus disposed of the word “Cloic-teach,” which Dr. Ledwich so relied upon, as determining the character of these antique remains, I take leave, evermore, to discard the misnomer, and draw attention to a name which I have never seen noticed as applied to any of those pyramidal edifices. That which I allude to is “Cathoir ghall,” which means the “Cathedral or temple of brightness” (“anddelight”[60]); not, I must premise, from any external daubing with which modern Vandalism may have thought proper to incrust it,—as happened to that at Swords,—but in evident reference to the solar and lunar light—the sources of life and generation—therein contemplated, at once, and interchangeably venerated.
The particular Tower to which this epithet had been assigned—and which it obtained, by way of eminence, for its colossal superiority—is not now standing.[61]It rose about half a mile distant from the old castle of Bally Carbery, in the barony of Iveragh, and county of Kerry; a place where one would hope that the true designation of such phenomena would be preserved most pure, being aloof from the influence of exotic refinements, and, thusfar, free from that maudlinscepticismand laboureddoubtwhich a “little learning” too frequently superinduces.
“Dear, lovely bowers of innocence and ease,—Seats of my youth, when ev’ry sport could please,—How often have I loiter’d o’er thy green,When humble happiness endear’d each scene!How often have I paused on every charm,—The shelter’d cot, the cultivated farm!While all the village train, from labour free,Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree.”[62]
No combination of letters could possibly approach closer, or convey to a discerning mind greater affinity of meaning to anything, than does the above name to the description given of them in the twelfth century by Giraldus Cambrensis, who calls them “turres ecclesiasticas, quæ, more patriæ, arctæ sunt et altæ, nec non et rotundæ.” This definition, vague as it may seem, affords ample illumination, when compared with the epithet which I have above adduced, to penetrate the darkness of this literary nebula. The word “turres” points out their constructional symmetry, and “ecclesiasticas” their appropriation to a religious use; and what can possibly be in stricter consonance with the tenor of this idea than “Cathaoir ghall,” or the Temple of Brightness, which I have instanced above as thevernacularappellation of one of those sanctuaries?
Should it be asked, why did not Cambrensis, at the time, enter more fully into the minutiæ of their detail? I shall unhesitatingly answer, it was because he knew nothing more about them. The Irish had at that moment most lamentably dwindled into adegenerate race. The noble spirit of their heroic ancestors, which had called forth those pyramids, for thetwofoldandmingledpurpose ofreligionandscience, had already evaporated; and all the historian could glean, in prosecuting his inquiries as to their era and cause, was that their antiquity was so remote, that some of them may be even seen immersed beneath the waters of Lough Neagh,[63]which had been occasioned many ages before by the overflowing of a fountain.[64]
Let us now turn to the annals of the “Four Masters,” which record the destruction of Armagh,A.D.995, by a flash of lightning, and see under what name they include the Round Towers in the general catastrophe. Here is the passage at full length, as given by O’Connor—“Ardmaeha do lose do tene saighnein, ettir tighib, 7[65]Domhuliacc, 7 Cloic teacha, 7 Fiadh-Neimhedh”; that is, Armagh having been set on fire by lightning, its houses, its cathedrals, its belfries, and itsFiadh-Neimhedh, were all destroyed.
TheUlster Annalshave registered the same event in the following words:—“Tene diait do gabail Airdmaeha conafarcaibh Dertach, na Damliacc, na h Erdam, na Fidh-Nemead ann cen loscadh”; that is, Lightning seized upon Armagh, to so violent a degree, as to leave neither mansion, nor cathedral, nor belfry, norFiadh-Nemeadh, undemolished.
Here we findFiadh-Nemeadhto occur in both accounts, while the belfries are represented in one place asCloic teacha, and in the other asErdam, and in both are opposed to, and contradistinguished from,theFiadh-Nemeadh. Our business now is to investigate what this latter word conveys; and though I do not mean, for a while, to develop itstrue interpretation,—of which I am the sole and exclusive depositary,—yet must I make it apparent, that by it—whatever way it must be rendered—all before me have understood, were emphatically designated our Sabian Towers. Thus Colgan in hisActs, p. 297, referring to these words of the Four Masters, says: “Anno 995, Ardmaeha cumBasilicis,Turribus,aliisque omnibus edificiis, incendio ex fulmine generato, tota vastatur.”
O’Connor also, wishing to wrest its import to his favourite theory of there having beengnomons, while ignorant of its proper force, indulges in a conjecture of the most lunaticostentation, and translatesFiadh-Nemeadhbycelestial indexes.
But though the word does notliterallysignify either “Towers”—as Colgan, for want of a better exposition, has set forth—or “celestial indexes”—as O’Connor, equally at a loss for its proper meaning, has ventured to promulgate, yet is it indisputable that it stood as the representative of thoseenigmaticaledifices, as well as that both writers had the same structures in view as comprehended under the tenor of thismysteriousdenomination.[66]
These annals I look upon in three different lights as invaluable documents—firstly, as they prove the existence of those edifices at the date above assigned; secondly, as they show that they were distinct things from the belfries—whether cloicteach or erdam—which shared their disaster; and, thirdly, because that, even admitting of O’Connor’s mistranslation, itgives us an insight into their character more fortuitous than he had anticipated.Celestial indexes![67]Could any one be so silly as for a moment to suppose that this was a mere allusion to the circumstance of their height? No; it was no such casual epithet, or witty effort of hyperbole; but it was, what Sallust has so truly said of the Syrtes, “nomen ex re inditum.”
The identity between this island and the “Insula Hyperboreorum” of Hecatæus being to be completely established in an ensuing chapter,—thebunglingof natives and theclaimsof externs notwithstanding,—I shall not hesitate to assume asproved, that ours was the “island” described.
Allow me then to draw your attention to an extract from Diodorus’sreportthereof:—“They affirm also,” says he, “thatthe moonis so seen from this island, that itappears not so distantfrom theearth, andseemstopresent on its disk certain projections like the mountains of our world. Likewise that theGod Apolloin person visits this island once innineteenyears, in which thestarscomplete theirrevolutions, and return into their old positions; and hence thiscycleofnineteen yearsis called, by the Greeks, the great year.”
Who is it that collates this description with the “celestial indexes”[68]above produced, that is not, at once, struck with the felicity of the coincidence? On earth, what couldcelestial indexesmean but such as were appropriated to the contemplation of the heavenly bodies?—just as the name of “Zoroaster”—which, in the Persian language, signifies “cœlorum observator,” that is, star-gazer, or observer of theheavens—was given to Zerdust, the great patriarch of the Magi, from his eminence and delight in astronomical pursuits.
