UC linguist dates St. Patrick half-century earlier
Scholars differ on much about the life of St. Patrick, but they tend to agree that his mission of walking the Emerald Isle to spread the gospel of Christ fits squarely into the 5th century A.D.
But now comes a challenge from a Patrick sleuth at UC Berkeley, Daniel Melia, a professor of rhetoric and Celtic studies -- and incidentally a former "Jeopardy" champion who won a quarter of a million dollars and a silver Corvette he still drives.
Melia has studied linguistic details of Patrick's writings and is prepared to argue that the Christian priest who evangelized most of what is now Ireland lived from the late 4th to early 5th centuries -- 50 years earlier than the dates generally agreed upon by Patrick scholars.
The argument poses no threat to Patrick's sainthood, which is based on myths layered on by later generations.
And there's no risk to the secular feast day of March 17, which historians maintain is the date Patrick passed on after his rugged life of proselytizing among Britain's pagan Celts. That date, Melia says, is legendary as well and may have been set long ago to mark a spring folk festival...
His [formal paper] is scheduled in July when he presents his findings to the XIIIth International Congress of Celtic Studies in Bonn, Germany.
Read entire article at San Francisco Chronicle
But now comes a challenge from a Patrick sleuth at UC Berkeley, Daniel Melia, a professor of rhetoric and Celtic studies -- and incidentally a former "Jeopardy" champion who won a quarter of a million dollars and a silver Corvette he still drives.
Melia has studied linguistic details of Patrick's writings and is prepared to argue that the Christian priest who evangelized most of what is now Ireland lived from the late 4th to early 5th centuries -- 50 years earlier than the dates generally agreed upon by Patrick scholars.
The argument poses no threat to Patrick's sainthood, which is based on myths layered on by later generations.
And there's no risk to the secular feast day of March 17, which historians maintain is the date Patrick passed on after his rugged life of proselytizing among Britain's pagan Celts. That date, Melia says, is legendary as well and may have been set long ago to mark a spring folk festival...
His [formal paper] is scheduled in July when he presents his findings to the XIIIth International Congress of Celtic Studies in Bonn, Germany.