Seán Hurley was the only Cork volunteer killed in Dublin during the Easter Rising of 1916.
Seán Hurley was born in July 1887 to John Daniel Hurley and Catherine Walsh of Drinagh, Co. Cork, Ireland. He was the youngest of seven children.
He attended Drinagh National School and the Clonakilty Boys School. Among his classmates in Clonakilty was Michael Collins.
Seán immigrated to London in 1906. He worked at Harrods department store as an accounts clerk.
He joined the Geraldine GAA club and was considered a good athlete. Among his team mates was Michael Collins.
Hurley joined the London branch of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. He also joined the newly formed London Branch of the Irish Volunteers.
Returning to the Dublin in January 1916, Hurley worked at Wilson and Crowe, Bootmakers, Lower Bridge Street, Dublin.
Hurley fought with the F Company, 1st Battalion. His commanding officers were Edward Daly, Piaras Beaslai, Jack Shouldice and Captain Fionán Lynch.
Hurley was garrisoned on Church Street during Easter Week.
Just before the rebels surrendered on 29 April 1916, Hurley was shot in the head and arm.
He was brought to the medical station at St. Mathews Hall, Church Street, which was run by the Capuchin Order. After the surrender he was transferred to Richmond Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
He was buried along with 15 other Easter Rising casualties in St Paul’s section, Republican Plot, Glasnevin cemetery, Dublin.
The commemorative sculpture in Drinagh portrays Seán Hurley in his volunteer uniform during the Rising. The sculpture was created by Don Cronin, http://www.doncronin.net/. Cronin also created the life size Bull in bronze in Macroom and Horse and Rider in bronze in Innishannon among many other works.
Partly funded by community donations and the Cork County Council, the statue was dedicated in 2016.
The Mint is located on Carlingford’s medieval main street.
It is a fortified town house or tower house dating to the 15th – 16th century, but its exact purpose is unclear.
The name “The Mint” is presumed to derive from a license granted to Carlingford by Edward VI of England in 1467 to mint coinage.[1]
The limestone building is believed to have housed one of Carlingford’s wealthy merchant families, the Marmions.[2]
However, some structural quirks of the building cast some doubt on whether it was a residence or a commercial building designed to house valuables. Thus the mystery of The Mint.
The building lacks a fireplace, suggesting it may not have been a residence. It is also highly fortified, with extra thick walls,
One historical fact that could indicate the structure was just an extra fortified residence is the fact that no coins minted in Carlingford have been found.
It’s defensive features include a a battlemented chemin de ronde on the roof, with loopholes for muskets. The street side doorway is protected by and elaborate machicolation, a structure for dropping stones or material such as boiling water, boiling oil, hot sand or quicklime[3] on attackers
The Mint also features a set of five highly decorated windows, three of which are at street level, on the side facing the street.
The ogee windows have carvings of a horse, a bust of a man, a bird, a snake and Celtic interlace designs. Some sources state this reflects a revival of interest in Celtic art during the 15th–16th centuries. Each of the windows have hood mouldings and mullions.
There are also five small windows on the rear each dressed either with an arch of stones or headers and sills. There is a large first floor opening on the rear of the building and what may have been a ground floor rear entrance that has been sealed up.
The Mint is the smallest of three fortified buildings in historic Carlingford.
Carlingford is also home to the majestic ruin, King John’s castle and the Taaffe’s Castle, another example of a fortified medieval Irish tower/town house.
[1]Ruding, Rogers (1 January 1840). Annals of the coinage of Great Britain and its dependencies: from the earliest period of authentic history to the reign of Victoria. Hearne. p. 241
The notion that Spanish sailors from the ill-fated Spanish Armada settled Ireland after their ships sank off the Irish coast is an enduring myth.
The myth posits that these Armada survivors stayed in Ireland, intermarrying with the Irish in great enough numbers to create an entire segment of the population with dark complexion, dark eyes and dark hair – unlike many pale Irish. These individuals are referred to by some as the Black Irish.
There is virtually no evidence – circumstantial or otherwise – to support the connection to Spanish Armada survivors. The term Black Irish is not widely used in Ireland. But the origin and use of the term is a subject for another video.
There is significant historical evidence that most of the Spanish who survived were either captured and killed by Irish locals or the English. The small number who were not killed were either noblemen taken for ransom or those who found help from friendly Irish or Scottish chieftains who then helped them return to Spain.
The Spanish Armada was a fleet of 130 ships that was part of plan to invade England in 1588.
The English attacked the Armada in the English channel. The Spanish fleet scattered and the English pursed the defeated Armada.
Trying to return to Spain, some Spanish Armada ships wound up off the west coast of Ireland.
