HISTORY OF IRELAND
to a new base at Kells. The probability is that they brought at least the bulk of the book with them: some subsequent work on it may have been done in this new monastery in Co Meath. Whatever its precise history, the
book can be securely placed within Irish culture. The contorted animals, highly stylised humans and fabulously ornate initial lettering are rooted in the La Tène tradition of ‘Celtic’ art that by the ninth century had been alive in Ireland for 1,000 years.”
29. ‘TARA’ BROOCH, EIGHTH CENTURY
“In the late-nineteenth century, copies of the ‘Tara’ brooch were a must-have item of Celtic chic. One important nationalist organisation, Inghinidhe na hÉireann (Daughters of Ireland), headed by Maud Gonne, adopted it as its membership badge. The brooch, made over a thousand years earlier, became a symbol of the Irish cultural revival because it presented a stunning answer to Victorian theories of Irish racial backwardness. In this case, at least, the symbol is not
let down by the reality: this brooch is an object that speaks of a culture functioning at the highest level of sophistication. Although it is less than 9cm in diameter, approximately 76 patterns have been identifi ed on its surface. Both faces of the brooch, and even the inner and outer edges of the ring, are covered with a teeming profusion of designs, each executed with dazzling skill. Even the cord that secured the brooch in position culminates in an elaborately designed link that incorporates serpent, animal and human heads. It is not the expression of a particular technique; it is a virtuoso performance of virtually every technique known to late-seventh and early-eighth century metalworkers.”
30. ARDAGH CHALICE, EIGHTH CENTURY
“It was found in 1868, under a stone slab in a ringfort in Reerasta, near Ardagh, Co Limerick, with a second, plainer bronze chalice and four gilt silver
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It has parallels not in Western Europe but with Byzantine vessels now in St Mark’s in Venice—not because there is direct Eastern infl uence but because they both draw on a common Roman
ancestor’. The squat shape of the two- handled bowl of the chalice, however, is indigenously Irish, and the animal art, with its typical abstraction, is very different from the more realistic Roman style of representation.”
34. TALL CROSS, MONASTER- BOICE, LATE-NINTH CENTURY
“There was no native tradition of building in cut stone, so the appearance
of high crosses in the eighth century was a major cultural innovation. So, as we have seen, was the idea of depicting, in a relatively realistic way, human subjects and stories. The crosses are not widely evident beyond Ireland and Irish-infl uenced Scotland. They required a huge investment of skill and resources and, as art historian Roger Stalley has put it, ‘it is hard to believe they were undertaken for purely altruistic or religious motives’. Yet they were erected on a very large scale: about 300 of them survive, of which 100 are decorated with carved images. This cross, from Monasterboice in
Co Louth, is almost seven metres tall, and every available face is covered with elaborate carvings of a dazzling variety of scenes.”
brooches. Along with the Derrynafl an chalice, this is one of the fi nest liturgical vessels of the Early Christian world. Its beauty lies in the contrast between the plain sheen of the polished silver and the fi nesse and complexity of the ornamentation: gold fi ligree of stylised birds and beasts; interlace in fi ligree and other techniques; intricate studs of red, blue and yellow glass (sometimes multicoloured or topped by fi ligree); and beautifully engraved lettering that spells out the names of the Apostles, with Paul being substituted for Judas. Like so much else from this
extraordinary period, the chalice suggests a culture that is at once international and insular. ‘The model’, says Raghnall Ó Floinn
of the National Museum, ‘is Late Roman tableware, from the early centuries AD.
36. BALLINDERRY SWORD, MID-NINTH CENTURY
“This is one of the fi nest surviving examples of a technology that helped to transform Ireland in the ninth and tenth centuries: a Viking sword. The Vikings typically imported their blades from high-quality workshops in the territory of the Frankish empire (today’s Germany). The blade of the Ballinderry sword has a maker’s name inlaid on it: Ulfberht. This identifi es it as the work of a master, probably based in the Rhineland, whose blades have been found as far away
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