The Highland monthly - National Library of Scotland

Ireland bcjoi'e the Conquest.
advanced pretensions to be the metropolis, civil as well as
ecclesiastical, of Ireland, and that this was so far acknowledged
by the Irish that, in 1 1 66,. Roderick O'Conner, King
of Connaught, went there to be inaugurated as King of
Ireland, of which office he was the last holder. In matters
ecclesiastical, we shall see that the foreign colonies exer-
cised a powerful influence on the course of Irish history.
So far as the native inhabitants of Ireland were concerned,
the reign of Brian and the Battle of Clontarff seem
to have produced no permanent effect, except in this, that
l-5rian's usurpation of the supreme sovereignty of Ireland
destroyed the tradition which had made that sovereignty
the heritage of the posterity of Nial of the Nine Hostages,
and had for a long time secured a comparatively peaceful suc-
cession, and once more made the high kingship a prize to be
striven for by any provincial king who thought himself power-
ful enough to overcome his compeers. The entirely personal
nature of Brian's power is shown by the fact that, on his
death becoming known, his victorious arm\' dissolved into
its elements of hostile tribes. Before the\' left the field of
battle, the tribes of South Munster withdiew to a separate
camp, and made a claim to the sovereignty o{ the whole
province; and on his march home with his own clan,
Brian's son, Donnchadh, was twice threatened with attack,
and a demand made on him for submission and hostages,
once by the men of South Munster, and once by the men
of Ossory and Leix, who, as inhabitants of Leinster, had
probably been in the army of Maelmordha and Sitric.
The sovereignty of Ireland was resumed by Malachy,
apparently without opposition, but the remaining eight
years of his life were spent in constant wars to assert his
authority, and he repeatedly made war on and ravaged the
foreigners ; and, thirty days before his death, he gained a
bloody victory over them at the Yellow Ford of Tlachtga,
in Meath. He died in Cro-inis (the island of the hut), in
Loch Ennell, near MuUingar, in the county of West Meath,
in the 73rd year of his age, and attended by the successors