St. Conall's Bell and Shrine: Brief History of Christianity In Ireland through one beautiful object

Christianity enters Ireland

St. Conall, a follower of St. Patrick, founded a monastery on the Island of Inniskeel during the 500's. The monks were learned and brought Christianity and learning of all kinds to Inniskeel and southern Donegal.  

This bell, which he used to call his followers, remained in the monastery for many centuries.  Iron bells like this were a common symbol of prayer in this area.  The iron has rusted through in some areas but the bell remains whole and stands upright.  It is about 8" tall and originally had a flat handle with two finger holes. 

Roman rites supplanted Celtic rites

As Roman-style Christianity entered Ireland and replaced the rites used by the Irish church, the monastery continued and the bell continued the call to prayer.  In the 1000's the bronze covering was added using designs which have Celtic and Viking motifs.

The very elaborate case or shrine used to protect the bell was created in the 1400's approximately.  It is gold and silver and has a chain where it was worn around the neck of the care taker. 

Catholics, forbidden to worship, prayed secretly

As Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries and Cromwell imposed anti-Catholic laws and burned churches and any remaining monasteries, the bell went into hiding with the O'Breslin clan.  It was displayed secretly for ceremonial occasions.

During the period of pilgrimage or tura, May to September when low tides were low enough for pilgrims to walk to the island, pilgrims would visit Inniskeel and walk around the carved stones and other places of devotion then pray at the two churches, St. Conall's and St. Mary's. They would kiss the shrine which enclosed the bell as it hung around the neck of the O'Breslin caretaker.

After the reformation, the pilgrimages continues with prayer in the ruins of the churches.

Political and religious turmoil intensified in modern times

After 1830 the bell fell into other hands, purchased, stolen and who knows what.  Eventually, one purchaser recognized its significance and gave it to the British Museum who owns it now.  Usually it is on display with the collection Brief History of the World in 100 Objects which we saw last summer.

Peace has returned to religion in Ireland

Many in Donegal have been working for years to have the bell come home for a visit.  It is here in Letterkenny for a few weeks and will travel to Inniskeel  from July 4-13 for both historical and religious display.  

The bell's visit ends with a religious service on Monday, July 13 with a combined Catholic and Protestant service in the Inniskeel Parish Church.

North Mayo Sculpture Trail

We've just had a couple grand days here in County Mayo, Ireland. Mayo is rugged and pretty remote, a place of hard times and bad weather. About 20 years ago, Ireland tried to increase tourist traffic here in Mayo by sponsoring a group of sculptures along the Atlantic Coast. It's worked somewhat - for instance, we came to see them! 

Tearmann na Gaoithe, by Alan Counihan

There are 15 sculptures, but we didn't see them all, or even most. How interesting that some have just disappeared, devoured by weeds or weather. It was an inauspicious start, to see our first sculpture, surrounded by industrial sites and with some of its parts missing.

Park, installed but not maintained in Killala

Uh-oh, we thought, are we on a fool's errand here? The second sculpture wasn't more encouraging, as it looked like the thousand inlays had fallen out of their bedding in a large retaining wall. The site itself was pretty fascinating, though. It's a waterfront and dock, with some guys fileting salmon, and a beautiful rocky shore. But what was once a shiny counterpart to the bleak concrete wall, is all but invisible now.

Tonnta na Mblianta, by Simon Thomas

But happily, persistence pays. Our project of seeing outdoor sculpture definitely perked up as we continued out a long peninsula full of green pastures, newly sheared sheep, sandy beaches, flowers and sun. 

Just keep going and going

At the end of a long headland, poking out into the Atlantic, cliffy and angular, a most dramatic landscape and a very solid, settled, strong stone sculpture, pictured at the top of this post. There were about eight people out here at the end of a very long road, and I thought it was great they'd come to see the sculpture, which caused Julianne much merriment as of course they were fishermen and nothing to do with art. 

