Four notes on Adomnán's Vita Columbae

The difficulty about the correct interpretation of some passages in Adomnán's Vita Columbae is due to his misunderstanding of his main written source, Cumméne Ailbe. I argue (i) that the earthquake whose location is given as Italy at 1.28 is that of Constantinople on 14 December 557, and that this mistake is due to the confusion of the suburb of Constantinople called Rhegium with the Italian town of the same name; (ii) that Guaire mac Aidáin was cleaning the wooden hull of his boat when he had the accident described at 1.47, and the vexed term cristilia refers to the encrustation on the hull; (iii) that the 'sea-monsters' whose attack upon Cormac ua Liatháin's craft is described at 2.42 are identifiable as dolphins; and (iv) that the book borne by the angel whose alleged appearance to Columba is described at 3.5 had originally been described as 'the book of the succession of the kings of Dál Riata', not 'the glass book of the ordination of kings', so that Columba had merely blessed Aidán mac Gabráin in the knowledge that he would be king one day and had not actually ordained him such.