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THE DIOCESE OF ROSS IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
THE RULE OF ST. CARTHACH. (OB. A.D. 636.)
THE IRISH CHURCH ESTABLISHMENT.
ANCIENT RELIGIOUS FOUNDATIONS OF ARDAGH.
LITURGICAL QUESTIONS
DOCUMENTS.
NOTICES OF BOOKS.
The Lives of the Irish Bishops, published by Ware, in 1665, andrewritten by Harris in the beginning of the last century, have been longregarded as authentic history; and the statements of these learnedwriters have been generally accepted without hesitation, being supposedto rest on ancient and indubious documents. It is thus, to take a quiterecent example, that the Rev. W. Maziere Brady, D.D., in the thirdvolume of his Records of Cork, Cloyne, and Ross (London, 1864),adopts, with only a few verbal variations, the whole narrative of Wareregarding St. Fachnan and his successors in the see of Ross.Nevertheless, many of his statements are inaccurate, and some of them,too, are wholly at variance with historic truth. At the very thresholdof our present inquiry we meet with one instance which alone shouldsuffice to render us cautious in accepting the assertions of suchhistorians, when unconfirmed by other authorities.
"One Thady" (Ware thus writes), "was Bishop of Ross on the 29th ofJanuary, 1488, and died a little after; but I have not found where hewas consecrated. One Odo succeeded in 1489, and sat only five years.He died in 1494" (Ware, pag. 587. Brady, Records, etc., vol. iii.,pag. 139).
How many errors are contained in these few words! This Thadeus wasnever Bishop of Ross, and so far from Odo being appointed[Pg 106] in 1489, hewas already Bishop of the see on the accession of Pope Innocent VIII.,in 1484. A letter of this Pontiff addressed to Odo, Bishop of Ross, on21st of July, 1488, has happily been preserved, and it presents to usthe following particulars connected with the see. No sooner had the seeof Ross become vacant by the demise of its Bishop about 1480, than Odowas elected its chief pastor, and his election was duly confirmed by theVicar of Christ. A certain person, however, named Thadeus MacCarryg, hadaspired to the dignity of successor of Saint Fachnan, and as he enjoyedhigh influen