Fierce storms in September 1588 sank many of the damaged ships.
Between 17 and 24 ships of the Spanish Armada were lost on the Irish coast. This about one-third of the fleet’s total loss of 63, about 6,000 men were killed.[1]
Spanish Armada ships either made landfall or where wrecked at several locations in Ireland.
The galleass La Girona sank off Lacada Point, County Antrim, 26 October 1588. Of the 1,300 on board, there were nine survivors. 260 bodies washed ashore.
A storm a month earlier was even more deadly.
On 21 September 1588, three damaged vessels of the Spanish Armada were blown ashore during a violent storm on Streedagh Beach in what is now County Sligo, Ireland.
Accounts differ but about 1,800 men drowned, according to an account by Captain Francisco de Cuellar, one of the few survivors. Approximately 300 made it ashore.
“Over a thousand drowned among them many important people, captains, gentlemen and regular officers….many men drowned inside the ships, while others jumped into the water never to come up again.” — Captain Francisco de Cuellar
Once ashore, most of the survivors were attacked by locals and robbed of everything, including their clothes, or they were attacked by English soldiers and slaughtered.
De Cuellar managed to survive a number of encounters with robbers and the English.
English soldiers in Ireland were ordered to kill any Spanish prisoners, England’s Lord Deputy William FitzWilliam instead of asking for ransom as was common during that period.
It was with the demise of these Spanish Armada ships is when the myth of Black Irish takes root.
So how did the myth of Spanish Armada survivors living in Ireland get started?
The historical record shows the Black Irish – Spanish Armada myth likely originates from local lore.
The first recorded references to descendants of the Spanish Armada among the Irish population are from the 20th century. All the references cite local stories as the source.
The first is from 1906, by British historian Maj. Martin A. Hume.
Hume points out there were too few Spanish Armada survivors to have made a difference in the Irish population and that centuries contact with Spain prior to the Armada would explain any “Spanish blood”.
“But it is certain the English at the time of the Armada prevented anything like a settlement of Spaniards there,” Hume wrote.
Hume’s remarks appeared in The Geographical Journal, XXVII: 5 (London, May 1906) p 448-449
The second reference is from British writer Lorna Rea’s 1933 book The Spanish Armada.
“A few others escaped. There were other Irish girls who pitied them and took them home and forgot they were enemies; so that even now on that coast a child is occasionally born whose dark hair and eyes and soft brown Southern skin testifies to it remote Spanish ancestry,” Rea wrote on page 160.
Rea does not question this account.
A third reference comes from Irish journalist T.P. Kilfeather. Kilfeather questions “the belief that men of Spanish appearance in County Galway [W Ireland] may be descendants of men who came ashore from the ships of the Armada and inter-married with the Irish…” — T.P. Kilfeather, Ireland: Graveyard of the Spanish Armada, 1967 p 63
About 5,000 men died by drowning, starvation or slaughter by local inhabitants and English troops, after their ships were driven ashore on the west coasts of Scotland and Ireland.
[1] Whiting, J. R. S. (1988). The Enterprise of England: The Spanish Armada. Gloucester: Sutton. p. 171. ISBN 9780862994761.
T.P. Kilfeather Ireland: Graveyard of the Spanish Armada (Anvil Books Ltd, 1967)
thomas p. kunesh, 1981. “The myth of the Black Irish: Spanish syntagonism and prethetical salvation.” Published online at: www.darkfiber.com/blackirish/. Retrieved 25 May 2013.
An Armada galeass, similar to Zuñiga, depicted in the anonymous Greenwich Cartoon, Unknown – National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London, Public Domain
English Ships and the Spanish Armada, August 1588 RMG BHC0262.jpg, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:English_Ships_and_the_Spanish_Armada,_August_1588_RMG_BHC0262.jpg
The English pursue the Spanish fleet east of Plymouth on 31 July – 1 August 1588 RMG D3294.tiff, Public Domain
St. Patrick isn’t Irish, and officially he’s not saint.
Patrick was never formally canonized. He lived before current Catholic Church laws on naming saints.[1]
Patrick was born in Britain to wealthy parents near the end of the 4th century as Roman rule was ending. His exact birthplace is uncertain.
The dates of Patrick’s life are also uncertain. It is generally accepted he died March 17. This date is Patrick’s feast day and is celebrated worldwide as St. Patrick’s Day.
There is general agreement among historians he was active as a missionary in Ireland in the fifth century.
Two works in Latin generally accepted as written by Patrick have survived. These are the autobiographical Declaration (Confessio) and the Letter to the soldiers of Coroticus (Epistola).[2]
These works provide the only generally accepted details of his life.[3]
According to the Confession of Saint Patrick, at the age of sixteen he was captured by a group of Irish pirates, from his family’s Villa at “Bannavem Taburniae”.[9]
Patrick escaped, returned to his family, and become a cleric. He returned to northern and western Ireland as a missionary, and later served as a bishop, but little is known about this time in his life.
