Ireland and the Classical World

1. The Archaeology of Roman Material in Ireland

  The Archaeologyof Roman Materialin Ireland 7 Philology and archaeology ideally should work together to integrate literary and material evidence in the investigation of a particular subject. The investigation of interaction between Ireland and the classical world is no exception, with literary studies aided by physical remains of Roman origin occurring in several dozen Irish sites of the early centuries .. The difficulty , as is so often the case, is one of interpretation.Were these objects lost or deposited in antiquity, or is their presence the result of careless medieval collectors or modern antiquarians? Does a Roman fibula in County Dublin necessarily point to manufacture in Roman Britain or the continent, or might an itinerant Gaulish craftsman in Ireland, or even a Roman-inspired Irish jeweler, have made the object? Surveys of Roman material in Ireland include those of Haverfield and Ó Ríordáin in  and  respectively, but the most complete current study is that of J. D. Bateson from .1 Using Bateson’s reasonable criteria , only a fraction of the many classical objects, especially coins, found in Ireland can be judged as acceptable evidence from antiquity. Much of the rest must be rejected due to uncertainties of origin or inadequate records, while confident judgment on other artifacts cannot presently be made. How these objects came to Ireland, whether by way of Roman merchants or visitors, refugees from Britain, returning Irish raiders, or other means, is also a difficult problem in which speculation is often the only option. Nevertheless, a brief look at some of the more interesting Roman finds       and their testimony for general patterns of distribution in the first through early fifth centuries .. can be fruitful for understanding the relations between Ireland and the classical world (see Figs.  and ). -  Contact between Ireland and the Mediterranean undoubtedly began before the Roman period, but pre-Roman artifacts are few and often of questionable origin. Such finds include Bronze Age double-axes and faience beads of respective Aegean and Egyptian manufacture.2 A barbary ape skull dated to the last few centuries .. was unearthed  kilometers southwest of Armagh at the site of Navan, also known as Emain Macha, famous in early Irish literature as the capital of the Ulaid (Ptolemy’s Woluntioi). The barbary ape was native to north Africa and thus indicates at least indirect trade routes connecting Ireland and the western Mediterranean in the centuries before Roman advances into the British Isles.3 Four small bronze figurines in the National Museum in Dublin dating from the second to first centuries .. also indicate early trade between Italy and Ireland . The four include an Etruscan warrior found in County Roscommon, a robed Etruscan figure from County Sligo, and two Hercules figures of unspecified provenience. -  The majority of Roman material of the first century .. is found, not surprisingly , along the east coast facing Roman Britain, although some artifacts have been unearthed farther inland and on the northern coast. A tiny sherd of first-century .. Arretine ware of Italian origin was found inland from the coast at Ballinderry, County Offaly, while a sherd of south Gaulish Samian ware, a brooch, and a Roman bronze fibula, all from the first century .., were found, respectively, in Counties Tyrone, Dublin, and Armagh.4 Another first-century Samian ware fragment, along with other Roman items, comes from the Drumanagh promontory at Loughshinny ,  kilometers north of Dublin.5 Of additional interest are the firstto second-century .. burial objects from the small island of Lambay, five kilometers off the coast of County Dublin, where a number of fibulae, a beaded torque, bronze discs, and other objects of arguably British origin were recovered from several inhumation burials.6 A commercial connection with the Brigantes tribe across the Irish Sea in central Britain, and       First Century A.D. Second Century A.D. Third Century A.D. Fourth-Early-Fifth-Centuries A.D. . .. .. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . ← 250 km . . . 100 km .  . Roman Archaeological Finds in Ireland (Accepted Finds of Fixed Date) possibly even identification of the site with Brigantian refugees, are feasible , especially given the crushing defeat of the Brigantes by the Romans in .. .7 A key site with Roman material dating from the first through fourth centuries .. is the Brug na Bóinne, a sacred mound at Newgrange on the Boyne River. This Neolithic tumulus has yielded coinage from emperors from Domitian (.. –) to Arcadius (.. –) and numerous       . . Tara Newgrange DUBLIN Lambay Island Bray Head Dalkey Island Rathlin Island . Emain...