III. TRACES OF THE CULTUS OF THE NINE MAIDENS IN SCOTLAND. BY J. M. MACKINLAY, M.A., F.S.A. (LOND. AND SCOT.) The story of the Nine Maidens forms a picturesque chapter in the annals of Scottish hagiology. These Nine Maidens were sisters, daughters of St Donevald, otherwise Donald, a Scot, who settled among the Picts. Their exact date is uncertain, but they are said to have flourished early in the eighth century. They lived in what is now the parish of Glamis, in Forfarshire, where St Fergus died later in the same century. Their home there was in the Glen of Ogilvy, now forming part of the possessions of the noble family of Strathmore. In his Kalendar, under 15th July, Adam King has this entry: "The 9 virgines dochters to s. donewalde vnder king eugenius ye 7. In scotland." The tradition is thus given by Bellenden, who, it is to be noticed, assigns seven instead of nine daughters to St Donevald: "In his (Eugenius's) time was Donevald, the haly man; quhilk levit ane sobir life at Ogilvy, haldin amang Pichtis in gret veneratioun. It is said that he had VII douchteris, quhilk levit with him in gret pennance, on beir breid and wattir. Thay eit nevir bot anis on the day; and the residew thairof occupyit in continewal labour and orison." The names of only two of the Nine Maidens are recorded. version of Boece's Chronicles of Scotland, says : "The eldest hecht Mazota to her name The secund sister callit Fyncana; "2 Stewart, in his metrical Quhat hecht the laif I cannot to zow sa, For quhy my author schew thame nocht to me ; Mazota seems to have been a person of some energy, for we are told that she "maid inhibitation to the wild geis, to eit hir faderis corne, and 1 Forbes's Kalendars of Scottish Saints, p. 157. 2 History and Chronicles of Scotland, bk. ix. ch. xxv. 3 Vol. ii. p. 329. thay obeyit hir haly monitionis; and thairfore, wild geis was nevir sene efter on that ground." 1 This reminds one of St Milburga, who founded a religious house at Wenlock in Shropshire in the seventh century, and is commonly associated with wild geese from her having forbidden them to fly over her land and devour her corn. The memory of St Mazota and her sisters was kept alive in the neighbourhood of their hermitage. Jervise says: "The Nine Maiden Well was near the old dove-cot within the Castle park of Glamis, where probably stood a chapel which was inscribed to these holy sisters." 2 On the death of their father St Donevald, the Nine Maidens, not wishing to be without a protector, removed to Abernethy near the Earn in Perthshire, still noted for its round tower, akin to the round tower of Brechin, though earlier in date than the latter. What then happened is thus narrated by Bellenden :: "Thir haly virginis, efter deceis of thair fader, come to Garnard, King of Pichtis, desiring sum place quhare thay micht leif ane solitar life, in the honour of God. Garnard condiscendit to thair desiris and gaif tham ane hous in Abernethy, with certane rentis to be takin up of the nixt landis, to thair sustentation quhare thay leiffit ane devote life and war buryit at the rute of ane aik, quhilk is haldin yit in gret veneration amang the pepil."3 What Garnard did for "the Maidens" is thus told in Stewart's metrical version of Boece : "At thair requeist ane proper mansioun Baring-Gould tells us that after their father's death the Nine Maidens "are said to have gone to Abernethy, where they lived in a hollow 1 Bellenden's Chronicles of Scotland, bk. ix. ch. xxv. 2 Epitaphs and Inscriptions, vol. i. p. 185. 3 Chronicles of Scotland, bk. ix. ch. xxv. Vol. ii. pp. 329-30. oak." In his Menologium Scoticum, of date 1622, Dempster gives the tradition of his day regarding the Nine Maidens. He says that their names were inscribed among those of the saints, that their abodean oak-was shown, in the memory of our fathers, full of years, and that their miracles, which had been engraved on the walls of the most ancient oratory, were lately profaned and abolished by the heretics.2 Dempster probably meant to indicate that the dwelling-place of the Maidens was at the foot of the oak in question. It is interesting to learn that, even in the seventeenth century, the fame of the oak at Abernethy was such that an enactment was passed by the kirk-session of Glamis forbidding maidens to go to it on pilgrimage.3 In treating of the Nine Maidens we are met with certain difficulties of chronology which call for notice. Bellenden says: "Thir virginis war not in time of Conrannus, with Sanct Brigitta, as the commonis haldis, bot in the time of Eugenius the VII; for he perseverit in gud peace with Garnard, and visyit oft times thir virginis with his liberalite and guddis." 4 Eugenius VII. can be fitted into the chronology tolerably well if we do not lay too much stress on the fact that 715 is given as the date of his death,5 and circa 716 as that of St Donevald, when the Nine Maidens went to Abernethy. Garnard is presumably the some as Garnad, a Pictish ruler, who held sway over the district be tween Scone and Meigle from 706 till 729.7 His name, or a name resembling it, is assigned to several other Pictish kings. Thus we find 1 Lives of the Saints, s. v., 15th July. 2 "Abernethæ Donevaldi agricolæ, et filiarum novem Sanctis adscriptarum, quarum domicilium quercus, patrum memoria, ostendebatur annosa, et miracula Ecclesiolæ vetustissimæ parietinis insculpta, ab hæreticis nuper profanata et abolita.”