By the 7th century, Patrick was revered as the patron saint of Ireland.
Two late 7th-century Patrick biographers documented the early exploits helping build his fame.[4][5]
In 431, Palladius was made the first bishop of Ireland, preceding Patrick.[7]
Palladius, from a prominent family in Gaul, was a deacon. Pope Celestine I made him a bishop and sent him to Ireland “to the Scotti believing in Christ”.[6]
Parts of both life stories may have been combined in Irish tradition.[10]
Palladius ministered in Ireland until the 460s.[8]
[2]Both texts in original Latin, various translations and with images of all extant manuscript testimonies on the “Saint Patrick’s Confessio HyperStack website”. Royal Irish Academy Dictionary of Medieval Latin from Celtic Sources.
[3]Macthéni, Muirchú maccu; White, Newport John Davis (1920). St. Patrick, his writings and life. New York: The Macmillan Company. pp. 31–51, 54–60.
[7]Cusack, Margaret Anne, “Mission of St. Palladius”, An Illustrated History of Ireland, Chapter VIII, 1868 Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
Entry for AD 431 Chronicle of Prosper of Aquitaine
[8]Byrne, pp. 78–79; Paor 1993, pp. 6–7, 88–89; Duffy 1997, pp. 16–17; Fletcher 1997, pp. 300–06; Yorke 2006, p. 112
[10]O’Rahilly, T. F. (1942). The Two Patricks: A Lecture on the History of Christianity in Fifth-Century Ireland. Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies.
The mythology surrounding St. Patrick is rich with symbolism.
These are the symbols of St. Patrick.
Patrick is associated with numerous symbols some more famous than others.[1]
The Shamrock
The most famous St. Patrick symbol is the shamrock.
Patrick is said to have used the three-leafed shamrock to explain the idea of the holy trinity.[2]
The shamrock became one of Ireland's national symbols.[3]
Crosses
St. Patrick is associated with several styles of crosses.[4]
One type commonly associated with Patrick is the cross pattée.[5]
The cross pattée can be seen on the white stole on Patrick's vestments in this stained glass window.
Perhaps the most famous St. Patrick cross is one used on flags: St. Patrick's Saltire.[6]
It is used in the insignia of the Order of Saint Patrick, established in 1783 by King George III.
After the 1800 Acts of Union it was combined with Saint George's Cross of England and Saint Andrew's Cross of Scotland.[7]
St. Patrick has also been credited with bringing the Celtic cross to Ireland.[8]
There are no known Celtic crosses from St. Patrick's time.
Popular legend posits that Patrick combined the cross symbol of Christianity with the sun cross to impress pagan converts of the importance of the cross. These two ideas were linked to appeal to pagans. Another interpretation says that placing the cross on top of the circle represents Christ's supremacy over the pagan sun symbol.
St. Patrick’s Blue
The official color of Ireland in heraldic terms is azure blue.[9]
The association of blue with Saint Patrick dates from the 1780s, when it became the color of the Anglo-Irish Order of St Patrick. Like St. Patrick's Saltire, the association of blue with St. Patrick came from the establishment of the Anglo-Irish Order of St Patrick.
The Irish Presidential Standard - A gold harp with silver strings on field of blue. This shade of blue has been described "St. Patrick's Blue".
St Patrick's Hall, Dublin Castle. Home of the Order of St. Patrick, Is carpeted in St. Patrick's blue.
There is no official Irish national color. Green is the de facto national color. The only rules about color are in the Irish Constitution regarding the national flag.[10]
St. Patrick’s Holy Wells
St. Patrick baptized a lot of Irish people. Often these baptisms took place at wells and springs that had been scared pagan sites.[11]
There are at least 25 holy wells associated with St. Patrick in Ireland and Northern Ireland. This St. Patrick's Holy Well is at Ogulla in County Roscommon.
Snakes
A famous myth involves Patrick driving snakes out of Ireland.[12]
Often this myth may be the only thing that many people know about St. Patrick.
There have been no snakes in Ireland since before the last ice age, 12,000 years ago.[13]
The Shepherd's Crook
St. Patrick is often depicted holding a shepherd's crook.[14]
A shepherd's crook is a long stick with a hook at one end used by shepherds to manage and catch sheep.
The crook symbolizes Patrick as a slave shepherd and as shepherd to his Christian followers.