Julianne is bird-watching; fishermen had more luck on the other side

This sculpture is in very good shape, endorsing the idea of durable materials needing no maintenance. Somebody had chiseled his declaration of love into a stone inside, but he did a very nice job of it. There was a box with writing materials to leave your thoughts, which I did. This is dry-laid stone, and it'll be here as long as the peninsula, good for a few thousand years.

The next sculpture we saw, not far as the crow flies but some a distance by road, was somewhat overwhelmed by its site. It's a solid piece, but low to the ground, on a startling headland called Downpatrick Head that demands attention. The sculptor is Danish and has made public art pieces in northern European countries.

Battling Forces, by Fritze Rind

Part of Downpatrick Head, just one section

Downpatrick Head from afar. Julianne and ancient standing stone

See how the headland rises up to meet the ocean? Rind's sculpture is located inland, where the peninsula joins the shore. She did well, but the site is so huge, the work seems smaller than it is.

Well, that was pretty good, and that was yesterday. Today we carried on, visiting a prehistoric site near Ballycastle. We learned a lot about peat and climate change and the prehistoric population of this area, very interesting. 

We were still on the Sculpture Trail, but we failed to find a hillside sculpture of trees planted in a very rough landscape, facing constant wind. The trees had died, we learned later. The berms protecting them were overcome by weeds and basically invisible now. We gave up on that one, and went on west toward the end of the land and more sculpture.

There are six works out there at the very end of County Mayo, but they are very scattered and we only saw two of them. We came across one by accident, stone-carved sheep in a circular setting. It was being enhanced by what will become a paved path, but now is just a construction site with frames and a bulk loader. The site is right next to the road at a junction, and I imagine it's a popular piece, because the locality is supporting it. It was pretty suitable for its setting, actually. Sheep are a mainstay of this economy.

Stratified sheep, by Niall O'Neill

Kind of dumb sheep, actually, but then, they are. There are five sheep in this sculpture, one ram and four ewes. They're carved from local stone. My pictures are actually detail views, as the sheep are rather dispersed. I couldn't get back far enough to get them all in the picture.

The last work was some kind of culmination, capstone, and peak experience for us! We almost didn't expect it, but it was perfect.

We drove west from Bangor (Ireland, not Maine), a bit north, and out onto a sand spit. About a kilometer offshore, little Claggan Island with a few inhabitants, including Laurance Howard and his family, who had donated land for the sculpture. We met three generations of Howards, who offer b&bs right there on their gorgeous property. Oh, we would have been tempted had we known about it. 

Howard farm on Claggan Island, county Mayo. You get there by driving on the sand of a long spit (underwater at high tide). 

Acknowledgement, by Marianna O'Donnell

Long sculpture with center division. It's tall, about 8' in the center, and you can walk through it. From one side it shows a slice of beach, but from the other side it focuses on a low pile of stones that lie slightly uphill. There's quite a story to the piece.

The Catholic Church refused burial in consecrated ground to people who hadn't been baptised. In Ireland this mainly meant stillbirths and infants who died shortly after birth. Shall I say, great consolation and support for the family? I don't know whether they've changed this policy, but as it turns out, the low pile of stones is the final burial place for such infants. So this sculpture is intended to honor those deaths. The picture of Julianne with Mr. Howard shows the stones.

Looking through

There is a poem by Dennis Mahon carved into a stone, too, which reads: "They are begging us you see in their wordless way, / To do something to speak on their behalf, / Or at least not to close the door again."

So that was the final work we saw on our visit to the North Mayo Sculpture Trail. We would have like to go on, but even we have some sort of schedule, so we said goodbye to Mr. Howard, and drove back to our b&b in Ballina, getting ready to go north next day.

by Nancy

Daily life on Ireland's Coast: Doolin and the Burren

Birds, music and archeology drew us here. Wildflowers and geology were unexpected pleasures. Poetry--who knew we were even looking for poetry? These were all grand and we have explored them all.  But even better--this is a slow-food paradise. Superb restaurants everywhere we turn and great local food to buy and cook at home.

Everyday a delight to the eye and mind and every meal a delight to the palate.

