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Authors: Peter Tremayne

Tags: #_NB_Fixed, #_rt_yes, #Church History, #Fiction, #tpl, #Mystery, #Historical, #Clerical Sleuth, #Medieval Ireland

BOOK: Absolution by Murder
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‘Fidelma, Fidelma. Remember that this is not your land of Ireland,’ he said hurriedly to quell the hot-tempered words that welled in her. ‘Here things are done differently. A murderess is stoned to death, especially one who kills for such a shameful crime as lust. This is the way it must be.’
Fidelma bit her lip and turned away. She was still too full of resentful belligerence to articulate the sudden distaste she felt.
It was not until the following day that she saw Brother Eadulf again in the refectory as the bell finished tolling for the serving of the
jentaculum,
the breaking of the fast.
Even before she was seated, the elderly
domina
Sister Athelswith came hurrying up to her.
‘A brother from Ireland has just arrived in search of you, sister. He is in the kitchens for his journey has been long and he is dusty and famished.’
Fidelma glanced up with interest.
‘He has come from Ireland? Searching for me?’
‘From Armagh itself.’
Fidelma stared in amazement before she rose and went in search of the traveller.
The man was exhausted and covered in the dust of travel. He was seated in a corner of the abbey kitchens tearing hunks of bread and slurping milk as if he had not eaten for many a day.
‘I am Fidelma of Kildare, brother,’ she announced.
He gazed up, his mouth still full of food.
‘Then I have something for you.’
Fidelma ignored the man’s ill manners, as he spoke with his mouth full and particles of his meal slipped from his mouth.
‘A message from Ultan of Armagh,’ the monk said, thrusting a package at her. She took it, turning in her hands the vellum-wrapped bundle, which was tied with a leather thong. What could the archbishop of Armagh, the leading churchman of Ireland, want with her?
‘What is it?’ she asked, wondering aloud rather than seeking an answer, for obviously the answer lay in the package.
The messenger shrugged between the mouthfuls of food he was masticating.
‘Some instructions from Ultan. You are requested to proceed to Rome to present the new Rule of the Sisters of Brigid for the blessing of the Holy Father. Ultan asks me to beg you to undertake this embassy for you are the best qualified and the ablest advocate of the Sisters of Brigit of Kildare, the Abbess Étain notwithstanding.’
Fidelma stared at the man, hearing his words but not really comprehending them.
‘I am to do what?’ she asked, scarcely believing her ears.
The monk glanced up, frowning as he took another bite of bread into his mouth. He chewed several times before answering.
‘You are to present the
Regula coenobialis Cill Dara
to the Holy Father for blessing. It is the request of Ultan of Armagh.’
‘Requesting me to go to Rome?’
Suddenly Sister Fidelma found herself hurrying along the vaulted cloisters of the abbey back to the refectory. She did not know why her heart was beating more rapidly or what made the day so suddenly pleasant and the future full of excitement.
No wild beasts are so cruel as the Christians in their dealings with each other.
Ammianus Marcellinus
(
c
. AD 330 – 95)
The Sister Fidelma mysteries are set during the mid-seventh century AD.
Sister Fidelma is not simply a religieuse, a member of the community of St. Brigid of Kildare. She is also a qualified
dálaigh,
or advocate of the ancient law courts of Ireland. As this background will not be familiar to many readers, this foreword provides a few essential points of reference designed to make the stories more readily appreciated.
Ireland, in the seventh century AD, consisted of five main provincial kingdoms: indeed, the modern Irish word for a province is still
cúige,
literally ‘a fifth’. Four provincial kings—of Ulaidh (Ulster), of Connacht, of Muman (Munster) and of Laigin (Leinster)—gave their allegiance to the
Ard Rí
or High King, who ruled from Tara, in the ‘royal’ fifth province of Midhe (Meath), which means the ‘middle province’. Even among these provincial kingdoms, there was a decentralisation of power to petty-kingdoms and clan territories.
The law of primogeniture, the inheritance by the eldest son or daughter, was an alien concept in Ireland. Kingship, from the lowliest clan chieftain to the High King, was only partial hereditary and mainly electoral. Each ruler had to prove himself or herself worthy of office and was elected by the
derbfhine
of their family—three generations gathered in conclave. If a ruler did not pursue the commonwealth of the people, they were impeached
and removed from office. Therefore the monarchial system of ancient Ireland had more in common with a modern day republic than with the feudal monarchies of medieval Europe.
Ireland, in the seventh century AD, was governed by a system of sophisticated laws called the Laws of the
Fénechas,
or land-tillers, which became more popularly known as the Brehon Laws, deriving from the word
breitheamh
—
a
judge. Tradition has it that these laws were first gathered in 714 BC by the order of the High King, Ollamh Fódhla. But it was in AD 438 that the High King, Laoghaire, appointed a commission of nine learned people to study, revise and commit the laws to the new writing in Latin characters. One of those serving on the commission was Patrick, eventually to become patron saint of Ireland. After three years, the commission produced a written text of the laws, the first known codification.
The first complete surviving texts of the ancient laws of Ireland are preserved in an eleventh-century manuscript book. It was not until the seventeenth-century that the English colonial administration in Ireland finally suppressed the use of the Brehon Law system. To even possess a copy of the law books was punishable, often by death or transportation.
The law system was not static and every three years at the Féis Temhrach (Festival of Tara) the lawyers and administrators gathered to consider and revise the laws in the light of changing society and its needs.
Under these laws, women occupied a unique place. The Irish laws gave more rights and protection to women than any other western law code at that time or since. Women could, and did, aspire to all offices and professions as the coequal with men. They could be political leaders, command their people in battle as warriors, by physicians, local magistrates, poets, artisans,