References:
[1] St. Patrick's Day Facts: Snakes, a Slave, and a Saint Archived 29 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine National Geographic
[2] Monaghan, Patricia (2009). The Encyclopedia of Celtic Mythology and Folklore. Infobase Publishing. ISBN 978-1438110370.
[3] Hegarty, Neil (2012). Story of Ireland. Ebury Publishing. ISBN 978-1448140398.
[4]List of Saint Patrick's crosses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Saint_Patrick%27s_crosses
[5] "Ireland: St Patrick's Cross". Flags of the World. 6 June 2012.
[6]Galloway, Peter (March 1999). The most illustrious order: the Order of St Patrick and its knights. Unicorn. pp. 171–2. ISBN 9780906290231.
[7] "The Union Jack or The Union Flag?". The Flag Institute. 20 June 2014.
[8] "The History and Symbolism of the Celtic Cross – Irish Fireside Travel and Culture.
[9] Galloway, Peter (1999). The most illustrious Order: The Order of St Patrick and its knights (2nd ed.). London: Unicorn. p. 174. ISBN 0-906290-23-6.
[10] Article 7 of the Constitution of Ireland (1 July 1937)
[11] Ireland's ancient holy wells of Saint Patrick, Driscoll, Amanda, IrishCentral, 27 Jan. 2023https://www.irishcentral.com/travel/best-of-ireland/ireland-holy-well
[12] Roy Flechner (2019). Saint Patrick Retold: The Legend and History of Ireland's Patron Saint. Princeton University Press. p. 213. ISBN 978-0-691-19001-3. Archived from the original on 11 June 2020
[13]Owen, James (13 March 2008). "Snakeless in Ireland: Blame Ice Age, Not St. Patrick". National Geographic News. Archived from the original on 10 May 2012
[14] Caeremoniale Episcoporum (Vatican Polyglott Press, 1985)
Images
Patrick depicted with shamrock in detail of stained glass window in St. Benin's Church, Kilbennan, County Galway, Ireland, Andreas F. Borchert, CC BY-SA 4.0
Shamrock, Creative Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Irish_clover.jpg
Church of Our Lady, Star of the Sea, and St. Patrick, Goleen, County Cork, Ireland, Andreas F. Borchert, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Goleen_Church_of_Our_Lady,_Star_of_the_Sea,_and_St._Patrick_North_Wall_Fourth_Window_Saint_Patrick_Detail_2009_09_10.jpg
A cross pattée, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Saint_Patrick%27s_crosses#/media/File:Cross-Pattee-Heraldry.svg
Saint Patrick's Flag, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Saint_Patrick%27s_crosses#/media/File:Saint_Patrick's_Saltire.svg
Flag of the United Kingdom, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Jack#/media/File:Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg
Celtic Cross, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Saint_Patrick%27s_crosses#/media/File:CelticCross.svg
Badge of the Order of St Patrick, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Patrick%27s_blue#/media/File:Badges_of_the_Order_of_St_Patrick.jpg
The Irish Presidential Standard, Setanta Saki, Public Domain, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Patrick%27s_blue#/media/File:Flag_of_the_President_of_Ireland.svg
St Patrick's Hall, Dublin Castle. Home of the Order of St Patrick, Adrian Grycuk, CC BY-SA 3.0 pl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Patrick%27s_blue#/media/File:St._Patrick%E2%80%99s_Hall_Dublin_Castle_2014.JPG
Patrick banishing the snakes, Lyricmac, CC BY 2.5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Patrick#/media/File:STP-ELP.jpg
The garter snake, Steve Jurvetson from Menlo Park, USA, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake#/media/File:Coast_Garter_Snake.jpg
Shepherd's crook, Auckland Museum, CC BY 4.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepherd%27s_crook#/media/File:Crook,_shepherd's_(AM_1958.105.1-2).jpg
A shepherd's crook, Arthur Hacker, Public Domain, https://archive.org/stream/artatsalonchamps00londrich#page/n103/mode/2up/search/Boughto,
The spring-fed Ogulla Holy Well in County Roscommon near Tulsk is where legend has it that St. Patrick baptized pagan High King Laoghaire’s daughters, Eithenia the Fair and Fedelmia the Red.
The Ogulla well is also called the Cliabach Well in some of Patrick’s hagiographies.
The was in use by Irish pagans prior to the arrival of Christianity. The well is one of numerous examples of Catholicism converting sacred pagan sites into scared Christian sites as the Irish pagan population is converted.
Today the site is considered one of the most sacred of the 25 holy wells associated with Patrick in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
The faithful leave votive offerings at a statue of St. Patrick located next to the well. In the rag tree tradition strips of cloth are tied around tree limbs and sometimes on the high cross that sits atop the well. The statue of St. Patrick is deteriorating and has lost its hands. Photos online show the statue once had a metal shepherd’s crook, which as of late 2022, was missing.