Living here for seven weeks has been more fun than we even expected.  We like to settle down in one place for awhile and we chose Doolin, County Clare for our long-stay in Ireland.  The rest of our trip will be a few days or a week in several places but this has been home for awhile.  We struck it lucky in our choice.


We have a 3-bedroom condo in what might pass as the center of Doolin.  Doolin, and many Irish towns, are scattered about rather than compact.  So we are central to the music pubs and can walk to hear music but few other services are anywhere close.  We also have a car--a necessity in this country; few locals or tourists do anything else and we now understand why.  For us, it has been great to have so much space so visitors could come: my sister, Kitty was with us for a few weeks and our neighbor, Mary was here too for a bit.  Both are fun explorers and easy house guests; it helps us feel grounded to have our friends and family around.

Our car and house with Nancy.

Getting around
Well, but learning to drive here--Yikes!  Left side of the road-ok. Manual transmission--ok.  Narrow roads, bordering on tiny, all with bikes, walkers and tractors around random bends. It has been a trifecta of anxiety.  It is just as bad being the passenger--we are so close to the edge of the road that the passenger is cringing and gasping as much as the driver is white-knuckled.

I am relieved to report that we have not harmed anyone and we are much more relaxed now.  We have not reached the point where we actually go as fast as the speed limit.  100 Km/hr seems laughable to us.



Taking care of business in the local market town
Early May, arriving in Doolin.  Rain.  Wind.  Where do we find groceries?  Really, the gas station? Or Enistymon, 50 k away.  OK!  Doolin does music and birds; Enistymon takes care of basics..

Turns out the Doolin gas station really sells a pretty good range of stuff with excellent local bread, eggs, meat.  The fish wholesaler behind the station sells fresh catch for pennies.  We realized we would not starve.  They also sell turf briquettes and fire-starter so we could have cozy turf fires of an evening.

Enistymon ended up being one of our fun go-to towns and we went often.  Supervalu--a grand little grocery store with lots of regular stuff.  A good wine selection, fresh local berries every time we went.  A parking lot under the store so no parking anxiety.

But there is much more to enjoy in the town.  Local cheese vendor and veggie truck on the main square; next to them the guru tea shop which makes actual french press coffee and sells Buddhist prayer flags.  An ordinary town, not a tourist destination.  We had medical check-ups there and I got my teeth cleaned.  For us, just like living somewhere.

Enistymon on market day.

The cascades of the Inagh River with a stone-arched bridge are in the middle of town with a grand old hotel on the bank.  The Dylan Thomas Bar in the Falls hotel has free wi-fi, good beer, coffee and desert, carved roasts for daily lunch and windows over-looking the falls and rook-nests right outside the window. And, and, and...  I guess I should mention the salmon swimming up to the fish ladder and the river otter chasing them.  A dipper was nesting near the fish ladder.  We stopped in often.

Inagh falls with Enistymon in back.

General Economy and Ambiance
We spent most of our stay in this western area of County Clare with a few pleasant forays into Galway for city life.  Our observation so far is that Ireland is still suffering from the economic downturn with lots of empty storefronts, lightly-booked tourist facilities, projects that were started and not completed.  We did meet young professionals who had migrated to Australia several years ago who are beginning to come back as work is now here for them. Ireland has put effort into the tourist infrastructure in our area, Doolin and the Cliffs of Moher particularly, and this has actually paid off according to some of those who live there. Galway is a high tech area with many server farms among other teckie businesses and a large university center for technology.  So, it is beginning to work out here. All of Ireland is internet friendly with free wifi at every turn.  Any pub we stopped in had free wifi so evenings we could listen to traditional music and pay our bills or post to facebook at the same time.

Our overall impression was of a very well kept area.  No run down houses, no junk cars or other outward signs of economic stress.  Empty storefronts were painted up and had window displays. Ennis, the capitol of County Clare, was recently a Tidy Town gold medal winner and they are in the running for a European award.  In France they had "flower villages;" in Ireland it is Tidy Towns.  We were impressed with both actually but I am thinking about Ireland right now.  Really no trash.  It was notable to find a bit of paper blowing on the road even in remote areas. While there is an economic emphasis on tourism in the area, it is not at all crowded or slick.  Most business are family owned and operated with the staff providing service with a pleasant personal touch.

