Why Hibernia? Where does that name come from? The Romans, who settled and conquered the British Isles during their spreading empire across Europe and Africa, were never really interested in the more remote island that is now Ireland. It was too isolated and exposed to the sea. To them it seemed the perpetual "land of winter." Hibernus is the Latin word for wintery, thus the name. According to Neil Hegarty in
The Story of Ireland: A History of the Irish People, they were content to visit the islands off the coast in order to trade with the Celts and Vikings who gave them their good butter and sheep's wool. I can attest personally to this being a very good reason for travel to Ireland - among many others. On my third day in the land of my Celtic ancestry, I'm beginning to own my inner Celt, or perhaps Viking, as I read and dive more deeply into the rich lore which comprises this culture. Janet has been an excellent tour guide and organized my days well. Today's agenda was Trinity College.
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| Trinity College, Dublin |
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| Edmund Burke - Irish Republican hero |
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| Touring the campus at Trinity |
Then I visited their library which is home to the Book of Kells probably the most famous and beautiful illuminated manuscript in existence. Written in 800 AD on the Isle of Iona off the coast of Scotland by Celtic monks, they were threatened constantly by raids of Norse Vikings who sought the gold and jeweled treasures and works of art housed in the monasteries. With the fall of Rome and the rest of Europe falling into the darkness of the Middle Ages, Irish monasteries remained a stronghold of intellectual life. There the study of Greek and Latin and the illumination of the gospels and other classic stories of Celtic culture continued for several centuries more.
Eventually the monastery on Iona was over run and burnt to the ground and hundreds of monks were killed. St. Columba, who is credited with founding this vast network of religious scholarship, had the great foresight to send their greatest treasure inland before the end. The Book of Kells as it became known was sent to the monastery at Kells for safe keeping and to be completed there. It illuminates the first four books of the bible: the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. According to the library at Trinity College Dublin where it is now housed, the book was never intended for daily use, but was a show piece most likely scribed and illuminated by four distinct artists working on different parts. It combines elements of Coptic and eastern influence with animism and spiritualism of Celtic and pre-Celtic origin. Its design forms display numerous animal and plant figures.
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Detail of animals and Celtic design
www.eccentricbliss.com/tag/Book-of-Kells |
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Christ Enthroned from the Gospel of John
www.wikipedia.org/Book_of_Kells |
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Design detail from the Book of Kells
www.medievalscript.com |
It was written in Latin and reflects the confluence with ancient Gaelic/Celt oral tradition, which when finally written down, centuries after other European cultures became written languages, was adapted from the Latin alphabet. Prior to that there was record of the Ogham alphabet: a series of hatch marks carved in stones to record poems and histories of the fili or bards who practiced law or magic and often became druids. It is said to have used trees as a source of reference and naming - sometimes called "The Language of the Trees."
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The Ogham Alphabet
www.graecomuse.wordpress.com
/2012/03/26/the-langauage-of-the-trees-ogham-archaic-inst |
The Trinity College library shows in great detail the Book of Kells supposed creation as well as similar manuscripts of lesser magnificence. The actual manuscript was given to the college during the reign of Elizabeth I, when monasteries were once again under attack due to the reformation. It is actually quite small and delicate despite the enormous photographs of details covering every wall of the exhibit. The book itself is hard to see because it is displayed in a darkened room, to preserve it, with only one or two pages open at a time. I envy the scholars who have license to turn its pages.
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| Trinity College Library - exhibit of Irish Heros |
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| Sir Isaac Newton |
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| Aeolian Harp |
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Charles Parnell fought for Irish Home Rule in
the British Parliament |
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| The stacks at Trinity |
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| Vaulted ceilings |
According to our history major guide (in his brown college robes), Trinity College itself was founded about the same time as the Book of Kells was sent to Dublin, by the Anglican Church of England. Catholics were largely excluded from its halls although women were admitted with full rights in 1904, which was far earlier than Oxford or Cambridge its sister schools. They waited until the 1970's.
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| Parliament Square Trinity College, Dublin |
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| Arnaldo Pomodoro bronze sculpture "Sfera con Sfera" |
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| Our handsome tour guide looking flummoxed |
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| Symbols of the Trinity abound |
Janet and I had lunch at a teashop called Brewely's where my Angus burger was pre-cooked, but the Harry Clarke stained glass windows were from the Art Nouveau Period. Harry Clarke was well known for his illustrations and his stained glass, which rivaled Louis Comfort Tiffany's.
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| Harry Clarke Windows |
There had been light rain most of the morning and then a downpour - more typical of Dublin - just as we left the restaurant.
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| Street mimes and companion |
Our afternoon was spent at the National Museum of Archeaology. We looked at the gold jewelry from the Neolithic Bronze Age in Ireland. Collars made from thin sheets of gold in the shape of half moons were called "lunalas" and speak for the abundance of gold in the early days of the island. There were amber beads and tonsures or twisted gold necklaces and bronze smithing tools for working the gold.
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| Gold Fibula - for fastening cloaks - National Museum of Ireland |
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| Gold Lunala - image from the National Museum of Ireland |
In addition we saw decorated stones and wood statues that were used in human sacrifice most likely to the fertility goddesses to ensure plentiful crops. Four human remains attest to the brutality of these early cultures. Preserved in peat bogs, the hair, skin and even fingers nails were still intact from perhaps 5 to 10 thousand years ago. Many show the marks of severed body parts or other indications that they were murdered for sacrifice.
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| Hand of a bog man - from www.tothedayslikethis.com |
I have been reading about the Tuatha De Danann or the ancient faerie Kings of Irish mythology. Irish people are a mix of these mystical godlike inhabitants and the Iberians who traveled there by boat from Spain, as well as the Vikings adding the blue eyed and blond haired elements and then the Anglos, the Celts and the Gauls from England and Europe. Underlaying the whole culture is a quality of the mystical and the magical.
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The Four Symbols - spear, stone, sword and cauldron represent the four elements.
www.mamatupa.tumblr.com |
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A family tree of the Tuatha or kings
www.tarataratara.net |
Tomorrow we drive to see Neolithic remains in the passage tombs at Newgrange at Bru na Boinne and then the ancient hill of Tara the supposed home of the ancient kings - both are mystical and holy sites.
On the way home in the pouring rain we stopped so I could buy Dean a shaving mug in a shop called Jamie Foxx.
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