The story of the baptism of Eithenia and Fedelmia is one of more bizarre and creepy of the St. Patrick legends.
Prior to the baptisms at Ogulla, Patrick had already had an intense encounter with their father, King Laeghaire at Tara. Patrick had ignited a fire at Hill of Slane in defiance of the king’s order not to light fires while a pagan feast fire was burning at Tara.
Summoned to Tara to explain himself, Patrick had a kind of evangelical mystical showdown with the king’s pagan priests, according to biographies written centuries after Patrick’s death.
Laeghaire, who had reportedly been trying to assassinate Patrick. However, he was impressed by the Christian missionary’s devotion to his belief and allowed him to continue preaching in Ireland.
Which bring us to his encounter with the king’s daughter’s.
The legend of Patrick’s baptism of Eithenia and Fedelmia is repeated in similar form in at least three separate accounts, all written hundreds of years after Patrick’s death near the end of the 5th century.
The accounts appear in the Book of Armagh (mid 9th century), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Armagh the Tripartite Life of St. Patrick (late 9th century) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vita_tripartita_Sancti_Patricii, and in Fr. John Colgan’s Acta Sanctorum Hiberniae https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acta_Sanctorum_Hiberniae published in 1645.
It is Fr. Colgan’s account that has become the popular version of the story.
https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=7tdhAAAAcAAJ&rdid=book-7tdhAAAAcAAJ&rdot=1&pli=1
In Colgan’s elaborate account, Ethenia and Fidelmia were baptized at Ogulla Well in the year 432 or 433, depending the source.
According to CatholicSaints.Info, Ethenia and Fidelmia “among the first converts to Christianity made by Saint Patrick.” https://catholicsaints.info/book-of-saints-ethenia-and-fidelmia/
While on a pilgrimage, St. Patrick arrived at a fountain called Clibech (today Ogulla Well) near Cruachan, with a large number of clerics. The group decided to camp there for the night and the account says they sang the praises of god and prayed all night.
In the morning, Ethenia and Fidelmia, the daughters of the King, show up at the fountain. In this telling, the astonished royal daughters thought Patrick and his band of clerics beings of another world.
But they quickly began questioning the group, most likely recognizing Patrick from his showdown with their father at Tara.
But Patrick manages to convert the two Druid princesses who take holy communion – and they die. Some account says Ethenia and Fidelmia wanted to be with Jesus so much the died of longing.
Ethenia and Fidelmia are later named as Catholic saints.
And no doubt their father was unhappy with Patriock and his band of roving clerics.
Sources and links:
Acta Triadis Thaumaturgae. In: Colgan, John. Acta Sanctorvm Veteris Et Maioris Scotiae, Sev Hiberniae Sanctorvm Insvlae, Volume 2. Publisher: Apud Cornelivm Coenestenivm, 1647.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7tdhAAAAcAAJ
Ogulla Holy Well
http://www.megalithicireland.com/Ogulla%20Holy%20Well%20Tulsk.html
Ogulla Holy Well: A Microcosm of Irish Spiritual History
http://pentecostaltopagan.com/my-pagan-path/ogulla-holy-well-a-microcosm-of-irish-spiritual-history/
St. Patrick Converts the King’s Daughters
https://traditioninaction.org/religious/h121_Patrick_4.htm
St. Patrick founds Ogulla Church,
https://www.irelandxo.com/ireland-xo/history-and-genealogy/timeline/st-patrick-founds-ogulla-church
Music:
Where the Thistle Grows - Bonnie Grace
Governor Of The North - Jo Wandrini
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St. Patrick is Ireland's leading patron saint. Although he wasn't the first Christian missionary in Ireland, he is credited with bringing Christianity to the island.
St. Patrick has a cool symbol: The shamrock.
St. Patrick is known for driving snakes out of Ireland.
There weren't any snakes in Ireland but Patrick drove them out anyway.
St. Patrick is the official sponsor of an awesome drinking holiday. Not an endorsement for this or any other beverage.
Today St. Patrick's Day, the anniversary of his passing, is celebrated worldwide.
St. Brigid is Ireland's female patron saint. She's as big a deal as St. Patrick.
St. Brigid also has a cool symbol: Brigid's cross.
St. Brigid is the patron saint of a great many things.
Among the things St. Brigid is patron saint of:
babies,
blacksmiths,
blacksmithing,
boatmen,
cattle farmers,
children whose parents are not married,
children whose mothers are mistreated by the children's fathers,
Clan Douglas,
dairymaids,
dairy workers,
dairy production,
fugitives,
healing,
Ireland,
learning,
Leinster,
livestock,
mariners,
midwives,
milkmaids,
nuns,
poets,
poetry,
the poor,
poultry,
poultry farmers,
poultry
raisers,
printing presses,
protection,
sailors,
scholars,
travelers,
and watermen.