lawyers and judges. We know the name of many female judges of Fidelma’s period—Bríg Briugaid, Áine Ingine Iugaire and Darí among many others. Darí, for example, was not only a judge but also the author of a noted law text written in the sixth century AD. Women were protected by the laws against sexual harassment; against discrimination; from rape; they had the right of divorce on equal terms from their husbands with equitable separation laws and could demand part of their husband’s property as a divorce settlement; they had the right of inheritance of personal property and the right of sickness benefits. Seen from today’s perspective, the Brehon Laws provided for an almost feminist paradise.
This background, and its strong contrast with Ireland’s neighbours, should be understood to appreciate Fidelma’s role in these stories.
Fidelma was born at Cashel, capital of the kingdom of Muman (Munster) in south-west Ireland, in AD 636. She was the youngest daughter of Failbe Fland, the king, who died the year after her birth and was raised under the guidance of a distant cousin, Abbot Laisran of Durrow. When she reached the ‘Age of Choice’ (fourteen years), she went to study at the bardic school of the Brehon Morann of Tara, as many other young Irish girls did. Eight years of study resulted in Fidelma obtaining the degree of
Anruth,
only one degree below the highest offered at either bardic or ecclesiastical universities in ancient Ireland. The highest degree was
ollamh,
still the modern Irish word for a professor. Fidelma’s studies were in law, both in the criminal code of the
Senchus Mór
and the civil code of the
Leabhar Acaill.
She therefore became a
dálaigh
or advocate of the courts.
Her role could be likened to a modern Scottish sheriff-substitute, whose job is to gather and assess the evidence, independent
of the police, to see if there is a case to be answered. The modern French
juge d’ instruction
holds a similar role.
In those days, most of the professional or intellectual classes were members of the new Christian religious houses, just as, in previous centuries, all members of professions and intellectuals were Druids. Fidelma became a member of the religious community of Kildare founded in the late fifth century AD by St. Brigid.
While the seventh century AD was considered part of the European ‘Dark Ages’, for Ireland it was a period of ‘Golden Enlightenment’. Students from every corner of Europe flocked to Irish universities to receive their education, including the sons of the Anglo-Saxon kings. For example, Aldfrith, who became king of Northumbria from AD 685-705, was educated at Bangor and achieved a reputation in Ireland as a poet in the Irish language. Three of his poems still survive in ancient texts. At the great ecclesiastical university of Durrow, at this time, it is recorded that no less than eighteen different nations were represented among the students. At the same time, Irish male and female missionaries were setting out to reconvert a pagan Europe to Christianity, establishing churches, monasteries and centres of learning throughout Europe as far east as Kiev, in the Ukraine; as far north as the Faroes, and as far south as Taranto in southern Italy. Ireland was a by-word for literacy and learning.
However, the Celtic Church of Ireland was in constant dispute with Rome on matters of liturgy and ritual. Rome had began to reform itself in the fourth century, changing its dating of Easter and aspects of its liturgy. The Celtic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church refused to follow Rome but the Celtic Church was gradually absorbed by Rome between the ninth and eleventh centuries while the Eastern Orthodox Churches have continued
to remain independent of Rome. The Celtic Church of Ireland, during Fidelma’s time, was much concerned with this conflict.
The first Fidelma mystery,
Absolution By Murder,
is set against the most famous debate between the representatives of the Celtic and Roman Churches at Whitby in AD 664.
One thing that marked both the Celtic Church and Rome in the seventh century was that the concept of celibacy was not universal. While there were always ascetics in both churches who sublimated physical love in a dedication to the deity, it was not until the Council of Nicea in AD 325 that clerical marriages were condemned but not banned. The concept of celibacy in the Roman Church arose from the customs practised by the pagan priestesses of Vesta and the priests of Diana. By the fifth century Rome had forbidden clerics from the rank of abbot and bishop to sleep with their wives and, shortly after, even to marry at all. The general clergy were discouraged from marrying by Rome but not forbidden to do so. Indeed, it was not until the reforming papacy of Leo IX (AD 1049-1054) that a serious attempt was made to force the western clergy to accept universal celibacy. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, priests below the rank of abbot and bishop have retained their right to marry until this day.
The condemnation of the ‘sin of the flesh’ remained alien to the Celtic Church for a long time after Rome’s attitude became a dogma. In Fidelma’s world, both sexes inhabited abbeys and monastic foundations which were known as
conhospitae,
or double houses, where men and women lived raising their children in Christ’s service.
Fidelma’s own house of St. Brigid of Kildare was one such community of both sexes in Fidelma’s time. When Brigid established her community at Kildare (Cill-Dara = the church of oaks) she invited a bishop named Conlaed to join her. Her first biography,
written in AD 650, in Fidelma’s time, was written by a monk of Kildare named Cogitosus, who makes it clear that it was a mixed community.
It should also be pointed out that, showing women’s coequal role with men, women were priests of the Celtic Church at this time. Brigid herself was ordained a bishop by Patrick’s nephew, Mel and her case was not unique. Roman actually wrote a protest in the sixth century at the Celtic practise of allowing women to celebrate the divine sacrifice of Mass.
Armed with this background knowledge we may now enter Fidelma’s world. This story is placed in the year AD 664.
The Sister Fidelma Mysteries:
 
Absolution by Murder
Shroud for the Archbishop*
 
*forthcoming
ABSOLUTION BY MURDER. Copyright © 1994 by Peter Tremayne. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
 
 
First published in Great Britain by Headline Book
Publishing
 
 
eISBN 9781466814011
First eBook Edition : March 2012
 
 
First U.S. Edition: January 1996

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