ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author maps the general topography of saintly vengeance in the landscape of Ireland's medieval hagiography. Any investigation of Ireland's hagiography must confront the vexing issue of chronology, a matter complicated both by the length of the tradition and by its survival in two languages. The author argues that the retaliatory episodes of Ireland's early saints comprise powerful statements concerning the Irish understanding of the nature of sanctity and sainthood. Some saints deliver the stunning and often lethal pronouncements of outright malediction. Using both language and, in some cases, gestures to indicate the maledictory act, curses have an instantaneous fulfillment that cannot fail to impress the Life's audience. Passive retaliatory judgment is the term the author use to describe instances of apparent vengeance in which the saints commit no act, either of speech or of gesture, to invoke the punitive miracles that occur.
