My dear James, Further to your query “Was St Gall “Irish”?” – I think we should also look at the history of Finnian, the Patron Saint of Movilla (Moville) in County Down. St. Finnian is a figure viewed as the founder of that important church but belongs to the obscure age of Irish history following the Justinian Plague of 549 when contemporary witnesses are at a premium. We do know that by 911 a now lost but partially reconstructable “Chronicle of Ireland” contains a notice of him. The version preserved in the Annals of Ulster reads, as the first entry for the year 579, Quies Uinniani episcope, m. nepotis Fiatach – The peaceful death of Bishop Uinnianus, son of the grandson of Fiatach. An improvement of the text could be Quies Uinniani episcope macu Fiatach– The peaceful death of Bishop Uiniannus of Dál Fiatach. The Dál Fiatach occupied the maritime area of North Down and from their traditions were of British Belgic origin.Three name forms are associated with St Finnian of Movilla in Medieval sources: Uinnian, Finnio , and the dithematic, non-hypocoristic Findbarr .

A possible interpretation of the Latinised spelling Uiniannus is that it is purely graphic representing a response over a long period of time to changes in the sound system of the Irish language. Certainly we can be sure that all three names belong to one historical figure The earliest testimony is that provided by Adamnan of Iona in his Tripartite Life of St Columba written about 700. He refers to one of Columba’s teachers, an elderly Bishop by the three name forms, Finbarr, Uinniau and Finnio. If the Bishop’s name were the Gaelic Finbarr it would be necessary to explain why he had the neo-British hyporocristic Uinniau. The possibilities are that Uinniau was the pet form of a British radical or that Finbarr is a Gaelic translation of the British root- form.

Information about Uinniau is preserved in sources associated with Ulster. As a correspondent of the British author, and eventually Abbot, Gildas he is known to us from a letter of Columbanus, very likely fragments of which are preserved in the Canon law text Collectio canonum hibernensis,of which one author has been supposed to be Cu Chuimne of Iona. Furthermore the Penitential of Uinniau is first known to us from its use by Columbanus to form his own. We may therefore suppose that both these works came from the library of Bangor before 590 when Columbanus left the continent. If Uinniau was one of Columba’s tutors then reason for an interest in him in Iona could be easily deduced.

Which brings us naturally to the question of nationality. Queries have been whether he was “British” or “Irish”, but are useless without reference to the Cruthin Controversy. It is perverse to suppose that he was other than a Briton, as I think Gallus was, and like Gallus, he was also a Scot since he was born and lived in Scotia (Ireland). The name Uinniau remains a linguistic oddity in Irish Gaelic because it is in fact British , the original language of the Dal Fiatach, the Belgic Celtic warrior aristocracy who imposed it on the Cruthin, the pre-Celtic inhabitants of the island, the original Pretani, or as we should say, Britons. But you can see the terrible problem this creates for the Irish academic élite, since a complete exposition of these issues in a British Isles context destroys the rationale for Irish nationalism and would indeed require the burning of my book “The Ulster People”. And that is why I did not bring out a second edition of the work, since I felt that the spirit of the 1930’s Nazi Museum of Ireland lived on, as it has with discussion on Mr Stuart.