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"High Scholars of the Western World"
4. NUMBERS OF STUDENTS
Judged by results the system of education in the Irish
schools could hardly have been bettered in those days.
The graduates it trained and disciplined assuredly left
their impress on the epoch in which they lived. "From
the schools of Ireland were to issue the men who were
destined during the next two centuries not merely to leave
their mark upon the church as theologians and founders
of monasteries, but, further, to play an important part
in molding the new civilization of the Prankish empire,
to lay the foundations of modern philosophy, and to promote
the study of natural science and literature." 1
These Irish seats of learning had large numbers of
students. Armagh had 3,000, many of them, as at other
places, from the Continent. At Clonard there were over
3,000, all residing in and around the college, while Bangor
and Clonfert had each as many. Other colleges had
smaller numbers of students, ranging from 2,000 down
2
to fifty. At the head of each of these colleges was the
"Per leiginn" or "Man of Learning," who was sometimes
a layman, generally a cleric, but always a scholar of great
renown. The abbot presided over both institutions
monastery and school combined.
Calling to mind the deserted aspect of the sites of these
early establishments at the present day there is nothing
more remarkable in the early annals than the busy inter-
course with the world which they disclose. Guests,
illustrious by kingly descent or civil status or ecclesiastical
rank, were ever coming and going. The abbots were
wont to travel in chariots; in places like Iniscaltra, Clon-
fert, Clonmacnois, lona, Bangor and Monasterboice, in
1 C. S. Boswell, "An Irish Precursor of Dante."
2 See Joyce, Social History, I. 408; Skene, Celtic Scotland, II. p. 419.
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