year 627. Little is known of
his early history; it is generally supposed that he was educated at
Iona, and that, having embraced the monastic rule, he returned to his
own country to extend its observance there. He presided over the great
Abbey of Raphoe, of which he was the founder, until the year 679, when
he was raised to the government of his order, and from that period he
usually resided at Iona. The fact of his having been chosen to such an
important office, is a sufficient testimony to his virtues, and of the
veneration and respect in which he was held by his contemporaries.

St. Adamnan paid more than one visit to his friend the Northumbrian
monarch (_regem Alfridem amicum_). On the second occasion he went with
the Abbot Ceolfrid, and after some conversation with him and other
learned ecclesiastics, he adopted the Roman paschal computation. Yet,
with all his influence and eloquence, he was unable to induce his monks
to accept it; and it was not until the year 716 that they yielded to the
persuasions of Egbert, a Northumbrian monk. Adamnan was more successful
in his own country. In 697 he visited Ireland, and took an important
part in a legislative council held at Tara. On this occasion he procured
the enactment of a law, which was called the Canon of Adamnan, or the
Law of the Innocents, and sometimes "the law not to kill women." We have
already referred to the martial tendencies of the ladies of ancient
Erinn--a tendency, however, which was by no means peculiar at that
period of the world's history. The propensity for military engagements
was not confined to queens and princesses--women of all ranks usually
followed their lords to the field of battle; but as the former are
generally represented as having fallen victims to each other's prowess
in the fight, it appears probable that they had their own separate line
of battle, or perhaps fought out the field in a common _melee_ of
feminine forces.

Had we not the abundant testimony of foreign writers to prove the
influence and importance of the missions undertaken by Irish saints at
this period of her history, it might be supposed that the statements of
her annalists were tinged with that poetic fancy in which she has ever
been so singularly prolific, and that they rather wrote of what might
have been than of what was. But the testimony of Venerable Bede (to go
no further) is most ample on this subject.

Irish missionary zeal was inaugurated in the person of St.