Nancy and Jessie holding Mary Mullan's book, Zephyr.

Poetry
The icing on the Enistymon cake.  The Salmon Poetry is the Motown of Poetry says our poet friend, Mary Mullen.  Our first stumble into Enistymon to find food and a cash machine was rewarded by a further stumble into Salmon Bookstore, part of Salmon Poetry, for a poetry reading.  Jessie Lendennie and other poets were having an event for World Poetry Day.  (Did you know there is such a thing?  Me neither.)  I really liked it--well crafted, tight little topics, a sweet time in the garden of a crammed full bookstore. Being here is re-opening my eyes to poetry. (Follow the above link to buy Mary's or Jessie's or other poetry--free shipping.)

Galway is also a center of poetry.  Part of the city's street are building-sized paintings with an associated poem.  These things pop up in any odd place such as a city parking lot.  Fun to stumble on after a walk along the river.


What's for fun?
Besides taking care of life's business, what did we do every day?
There is everything to do here, an adventure every day.


Walking and biking
I had expected to do more walking and bicycling but many of the designated walking/biking paths are along quite busy roads and everything is steep.  When weather permitted, we drove to where the paths were off road and hiked from there. Nancy preferred to use her time drawing and painting so was willing to drop us off and pick us up elsewhere.  Best hike:  from the top of the Cliffs of Moher down into Doolin.  I can't even begin to describe the views out over the Aran Islands, the nesting birds, wildflowers.  It was about as strenuous as I could manage with some steep descents and about 8-9 km.  But well worth the effort.  Another hike: along a back road over a ridge from Burren National Park where we found a farmhouse offering tea and scones halfway along.  A final hike was along a ridge above Fanore and the Atlantic coast looked out over Galway bay and the Connemara Mountains to the north.  We saw/heard skylarks displaying and later cuckoos.  Best bike ride: Inis Mor, the largest of the Aran Islands.




Birds
The stunning Cliffs of Moher here provide nesting sites for thousands of seabirds including puffins, razorbills, guillemots, fulmars, choughs and more.  A visitor center with viewing platform allows good views of puffins flying in and out of their nests.  One day, I felt like I was in a nature video watching a peregrine hunting a cliff-face of fulmars.  As the
peregrine approached, dozens of fulmars swarmed out and chased it away. After several tries, the peregrine went hungry as far as I could see. Scenic boat cruises tour along the cliff face where you are feet away from nesting kittiwakes and guillemots.  The ferry to the Aran islands passed colonies of nesting Arctic terns and little terns. Gannets, shearwaters and other seabirds appeared as we got out further.  Inland, skylarks, cuckoos, pipits, stone chats--many more.  When we were first here, the dawn chorus of songbirds swelled out. By now, mid-June, most are on the nest and quiet.  Eurasian Marsh Harriers are rare and endangered throughout UK and Ireland but we watched one hunt over a field of neolithic cahers for about 20 minutes. Below--seabird nesting sites.

Drawing and Painting
While I was watching birds or riding bikes, Nancy spent her time drawing and painting with some great results. It has been a bit difficult making the transition from glass sculpture to watercolor and drawing but in my opinion, she has been successful.  Nancy would argue--"not so" --but I am writing this section so my word goes.


The painting heading this post is one of the view from our livingroom done in watercolor.  Here is a drawing done while we were watching music at McGann's pub.  Brown ink on cream-colored paper.




Archeology of prehistory
The whole area was heavily populated in the neolithic--between about 6,000 and 4,000 years ago. Again during the late iron age and early Christian era, later middle ages and into the modern era under the Normans and then British rule, the population surged and fell.  Inhabitants from every era left stone buildings or monuments and they are there for us to find.  Some say this area of Ireland has more prehistoric sites than any other area of Ireland.  Most are not fully explored but a few have been well excavated and dates can be extrapolated.

