|
Life
| b. Quin, Co. Clare, 17 March.; ed. nr. Ennis under Donogh an Charrain; learned Greek, Latin and Hebrew through Irish, his master knowing no English; five years at the plough, then tutor; went to Carrick-on-Suir, stayed as teacher; estab. the first printing press in the town; printed The Chronoscope; also The Pentaglot Preceptor, or Elementary Institutes of the English, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Irish Languages, Vol. 1: containing a Grammar of the English Tongue (1796); moved to Dublin and served as Sec. of Gaelic Society, 1815; later employed in Record Commission, Dublin; |
| undertook the completion of Haliday’s trans. of Keating’s History of Ireland [Foras Feasa ar Eirinn] and a version of Colgan’s Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae; issued A Geographical and Statistical History of Ireland; taught Irish at Linen Hall Library, counting Thomas Russell among his pupils; collaborated with Bunting on field-work and later made a journey to Castlebar, Co. Mayo, collecting songs for the former’s Ancient Irish Music, being financed by the McCrackens; arrested on suspicion of sedition;his contribs. to Bunting superceded at the eleventh hour by Thomas Campbell's “Exile of Erin” for security of the editor; |
| may have written the life of St Patrick (1810) which was published by the printers to St. Patrick's College, Maynooth, in conjunction with his grammar; in it the author contests Protestant versions of Patrician hagiography and particularly berates Edward Ledwich; also purportedly issued a Life of Columbkille [sic]; compiled “Historical notices of the author’s family and life” in conjuction with the edition of the Earl of Castlehaven’s Memoirs, or Review of the Civil War (1815); |
| issued An Introduction to the Knowledge of the Irish Language as now Spoken (1815); also The Classical Students Metrical Mnemonics, containing [ …] definitions and rules of the English, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages (Dublin 1817); An Easy Introduction to Practical Astronomy in familiar verse, all the necessary in mnemonic verses and rhymic couplets (1817); his date of death is conjectured at 1830 by librarians but more often simply given as fl.1810. PI RAF |
[ top ]
Works
|
See also Diary and Letters of Patrick Lynch [Sec. of the Dublin Gaelic Soc.], in Charlotte M. Fox, Annals of the Irish Harpers (1911), q.pp. |
[ top ]
Bibliographical details
The Pentaglot Preceptor: or Elementary Institutes of the English, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Irish, languages. Vol. I: Containing a complete grammar of the English tongue For the Use of Schools, and peculiarly calculated for the Instruction of such Ladies & Gentlemen, as may wish to learn without the help of a Master. By Patrick Lynch (Carrick: printed by John Stacy, M,DCC,XCVI. [1796]), [2],xvi,122p., 8°, and Do., by Patrick Lynch, Secretary to the Gaelic Society of Dublin. [with an inserted preface dated May 1st, 1802, and unaltered t.p. incl. date of pub.] (Carrick [1802]) [ ESTCT106609; also Electronic version by Thomson Gale [Chicago] 2003; available online by licence]. See also 1805 edn., infra.A Plain, Easy and Comprehensive Grammar of the English Tongue, in which the definitions and rules necessary to be committed to memory are composed in familiar verse. With a preliminary essay, containing ... a critical review of the most celebrated English Grammars, &c. / [by Patrick Lynch, Secretary to the Gaelic Society of Dublin] (Carrick: [John Stacy] 1805) [t.p. of the 1976 original also given].
A Treatise on Practical Surveying, demonstrated from its first principles: wherein everything that is useful and curious in that art is fully considered and explained [...] by Robert Gibson, Teacher of the Mathematics [6th edition; improved] (1810).
The Life of Saint Patrick, / Apostle of Ireland: / to which is added, / in the original Irish character / (with both a Latin and an English translation) / the Celebrated Hymn / composed above 1200 Years since / by his disciple, Saint Fiech; / comprehending a Compendious History of his Life / annexed is a / Copious Appendix /containing a summary account of the various ecclesiastical Institutions, Orders, Edifices, and Establishments in Ireland, since the introduction of the Christ Religion / also a Chronological Table/of the / Archbishops of Armagh, Dublin, Cashell, and Tuam, from the death of St. Patrick till the present year. / [As anon. - given as Patrick Lynch in BML Catalogue.] for contents and extracts, see under St. Patrick [q.v.]