Now, “the moon being so seen from this island that it appears not so distant from the earth,” is so obvious a reference to the study of astronomy that it would be almost an insult to go about to prove it; but when it is said that “it presents on its disk certainprojectionslike the mountains of our world,” it not only puts that question beyond the possibility of dispute, but argues furthermore a proficiency in that department, which it is the fashionnow-a-daysto attribute only tomoderndiscoveries.
But have we any evidence of having ever had amongst us, in those “olden times,” men who by their talents could support this character? Hear what Strabo says ofAbaris, whom “Hecatæus and others mention” as having been sent by his fraternity from the “islandof the Hyperboreans” to Delos, in Greece, in the capacity of a sacred ambassador, where he was equally admired for his knowledge, politeness, justice, and integrity. “He came,” says Strabo, “to Athens, not clad in skins like aScythian, but with a bow in his hand, a quiver hanging on his shoulders, a plaid wrapt about his body, a gilded belt encircling his loins, and trousers reaching from the waist down to the soles of his feet. He was easy in his address, agreeable in his conversation, active in his despatch, and secret in his management of great affairs; quick in judging of present occurrences, and ready to take his part in any sudden emergency; provident withal in guarding against futurity; diligent in the quest of wisdom; fond of friendship; trustingvery littletofortune, yet having the entire confidence of others,and trusted with everything for his prudence. He spake Greek with a fluency, that you would have thought he had been bred up in the Lyceum, and conversed all his life with the Academy of Athens.”[69]
This embassy is ascertained to have taken placeB.C.600; and from what shall be elsewhere said of the “island of the Hyperboreans”—coupled with the circumstance of the orator Himerius having called this individual a Scythian, which Strabo would seem to have insinuated also—we can be at no loss in tracing him to his proper home.
“Far westward lies an isle of ancient fame,By nature blessed, and Scotia is her name;An island rich—exhaustless in her storeOf veiny silver and of golden ore;Her verdant fields with milk and honey flow,Her woolly fleeces vie with virgin snow,Her waving furrows float with verdant corn,AndArmsandArtsher envied sons adorn.”
Such is the description of Ireland given by Donatus, bishop of Etruria, in 802; and I have selected it among a thousand other authorities of similar import, to show that Scotia or Scythia was one, and thelast, of theancientnames of this country;[70]while the name of “Hyperborean” was the distinctive character assigned thereto, not only as descriptive of its locality towards the north, but as worshipping the wind Boreas.
Did I not apprehend it might be considered irrelevant to the scope of this work, I could easily prove that the amity, said by Hecatæus to have been cemented on the occasion of the visit above alluded to, was not that of a mere return of courteous civilities for a casual intercourse, but one of a far more tender andfamiliarnature, viz. the recognition on both sides of their mutual descent from one common origin: the same people who had settled in this country, and imported the mysteries of their magic priesthood, being akin to the first settlers on the coasts of Greece, which they impregnated with similar initiation. I am anticipated, of course, to have meant the Pelasgi, who, under another name, belonged to the same hive as the Indo-Scythæ, or Chaldean Magi, or Tuath-de-danaan,—as the head tribe thereof were called,—who, having effected an establishment onthishappy isle, aloof from the intrusion of external invasion or internal butcheries, were allowed to cultivate thestudyof theirfavourite rites, the fame and eminence of which had obtained for its theatre, of all nations, the designation of “sacred.” But I fear it would be encroaching upon the patience of my readers, andbesides anticipating, in point of order, what may by and by follow.
An inconsistency, however, appears in the details, which I cannot here well overlook. It is this. Himerius has called this our ambassador a “Scythian”; and Strabo has affirmed, that he was “not clad like a Scythian.” How, then, shall I cut this knot? Thus. Abaris, as his name implies, was one of the Boreades, or priests of Boreas, belonging to the Tuath-de-danaan colony in this island, who were subdued about six hundred years before this event by the Scythians, whose dress, as well as manners, differed in all particulars from those of their religious and learned predecessors.
But though the Scythians, from state policy, had suppressed the temple-worship when they deposed from the throne their antecedent Hyperboreans, they were but too sensible of their literary value not to profit by their services in the department of education. Hence it came to pass, that the Boreades were still indulged with their favourite costume, while the inferior communities were obliged to conform to the rules and the fashions of the ascendant dynasty. In a short time, however, the Scythian Druids superseded the Danaan Boreades, by the influence of their own instruction; and the consequence was that of that graceful garb, in the folds of which our ancient high priests officiated at the altar, or exhibited in the senate, not a single vestige is now to be traced except in the word God,Phearagh, whom I shall anon introduce, and in the highlands of Scotland, where a remnant of those Hyperborean or Danaan priests took shelter from the ruthless Picts, resigning to thoseremorseless and intolerant persecutors the ground of the only two temples which they were able there to raise, as the last resort of their hopes, and the solace of their exile.[71]
Nor is it alone as accounting for the circumstance of costume that the above explanation deserves the reader’s regard. An additional insight is afforded, by its enabling us to account for that boundless superiority which, the Irish Druids possessed over all other bodies of the same denomination all over the world. Originally, the Druids were an humble set of men, without science, without letters, without pretensions to refinement; but having succeeded here to the fraternity of the accomplished Danaan Boreades, who, in the revolution of affairs, were forced to communicate their acquirements to the opposite but prevailing priesthood, those latter so far profited by the ennobling opportunity, as to eclipse all other Druids, as well in Europe as in Africa.
Cæsar, in hisCommentaries, bears direct testimony to their astronomical research, saying: “Multa præterea de sideribus atque eorum motu, de mundi ac terrarum magnitudine, de rerum naturâ ac deorum immortalium vi ac potestate disputant ac juventuti transdunt.”—De Bel. Gal.lib. 1-6, c. xiv. Pomponius Mela, also confirming the fact, says: “Hi terræ mundique magnitudinem ac forman, motus cœli ac siderum, ac quid Dii velint scire, profitentur.”—De Situ Orbis, lib. 3, c. ii. These two latter authorities, I admit, were more immediately directed to theDruidsof Britain; but as it is agreed on allhands thatthatbody of religionists had received the seeds of their instruction from the IrishMagi, who were infinitely their superiors inallliterary accomplishments, I think we may be warranted in extending the commendation to Ireland also, as the writers indubitablyincludedit under thegeneral nameofBritain.
But were allexternaltestimonies silent on the matter, and mercenary vouchers even assert the reverse, the internal evidence of our language itself, a language so truly characterised as “more than three thousand years old,” would afford to the ingenious and disinterested inquirer the most convincing proof of the ground which I have assumed. In that language—and the writer of this essayoughtto knowsomethingof it—there is scarcely a single term appertaining to time, fromlaa day, derived fromliladh, to turn round,—in allusion to the diurnal revolution,—up tobleain, a year, compounded ofBel, the sun, andAin, a circle, referring to its annual orbit, that does not, in its formation and construction, associate the idea with the planetary courses, and thereby evince, not only an astronomical taste, but that astronomy was the “ruling passion” of those who spoke it.
