ut he doubts if any considerable church here was founded by Columba
himself, or indeed before 804. He grounds his doubts chiefly on the
negative circumstance that there is "no mention of the place in the
_Annals_ as a religious seat" till the year 804. But the _Annals of the
Four Masters_ record two years previously, or in 802, that "the church
of Columcille at Ceanannus (or Kells) was destroyed" (vol. i. p. 413),
referring of course to an _old_ or former church of St. Columba's there;
whilst the _Annals of Clonmacnoise_ mention that two years afterwards,
or in 804, "there was a new church founded in Kells in honour of St.
Colume."--(See _Ibid._, footnote.)[68] The learned editor of the _Annals
of the Four Masters_, Professor O'Donovan, has translated and published,
in the first volume of the _Miscellany of the Irish Archaeological
Society_, an ancient poem attributed to St. Columba, and which, at all
events, was certainly composed at a period when some remains of Paganism
existed in Ireland. In this production the poet makes St. Columba say,
"My order is at Cennanus (Kells)," etc.; and in his note to this
allusion Dr. O'Donovan states that at Kells "St. Columbkille erected a
monastery in the sixth century."--(_Miscellany of Archaeological
Society_, vol. i. p. 13.) Some minds would trust such a question
regarding the antiquity of a place more to the evidence of parchment
than to the evidence of stone and lime. The beautiful _Evangeliarium_,
known as the _Book of Kells_, is mentioned by the _Four Masters_ under
the year 1006 as being then the "principal relic of the western world,"
on account of its golden case or cover, and as having been temporarily
stolen in that year from the erdomh or sacristy of the great church of
Kells. In the same ancient entry this book is spoken of as "the Great
Gospel of Columcille," and whether originally belonging to Kells or not,
is certainly older than the ninth century, if not indeed as old as
Columba. The corresponding _Evangeliarium_ of Durrow, placed now also in
Trinity College, Dublin,--"a manuscript" (says Dr. Reeves, p. 276)
"approaching, if not reaching to the Columbian age,"--is known from the
inscription on the silver-mounted case which formerly belonged to it, to
have been "venerable in age, and a reliquary in 916" (p. 327). In the
remarkable colophon which closes this manuscript copy of the
Evangelists, St. Columba himself is professed to be the copyist or
writer of it, the read