Nancy is working on a blog about "What they left Behind" so I will not explain much here.  But we had great fun travelling around to find different sites. I say find but often we just stumbled upon things.  This area is so empty of inhabitants or tourists that we would often be tooling along and come right to a 6,000-year-old wedge tomb and neolithic habitation site with no one around and just a rusty sign post.  We have become connoisseurs of stone walls and sometimes could identify medieval field systems or neolithic enclosures.  There is so much here that it is common to find a dolmen in the middle of a cow field with no information.  We have the pleasure of trying to solve the puzzle. A great book:  Hugh Carthy, Burren Archeology, a Tour Guide, helped us map out our exploration and understand some of what we were seeing.









We have what we have come to think of as "our standing stone" which we see out our back door, up a small hill.  It is in someone's pasture and we could not walk up to it but found it on Google earth in the center of a ring with another stone fallen down.








Remains of early Christianity

Early Christianity flourished here and ancient, roofless churches are scattered about in odd corners too.  More than we can count.  The earliest remains are from about 800 as churches built earlier were timber and left no remains.  They are mainly deserted and roofless from the Cromwell repressions but have remained hallowed ground so the burials have continued to now.  We have visited many and find them evocative, beautiful.  Bits of carving remain on some; other are almost overgrown with honeysuckle and roses.  There is much to say about these churches--maybe they can become their own post.





Lunch
Everyday, some wonderful lunch.  Everywhere we went, we came across superb restaurants.  I do not know if this will be true all over Ireland--I will report back.  But in this area, the "Slow-food movement" is flourishing.  Thank-you Italy.  May was the "Slow-food Festival" so all over the area local cheese makers, meat producers, fishers, and restaurants were strutting their stuff and we found great places to eat in the unlikeliest places.

A few of our favorites:
Tea and Garden room in the former Coast Guard Station, Ballyvaughn, pictured above.

Cassidy's Pub in Carran out there alone among the neolithic sites, geological wonders and wildflower meadows.  We went back often.

Vasco's near the Fanore beach--local cheese plate to die for, excellent wine selection, a cozy respite from rain and wind on some days.

Kilshanny House, on the way to Ennistymon on the main highway.  We found it because we were so tense from learning to drive in the area we needed to pull off to catch our breath--and there was this great pub and restaurant.  A harpist was playing, the fire was warming, scones were just out of the oven, shepherds pie was perfection.  We went back often.

Russell Gallery in New Quay is an excellent art gallery which turns out to have an Italian wine and espresso bar.  Good food too.  Their family winery in Tuscany provided wine, olive oil and other must-haves for the house too.  Nearby we went to a local concert with the community singers hosting a similar group from Bologna, Italy.

Linnane's Lobster Bar, also in New Quay, gets their fish and shell fish right there on the quay. There is a cozy inside for the rainy days and picnic tables for the sunny day.  We enjoyed them all.

Stonecutter's Kitchen near the Cliffs of Moher--great stop for lunch or snacks.
Doolin Cafe our frequent afternoon coffee and cake place.

Pubs are all over and pretty much all good or good enough.  We have not acquired  a taste for Guinness but another Irish beer--Smithwicks (Smiddiks) has become our drink of choice.  Pub food runs to burgers, curry and lasagna.  We did not try the lasagna that often so cannot really compare with our Italian lasagna challenge but the burgers were reliably good.

Evenings we usually cook at home with great local ingredients.  I learned to make leek and potato soup after enjoying it so much in restaurants.  This is beef and dairy country so we have great cheeses and beef.  Our butcher in Enistymon raises their own beef and lamb and will cut to order. Aran Islandmen fish and bring their catch in to the Doolin pier so we re able to get good fish and shellfish at the gas station (where else?).  Local produce in season now-potatos, leeks, beets and other root crops.  Berries are coming in from Wexford.

