Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Patrick (d.1084)

956915Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 44 — Patrick (d.1084)1895John Thomas Gilbert

PATRICK (d. 1084), bishop of Dublin, also known as Gillapattraicc, was an ostman of good family, who became a priest. In 1074 the clergy and people of Dublin chose him to fill the see of that city, vacant by the death of Donatus. He received consecration at St. Paul's Church, London, from Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury, to whom he made a vow of spiritual obedience. It was part of William I's Irish policy to bring the Irish church under the control of the archbishop of Canterbury. For many years after Patrick's time the bishops of Dublin were consecrated by archbishops of Canterbury. Lanfranc mentioned Patrick with commendation as his fellow bishop in letters addressed to Godred and Tirdelvac, whom he styled kings of Ireland. Patrick was drowned in October 1084, on a voyage to England. In a letter from Dublin to Lanfranc, Patrick, after his decease, was referred to as a good and pious pastor.

[Ware's Ireland, ed. Harris, pp. 306-8; Sylloge veterum epistolarum, 1632; Lanfranci Opera, 1648; Wharton's Anglia Sacra, 1691; Annals of Ireland, 1851; Lanigan's Ecclesiastical History, 1822, iii. 434-5, 457-8; Baronius, Annales (1745), xvii. 606-7; Wilkins's Concilia, i. 361; Freeman's Norman Conquest, iv. 528-9; Annals of the Four Masters, ii. 981; Dalton's Archbishops of Dublin, 1838; Gilbert's Chartularies of St. Mary's Abbey (Rolls Ser.), 1884.]