[7] His father was born in Connemara in Connaught, and settled in Hui Conaill Gabhra in the south of County Limerick near Killeedy, where Saint Ita lived.
[10] He reached southern Éile in County Tipperary, where a chieftain granted him a site for a monastery in the forest near Lake Lurgan, since known as Liathmochaemog (Liathmore) in the parish of Two-Mile Borris, Barony of Eliogarty.
Saint Cainnech of Aghaboe, who was present, placed the head in its position on the body and prayed to Christ, who restored life to Dagán.
[15] John Francis Shearman (1879) wrote that "Thirty years ago there was at Tifeachna, on the western side of the churchyard, a pyramidical-shaped monument, built of small truncated codes, placed loosely one on top of the other, they are probably the memorials ferrred to in the aforesaid chapter.
[9] John Colgan in his Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae (1645) gives an account of the birth of Pulcherius, His father's name was Beoanus; he was a skilful artificer, and of an honourable family in Connaught; but being compelled to fly into exile, he came into the neighbourhood of St. Ita.
St. Ita acquiesced in the proposition, and gave him her sister Ness to wife; and he, with great assiduity, applied himself to erect the buildings in the monastery of the saint.
She, however, prayed that it might be shown to her, and the bead, through the divine power, flew through the air, and stopped where the body lay before her; and the Lord, at the entreaty of his handmaid, made the head adhere to the body as perfectly as if had never been cut off, except that a slight mark of the wound remained; and the space of one hour having passed, he rose alive, saluting the servant of the Lord, and returning thanks to God.
He was the son of Bocan, a native of Coumacne, in Connaught, (Conmacne, of Galway,) who, having left his own country, settled in Hy-Conall-Gaura, in the west of the county Limerick, where Pulcherius was born, about the year 550.
His mother's name was Nessa, of the Nandesi sept, and through her he was nephew to the celebrated St. Ita, called the Brigid of Munster, with whom he remained twenty years.
[6] Having, in compliance with the instructions of Comgall, repaired from the austere retreat of Bangor to his own country, and having been introduced to the chieftain of Ely O'Carrol, who received him with attention, and generously offered his own residence, for the purpose of converting it into a monastery; he declined the offer of the prince, but Pulcherius accepted the grant of a lonesome spot in a thick forest, to which he gave the name of Leathemore.
[19] Here he spent some years shut out from the intercourse of the world, training up a numerous body of disciples in the duties and observances of a spiritual life.
The prince, who was his benefactor, having died, Ronan, his successor, intended to expel the saint from his territory, and went with this resolve towards the monastery, having in his train a party of soldiers to execute his mischievous design.
Pulcherius replied, that he would not go out of the monastery until after finishing another part of the office, called None; having done so, he visited Ronan, and having imparted his benediction, relieved the prince from the awkward position which his own temerity had procured.
[20] Thenceforth a great friendship existed between them; and after Ronan's death, the saint fervently supplicated the father of mercy for the repose of his soul.
At a later period, Failbhe Fiend, king of all Munster, being displeased with Pulcherius for preventing some horses of his to graze in the field belonging to his monastery, ordered the chieftain to expel him from that country.