Citations:Iona

English citations of Iona

• 1894, Joseph Thomas Fowler, Adamnani Vita S. Columbae, Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, Introduction, chapter vii: “Columba in Iona”, § 2, pages lxv–lxvi, footnote 4:

  The usual name ‘Iona’ has been suggested by a misreading of the adjective ‘Ioua,’ confirmed by an imaginary connexion with ‘Iona,’ the Hebrew equivalent of the Latin ‘Columba.’ Adamnan’s practice is to put the names of islands as adjectives agreeing with insula. The root of Ioua is I ou or Eo, and Codex A always has Ioua,…which reading prevails also in Codd. C, F, S. Colgan took ‘Iona’ from an inaccurate transcript of Cod. A, and saw that it was an adjective, though not aware of its true form. In Irish writings the name occurs as Ia, hIe, hI, Eo, I, often with the addition of ‘Coluimcille.’ In Latin we find Hii, Eo, Hu, Hy, Hya, Hi, I, Iona, and the adjectives Ioua, Euea, Hiiensis, and Ionensis. The Saxon Chronicles have Ii and Hii. Scottish forms are Yi, Hii-coluimchille, Hy, Iona, Yona, I, Hii. On the monuments in the island Y is the prevailing form, but ‘Iona’ seems to be the true reading of the monument of the Prioress Anna, 1543, at the Nunnery church. Icolmkill, Ycolmkill, and Ecolmkill are the regular forms in legal documents, and Ee-choluim-cille is at present the recognized vernacular. On a gravestone of 1790 is I-Colm-kill. See further in Reeves, 1857, 258; 1874, cxxvii. ‘Iona,’ although an incorrect form, has now become thoroughly established, and may therefore be used, under protest.