“The Irish language,” says Davies, an intelligent and respectable Welsh writer, “appears to have arrived at maturity amongst the Iapetidæ, while they were yet in contact with Aramæan families, and formed a powerful tribe in Asia Minor and in Thrace. It may, therefore, in particular instances, have more similitude or analogy to the Asiatic dialects than what appears in those branches of the Celtic that were matured in the west of Europe. Those who used this language consisted partly of Titans, of Celto-Scythians,or of those Iapetidæ who assisted in building the city of Babel, and must have been habituated, after the dispersion, to the dialects of the nations through which they passed, before they joined the society of their brethren.” We thank this learned author for the flattering notice which he has been pleased to take of us; and though, in his subsequent remarks, he steers far wide of our true pedigree, yet a concession so important as that even here adduced, must command at least our becoming acknowledgments.
The splendid examples which we have had of primitive teachers of Christianity in this kingdom, and whom Ledwich himself, reluctant as he was to afford ordinary justice to Irish merit, is obliged to praise, were not more remarkable for the sanctified zeal and enthusiastic devotion with which they propagated the Gospel, than they were for the diversified range of their literary acquirements, and the moral sublimity of their ideas and conceptions.[72]Speaking of a production belonging to one of these worthies, Ledwich remarks: “In this tract we can discover Cumman’s acquaintance with the doctrine of time, and the chronological characters. He is no stranger to the solar, lunar, and bissextile years, to the epactal days, and embolismal months, nor to the names of the Hebrew, Macedonian, and Egyptian months. To examine the various cyclical systems, and to pointout their construction and errors, required no mean abilities: a large portion of Greek and Latin literature was also necessary.”[73]
Here I would have it distinctly noticed, that the above-mentioned individuals who shone in the galaxy of our early Christian constellations, had been but just converted from paganism by St. Patrick, and consequently were not indebted for this “learned lore” to the Romish missionaries, but to the more elevated genius of their native institutions. This it was that enabled them to make those astronomical observations which our annals commemorate; and who can say, amidst the decay of time, the ravages of persecution, and the fury of fanaticism, what tomes of such labours has not the world lost? Some few, however, remain, of which we shall adduce some by way of specimen. Solar eclipses of 495, 664, 810, 884; lunar, of 673, 717, 733, 807, 877; solar and lunar, 864; a comet 911, are recorded in our annals.
Those of the “Four Masters” additionally record certain extraordinary celestial phenomena in 743:—“Visæ sunt stellæ quasi de cœlo cadere.” Again, in 744, they observe: “Hoc anno stellæ item de cœlo frequentes deciderunt”; while it cannot be too diligently noted, “that, when the rest of Europe, as Vallancey so justly remarked, through ignorance or forgetfulness, had no knowledge of thetrue figureof the earth, in the eighth century, the rotundity and true formation of it should have been taught in the Irish schools,” which we shall by and by more pointedly advert to.
It thus appears manifest that the Irish must, at onetime, have not only possessed, but excelled in, the science of astronomy. How did they acquire it? is the next question. “Ad illa mihi pro se quisque acriter intendat animum.” In that passage of Diodorus, to which I have already referred, we find the following appropriate characteristic:—“It is affirmed that Latona was born there, and that, therefore, the worship of Apollo is preferred to that of any other God; and as they daily celebrate this deity with songs of praise, and worship him with the highest honours, they are considered aspeculiarlythepriestsof Apollo, whose sacred grove andsingulartemple ofround form, endowed with many gifts, are there.”
Now, it is universally known that Apollo, which, “according to the learned Pezron, is no other than Ap-haul, or the son of the Sun,” was understood by the ancients only essentially to typify that powerful planet, “which animates and imparts fecundity to the universe, whose divinity has been accordingly honoured in every quarter by temples and by altars, and consecrated in the religious strains of all nations” and all climes.
His being peculiarly worshipped in this island only shows the intimate knowledge it possessed of the mysteries of thesolar system; and that near converse which we have been already told it possessed with the moon, is confirmation the most positive of this explanation.
Let me here again recall to the reader’s mind the name ofCathaoir Ghall, ortemple of brightness, which I have before adduced, and when we compareallwith thecelestial indexesrecorded in our annals, the conclusion is inevitable,that the Round Towers of Ireland were specifically constructed for the two-foldpurpose of worshipping the Sun and Moon—as the authors of generation and vegetative heat—and, from the nearer converse which their elevation afforded, of studying the revolutions and properties of the planetary orbs. Let me, however, before elucidating the era of their actual erection, with theirPhallicform and their further use, revert to the Mosaic history for thegroundworkof my development.
“And chiefly thou, O Spirit! that dost preferBefore all temples th’ upright heart and pure,Instruct me, for thou know’st; thou from the firstWast present, and, with mighty wings outspread,Dove-like sat’st brooding on the vast abyss,And mad’st it pregnant. What in me is dark,Illumine! what is low, raise and support!That to the height of this great argumentI may assert eternal Providence,And justify the ways of God to man.”[74]
Nimrod, the son of Cush, “the mighty hunter before the Lord,” was the first person,[75]according to Vossius,[76]who introduced the worship of thesunas a deity. Disgusted with the roving character of his previous life, and tired of peregrination, he resolves to build himself a permanent abode, and persuades his followers to embark in the design, “lest they be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.”[77]Mankind had already relapsed into the follies of their antediluvian ancestors. The awful lesson of the watery visitation was read to them in vain, and again they verified what God had before that memorable epoch with sorrow declared, “that every imagination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually.”[78]
In Babel, the city thus agreed upon to be built, as the anchor of their stability and the basis of their renown,—we find a “Tower” mentioned, “whose top mayreach,” says our version (but should it not rather bepoint?)towards heaven.
What was the object of this architectural elevation?
Not certainly, as some have supposed, as a place of refuge in apprehension of a second deluge; for in that case, it is probable, they would have built it on an eminence, rather than on aplain,whereasthe Bible expressly tells us they had selected the latter.
Much less could it be, what the poets have imagined, for the purpose of scaling the celestial abodes, and disputing with Jehovah the composure of His sovereignty.
What, then, was it intended for?
Undoubted as an acknowledgment, however vitiated and depraved, of dependence upon that Being, whose acts shine forth in universal love, but whose spiritual adoration was now partially lost sight of, ormergedin the homage thus primarily tendered to thelucid offspringof hisomnipotent fiat.