Music
Evenings = Irish traditional music.  We are here because Doolin is famed for the number and quality of their traditional musicians.  Three pubs here have been centers for musicians for many years and music happens there every night.  It is light until about 10 PM which is when they begin to play but it is hard for us to get up and out so late.  Thus, we did not go to music every night even though it was there.  Other areas around the county also have fine musicians playing usually on weekends.

The musicians we did see were excellent.  Rarely did anyone give their names so mainly we do not know who they are.  One set of folks--Dermot (concertina) and Flo (harp) with a banjo player were good enough that we tried to follow them around and found a CD.   Here is a Youtube video of them in a different venue but I think you can catch the sweetness of the harp here quite well.

Another highlight was a group of older local players that we tracked down a few times.  It was fun when they were playing as all their local older friends came out too and some teens were sitting in to learn how to play.  Such quality and ease with each other.  No CD's or Youtube for these guys--just neighbors.

The Doolin Folk Music festival was last weekend, right next door to us.  We particularly enjoyed a set by Sharon Shannon that got us all up and dancing.  The town was hopping with all hostels and many B&B's crammed.  People were sleeping in tents and their cars.  Every age of people in the audience listened and danced to a range of music from ballad singers to traditional Irish to wider folk music which seems to be based on "trad" but with other musical twists in the mix.  A central courtyard with turf fires and plenty of Guinness kept the crowd amiable.

Elsewhere, we found jazz offerings and an early music cello concert.  The local chorus singing with their Italian guests was a different range of traditional local musicians.  All around, a musical garden of delights.





Leaving
We have been here the best part of seven weeks and off we go.  Tomorrow in Galway, a musical evening of W.B. Yeats poems including "The Swans of Coole" written when he stayed at Coole here in the Burren.  Ballina for a really significant neolithic archeological site.  Donegal for scenery. Derry for a touch of city.  Antrim and the Giant's Causeway.  Belfast, New Grange and Dublin.  We are excited about the next things and sad to leave our beautiful "home."


Text by Julianne
Photos by Nancy and Julianne.

What They Left Behind: Prehistory in the Burren

Walking in Burren National Park
Deforestation is a souvenir from prehistory

People have been living in this area of western Ireland for thousands of years. Their remnants are all around, and we went all around to look at them. I'll share what we found, hopefully in a more or less clear fashion. I'm actually kind of shoddy with dates, so I am cribbing from Hugh Carthy's wonderful Burren Archaeology: A Tour Guide, so I don't go too far astray.

There are three main periods of Irish history in the west, prehistoric (up to about 500 BC), medieval (500 AD up to about 1700), and modern (which means since 1700). These are rough dates, as you may suppose, because it's hard to date rocks using carbon-14 technology (no carbon in those rocks) so just bear with me.

I'll start with prehistoric. This mainly means Neolithic, which means after farming was invented, but before people started using metal tools. They were still using stone for tools. Plenty of that around here.

However, even before farming, people were here, as hunter-gatherers. There was a tool workshop for making stone arrow heads, scrapers, and axes, on the beach where the river through Doolin joins the Atlantic. There are useful-looking rocks on that beach, and flakes and tool-making debris were found there. Nobody knows the dates of the tool-making, however. These days there's a hiking trail on far side, and on the near side, a pasture as well as a little golf course.

Mouth of the Aille River at Doolin. Can't see the river which is below the near cliff. Rocks formerly used for stone-age tool making on this stony beach.

The hunter-gatherers left very few traces of themselves, so, moving right along, we come to the first farmers, starting about 6,000 years ago. Neolithic people lived in houses, grew crops, herded cattle and sheep and goats, and built stone enclosures and graveyards. They built stone walls, oh, so many walls! You can't believe the labor that has gone into wall-building over the centuries, and it started right with these earliest farmers. To get the rocks out of the fields, they made miles of stone walls. A shocking amount of heavy labor went into those walls.

The oldest walls are long broken down and overlaid with other walls. But looking from the air, it's possible to see them still in the landscape. 