She is also one of several patron saints of beer.
https://vinepair.com/articles/patron-saint-of-beer/
St. Brigid even turned water into b*er. (Sorry about the *. You can't say this word in a description of YouTube doesn't like it.)
That's right. She's a patron saint of b*er.
Sadly, Brigid does not have an awesome drinking holiday associated with her.
St. Columba is Ireland's third patron saint.
He was such a badass saint he could baptize an entire tribe of Picts with one hand.
St. Columba came to Ireland from Scotland.
Columba could predict when people would die, which made him popular.
Despite the obvious handicap of being Scottish, Columba became one of the 12 apostles of Ireland.
Columba left behind this church in Donegal.
But he lacks both a cool symbol and an awesome drinking holiday.
Thank you for watching!
Image credits:
Shamrock: According to legend, Saint Patrick used the three-leaved shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity to Irish pagans. – Creative Commons via Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamrock#/media/File:Irish_clover.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Irish_clover.jpg
Pint of Guinness – Public Domaine pictures
https://www.publicdomainpictures.net/pictures/20000/velka/pint-of-proper-guiness-in-dublin.jpg
St. Columba’s church - West wall of St Columba's church, Gartan, Donegal; Gartan is said to be the birthplace of Columba, Kay Atherton, Creative Commons via Wkipedia
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3e/St_Columba%27s_church%2C_Gartan%2C_Donegal.jpg
St. Patrick postcard - : "St. Patrick's Day Souvenir" postmarked 1912 in the United States. On postcard: "OLD WEIR BRIDGE" Description: "1912 POSTCARD ST. PATRICK'S DAY SOUVENIR; POSTALLY USED and CANCELLED MARCH 1912" Pictured: The painting depicted is of the "Old Weir Bridge" located Dinis Cottage, in Killarney National Park, Ireland. Public Doman via Wikimedia Commons
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/PostcardStPatricksDaySouvinir1912.jpg
Patrick depicted with shamrock in detail of stained glass window in St. Benin's Church, Kilbennan, County Galway, Ireland, Andreas F. Borchert, Creative Commons via Wikipedia
St. Finnian imparting his blessing to the Twelve Apostles of Ireland.
Clonard, County Meath, Ireland Detail of the seventh stained glass window in a series depicting the life of St. Finian in the Church of St. Finian at Clonard. The windows were created by Hogan in 1957. The inscription reads: Saint Finian imparts his blessing to twelve apostles of Ireland. This image has been cropped from this image. Andreas F. Borchert, Creative Commons via Wikipedia.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Saint_Columba_converting_the_Picts.jpg Saint Columba converting King Brude of the Picts to Christianity, Mural painting in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, photographed by uploader, Kim Traynor. Creative Commons via Wikimedia Commons
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiberno-Scottish_mission#/media/File:Columbanus_at_Bobbio.jpg
Fresco of Saint Columbanus in Brugnato Cathedral, Fresco of Saint Columbanus on a column at Brugnato Cathedral in Italy, Davide Papalini, Creative Common via Wikipedia.
https://www.wikigallery.org/wiki/painting_130889/Lorenzo-Lotto/Blessings-of-St-Bridget-(detail)-1524
"Blessings of St Bridget (detail) 1524" oil on Canvas. Lorenzo Lotto. Public domain via Wikigallery.
In 433 AD St. Patrick lit a fire on Hill of Slane, in an act of defiance of the pagan High King Lóegaire (Laoire), according to the monk Muirchú’s highly mythological 7th century hagiography of St. Patrick, Vita sancti Patricii.
Lóegaire had forbidden any other fires while a festival fire was burning at his headquarters on the Hill Tara, which can be clearly seen from the Hill of Slane, about 16 kilometers (about 10 miles) away, according to Muirchú’s account.
Other accounts of the life of St. Patrick describe various versions of what happened after the saint lit his defiant fire. The accounts agree that Lóegaire apparently allowed St. Patrick, who he had reportedly been trying to assassinate, to continue spreading the word of Christianity in Ireland.
In another legendary act, St. Patrick would later in his life baptize two of Laoghaire’s daughters, Eithne the Fair and Fedelm the Red at Rathcroghan’s Ogulla Holy Well in County Roscommon.
Today the Hill of Slane is dominated by a group of picturesque ruins and historical sites, most dating to the middle ages.
The ruins of a friary church, with a still in use graveyard, and college can be seen on the top of the hill. The now ruined friary church was built on the site of an earlier church, was restored in 1512. The ruins include a 19-meter (62 ft) high early gothic tower.
