Note 241 — Chapter I

Mael Isa Ua hAinmire, who is always called Malchus in Latin documents, though a native of Ireland, had been a monk of Winchester, as we are here told. He was elected first bishop of the Danish colony of Waterford in 1096, and was consecrated by Anselm, assisted by the bishops of Chichester and Rochester, at Canterbury on December 28, having previously made his profession of obedience to the archbishop as one of his suffragans (Eadmer, p. 76 f.; Ussher, pp. 518, 565). He signed the Acts of the Synod of Rathbreasail in 1110 as archbishop of Cashel (Keating, iii. 307). He had probably been translated to that see shortly after its foundation in 1106 (see below, p. 65, n. 4). The Synod of Rathbreasail enlarged the Danish diocese of Waterford by adding to it an extensive non-Danish area, which included the ancient religious site of Lismore, on which St. Carthach or Mochuta had founded a community in the early part of the seventh century (Lanigan, ii. 353). The Synod decreed that the see of this diocese should be either at Lismore or at Waterford, apparently giving preference to the former (see p. xlvii). It would seem that after organizing the diocese of Cashel Malchus retired to his former "parish," just as at a later date Malachy retired from Armagh to Down (§ 31), placing his see at Lismore. There, at any rate, he was established when Malachy visited him, and there he died in 1135 "after the 88th year of his pilgrimage" (A.F.M.). An attempt has been made to distinguish Mael Isa Ua hAinmire from the Malchus of the text (Lanigan, iv. 74), but without success. It is interesting to observe that both A.F.M. and A.T. style him bishop of Waterford in the record of his death.