This tower, so erected by Nimrod, in opposition to the established system of religious belief, and which, therefore—but from anoblerreason than what was generally imagined, viz. his researches in astronomy, and the application thereto of instruments—procured him the appellation ofrebelfromnemh, heaven, androdh, an assault, was, I hesitate not to say, a temple constructed to the celestial host, the sun, moon, and stars, which constituted the substance of theSabian idolatry.[79]
Shinaar, in Mesopotamia, was the theatre of this dread occurrence—this appalling spectacle at once of man’s weakness and God’s omnipotence:—Here the Noachidæ had been then fixed; and the name by which this innovation upon their previous usages is transmitted, viz.Ba-Bel, corroborates the destination above assigned.[80]
The word “Baal,” in itself an appellative, at first served to denote the true God amongst those who adhered to the true religion; though, when it became common amongst the idolatrous nations, and applied to idols, He rejected it. “And it shall be in that day that you shall call me Ishi, and shall call me no more Baali.”[81]Another name by which theGodheadwas recognised was Moloch. The latter, indeed, in accuracy of speech was the name assigned him by the Ammonites and Moabites—both terms, however, corresponded in sense, “Moloch” signifying king, and “Baal” Lord, that is, of the heavens; whence transferring the appellation to the Sun, as thesourceanddispenserof allearthly favours, he was also called Bolati,i.e., “Baal thebestower,” as was the moon, Baaltis, from the same consideration: whilst the direct object of their internal regard was not, undoubtedly,that globe of fire which illumines the firmament and vivifies terrestrials, but, physically considered,natureat large, thefructifying germof universalgenerativeness.
The Sun, it is true, as the source of light and heat, came in asrepresentativefor all this adoration. Thus viewed, then, it would appear that the origin of the institution may have been comparatively harmless. God being invisible, or only appearing to mortals through the medium of His acts, it was natural thatman, left to the workings of unaided reason, should look on yon mysterious luminary with mingled sentiments of gratitude and awe. We have every reason, accordingly, to think, that solar worship at first was only emblematical, recognising, in the effulgence of the orb of day, the creative power of Him, the
“Father of all, in every age,In every clime adored,By saint, by savage, and by sage,Jehovah,Jove, orLord”—
who sent it forth on itsbeneficenterrand.
As such, originally they had no temples dedicated to the occasion; they met in the open air, without the precincts of any earthly shrine: there they poured forth their vows and their thanksgivings, under the aërial canopy of the vaulted expanse; nor can it be denied but that there was something irresistibly impressive in such an assemblage of pious votaries, paying their adoration to the throne of light in the natural temple of his daily splendours.[82]
The degeneracy of man, however, became manifest in the sequel, and, from the frequency of the act, thetype was substituted in room of the thing typified. “Solum in cœlis deum putabant solem,” says Philobibliensis, in his interpretation of Sanchoniathon. Nor did it stop here, but, proceeding in its progress of melancholy decay, swept before it the barriers of reason and moral light; and, from the bright monarch of the stars, who rules the day, the seasons, and the year, with perpetual change, yet uniform and identical, bowed before the grosser element ofmaterial fire, as his symbol or corporeal representative.
But the worst and most lamentable is yet untold. The sign again occupied the place of the thing signified, and the human soul was prostrated, and human life often immolated, to propitiate the favour of earthly fire, now by transition esteemed a god. They had, it is true, from afaintknowledge of the sacred writings, and a perverted exercise of that inspired authority, something like an excuse for, at least, a decent attention in the ordinary management of that useful article. In Lev. vi. 13 it is said: “The fire upon the altar shall ever be burning, it shall never go out.” This injunction given by the Lord to Moses, to remind His people of the constant necessity of sacrifice and prayer, the Gentiles misconstrued into reverence for the fire itself, and “quoniam omnes pravi dociles sumus,” hence the ready admission with which the doctrine was embraced, and the general spread of that which was at first but partial and figurative.
Indeed we find that God Himself had appeared to Moses in a “flame of fire in the midst of a bush” (Ex. iii. 2), and in presence of the whole Israelitish host (Ex. xix. 18). “The Lord descended upon Mount Sinai, as the smoke of a furnace;” while in Ex. xiii. 21, it is declared that “the Lord wentbefore them by day in a pillar of a cloud, and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light.” So accordingly we find Elijah, 1 Kings xviii. 24, when challenging the priests of the false divinities, propose a decision by fiery ordeal. “Call you on the name of your gods,” he says, “and I will call upon the name of the Lord: and the God that answereth byfire, let him be God; and all the people answered, it is well spoken.”
The infidels, therefore, who could not concede any superiority to the religion of the Hebrews, and yet could not deny those manifestations of divine support, thought they best proved their independence by instituting a rivalship, and got thereby the more confirmed in their original idolatry. Their bloody sacrifices themselves originated, we may suppose, in some similar way. God must, undoubtedly, have prescribed that rite to Adam, after his fall in Paradise, else how account for the “skins” with which Eve and he had covered themselves? The beasts to which they belonged could not have been slain for food; for it was not till a long time after that they were allowed to eat the flesh of animals. We may, therefore, safely infer that it was for a sin-offering they had been immolated; and the subsequent reproof given to Cain by the rejection of his oblation, evidently for the non-observance of the exact mode of sacrifice prescribed, coupled with the command issued to Abraham, to try his obedience, by offering up his own son, are undeniable proofs of the truth of this inference.
In “Ur” of the Chaldees, a name which literally signifies “fire,” the worship of that element first originated. Thence it travelled in its contaminating course, until all the regions of the earth got impregnatedtherewith. In Persia, a country with whichthis islandhad, of old, the mostdirect communication, we also find a city denominated “Ur”; and who does not know that the Persians, having borrowed the custom from the Chaldean priests, regarded fire with the utmost veneration? Numerous as were the deities which that nation worshipped, “fire,” on every occasion, in every sacrifice—like the Janus of the Romans—was invoked the first. Their Pyrea, in which they not only preserved it ever burning, but worshipped it as a deity, have been noticed by Brisson—but without the necessary adjunct of their being an innovation.
Even the ordinary fire for culinary or social purposes participated in some measure in this hallowed regard; as they durst not, without violating the most sacred rules, and stifling the scruples of all their previous education, offer it the least mark of impious disregard, or pollute its sanctity by profane contact.
It was, however, only as symbolical of thesunthatthey, like the Chaldeans, paid it this extraordinary reverence—a reverence not limited to mere religious rules, but which exercised control over and biassed the decisions of their most important secular transactions. Accordingly, we learn from Herodotus, lib. vii., as quoted by Cicero in “Verrem,” that when Datis, the prefect of Xerxes’ fleet, flushed with the result of his victory over Naxos and the city of Eretria in Eubœa, might easily have made himself master of the island of Delos, he however passed it over untouched in honour of that divinity before whom his country had bowed, having been sacred to Apollo or the sun, and reputedly his birthplace.
