Note 966 — Chapter IX · THE LANDS
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ibid., I, 30. This legend regarding the properties of the earth of Ireland was very widespread in the Middle Ages. It is found in Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica, I, 1 (Giles’s edit., vol. ii, p. 34), which Giraldus goes on to quote at length on the subject (Top. Hiber., I, 31). It also appears in Gervase of Tilbury’s Otia imperialia, vol. i, p. 917 (see Liebrecht, op. cit., p. 88, note 21). Solinus, Collectanea, 22 (Mommsen’s edit., p. 101), and Isidore, Etym., XIV, 6, ascribe similar properties to the earth of the Isle of Thanet. In his Letter, Prester John boasts that some of his territories are proof against poisonous snakes and animals. See Letter of Prester John, 21, in: Zarncke, Priester Johannes, in: Abhandlungen, vol. vii, 1879, p. 912.