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The Magnificent Gael
A biography of St. Columba, or "Columcille." Ireland's Greatest Son, Scotland's Founding Father...
208 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1976
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July 18, 2018
Reg Hale was a gentleman in the truest sense of the word.
My wife and I had the pleasure of joining old Reg, the author of this beautifully-illustrated and meticulously researched rare book, and his charming wife for dinner several times in the early 1980's.
He and I (though I utterly lacked his wealth of knowledge about history) were both members of the fledgling Heraldry Society of Canada.
A proud Canadian who relished medieval folklore, Mr. Hale was a fascinating teller of tales, and if you should chance upon this little volume some day in your travels you'll see what I mean.
It is a book on that 6th century Apostle of Ireland, Saint Columba.
Reg was a truly gentle human being, as quietly ruminative and immersed in mystical far-away lore as his wife was effervescently affable and outgoing. Sometimes opposites attract - and they bond forever in hidden depths of their personalities, invisible to onlookers.
As was the case for me and my wife, as well! So no wonder we formed a kinship with the two of them. I, introspective as Reg - and my wife, bubbling and active as his delightful spouse: but like them, strangers to this modern, badly compromised and sullied world.
His wife at that time was trying in some small way to help restore some semblance of a moral order to our decayed world, and Reg, as always, had his books.
He has gone to his reward now, but this book is the legacy of his lifetime of reading.
Much Columbine lore is lost in the mists of time, but we still have the salient facts of Columba’s lifetime of teaching, opposing Druidic remnants in Ireland and Scotland, and spreading the Catholic faith to the Celtic people.
Who knows but that the progenitors of some of the Jacobite families that suffered decimation at, and in the aftermath of Culloden, were among his early converts!
For his influence on the Celts was enormous.
We learn in the wonderful Sister Fidelma mystery series - written by that eminent historian, as well as accomplished novelist, Peter Tremayne - that not long after the saint’s life the Celtic Church found itself at odds with Rome.
The Celts, you see, had come to believe in marriage among the clergy - even back then a no-no for the papacy!
We learn in the first Sister Fidelma whodunit though - entitled Absolution by Murder - that the British bishops convened an English synod in the early Middle Ages, attended by the Celts...
They all contentiously, but in the end peaceably agreed there and then that the Irish Church should amalgamate with Roman Catholics, and conform to their traditions.
So the more of these good reference books that we have on those pre-synod ways & days of the saint the better!
The Fidelma mysteries, by the way, are an excellent anodyne for wintertime accidie and ennui, as I discovered last winter - light, sybaritic and rich in historical fact as they are.
But this fine little rare book, if you can find it, will give you a lavish prequel to that ancient tempest in a teapot!
My wife and I had the pleasure of joining old Reg, the author of this beautifully-illustrated and meticulously researched rare book, and his charming wife for dinner several times in the early 1980's.
He and I (though I utterly lacked his wealth of knowledge about history) were both members of the fledgling Heraldry Society of Canada.
A proud Canadian who relished medieval folklore, Mr. Hale was a fascinating teller of tales, and if you should chance upon this little volume some day in your travels you'll see what I mean.
It is a book on that 6th century Apostle of Ireland, Saint Columba.
Reg was a truly gentle human being, as quietly ruminative and immersed in mystical far-away lore as his wife was effervescently affable and outgoing. Sometimes opposites attract - and they bond forever in hidden depths of their personalities, invisible to onlookers.
As was the case for me and my wife, as well! So no wonder we formed a kinship with the two of them. I, introspective as Reg - and my wife, bubbling and active as his delightful spouse: but like them, strangers to this modern, badly compromised and sullied world.
His wife at that time was trying in some small way to help restore some semblance of a moral order to our decayed world, and Reg, as always, had his books.
He has gone to his reward now, but this book is the legacy of his lifetime of reading.
Much Columbine lore is lost in the mists of time, but we still have the salient facts of Columba’s lifetime of teaching, opposing Druidic remnants in Ireland and Scotland, and spreading the Catholic faith to the Celtic people.
Who knows but that the progenitors of some of the Jacobite families that suffered decimation at, and in the aftermath of Culloden, were among his early converts!
For his influence on the Celts was enormous.
We learn in the wonderful Sister Fidelma mystery series - written by that eminent historian, as well as accomplished novelist, Peter Tremayne - that not long after the saint’s life the Celtic Church found itself at odds with Rome.
The Celts, you see, had come to believe in marriage among the clergy - even back then a no-no for the papacy!
We learn in the first Sister Fidelma whodunit though - entitled Absolution by Murder - that the British bishops convened an English synod in the early Middle Ages, attended by the Celts...
They all contentiously, but in the end peaceably agreed there and then that the Irish Church should amalgamate with Roman Catholics, and conform to their traditions.
So the more of these good reference books that we have on those pre-synod ways & days of the saint the better!
The Fidelma mysteries, by the way, are an excellent anodyne for wintertime accidie and ennui, as I discovered last winter - light, sybaritic and rich in historical fact as they are.
But this fine little rare book, if you can find it, will give you a lavish prequel to that ancient tempest in a teapot!
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review