But do I mean to say that the Round Towers of Ireland were intended for the preservation of the sacred fire? Far, very far indeed, from it. Thatsome fewof them were therewith connected—I sayconnected, not appropriated—may, I think, be well allowed; nay, it is my candid belief, so far as belief is compatible with a matter so unauthenticated. But having all through maintained that they were not all intended for one and the same object, I must have been understood, of course, by the numerous supporters of that fashionable proposition as including fire-worship within the compass of my several views. I put it, however, frankly to the mostardentsupporter of that theory, who for a moment considers the differentbearingsand peculiarities of those several structures, comparing them first with one another, and then with the description of fire-receptacles which we read of elsewhere, whether he can dispassionately bring himself to say that all our Round Towers, or indeed above two of those at present remaining, could have beeneven calculatedfor that purpose?
Where, let me ask, is it they will suppose the fire to have been placed? In the bottom? No; the intervening floors, of which theGREATER PORTIONretain evident traces, would not only endanger the conflagration of the whole edifice, as it is most probable that they were made of wood, but would also prevent the egress of the smoke through the four windows at the top, for which use, they tell you, those apertures were inserted.
But I am answered that the tower of Ardmore, which has within it no vestiges of divisional compartments, could offer no hindrance to the ascent of the smoke, or its consequent discharge through thefour cardinal openings. To which I rejoin, that if there hadeverbeen a fire lighted within that edifice, and continued for any length of time, as the sacred fire is known to have been kept perpetually burning, it would have been impossible for the inner surface of that stately structure to preserve the beautiful and white coating which it still displays through the mystic revolutions of so many ages. The same conclusion applies to the tower of Devenish, which, though it has no inside coating, yet must its elegant polish have been certainly deteriorated, if subjected to the action of a perpetual smoke.
ARDMORE.
The instance which is adduced of the four temples described by Hanway in hisTravels into Persia, proves nothing. It certainly corresponds with the architectural character of some of our Round Towers, but leaves us as much in the dark as to the era and use of both as if he had never made mention of any such occurrence.
To me it is as obvious as the noon-day sun thatthey tooon examination would be found of a more comprehensive religious tendency than what could possibly relate to the preservation of the sacred fire; for it is well known that when temples were at all appropriated to this consecrated delusion, it was within a smallcryptorarched vault—over which the temple was erected—that it was retained. The Ghebres or Parsees, the direct disciples of Zoroaster, the reputed author of this improved institution, “build their temples,” says Richardson,[83]“oversubterraneous fires.”
Whenever a deviation from this occurred, it was in favour of a low stone-built structure, all over-arched,such as that whichHanway met with at Baku, andcorresponding in everyparticular with the edifices of this description to be seen at Smerwick, county Kerry, and elsewhere throughout Ireland.[84]
The fire-house which Captain Keppel visited at a later period at Baku, in 1824, was a small square building, erected on a platform, with three ascending steps on each side, having a tall hollow stone column at every side, through which the flame was seen to issue, allin the middle of a pentagonal enclosure—comprising also a large altar, whereon naphtha was kept continually burning.
Now, could anything possiblycorrespond more minutelywith Strabo’s description of the Pyratheia than does this last account? “They are,” he says, “immense enclosures, in the centre of which was erected an altar, where the Magi used to preserve, as well a quantity of ashes, as the ever-burning fire itself.” And could anything possibly bemore oppositeto our Round Towers than all these accounts?
When, therefore, we are told[85]that at the city of Zezd in Persia—which is distinguished by the apellation of Darub Abadat, or seat of religion—the Ghebres are permitted to have an Atush Kidi, or fire-temple, which they assert had the sacred fire in it since the days of Zoroaster, we must be prepared to understand it as corresponding in architectural proportion with one or other of the instances just nowdetailed; and in truth, from recent discovery, I have ascertained—since the above was composed—that it is nothing more than asorry hut.
But Pennant’s view of Hindostan is brought forward as at once decisive of the matter. What says Mr. Pennant, however? “All the people of this part of India are Hindoos, and retain theold religion, with all its superstition. This makes the pagodas here much more numerous than in any other part of the peninsula; their form too is different, being chiefly buildings of acylindricalorround towershape, with their tops either pointed or truncated at the top, and ornamented with something eccentrical, but frequently with a round ball stuck on a spike: this ball seems intended to represent thesun, an emblem of the deity of the place.”
To this ascription of this learned traveller I most fully, most heartily respond. Pagoda is a name invented by the Portuguese, from the Persian “Peutgheda,” meaning a temple of idols, in which they supposed them to abound, but which in reality were only so many figures or symbols of the “principle of truth,” the “spirit of wisdom,” the “supreme essence,” and other attributes of the Godhead, which, I believe, they in a great measure spiritually recognised. Those structures, therefore, as the very word implies, had no manner of relation to the sacred fire, but they had to the sun and moon, the supposed authors ofgenerationandnutrition, of which fire was only the corrupt emblem; and the different forms of their constructural terminations, similar to those elsewhere described by Maundrell, some beingpointed, and some beingtruncated, harmonises most aptly with theradialandhemispherical representationsof the two celestial luminaries, as well as with that organ of humanprocreationwhich we shall hereafter more particularly identify. These are the two Baals dwelt so largely upon in the Scriptures—Baal masculine, the sun, and Baal feminine, the moon, from both of which the Hindoos derive their fabulous origin. Indeed it was from their extreme veneration for the “queen of night” that they obtained their very name; Hindoo meaning, in the Sanscrit language, the moon; and accordingly we find among them Hindoo-buns, that is, children of the moon, as we do Surage-buns, children of the sun, the other parent of their fanciful extraction.
Here then, methinks, we have at once a clue to the character of those Round Towers so frequent throughout the East, of whose history, however, the Orientals are as ignorant as we are here of our “rotundities.” Caucasus abounds in those columnar fanes, and it must not be forgotten that Caucasus has been claimed as the residence of our ancestors. On Teric banks, hard by, there is a very beautiful and lofty one as like as possible to some of ours. The door is described as twelve feet from the ground, level and rather oblong in its form. Lord Valentia was so struck with the extraordinary similitude observable between some very elegant ones which he noticed in Hindostan and those in this country, that he could not avoid at once making the comparison. The inhabitants, he observes, paid no sort of regard to those venerable remains, but pilgrims from afar, and chiefly from Jynagaur, adhering totheir old religion, used annually to resort to them as the shrines of their ancient worship. Yet in the ceremonies there performed we see no evidence of their appropriation to the sacredfire—howevertraditionmay have ascribed them as once belonging to the Ghebres! Franklin mentions some he has seen at Nandukan, as do other writers in other sites. In short, all through the East they are to be met with, and yet all about them is obscurity, doubt, and mystery, a proof at once of the antiquity of their date, and of their not being receptacles for fire, which,if the fact, could bethereno secret.
