How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland's Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe

Lindisfarne was a sister house of the Irish monastery Iona, established under the direction of the exiled Irish monk Columba and his early followers. Iona, located on a remote island off the Scottish coast, attracted numerous devotees. This growth meant that a network of Irish monastic houses was established across Britain. Lindisfarne, the most influential of these houses, was the site of production for the Hiberno-Saxon Lindisfarne Gospels, and possibly for the Book of Kells. Unfortunately, Lindisfarne’s location on an island off the West Coast of England made the abbey vulnerable to Viking attacks that caused the monks to flee in the late 800s. The abbey survived, nevertheless, and eventually clerics returned to reside at the site until the Dissolution of the Monasteries under the English King Henry VIII in the 1500s.

The term Middle Ages refers to the period between the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and the birth of the Italian Renaissance. The Middle Ages, also called the medieval period, in European history lasted from approximately 500-1500. Although the era was frequently mislabeled as the “Dark Ages” until recent decades, the medieval period was not an unenlightened, unproductive, or backward age. Cahill’s book focuses on the early Middle Ages, when Irish monastics helped reshape Europe’s cultural landscape. This was also a period of translation, recovery of classical texts in Europe, production of art, and travel and trade among nations.

Cahill uses the term pagan to refer to Greco-Roman cultures and to the pre-Christian peoples of Ireland. The term refers in this context to people who subscribe to polytheistic belief systems (those that require belief in more than one god), rather than monotheistic Christianity. Cahill notes that St. Augustine ascribed partial responsibility for the decline of the Roman Empire to pagan gods' inability to protect Rome physically or to provide moral guidance to its people. Pre-Christian cultures in Ireland also followed polytheistic beliefs systems and rituals, many of which were integrated into later Catholic practices. For example, Brigid of Kildare (also referred to as Brigit) is an iconic Irish Catholic figure who shares many attributes and her feast day with the Celtic goddess Brigid. Cahill acknowledges these connections and Irish Catholics' incorporation of pagan celebrations into their religious practices as they evangelized following the decline of the Roman Empire.