Welsh Journals

justice to the large number of maps, as well as to the plates. Plate no. 6. showing the gallery grave of Labbacallee has suffered greatly from having to overlap two pages. The book will be valuable as a re-statement of a theme which is still of immense importance to historians and archaeologists. It will provide fresh inspiration for investigators, and will by implication draw attention to those areas where further work is needed. DONALD MOORE National Museum of Wales, Cardiff. THE PASTORAL STRUCTURE OF THE CELTIC CHURCH IN NORTHERN BRITAIN. By G. W. C. Addleshaw. University of York, Borthwick Institute of Historical Research, Borthwick papers no. 43. St. Anthony's Press, York, 1973. Pp. 30. 30p. This is essentially a derivative work, based on the studies and conclusions of other scholars, but a student coming fresh to the period and subject would find it helpful. The occasional rather incautious statement slips in. For example, it cannot be demonstrated that from the mission of Cormac in particular to see the Orkneys arose subsequently the two 'chief Celtic monasteries on the Orkney mainland (p. 17). It is difficult to see how Brechin is known to have been important in the monastic structure among the Picts, while at the same time acknowledging that it was not founded until the end of the tenth century (p. 18). The section on 'The later centuries of the Celtic Church' (pp. 23 ff) contains details of interest. It is unfortunate that the evidence for the history of the Culdees in Scotland is so imperfect. The point is well made that anchorites were not necessarily so isolated as to be divorced from the life of the Church (pp. 20 ff, 29), but the great difficulty under which the author is labouring is that as yet we really know very little about the 'pastoral vitality' or otherwise of the Celtic Church in north Britain for most of its history. D. P. KIRBY Aberystwyth. BRENHINEDD Y SAESSON OR THE KINGS OF THE SAXONS. B.M. COTTON MS. CLEOPATRA BV, AND THE BLACK BOOK OF BASINGWERK, N.L.W. MS. 7006. Text and translation with introduction and notes by Thomas Jones. Board of Celtic Studies, University of Wales, History and Law Series, No. 25. University of Wales Press, Cardiff, 1971. Pp. 439. £ 5.25. The publication of this edition of Brenhinedd y Saesson marked the com- pletion by the late Professor Thomas Jones of his scholarly work on the Welsh texts of the chronicles of independent Wales. Of the two versions