—Forbes's Kalendars of Scottish Saints, p. 205. 3 Rev. J. M'Lean's Translations of the Names of Places in the Deeds of Entail of the Breadalbane Estate; Dr A. Laing's Introduction, p. 20. Chronicles of Scotland, bk. ix. ch. xxv. 5 Wyntoun's Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland, vol. iii. p. 326. that Eugenius died at Abernethy, and was buried in Iona. 6 Forbes's Kalendars of Scotland, s. v. "Donald." 7 Skene's Chronicles of the Picts and Scots, pref., p. 126, n. VOL. XL. Wyntoun says 17 Garnard, son of Donald, who reigned from A.D. 584 till 599; Garnaid, son of Wid or Foith, whose rule extended from A.D. 631 till 635; and Gartnaid, son of Donnell, a contemporary of King Oswy of Northumbria in the middle of the same century.1 The best known of these, though the furthest removed from the time of the Nine Maidens, is Garnard, son of Donald, as it was during his reign that the church of Abernethy, under the influence of St Columba's mission, was dedicated or re-dedicated to St Bridget, Abbess of Kildare, who died in 523. Bower, the continuator of Fordun, tells what he says he found in a certain chronicle of the church of Abernethy,2 viz., that, after Garnard had built the church there, St Patrick introduced St Bridget into Scotland, with her nine virgins, and offered to God, to the blessed Mary, and to the blessed Bridget and her virgins, all the lands and tithes which the prior and canons have from of old. In the Pictish Chronicle 3 we read that in the fifth year of Nectan, who ruled over the Picts from 457 till 481, the King gave ("immolavit") Abernethy to God and St Bridget till the day of judgment ("ad diem judicii"), and that Darlugdach (called by an anachronism Abbess of Kildare) was present and sang Alleluia over the gift ("cantavit alleluia super istam hostiam "). Dr W. F. Skene observes: "Kildare was, as we know, dedicated to the great virgin saint of Ireland, St Bridget or St Bride, and was the mother-church of all her foundations; but there was within the country of the Picts one church in especial which was also dedicated to St Bride, and was held to be in a manner affiliated to that of Kildare, and that was the church of Abernethy." 4 1 Celtic Scotland, vol. i. pp. 242, 246-7, 257, 305, 258, 259. "Garnard filius Dompnach sive Makdompnach, qui fundavit et ædificavit ecclesiam collegiatam de Abirnethy. Postquam illuc introduxit beatus Patricius sanctam Brigidam, sicut in quadam chronica ecclesiæ de Abirnethy reperimus, cum suis novem virginibus in Scotiam; et obtulit Deo et beatæ Mariæ, et beatæ Brigidæ, et virginibus suis, omnes terras et decimas quas Prior et canonici habent ex antiquo." -Fordun's Scotichronicon, Goodall's edition, I. p. 188. 3 P. 6. 4 Celtic Scotland, vol. ii. p. 309. Special notice has here been taken of St Bridget's connection with the church of Abernethy, inasmuch as the Aberdeen Breviary links the story of St Mazota with that of the Abbess of Kildare, thereby removing Mazota to a date earlier than her own. The narrative in the Breviary is thus given by Bishop Forbes: "Graverdus, son of Domath, the distinguished king of the Picts, and cousin of S. Brigida, while fighting against the Britons, is supernaturally warned to send for her to Hibernia and to obey her precepts. S. Brigida obeyed the summons, and with nine holy virgins came from Hibernia to Scotia, and settled at Abirnethy close to the Taye on the south, in which place she erected a basilica in honour of Almighty God and the Virgin Mary, in which the king with all his family was baptized. Mazota was the most remarkable of these virgins, and she followed in all things the steps of Brigida. The king of the Picts promised that the church should be dedicated by S. Patrick, at that time dwelling in Scotia, and there Mazota with the other virgins continued to serve God, till they all died and were buried. No tongue can tell the miracles that God in Heaven caused to take place by her agency."1 We may remark in passing that an interesting reminiscence of St Bride's Nine Maidens was to be met with till recent times in Sanquhar parish, Dumfriesshire, where "it was customary to resort on May-day to St Bride's Well, where each maiden presented nine smooth white stones as an offering to the Saint, which correspond in number with St Bride's nine virgin attendants." 2 The solution of the chronological problem thus raised is evidently to be found in the fact that there are clearly two separate traditions which have become intertwined. There is the tradition that St Bridget had nine maidens as her attendants, and there is the tradition of the Nine Maidens, daughters of St Donevald. In both stories Abernethy appears prominently as the rendezvous of the two sets of maidens, and forms a link between both. We are therefore led to conclude that Mazota has been removed from her own proper 1 Kalendars of Scottish Saints, p. 395. |