Yes, I verily believe, and I will as substantially establish, that they were, what has already been affirmed, in reference to those in Ireland, viz. temples in honour of the sun and moon, the procreative causes of general fecundity, comprising in certain instances, like them, also the additional and blended purposes of funeral cemeteries and astronomical observatories. The Septuagint interpreters well understood their nature when rendering the “high place of Baal”[86]by the Greek στηλη του βααλ, or Pillar of Baal, that is, the pillar consecrated to the sun; while the ancient Irish themselves, following in the same train, designated those structures Bail-toir, that is, the tower of Baal, or the sun, and the priest who attended them, Aoi Bail-toir, or superintendent of Baal’s tower. Neither am I without apprehension but that the name “Ardmore,” which signifies “the great high place,” and where a splendid specimen of those Sabian edifices is still remaining, was in direct reference to that religious column; but thisen passant.
In thesepulchralopinion I am not a little fortified by the circumstance of there being found at Benares pyramids corresponding in all respects, save that of size, to those in Egypt, having also subterraneanpassages beneath them, which are said to extend even for miles together. A column also, besides a sphinx’s head, which has been discovered not long since in digging amid the ruins of an ancient and unknown city, on the banks of the Hypanis, bearing an inscription which was found to differ on being compared with Arabic, Persia, Turkish, Chinese, Tartar, Greek, and Roman letters; but bore “a manifest and close similarity with the characters observed by Denon on several of the mummies of Egypt,” gives strength to the idea of the identity of the Egyptian religion with that of the Indians, as it does to the identity of destination of their respective pyramids.
Now if there be any one point of Irish antiquity which our historians insist upon more than another, it is that of our ancestral connection with the Egyptian kings. In all their legends Egypt is mixed up—in all their romances Egypt stands prominent, which certainly could not have been so universal withoutsomethingat least like foundation, and must, therefore, remove anything like surprise at the affinity our ancient religion bore, in many respects, to theirs, since they were both derived from the same common origin.
I have already intimated my decided belief of the application of the Egyptian pyramids to the combined purposes of religion and science. The department of science to which I particularly referred was astronomy, the cultivation of which was inseparably involved in all their religious rites; for despite of the reverence which the Egyptians seemed to pay to crocodiles, bulls, and others of the brute creation, in those they only figured forth the several attributes, all infinite, in the divinity; as their worship, like that of the ancient Irish, was purely planetary, or Sabian.
The Indians too have images of the elephant, horse, and other such animals, chiselled out with the most studious care, and to all intents and purposes appear to pay them homage; but, if questioned on the subject, they will tell you that in the sagacity of theformer, and the strength and swiftness of the latter, they only recognise the superior wisdom and might of the All-good and All-great One, and the rapidity with which his decrees are executed by his messengers.
If questioned more closely, they will tell you that the Brahmin is but reminded by the image of the inscrutable Original, whose pavilion is clouds and darkness; to him he offers the secret prayer of the heart; and if he neglects from inadvertence the external services required, it is because his mind is so fully occupied with the contemplation of uncreated excellence, that he overlooks the grosser object by which his impressions were communicated. Then with respect to their subterranean temples or Mithratic caves, of which we have so many specimens throughout this island, they affirm that the mysterious temple of the caverns is dedicated to services which soar as much above the worship of the plain and uninstructed Hindoo, as Brahma the invisible Creator is above the good and evil genii who inhabit the region of the sky. The world, whose ideas are base and grovelling as the dust upon which they tread, must be led by objects perceptible to the senses to perform the ceremonial of their worship; the chosen offspring of Brahma are destined to nobler and sublimer hopes; their views are bounded alone by the ages of eternity.
These specimens, though brief, will prove that the spirit of the religion of ancient India and Egypt was not that farrago of mental prostration which some have imagined. No, the stars, as the abode, or immediate signal of the Deity, were their primary study; and even to this day, depressed and humiliated as theIndians are, and aliens in their own country, they are not without some attention to their favourite pursuit, or something like an observatory to perpetuate its cultivation. In May, 1777, a letter from Sir Robert Baker to the President of the Royal Society of London was read before that body, which details a complete astronomical apparatus found at Benares, belonging to the Brahmins.
Such is the remnant of that once enlightened nation, the favourite retreat of civilisation and the arts, which sent forth its professors into the most distant quarters of the world, and disseminated knowledge wherever they had arrived. “With the first accounts we have of Hindostan,” says Crawford, “a mighty empire opens to our view, which in extent, riches, and the number of its inhabitants, has not yet been equalled by any one nation on the globe. We find salutary laws, and an ingenious and refined system of religion established; sciences and arts known and practised; and all of these evidently brought to perfection by the accumulated experience of many preceding ages. We see a country abounding in fair and opulent cities; magnificent temples and palaces; useful and ingenious artists employing the precious stones and metals in curious workmanship; manufacturers fabricating cloths, which in the fineness of their texture, and the beauty and duration of some of their dyes, have even yet been but barely imitated by other nations.
“The traveller was enabled to journey through this immense country with ease and safety; the public roads were shaded with trees to defend him from its scorching sun; at convenient distances buildings were erected for him to repose in, a friendlyBrahmin attended to supply his wants; andhospitalityand thelawsheld out assistance and protection toall alike, without prejudice or partiality.... We afterwards see the empire overrun by a fierce race of men, who in the beginning of their furious conquests endeavoured, with their country, to subdue the minds of the Hindoos. They massacred the people, tortured the priests, threw down many of the temples, and, what was still more afflicting, converted some of them into places of worship for their prophet, till at length, tired with the exertion of cruelties which they found to be without effect, and guided by their interest, which led them to wish for tranquillity, they were constrained to let a religion and customs subsist which they found it impossible to destroy. But during these scenes of devastation and bloodshed, the sciences, being in the sole possession of the priests, who had more pressing cares to attend to, were neglected, and are now almost forgotten.”
I have dwelt thus long upon the article of India, from my persuasion of the intimate connection that existed at one time as to religion, language, customs, and mode of life between some of its inhabitants and those ofthiswestern island. I have had an additional motive, and that was to show that the same cause which effected themystificationthat overhangsourantiquities, has operated similarly with respect totheirs, and this brings me back to the subject of the Round Towers, in thehistory, or rather themystery, of which, in both countries, this result is most exemplified.
