Ossian Collection > Report of the Committee of the Highland Society of Scotland, appointed to inquire into the nature and authenticity of the poems of Ossian

GAELIC MANUSCRIPTS 237
The church discipline of this ancient Scots institution
differed remarkably from the Romish in this respect, that
an Abbot, or even a Presbyter, was equal in authority to a
Bishop ; though it should seem that by the age of Bede,
this privilege was confined to the Abbot of Iona or I Cho-
lum Chille. " That island," says he, " has an Abbot,
" who is a Presbyter, for its ruler, to whose direction all
44 the province, and even the Bishops, contrary to the usual
" method, are subject, according to the example of its first
44 teacher, who was not a Bishop, but a Presbyter and
" Mcnkf." And thence it happened that in the early
period of the Scots and Irish Church, Ab, Popa or Pupa,
denoted Lord, and Master, as ancient Glossaries of obso-
lete words inform us £.
In 710, Naitan King of Picts, was prevailed upon by a
letter from Ceolfrid, Abbot of Girwy, to recommend the
Romish observance concerning Easter and the Tonsure to
the clergy of his dominions. 4< The nineteen years circles
44 or revolutions were sent throughout all the provinces of
" the Picts to be transcribed and observed, instead of the
" eighty-four years revolutions. All the ministers of the
" altar, and the monks, had the crown shorn, and the cor-
44 rected nation (as Bede expresses it) rejoiced, as being
" newly put under the instruction of Peter, the most blessed
" prince of the apostles, and to be secured under his pro-
44 tection*."
In 716, Ecgbercht, an English priest, went from Ireland
to Iona, in order to effect the like change in the religious
usage of the Scots. The monks of that island, to whom
the Church of Scotland was subject, gave him a welcome
t id. L. III. c. 4.
J Lhuyd. Archaeolog. Britaan. Tit. II. in vocib. DominuSj Magister, et
Tit. X in vocib. Ab. Popa.
* Bed. Histor. Ecclesiast. Lib. V cap. 22