Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/428

 CORKER

372

CORKER

finally established himself near the marsh of Lough ^c (Eu-ce), which appears to have been the original nfme of the place. There he fomided a monastic sod about 620, which in a short time attracted a multitude of students and produced many great scholars. The Irish " Life of Finbarr" gives the names of a dozen of these holy and learned men, who in turn became founders of churches and schools in the South of Ireland. The most distinguished of them was St. Colman Mac Ua Cluasaigh, Ferlegind or professor in the School of Cork about the year 664. At that time all Ireland was devastated by a terri- ble yellow plague which carried off two-thirds of the population. There was a prevalent idea that the pestilence could not, or at least did not, extend beyond nine waves from the shore. So Colman and.

his pupils wisely resolved to migratefrom their monas- tery in the marshes of Cork to one of the islands in the high sea. Being a poet and a holy man he composed a poem, mostly fn Irish, committing himself and h^ pupils to the protection of God and His saints espe- cially the patron saints of Erin. As they sought their isla/d refuge the students chanted the P°em verseJjy verse, each one reciting his o^v^l stanza until it was finished, and then they began agam. Fortunately

lines themselves do. The School of Cork cx)ntmued to flourish for many centuries, even after^the Danes had established themselves there; m 8/4 we tmd recorded the death of a "Scribe of Cork", and m 891 we are told of the death of a certam son of Connudh, " a scribe, wise man, bishop and abbot of Cork". In 1134 the ancient monas- tery and School of Cork, which had fallen into de- cay, were ref ounded by the celebrated Cormac Mac- Carthy, King of Mimster.

(See FlNB-\RR, S-UNT.) Tom., Bv.^k ,>i Hijmn.-i (Dub-

Dul-1

-of

Eccl.HM. of Inland lUubUn. 1S29), II. 314 sqq.

John Healy.

Corker, M.'^rRDS, an, K\L, Cork English Benedictine, b. in

1636 in Yorkshire; d. 22 December, 1715 at Padding- ton near London. His baptismal name James, he ex- changed for Maurus when he entered the order. On 2 Apr, 1656, he took vows at the English Benedic- tine Abbey of Lamspringe near Hildeshcim, in Ger- many and returned to England as missionarj' m lb6o Being accused by Titus Gates of implicanon m th^ Popish Plot" he was imprisoned '? ^evx gate but ^^ acquitted of treason by a London jury, 18 July, 1679.

civj:

QUEENSTOWN HaRBOUH, CORK

most of this poem stUl survives and is pnnted in the "Leabhar Imuin" or "Book of Hymns (edited by J II. Todd, Dublin, 1855-69). The language is of the most archaic tvpe of Gaelic, and is interspersed here and there willi'phrases mostly taken from Scrip- ture but made to rhvme with each other as the Gaelic

Hereupon he was arraigned for being a priest and sei tenced to death. 17 January, 1680. Through infli In ialfriends he was granted a reprieve and detame in Newgate. While thus confined he is said to hav recoi^iled more than a thousand ^^^-?}^^}^^. Faith. One of his fellow-prisoners at Newgate «.