The friary was abandoned in 1723.
A holy well, now filled in with rocks due to safety concerns, is located just inside the graveyard’s wall.
At this well, Patrick is said to have baptized St. Erc, a pagan priest, who he appointed a bishop. The foundation of the original monastery on the Hill of Slane is attributed to St. Erc and it remained active for at least six hundred years.
The baptism and life of St. Erc are on firmer historical footing than many of St. Patrick’s mythical exploits such as driving the snakes out of Ireland.
Next to the friary church is a structure known as the college.
These ruins are from different phases of construction and various purposes, according to the Voice From Dawn website.
From Voice of Dawn:
“The earliest building, likely a tower house, is now known as the “rectory,” and was used for the administration of the parish. In the late 15th century a chantry college was built on the site, endowed for priests to celebrate masses for the souls of the Fleming family. The structure housed four priests, four lay-brothers and four choirboys in some comfort, with fireplaces and a double garderobe (toilet). The buildings were situated around an open rectangular cloister.
The college was rebuilt in the 16th century with a further Fleming family bequest, There was once a bawn (defensive enclosure) around the tower house, whose only remnant today is its massive gatehouse.”
https://voicesfromthedawn.com/hill-of-slane/
Over the centuries the site endured numerous attacks and tribulations including dissolution of the monastery by Henry VIII in 1631 and attacks by Oliver Cromwell’s troops in 1651.
Sources and links:
Discovery Boyne Valley
https://www.discoverboynevalley.ie/boyne-valley-drive/heritage-sites/hill-slane
Voices From Dawn
https://voicesfromthedawn.com/hill-of-slane/
Slane and District History Society
https://slanehistoryandarchaeologysociety823029674.wordpress.com/
Meath County Council – Hill of Slane
https://www.meath.ie/discover/heritage/heritage-sites/hill-of-slane
Read more on our website: https://irelandinsideandout.com/
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Chapters: 00:00 intro 00:50 The Pale 01:21 Tower House subsidy and building boom 01:33 Ardee Castle – Ireland’s largest Tower House 02:50 A look inside from the northwest side. 03:40 Another look inside O4:08 View of the vaulted ceiling storeroom 04:31 Stone Spiral Staircase 04:59 The murder hole 05:15 Castle features 05:58 Site of forge and blacksmith shop
Roodstown Castle is a 15th-century fortified tower house and National Monument located in County Louth, Ireland.
Tower houses were fortified residencies of Irish rural gentry built during the 15th and 17th centuries. Roodstown Castle is associated with the Taaffe family, who were active in the area until the 17th century.
In the mid-fifteenth century men loyal to the English crown living in the Dublin (English) Pale were offered a £10 annual government subsidy to construct a fortified house within the Pale. £10 may not sound like a lot, but in the mid-15th century this was enough money to buy 13 horses or 25 cows or pay a skilled craftsman for almost a year. https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/c…
Thanks to the subsidy, numerous tower houses were built win the Pale during the 15th century. Pioneering Irish historian and archeologist Harold G. Leask estimated that more 2500 tower house may have been built in Ireland. There are similar structures in Scotland.
There are 26 tower houses in Co. Louth. Roodstown may have been one of these subsidized tower houses. Roodstown Castle shows the original owners’ wealth and the builders’ craftsmanship six hundred years ago.
The castle’s detailed window and door openings are testament to the skills and craftmanship of the area’s stone workers.
Subsidized or not Roodstown Castle sits at a strategic location between the River Glyde, River Dee, Ardee and the Irish Sea. Roodstown Castle is considered an excellent example of a surviving tower house since its original outside structure is still intact.
Constructed of rubble masonry with limestone trim, Roodstown Castle is a rectangular four-story tower house with small turrets at diagonally opposed corners.
There is a spiral stairway in the southeast side and garderobes in the northwest. The castle contained a vaulted ground-floor cellar or storage space, a murder-hole, a crenelated parapet, chemin de ronde.
The upper floors have large ogee arch windows and fireplaces. The roof and timber floors above the ground floor no longer exist. Roodstown Castle was occupied during a tumultuous period of history. The nearby town of Ardee, which has its own significant tower house, Ardee Castle, suffered mightily during this time.
Roodstown Castle is located 3.6 km (2.2 mi) north-northeast of Ardee. There is no access to the inside of the castle for safety reasons and the main gate to field where the castle is located is frequently locked. https://www.geograph.ie/photo/881262
Dolan and Murray, n.d., p.75 in Mitchell, Frank & Tuite Breeda, ‘The Great Bog of Ardee’, Journal of the County Louth Archaeological and Historical Society, 1993, Vol.23 No.1, pp.7-95.
