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Dave's Mythical Creatures and Places |
Saint Brendan's Island
Saint Brendan was a real person who was born in Ireland around the year 489. He was ordained in 512 and traveled extensively, as far as the Hebrides, Orkneys, and the Faroe Islands. He died in 577, and about 200 years after his death a book titled Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis appeared, describing his travels. This book was widely copied and translated until the 1400's.
In the book, Saint Brendan is told about the "Promised Land of the Saints" by another saint who has been there, Saint Barrind. Saint Brendan and more than a dozen monks set sail to find this island. They travel for 7 years, encountering many things such as a griffin and a devil-whale. Finally they find the island, which is an earthly paradise, but they have to return home. They return with fruit and precious stones from the island. The story of Saint Brendan was much exaggerated to provide allegorical lessons, much in the same way the Physiologus was. Despite this, some of the places that he visited seem to correspond with actual locations.
On maps, Saint Brendan's Island first appeared on the Ebstorf map of 1235, in a location where the Canary Islands are. Other early maps confused the location with the Madeira Islands or the Azores. As this region became explored and mapped, Saint Brendan's Island seemed to move northward, to regions that were not as well known. It appeared on maps up into the early 1800's.
Honorius of Atun called it the Lost Isle in his 1130 book on geography, saying "There is in the Ocean a certain isle agreeable and fertile above all others, unknown to men but discovered by chance and then sought for without anyone being able to find it again and so called the "Lost Isle." It was, so they say, the island whither once upon a time St. Brandan came."
