Texts
Vita sancti Cathroe
Incoming data
The catalogue entry for this text has not been published as yet. Until then, a selection of data is made available below.
Continental Latin vita of St Cathróe of Metz, which is thought to have been written by one Reimann or Ousmann in the 980s, relatively soon after the subject’s death (see Dumville), and which was dedicated to Immo, abbot of Gorze. While the sole manuscript known to have contained the text is lost, it formed the basis for two 17th-century ‘editions’, one by John Colgan and the other by the Bollandists. BHL 1494.
Manuscript witnesses
Text
Sources
Primary sources Text editions and/or modern translations – in whole or in part – along with publications containing additions and corrections, if known. Diplomatic editions, facsimiles and digital image reproductions of the manuscripts are not always listed here but may be found in entries for the relevant manuscripts. For historical purposes, early editions, transcriptions and translations are not excluded, even if their reliability does not meet modern standards.
[ed.] Skene, William F., Chronicles of the Picts, chronicles of the Scots, and other early memorials of Scottish history, Edinburgh, 1867.
Internet Archive: <link>, <link> Internet Archive: <link>, <link>
106–116 Excerpt from Colgan’s text, though with some misprints. direct link
[ed.] Acta sanctorum quotquot toto orbe coluntur, vel a catholicis scriptoribus celebrantur, 68 vols, vol. 6: Martius I (1–8), Antwerp: Ioannes Meursius, 1668.
Google Books: <link>
469–474 (introduction), 474–481 (text) [‘De S. Cadroe abbate Metis in Lotharingia’] direct link
[tr.] Anderson, Alan Orr [ed.], Early sources of Scottish history A.D. 500 to 1286, 2 vols, Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1922.
Internet Archive – volume 1: <link> Internet Archive – volume 2: <link>
431–443 Translation of part of the text (roughly corresponding with Skene’s excerpt), with footnotes. direct link
Secondary sources (select)
Clarke, Michael, “The Leabhar gabhála and Carolingian origin legends”, in: Pádraic Moran, and Immo Warntjes (eds), Early medieval Ireland and Europe: chronology, contacts, scholarship. A Festschrift for Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, 14, Turnhout: Brepols, 2015. 441–479.
abstract:
The Irish Leabhar gabhála is poised between several different literary modes: conduit of ancient traditions, bogus charter of national identity, by-product of commentary on Latin cosmography and world history. Attempts to explain the themes and purposes of its earlier sections (Tracts I and II) usually focus on parallels between the story of the ancestors of the Irish and that of the Hebrews of the Old Testament. This article attempts to situate the work in the context of Carolingian global and national histories, focussing on the theme of the origins of each nation in the westward wanderings of fugitives from the classical heartlands of the eastern Mediterranean or western Asia. It is argued that the narrative of the travels of the ancesters of the Goídil (Irish) involves an implicit parallel with the travels of the ancestors of Romans, Franks, and British from the fall of Troy. The paper proposes that this parallel may have been prominent in a lost Latin version of the Leabhar gabhala of which parts are preserved as embedded quotations in hagiographical texts.
Ó Riain, Pádraig, “Scottorum origines fabulosae: the Metz version of Lebor gabála Érenn”, in: John Carey (ed.), Lebor gabála Érenn: textual history and pseudohistory, 20, Dublin: Irish Texts Society, 2009. 33–47.
Dumville, David N., “St Cathróe of Metz and the hagiography of exoticism”, in: John Carey, Máire Herbert, and Pádraig Ó Riain (eds), Studies in Irish hagiography: saints and scholars, Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2001. 172–188.
Macquarrie, Alan, The saints of Scotland: essays in Scottish church history AD 450–1093, Edinburgh: Donald, 1997.