Donnolly, Colm J., ‘Frowning Ruins: The Tower Houses of Medieval Ireland,’ History Ireland, Vol. 4 No.1, Spring 1996, 11-16.
Leask, Harold G., Irish Castles and Castellated Houses, Revised 2nd ed., Dundalgan Press, Dundalk, 1951, p.75.
Mitchell, Frank & Tuite, Breeda, ‘The Great Bog of Ardee’, Journal of the County Louth Archaeological and Historical Society, 1993, Vol.23 No.1, pp.7-95.
Rowan, Alistair, ‘The Irishness of Irish Architecture’, Architectural History, 1997, Vol.40 pp.1-23. Wright, Thomas, Louthiana: Or an Introduction to the Antiquities of Ireland, 1758, Dundalk: W. Tempest Limited.
Drombeg stone circle (also known as The Druid’s Altar), is one of Ireland’s most-visited megalithic sites. It is a protected Irish National Monument.
Chapters: 00:00 Intro 00:49 3-D View of recumbent stone. 02:46 E.M. Fahy’s schematic drawing of Drombeg excavation 04:42 fulacht fiadh
Drombeg is a small axial stone circle located 2.4 km (1.5 mi) east of Glandore, County Cork, Ireland.
The name Drombeg means small ridge.
The site is strategically situated in atop a small valley with an expansive view of the surrounding area. It overlooks a gentle slope that extends down to the Atlantic ocean to the west.
Archeologist E.M. Fahy excavated and restored Drombeg in 1957-58. Drombeg originally had 17 stones and 13 remain today. The circle is about 9 meters, 31 feet, in diameter.
Fahy replaced two stones during the restoration in the late 1950s. He also removed an area of gravel from the center of the circle and made a startling discovery.
Fahy discovered an inverted pot in the center of the circle containing the cremated remains of an adolescent wrapped with thick cloth.
Near the pot were smashed pottery sherds and sweepings from a pyre. Radiocarbon dating of samples taken from Drombeg revealed it was active c. 1100–800 BCE.
Several surveys of the site were made in the early 20th century and a journal article from 1903 indicated there may have once been a standing stone at the center of the circle, according to the website voicesfromthedawn.com https://voicesfromthedawn.com/drombeg….
Drombeg’s alternate name, the Druid’s Altar, may have originated from local stories the recumbent stone was a sacrificial altar and the circle was built by Druids.
Reputed to be a sacrificial altar, the recumbent stone is darker than the other stones in the circle. It is directly opposite two stones, each more than two meters (7 ft) tall, that appear to frame a ceremonial entrance portal.
The recumbent stone has two cup-marks and what has been interpreted as a depiction of either a stone axe or a human foot.
Although the discovery of the cremated remains lends some credence to the idea that the site may have involved some form of human sacrifice.
However, the circle predates and the radiocarbon dates for the human remains predate the Druids. A guidebook written in the 1990s also invented a narrative for the Drombeg which may have also helped reinforce the idea the site was associated with human sacrifice even though the exact nature of how and why the remains were buried in the circle is unknown.
The Drombeg site also includes another Bronze Age feature, a fulacht fiadh and the remains of two associated stone and wood huts. A fulacht fiadh is a kind of pit that was used for boiling water by means of heated stones.
Excavation by Fahy in 1959 uncovered the foundations of two conjoined circular huts. The huts, one of which was used as a hearth for heating rocks, are linked by a 9 m (30 ft) stone causeway to the fulacht fiadh.
Water in a trough was boiled by dropping in red-hot stones from the adjacent hearth. Evidence form the site suggests the fulacht fiadh was in use until 5th century AD.
The fulacht fiadh at Drombeg is often referred to as a communal cooking pit. The term, fulacht fiadh, has been treanslated by some scholar to mean “cooking place” of deer or game. However, no direct evidence of food or cooking food has been found at the site. A number of alternate uses for the boiling pit have also been suggested ranging from a sweat lodge to being used to prepare hides to make leather to boiling wool.
When Fahy excavated the fulacht fiadh he reportedly conducted experiments demonstrating that he could heat the 265 liters (70 gallons) of water in the trough by adding stones baked three hours in a hearth. The water boiled vigorously after 18 minutes and was hot two hours later.
Sources: Fahy, E.M. (1959). “A Recumbent-stone Circle at Drombeg, Co. Cork”. Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society. 2. LXIV: 1–27. Fahy, E.M. “A Hut and Cooking Places at Drombeg, Co. Cork.” Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society 65 (January-June, 1960): 9-10. Keogh, Jackie (4 January 2017). “New discoveries about Drombeg Stone Circle”. Southern Star. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
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