The Irish standard., 1898-06-25
GIVES RELIABLE AUTHORITY
The Sage of Nininger Quotes Sir
John I. Gilbert.
GORMLY WAS THRICE MARRIED
The Gay Morse Widow EspouseG
Two Irish Kings.

In last weeks issue of The Represent
ative,' Hon. 1gnatius Donnelly writes
the following interesting article under
the initials of his name:
In our address before the "Sons Of
Norway" on the 18th of May, we under
took to show that the people of the
Scandinavian peninsula had contributed!
enormously to the population of all the
countries Of Europe. The able editor
of the Irish Standard, of Minneapolis,
did US the honor to repuLlish our ad-
dress in eXtenso and comment upon it
In very liberal and complimentary
terms.
In another column of his paper he
makes this point:
Says Ignatius Donnelly: The wife of
Brian Boru was Il Scandinavian, and his
daughter married a man Of that race
called "sigtrig of the Golden Beard"
Would he kindly give in the columns of
The Representative his authority for
that statement?
We would refer him to "The History
of the Viceroys of Ireland, by ]. T. Gill
bert, Dublin, 1866" page 5, where we
find the following statement:
"The intimate connections existing
between the Irish and the scandinav-
1ans, in the eleventh century, are ex-
emplifled in the marriage of Melsachlin
II, monarch of Ireland. to the daughter
of Olaf, Morse king of Dublin. After
Olafs death his widow, Gormly or
Kormolda, married Melsachlin, and
subsequently became the wife of Brian
Borumah, who espoused his own daugh-
ter to Sigtrig of the silken beard, king
of Dublin, son of Gormly by Olaf.".
The Scandinavian "sagas' are full of
illusions to the intimate relations which
existed between the Mortimer and the
Irish.
The Scandinavians established their
settlement in Dublin in A. D. 1856, and
built dun or fortress there. They
were called by the Irish "tne figures of
Ath Cliath." Dublin was known as
aile-atha-cliath, the town of The ford
of hurdlcs'-the hurdles being made of
twigs and branches Of trees, and used
as rude floating bridge
The same authority just quoted says,
page 4:
Many of the important Scandinavian
settlers became allied and intermarrled
with the natives, with whose interests
they thus grew identified; consequently
in the majority of hostings and engage
ments from the ninth to the twelfth
century, Gaels and Norsemen were to
be found ranged on both Sides"
In the middle of the twelfth century,
when the Norman-English invaded Ire
land, Fitz-Gislebert besieged Dublin,
then a Norwegian town, ruled over by
a king named Hanskuld Mac Thorkel.
The English won in the fight; and
Hanskuld fled This shows that dis
tinct Scandinavian occupancy of parts
OF Ireland continued down to the COM
ing of the English
In S66 (see Keatings History of Ire
land, vol. 2, p. 99), Torgesius or Thor
gesius, king of Norway, became king of
Ireland, and held possession of the
whole island for 13 years. Heating
says: "a soldier was billeted by author
ity upon every house and cottage,
throughout the whole kingdom. The
insolence and rapines of these comrlon
soldiers were insupportable, for the
master of the family had no power in
his own house; he could not command
the use of a hen or chicken of his
own, for fear of giving offense to this
rascally foreigner; whose vengeance he
dreaded and whose resentment perhaps
would dispossess him of all he had"
Such a state of things in rude age
must have led to great mixture Of
races.
The Irish finally rose in rebellion
and interesting story.
The old king, Torgesius, coveted the
handsome daughter Of the Irish king of
Meath, his neighbor, and compelled him
to send her to his palace. The Irish
king pretended to cheerfully acquiesce;
and offered to send with his daughter
Is Of the handsonsst girls in his king
dom. Torgesius was delighted, and in
vited Is of his chief mobiles to receive
them. But when the princess came she
was accompanied not by girls, but by
Is beardless young warriors, dressed as
maidens, but armed with short swords
hidden under their garments; and the
impatient lovers finished their fcstivi-
ties in the arms of death. Torgesius
was killed and all his chief courtiers.
"A general uprising followed and the