ABSTRACT
In Ireland the Easter controversy was active for almost the whole of the century. The seventh-century Romani were treating the Celtic peculiarities of liturgical practice as the church had once treated the Quarto-decimans. The dispute over the date of Easter was not the only controversy which troubled the seventh-century church. Tolerance of liturgical diversity was already a rather old-fashioned attitude in the seventh-century continental church. The liturgical practices of the Christian church varied considerably from one area to another, and the Popes, though they normally followed the Alexandrine computists in their Easter reckoning, never gave formal approval to any one cycle. The Columban monasteries in Gaul, the paruchia Fursei, and, the Iona mission to the English brought the Celtic church into close contact with continental practices. When Irish clergy travelled abroad and made any stay in Gaul or England the Celtic peculiarity which was most troublesome to their hosts was their date for celebrating Easter.
