Note 1008 — Chapter X · LEARNING AND LANGUAGE. (continued 2)

Grafann. There is no saint of this name in the Calendar. But the Four Masters, at A.D. 745, record the death of Dubhdaleithe na graiffne (‘D. of the writing’) abbot of Cill-Scire (Kilskeery, Co. Meath), evidently the person referred to, as na graifne is the gen. sing. of grafann, which means ‘writing’ (from graib, or graif = graphium; Reeves’s Adamnan, 205, note a). And Dubhdaleithe might well have been called Grafann, as he is supposed to have been the author of a chronicle called the Book of Dubhdaleithe, quoted in the Annals of Ulster.