As to their appropriation, then, to thesacredfire, though I do not deny thatsomeof themmayhave been connected with it, yet unquestionablytoo muchimportancehas been attached to thevitrifiedappearance of Drumboe tower as if necessarily enforcing our acquiescence in the universality of that doctrine. “At some former time,” says the surveyor, “very strong fires have been burnedwithin this building, and the inside surface towards the bottom has the appearance of vitrification.”
I do not at all dispute theaccident, but while the vitrified aspect whichthis towerexhibits is proof irresistible thatno fire ever enteredthose in whichno suchvitrification appears, I cannot buthere tooexpress more than a surmise that it was not the “sacred fire,” which, when religiously preserved, was not allowed to break forth in thosevolcanoesinsinuated; but in alambent, gentle flame, emblematic of that emanation of the spirit of the Divinity infused, aslight from light, into the soul of man.
“Hail, holy Light! offspring of heaven first-born!Or of th’ Eternal co-eternal beam!May I express thee unblamed? Since God is light,And never but in unapproached lightDwelt from eternity; dwelt then in thee,Bright effluence of bright essence increate!Or hear’st thou rather, pure ethereal stream,Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the sun,Before the heavens, thou wert, and at the voiceOf God, as with a mantle, didst investThe rising world of waters dark and deep,Won from the void and formless infinite.”[87]
But to prove that they were not appropriated to the ritual of fire-worship,nay, that their history and occupation had been altogether forgotten when that ritual now prevailed, I turn to the glossary of Cormac, first bishop of Cashel, who, after hisconversion to Christianity, in the fifth century, by St. Patrick, thus declares his faith:—
“Adhram do righ na duileDo dagh bhar din ar n’ daoneLies gach dream, leis gach dineLeis gach ceall, leis gach caoimhe.”
That is—
“I worship the King of the Elements,Whose fire from the mountain top ascends,In whose hands are all mankind,All punishment and remuneration.”
No allusion here to “towers” as connected with thatfireso pointedly adverted to. And lest there should be any doubt as to theidentityof this fire with the religious element so frequently referred to, we find the same high authority thus critically explain himself in another place: “dha teinne soinmech do gintis na draoithe con tincet laib moraib foraib, agus do bordis, na ceatra or teamandaib cacha bliadhna”—that is, the Druids used to kindle two immense fires, with great incantation, and towards them used to drive the cattle, which they forced to pass between them every year.
Nay, when St. Bridget, who was originally apagan vestal, and consequently well versed in all the solemnities of the sacred fire, wished, upon her conversion to Christianity,A.D.467, to retain this favourite usage, now sublimated in its nature, and streaming in a more hallowed current, it was not in a “tower” that we find she preserved it, but in a cell or low building “like a vault,” “which,” says Holinshed, whose curiosity, excited by Cambrensis’s report,[88]had induced him to go and visit the spot, “to this day they call the fire-house.” It was a stone-roofededifice about twenty feet square, the ruins of which are still visible, and recognised by all around as once the preservative of the sacred element. When Cambrensis made mention of this miraculous fire of St. Bridget, why did he not connect it with theRound Towers, which he mentions elsewhere? He knew they had no connection, and should not be associated.
But, forsooth, the Venerable Bede has distinctly mentioned in theLife of St. Cuthbertthat there were numerousfire receptacles, remnants of ancient paganism, still remaining in this island!—Admitted. But does it necessarily follow that they were theRound Towers?[89]No: here is the enigma solved—they were thoselow stone-roofed structures, similar to what the Persians call the “Atash-gah,” to be met with so commonly throughout all parts of this country, such as at Ardmore, Killaloe, Down, Kerry, Kells, etc. etc. The circumstance of St Columbe having for a time taken up his abode in this last-mentioned one, gave rise to the idea that he must have been its founder: but the delusion is dispelled by comparing its architecture with that of the churches which this distinguished champion of the early Christian Irish Church had erected in Iona,[90]whose ruins are still to be seen, and bear no sort of analogy with those ancient receptacles. Struck, no doubt, with some apprehensions like the foregoing, it is manifest that Miss Beaufortherself, while combating most strenuously for the Round Towers asfire receptacles, had no small misgiving, nay, was evidently divided as to the security of her position. “From the foregoing statements,” she observes, “a well-grounded conclusion may be drawn that theselow fabricsare seldom found but in connection with the towers, and were designed for the preservation of the sacred fire; in some cases the lofty tower may have served for both purposes.”[91]The lofty tower, I emphatically say, was a distinct edifice.
Again, when St. Patrick in person went round the different provinces to attend the pagan solemnities at the respective periods of their celebration, we find no mention made of any such thing as a “tower” occupying any part in the ritual of their religious exercises. When he first presented himself near the Court of Laogaire, not far from the hill of Tara, on the eve of the vernal equinox, and lit up a fire before his tent in defiance of the legal prohibition, the appeal which we are told his Druids addressed to the monarch on that occasion was couched in the following words:—“This fire which has to-night been kindled in our presence, before the flame was lit up in yourpalace, unless extinguished this very night, shall never be extinguished at all, but shall triumph over all the fires of our ancient rites, and the lighter of it shall scatter your kingdom.” In this notification, as I translate it from O’Connor’sProlegomena, i. c. 35, there occur two terms to which I would fain bespeak the reader’s regard; one is the wordkindled, which implies the lighting up of a fire where there was none before; the second is the wordpalace, which is more applicable to a kingly residence or private abode,than to acolumnar structure, which would seem to demand a characteristic denomination.
Another objection more imposing in its character, and to thelocalantiquary offering no small difficulty to surmount, is that those above-mentioned low structures must have been erected by our first Roman missionaries, because that they bear the strongest possible affinity to the finish and perfection of the early Roman cloacæ or vaults. This difficulty, however, I thus remove: no one in this enlightened age can suppose that these stupendous specimens of massive and costly workmanship, which we read of as being constructed by the Romans in the very infancy of their State, could have been the erection of a rude people, unacquainted with the arts. The story of the wolf, the vestal, and the shepherd is no longer credited; Rome was a flourishing and thriving city long before the son of Rhea was born, and the only credit that he deserves, as connected with its history, is that of uniting together under one common yoke the several neighbouring communities, many of whom, particularly the Etrurians, were advanced in scientific and social civilisation, conversant not only with the researches of letters, and the arcana of astronomy, but particularly masters of all manual trades, and with none more profoundly than that of architecture.
