CARTHAGH (CARHACH, MO-CHUTA), saint. - He was first abbot of the ancient monastery of Rathan (now Rahan), in central Ireland. While the Paschal controversy between the Celtic Church and the Roman Church was raging, he, who there is reason to believe adhered to the Roman system, was expelled from Rathan in 636 and went south to found Liss-mòr (Lismore), which soon became one of the greatest monasteries of Munster. There he died, according to the annals, in 637. In the 12th century (or perhaps the 11th) a Latin Vita of C. was written at Liss-mòr; it has come down to us, and from it other Gaelic and Latin versions were derived, all of them, together with the Vita, highly interesting for ecclesiastical history and topography, though rather for the 12th century than for the 7th. Tradition attributes to C. a metrical Rule in Gaelic which probably belongs to the beginning of the 9th century.
Anselmo M. Tommasini