Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Corpre Cromm
CORPRE CROMM (Corpre the bent or stooping), Saint (d. 900), became abbot of Clonmacnois in 886, in succession to Maeldari, who died in that year. He was regarded as the ‘chief ornament of his age and country, a cherisher and promoter of religion,’ or, as the ‘Lebar Brecc’ has it, ‘the head of piety and charity in Ireland in his time.’ The ‘Martyrology of Donegal’ in giving his pedigree represents him as the son of Feradach, a descendant in the fourth generation of Mainè Mor, from whom were the Ui Mainè of the race of Colla da Chrioch, but this is a very strange mistake. The author has, in fact, supplied the saint with a pedigree belonging to a totally different person, who bore the name of Corpre Cromm, but was a layman, not an ecclesiastic. He was a prince of Ui Mainè who flourished three centuries earlier, having been a contemporary of St. Ciaran of Clonmacnois [q. v.], who died in 549, and to whom he made several grants for the benefit of his monastery. The ‘Book of Leinster,’ in which Corpre is styled correctly ‘Episcopus,’ gives a brief notice of his parentage, and he is there stated to have been the son of Decill, son of Adsluag, son of Aelbad.
In the church of Clonmacnois he gathered round him a band of twelve presbyters, the number being suggested, as Bishop Reeves has observed, in this and other instances, by the desire which prevailed in the early ages of christianity to imitate even the accidental features of the apostolic system.
In 895 he was engaged in holding a ‘synod of seniors,’ or learned men, at Inis Aingean (now Hare Island) in Loughrea on the Shannon, some nine miles higher up the river than Clonmacnois. Here St. Ciaran [q. v.], the founder of that famous monastery, had erected his first church. The synod was rudely interrupted by a party of Connaughtmen, who had made an inroad into Westmeath. They showed entire disregard to the sanctity of the bishop and of the shrine of St. Ciaran which he had with him, and in the tumult which took place the island was profaned by murder. In the community of Clonmacnois, however, Bishop Corpre was held in such reverence that the anniversary of his death was observed as a festival, and his memory was perpetuated by an inscription in the Irish language, described by Dr. Petrie as still to be seen there, and containing the words, ‘Pray for Corpre Cromm.’ Though few particulars of his life have been preserved, he is well known in Irish hagiology in connection with the story of the apparition of King Moelsechlainn. Thus the ‘Four Masters,’ in recording his death, add that ‘it was to him the spirit of Moelsechlainn showed itself.’ The legend is of considerable antiquity, being found in the ‘Lebar Brecc,’ a compilation of the fourteenth century. It was intended to enforce on kings the duty of liberality to the church, the only alleviation to his sufferings which the king of Ireland enjoyed after death being derived from the ring and the shirt which he had bestowed in his lifetime. It further proved the advantage of burial in the sacred soil of Clonmacnois, where the deceased had the benefit not only of the intercession of the departed founder, the great St. Ciaran, but of his successor, the living St. Corpre, and his twelve priests.
In the modern summary of the legend in the ‘Martyrology of Donegal,’ where the king's release from torment through St. Corpre's intercession is described, ‘purgatory’ is substituted for ‘hell,’ the compiler, O'Clery, being no doubt scandalised at the statement that the power of St. Corpre extended so far as is there stated. His day is 6 March.
[The Lebar Brecc, pp. 259, 260; Book of Leinster, p. 348 e; Martyrology of Donegal, p. 67; Annals of the Four Masters, A.D. 894–9; Petrie's Essay on the Round Towers, p. 325; Colgan's Acta Sanct. 6 March; Lanigan's Eccl. Hist. iii. 426, 427; O'Donovan's Tribes and Customs of Hy Many, pp. 15, 27.]