But who, let me ask, were those Etrurians? none others, most undoubtedly, than the Pelasgi or Tyrseni, another branch of our Tuath-de-danaan ancestors, who, as Myrsilus informs us, had erected the ancient wall around the Acropolis of Athens, which is therefore styled, by Callimachus, as quoted in the Scholia to theBirdsof Aristophanes, “the Pelasgic Wallof the Tyrseni.” It is now a point well ascertained by historians that what are termed by ancient writersCyclopean walls—as if intimating the work of a race of giants, while the true exposition of the name is to be found in the fact of their having been constructed by a caste of miners, otherwise called arimaspi, whose lamp, which perhaps they had fastened to their foreheads, may be considered as theironly eye—were actually the creation of those ancient Pelasgi, and, as will shortly appear, should properly be called Irish.[92]Mycenæ, Argos, and Tiryns, in Greece, as well as Etruria and other places in Italy, the early residences of this lettered tribe, abound in relics of this ancient masonry. In all respects, in all points, and in all particulars it corresponds with that of those above-mentionedlow, stone-roofed, fire-receptacles, so common in this island; which must satisfactorily and for ever do away with the doubt as to why such features of similarity should be observed to exist between our antiquities and those ofancient GreeceandRome; not less perceptible in the circumstance of those edificial remains than in the collateral evidences of language and manners.
The sacred fire, once observed with such religious awe by every class, and in every quarter of this island, was imported from Greece into Italy by the same people who had introduced it here. Let me not be supposed to insinuate that the people of the latter country,modernly considered, adopted the usage from those of the former country, moderns also; no, there was no intercourse between these parties for many years after the foundation of the western capital.Indeed it was not until the time of Pyrrhus that they knew anything of their respective existences, whereas we find that the vestal fire was instituted by Numa,A.U.C.41. What I meant therefore to say was, that the same early people, viz. the Pelasgi, who had introduced it into Greece, had, upon their expulsion from Thessaly by the Hellenes, betaken themselves to Latium, afterwards so called, and there disseminated their doctrines not less prosperously than their dominion.
Numa was in his day profoundly skilled in all the mysteries of those religious philosophers; and his proffered elevation to the Roman throne was but the merited recompense of his venerable character. His whole reign was accordingly one continued scene of devotion and piety, in which pre-eminently outshone his regard to Vesta,[93]in whose sanctuary was preserved the Palladium, “the fated pledge of Roman authority,” and which too, by the way, ever connected as we see it was with theworship of fire, would seem to make the belief respecting it also to be of Oriental origin. This eastern extraction additionally accounts for that dexterous State contrivance of client and patron established in the early ages of the Roman government, corresponding to our ancient clanship—both evidently borrowed from the same Indian castes.
I now address myself to another obstacle which has been advanced by an Irishlady, and of the most deserved antiquarian repute, whose classic and elaborate treatise on this identical subject, though somewhat differently moulded, has already won her the applause of that society whose discriminating verdict I nowrespectfully await. But as my object istruth, divested as much as possible of worldly considerations, and unshackled by systems or literary codes, I conceive that object will be more effectually attained by setting inquiry on foot, than by tamely acquiescing in dubious asservations or abiding by verbal ambiguities.
What elicited this sentiment was Miss Beaufort’s remark on the enactment at Tara,A.D.79, for theerection of a palacein each of the four proportions subtracted by order of Tuathal Teachmar, from each of the four provinces to form the present county of Meath. Her words are as follow:—“Taking the landing of Julius Cæsar in Britain, in the year 55 before Christ, as a fixed point of time, and counting back fifty years from that, we shall be brought to about one hundred years before the Christian era, at which time the introduction of the improvements and innovations of Zoroaster, and that also of fire towers, may, without straining probability, be supposed to have fully taken place.That it wasnot much earlier may be inferred from the before-mentioned ordinance of the year 79A.D., to increase the number of towers in the different provinces.”
With great submission I conceive that theerrorhere incurred originated on the lady’s part, from mistaking as authority the comment in theStatistical Survey, vol. iii. p. 320, which runs thus:—“It is quite evident from sundry authentic records, that these round towers were appropriated to the preservation of the Baal-thinne, or sacred fire of Baal: first at the solemn convention at Tara, in the year of Christ 79, in the reign of Tuathal Teachmar, it was enacted, that on the 31st of October annually, the sacred fireshould be publicly exhibited from the stately tower of Tlactga, in Munster, from whence all the other repositories of the Baal-thinne were to be rekindled, in case they were by any accident allowed to go out. It was also enacted, that a particular tower should be erected for that purpose in each of the other four provinces, Meath being then a distinct province. For this purpose the tax called Scraball, of threepence per head on all adults, was imposed.”
Well, for this is quotedPsalter of Tara, by Comerford, p. 51; on referring to which I find the text as thus: “He (Tuathal) also erected a stately palace in each of these proportions, viz. in that of Munster, the palace of Tlactga, where the fire of Tlactga was ordained to be kindled on the 31st of October, to summon the priests and augurs to consume the sacrifices offered to their gods; and it was also ordained that no other fire should be kindled in the kingdom that night, so that the fire to be used in the country was to be derived from this fire; for which privilege the people were to pay a scraball, which amounts to threepence every year, asan acknowledgment to the King of Munster. The second palace was in that of Connaught, where the inhabitants assembled once a year, upon the 1st of May, to offer sacrifices to the principal deity of the island under the name of Beul, which was called the Convocation of Usneagh; and on account of this meeting the King of Connaught had from every lord of a manor, or chieftain of lands, a horse and arms. The third was at Tailtean, in the portion of Ulster, where the inhabitants of the kingdom brought their children when of age, and treated with one another about their marriage. From this custom the King of Ulsterdemanded an ounce of silver from every couple married here. The fourth was the palace of Teamor or Tara, which originally belonged to the province of Leinster, and where the States of the kingdom met in a parliamentary way.”
I now leave the reader to decide whether the word “palace” can be well used to represent an “ecclesiastical tower,” or indeed any tower at all; or whether it is not rather a royal residence for the several provincial princes, that is meant to be conveyed; as is evident to the most superficial, from the closing allusion to thepalaceof Tara, “where the States of the kingdom met in a parliamentary way.” The impost of the scraball, I must not omit to observe, has been equally misstated in the survey; for it was not for the purpose of erectinganystructures, but as an acknowledgment of homage and a medium of revenue that it was enforced, as will appear most clearly on reverting to the original, and comparing it with the other means of revenue, which the other provincial kings were entitled to exact. But what gives the complete overthrow to the doctrine which would identify thosepalaceswith columnar edifices, is the fact that there are no vestiges to be found ofRound Towersin any, certainly not in all of those four localities specially notified. Wells and Donaghmore are the only Round Towers now in the county Meath, and these are not included among the places above designated.