The Earl of Castlehaven’s Memoirs: or, His Review of the Civil Wars in Ireland; with his own engagement and conduct therein: containing also an appendix and post-script, enl. & cor. by himself; to which is prefixed, Historical notices of the author’s family and life, comp. for this edition [by Patrick Lynch] (Dublin: Printed by Espy and Cross 1815), xxxii, 184pp., 4° [Incls. “Historical notices of the author's family and life” signed: P. Lynch.
Criticism
See Claire Connolly, ‘Irish Romanticism, 1800-1839’, in Cambridge History of Irish Literature (Cambridge UP 2006), Vol. I [Chap. 10], espec. p.4324f.
Commentary
W. B. Stanford, Ireland and the Classical Tradition (IAP 1976; 1984), calls him a rural polymath from Co. Clare; learned Hebrew as well as Greek and Latin; published in The Pentaglot Preceptor, or Elementary Institutes of the English, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Irish Languages, vol. 1, containing a Grammar of the English Tongue (1796); went to Dublin as a schoolmaster and in 1815 became secretary of the Gaelic Society; no further vols. of Pentaglot appeared; The Classical Students’ Metrical Mnemonics, Containing in Familiar Verse All the Necessary Definitions and Rules of the English, Latin, Greek and Hebrew Languages (1817); also produced versions of Alvary’s Latin and Wetenhall’s Greek grammar as well as works on Irish and on Irish saints; Stanford regards Lynch as exemplifying the traditional omnivorousness and boldness of the native Irish scholars, a trait to be seen in writers like James Joyce. [37]
[ top ]
Quotations
The Life of Saint Patrick (1810): Lynch claims that St. Patrick was born in Tours, properly Naom (or Neam) Tour, in Armorican Gaul, on the Loire, a.d..373; Consecrated Bishop, and sent on the Irish Mission by Pope Celestine in 433; After 60 years spent in accomplishing the complete conversion of Ireland, d. in the 120 year of his age, March 17th, 493; reads ‘Nemthur’ in the Hymn to Fiech [Fiacc], rather than Nempthur, as often translated through error. He strenuously attests that the bishops of Ireland (R.C.) are in directly line of succession from Patrick, that the Irish Church has always been faithful to Rome and shared its doctrines. (For extensive extracts, see under St. Patrick, Commentary, infra.]
References
British Library Catalogue lists Patrick Lynch [Secretary to the Gaelic Society of Dublin], The Life of Saint Patrick, / Apostle of Ireland: / to which is added, / in the original Irish character / (with both a Latin and an English translation) / the Celebrated Hymn / composed above 1200 Years since / by his disciple, Saint Fiech; / comprehending a Compendious History of his Life / annexed is a / Copious Appendix /containing a summary account of the various ecclesiastical Institutions, Orders, Edifices, and Establishments in Ireland, since the introduction of the Christ Religion / also a Chronological Table/of the / Archbishops of Armagh, Dublin, Cashell, and Tuam, from the death of St. Patrick till the present year. / Together with an abstract of Irish Grammar (Dublin: printed by H. Fitzpatrick, No. 4 Capel-Street, Printer and Bookseller to the R. C. College of St. Patrick, Maynooth 1810), 12o., entered in Stationers’ Hall. 350pp. Note: though author of the grammar attached, he is prob. not the author of the main text. [See Saint Patrick, q.v..]
Notes
Bolg an tSolair (20 April 1795): Editorial, probably by Thomas Russell, praised ‘Mr Lynch’s attempts to revive Grammatical and Critical Knowledge of the Irish language in this town’. (See Mary Helen Thuente, ‘The Literary Significance of the United Irishmen’, Michael Kenneally, ed., Irish Literature and Culture, Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1992, pp.35-62; p.42.)
[ top ]