Editing History of the Isle of Man (section)

===Early Middle Ages===
Tradition attributes the island's conversion to Christianity to [[St Maughold]] (Maccul), an Irish missionary who gives his name to a parish. There are the remains of around 200 tiny early chapels called [[keeill|keeils]] scattered across the island. Evidence such as [[radiocarbon dating]] and [[magnetic drift]] points to many of these being built around AD 550–600.<ref>{{cite report |url=http://www.wessexarch.co.uk/files/62511_Isle%20of%20Man%20report.pdf |title=Speke Keeill, Mount Murray Hotel, Isle of Man: Archaeological Evaluation and Assessment of Results |publisher=[[Wessex Archaeology]] |date=2007 |access-date=2016-01-01 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305072202/http://www.wessexarch.co.uk/files/62511_Isle%20of%20Man%20report.pdf |archive-date=2016-03-05 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

The [[Britons (historical)|Brythonic]] culture of ''Manaw'' appears throughout early British tradition and later [[Medieval Welsh literature|Welsh writings]]. The family origins of [[Gwriad ap Elidyr]] (father of [[Merfyn Frych]] and grandfather of [[Rhodri the Great]]) are attributed to a ''Manaw'' and he is sometimes named as ''Gwriad Manaw''.<ref name=Lloyd324>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_NYwNAAAAIAAJ |title=A History of Wales from the Earliest Times to the Edwardian Conquest |last=Lloyd |first=John Edward |author-link=John Edward Lloyd |year=1912 |publisher=Longmans, Green, & Co. |page=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_NYwNAAAAIAAJ/page/n346 324] and note |quote=Gwriad. |access-date=May 30, 2013}}</ref> The 1896 discovery of a cross inscribed ''Crux Guriat'' (Cross of Gwriad) and dated to the 8th or 9th century greatly supports this theory.{{sfnp|Kermode|1897|pp=48–53}}

The best record of any event before the incursions of the Northmen is attributed to [[Báetán mac Cairill]], king of [[Ulster]], who (according to the ''[[Annals of Ulster]]'') led an expedition to Man in 577–578, imposing his authority on the island (though some have thought this event may refer to [[Manaw Gododdin|Manau Gododdin]] between the Firths of [[Firth of Clyde|Clyde]] and [[Firth of Forth|Forth]], rather than the Isle of Man).{{sfnp|Moore|1911|p=537}} After Báetán's death in 581, his rival [[Áedán mac Gabráin]], king of [[Dál Riata]], is said to have taken the island in 582.

Even if the supposed conquest of the Menavian islands – Mann and [[Anglesey]] – by [[Edwin of Northumbria]], in 616, did take place, it could not have led to any permanent results, for when the English were driven from the coasts of [[Cumberland]] and [[Lancashire]] soon afterwards, they could not well have retained their hold on the island to the west of these coasts.{{citation needed|date=January 2017}} One can speculate, however, that when [[Ecgfrith of Northumbria|Ecgfrið]]'s Northumbrians laid Ireland waste from Dublin to [[Drogheda]] in 684, they temporarily occupied Mann.{{sfnp|Moore|1911|p=537}}