Enda of Aran - Saint Brendan's Stone

Saint Brendan's Stone

When Saint Brendan returned from his travels far to the West he thanked God at the Abbey and laid down the only gift he bought back from his travels, a stone with an eye carved on one end and a rune on the other. It was given him by a dwarf far to the West. This stone floats if placed on water and the gem points to the Last Isle of the West. The rune is a variant of the Norse Reith rune which resembles the letter 'r'. This is called the “Styrimathr” (STEE-ri-mah-thur) meaning in Norse “the Captain of the Seas path”. It is carried in a small silk purse by the Abbot of the Abbey of St. Enda.

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