Part of the Glasha Group of field walls, from Ordnance Survey Ireland
Credit: Hugh Carthy, Burren Archaeology: A Tour Guide, 2011

The Glasha Group is almost directly across the road from where we're staying here in Doolin. It was great to get this photo, since from the ground you can barely see the faint shadows of the old walls. They're very clear from the air, though. The long straight lines are the modern walls, and the shallow, shadowy lines are where the pre-historic walls used to be. The squiggly, wandering lines are likely early, the long parallel lines later in the domestication of the land.

When farming began in western Ireland, the rock that is now the Burren was covered with soil and forests. Forests of oak and elm made heavy work to log off in the lowlands, but in the uplands pine and hazelwood were more common. These proved easier to clear, so much early settlement was in the higher regions. The growing season was longer than now, as temperatures were higher by a couple degrees at that time.

Creating a settled farming system based on linear fields separated by stone walls might have taken about 500 years. They built up communities, developed ritual life, engaged in long-distance trade. A beautiful stone ax was found in a grave from this period, of stone from northern Italy. Trade probably sparked the development of Bronze Age technology in Ireland, too.

So now we are talking about the same people, but with a more complicated technology. The Stone Age waned and the Bronze Age began. Society became more hierarchical, with some people having more power than others, a stratification that carried into the visible remains.

Anyway, while society was becoming more complex, climate change was going on at the same time. Ireland became cooler and much wetter. It wasn't just Ireland - a large change in the climate took place all over Europe.

In western Ireland the loss of tree cover in the uplands had already led to erosion of the thin soil. In heavier rains the earth slid right off the rocks that lay just underneath, leaving bare stone. In flatter landscapes, grasslands became bogs.

The dramatic landscape now called the Burren came about at that time. Now it's a tourist attraction, but for those Bronze Age farmers it was a disaster. The population fell, as the uplands were abandoned. Stone walls were not built for a thousand years. Other parts of Ireland, including the Aran Islands, became more important than the Burren. 

Still so bare? Well, today's sheep and cattle keep the brush and trees down, fostering grasses and wildflowers. Where they don't graze, brush and small trees come back. If the farmers stop pasturing their cattle in the uplands the Burren will revert to brush. You can see it happening a bit in the pictures above. Actually there are some areas (but not in the parkland in the pictures) where thorn bushes and gorse are the principal greenery now. Although we could make out something of the ancient walls, some of the land seems essentially abandoned to wilderness. 

Besides the rocky Burren itself, and the miles of rock wall, those ancient farmers left some artifacts, such as graves lined with stone, called dolmens. They installed their dead, and then piled rocks on top and all around. Grass and flowers grew up, also brambles and whatnot, eventually burying the dolmens. These lumps of rocks, called cairns, are all around, there must be hundreds of them. A few have been excavated. 

Poulnabrone, showing the context and the broken backside

Poulnabrone, showing the entrance and how the roof sits

The most major excavation was at Poulnabrone, which yielded bones of 33 individuals inside, and one outside. The oldest bones were about 5,800 years old, the latest 5,200 years old, except for the infant buried outside, about 3500 years ago. Clearly only a few of all the people living in that area could be buried there.

The bones were disarticulated and jumbled without any discernable order. Only one of those people had lived past 40; many had arthritis, and the children's teeth showed malnutrition. So it was not an easy life. 

We made sort of a project of finding unlisted dolmens. Here are a few pictures of them. 

 We couldn't get closer, too many walls

Many questions about building these dolmens.
For instance, how did they move the capstone?

This a total surprise,
near the worst road we attempted,
yet it's a very good situation for a dolmen.

Parknabinnia, a named dolmen

So, walls, tombs, and an eroded landscape. What we found from the prehistoric period. Considering the land has been occupied almost all the time since, it's pretty amazing even so much has survived. 

I think this posting is long enough, don't you? I'm hoping to make a posting for medieval discoveries that we made in the Burren area of western Ireland, and Julianne is doing one on daily life in Doolin now. I hope you will like them.

by Nancy