-Professor M.J. O'Kelly, December 21st 1969
Yesterday Norah, Katy and I took a tour of the Hills of Tara and Newgrange, some pretty important, not to mention fascinating, Irish heritage sites. We went on a tour bus that pretty much chock full of Americans from California and Arkansas and we quickly realized that we're not quite ready to go back to the states. Not that I don't love Americans, and these people were extremely nice, but I prefer the comparably subdued nature of the Irish. Usually I'm the only loud American, now there was a whole bus stealing my thunder!
Just kidding, it was a really enjoyable day with ridiculously nice weather. Although its been humid, the humidity has kept the temperature in the low 60s! Heat wave! I saw plenty of shorts today, obviously.
This is a statue of St. Patrick at the entrance of Tara. When St. Patrick was kicking around these parts in the 4th-5th century, Tara was a very important political and religious location, not for Christianity of course. This was the seat of the High King of Ireland. There were many kings throughout Ireland, but there was only one High King at a time, in this region anyways. I'm not sure how far his rule extended.
Mound of the hostages. Before I took a slight tumble down this hill (more embarrassing than painful)I learned that this hill belong to Niall of the Nine Hostages, one of the High Kings in Irish history. This hill is full of Niall's dead hostages and slaves, and it's the biggest grave at Tara by far. Niall is the one responsible for capturing Patrick and bringing him to Ireland to work as a shepherd before he fled back to the mainland to become a priest. So, in a very roundabout way, Niall helped bring Christianity to Ireland.
So, that's the story my tour guide told me, the bit about Niall is definitely true, but wikipedia tells me that the Mound of the Hostages is actually a Mesolithic/neolithic passage tomb, making it much older than Niall's time! There's an estimated 500 bodies buried inside. Maybe the tour guide just got a bit confused, is it wrong I trust wikipedia?
So many hills! They're not all graves, since this was the seat of the high king, Tara was actually quite the bustling city! Before the vikings came and built up Dublin, Tara would have been the biggest city and probably equivalent to the modern day idea of capital city. Many of the dips and bends in the hills are where houses were built, banquet halls were laid out, etc. All of the buildings were wooden so none of the structures survived to today.
This stone is called Lia Fail, or the Stone of Destiny. This is where the High King was inaugurated and the stone was supposed to cry out in joy. Not sure what a crying stone sounds like. It was said that the Tuatha De Danann, a divine Celtic race, brought four treasures to Ireland and Lia Fail is one of those treasures. The others were a spear, a sword and a cauldron. No word on those, I'd definitely like to read up more on this!
Katy and Norah walking through a graveyard by Tara.
This church is right outside Tara, it's actually a visitor's center now which wasn't open. Overall Tara wasn't very well taken care of, there was sheep poop everywhere! I don't know how I feel about sheep being allowed free reign over the former seat of the High King of Ireland, seems a bit disrespectful and, more importantly, not good for tourism!
This describes weather every day in Ireland! They never have to change it!
Me by the River Boyne. Remember our friend William of Orange from the Belfast post? This was where he battled Ireland into submission. When I was here I remembered the song that (I think) Uncle Bill used to sing called "The Old Orange Flute," I have an image of myself sitting on the floor in the Elks Club listening to him sing it. I just kind of realized that the song is Protestant and about the Orange Men, a Protestant group that stems from William of Orange. They march in a parade every year on July 12th with flutes and drums to commemorate the victory at the Boyne.
This is Newgrange from outside. Sorry this post is turning into a history lesson, but the older the history the more intrigued I am! Newgrange is just one tomb in the Bru na Boinne area which also includes the tombs at Knowth and Dowth. Newgrange is nearly 5,000 years old making it 500 years older than the Great Pyramids in Egypt and over a 1,000 years older than Stonehenge! However, I only heard about Newgrange when I came to Ireland. If you can't get an idea of how old it is from those comparisons, here's a couple more, it's 3,000 years older than Christ and was built before the invention of the wheel or the use of metal. Impressed? I am! The outside wall was rebuilt (using the original stones) in the 1970s, but besides that renovation the structure is still standing on its own!
This house kind of looks like a duck head to me. I'm not really sure what it is, but it stands right outside of the tomb.
Art on rocks surrounding the back of the tomb. They may not have invented the wheel yet but they were well on their way, they seem to have the circle down.
Close-up of the elaborate entrance stone. Originally those entering would have to leap over the entrance stone which probably was pretty difficult, I can't imagine they were very tall. I'm sure the struggle had some sort of significance, or maybe it was just a cruel joke.
This is what fascinates me most about Newgrange, the entrance, including the window box over the entrance door. The tomb lay undetected for literally thousands of years until the 18th century, actual archeological work wasn't done until the mid 20th century. It took Professor O'Kelly, who I quoted above, almost seven years to discover the significance of the window box. Every year for about six days around the Winter Solstice, the window box matches up perfectly with the rising sun. The Sunlight goes through the window box and lightens the interior chamber for all of about 17 minutes.
Unfortunately you weren't allowed to take photos inside the tomb, but its a relatively small chamber with a spectacular vaulted ceiling and three basin stones where human remains and bone bead offerings were found. I can only imagine what it must be like to be inside the tomb during the solstice. I actually entered a lottery to be in the tomb that week! This phenomenon gives Newgrange increased significance, beyond being a spectacularly constructed tomb. This perfect engineering seems to hint at some sort of religious significance relating to the sun. Archeologists can only speculate to the significance, but I still find it absolutely fascinating!
Ok, back to 2010.
Norah, Katy, a couple other Trinity friends, and I went to see an American singer Ingrid Michaelson at The Academy on the north side last night. I had heard a few of her songs before, but Katy convinced me to check her out live. She was really funny and actually really great live! This is just a picture of me and Norah at the show.
Here's Katy and Ingrid. She's one of Katy's favorite performers so she was really excited to get to meet her.
In other news I'm done with school! I took my exam this morning and feel really relieved, but exhausted. I have more to post on a cemetery I visited today, I suddenly went into tourist overdrive!
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