Project MUSE®: Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature - Latest Articles
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813
Project MUSE®: Latest articles in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature.daily12026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00text/htmlen-USVol. 102C (2002) through current issue
Latest Articles: Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, LiteratureTWOProject MUSE®Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature2009-00480035-8991Latest articles in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature. Feed provided by Project MUSE®The cross-slabs of Clonmacnoise: Reassessing one of the largest collections of early medieval carved stone monuments in northwest Europe
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974276
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Clonmacnoise, Co. Offaly, was established on the east bank of the Shannon in the sixth century and developed into the most important ecclesiastical civitas in the Irish midlands, patronised at different times by kings of Connacht west of the Shannon and Mide east of it (e.g. Kehnel 1997; King 1998b; 2003). With six high crosses and c. 720 cross-slabs and related monument types, it boasts by far the largest collection of early medieval carved stone monuments in Ireland, and one of the largest in northwest Europe. Despite its international importance, indeed because of its sheer scale, it has been somewhat neglected. The only comprehensive study of the collection was published well over a century ago (Macalister
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallThe cross-slabs of Clonmacnoise: Reassessing one of the largest collections of early medieval carved stone monuments in northwest Europe2025-11-14text/htmlen-USThe cross-slabs of Clonmacnoise: Reassessing one of the largest collections of early medieval carved stone monuments in northwest Europe2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®2528232026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14St Brigid's shoe: Metalwork, faith and politics in County Galway in 1710
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974277
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The metal shoe referred to in recent literature as the shrine of St Brigid's shoe (in this paper as St Brigid's shoe) is associated with Loughrea, Co. Galway, in the diocese of Clonfert. It was acquired by George Petrie before 1845, was acquired with Petrie's collection by the Royal Irish Academy in 1868 and is now held as part of the Academy collection by the National Museum of Ireland (registration number P1023).George Petrie, himself the earliest commentator,1 referred in 1845 to the presence of the shoe 'in [his] own Cabinet', linking it with Loughrea and reporting that it 'was popularly known as St. Bridget's slipper, and, no doubt, originally encased a real shoe' attributed to her (1845, 341–2).2 In 1876 it
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallSt Brigid's shoe: Metalwork, faith and politics in County Galway in 17102025-11-14text/htmlen-USSt Brigid's shoe: Metalwork, faith and politics in County Galway in 17102025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®2221682026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Edmund Spenser, A view of the present state of Ireland [1596]: A radical re-appraisal of a well-known text
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974278
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I have made frequent reference to Spenser's View in previous publications, but it is only now that I am able to interrogate what motivated and influenced Spenser as he was writing his text because my involvement with Elizabeth Fowler as joint editor of a proposed fresh edition of the work has required me to look more closely, and more critically, at what he composed.2 This joint edition is, however, far from complete, and I think it wise to summarise my personal thinking on the subject because my advancing years alert me to the possibility that I may not live to see the new edition released.Specialists will appreciate that there exists no copy of the View written in Spenser's own hand. This means that each of the
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallEdmund Spenser, A view of the present state of Ireland [1596]: A radical re-appraisal of a well-known text2025-11-14text/htmlen-USEdmund Spenser, A view of the present state of Ireland [1596]: A radical re-appraisal of a well-known text2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1103602026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Insularisation and isolation? Aligning the Mesolithics of Britain and Ireland
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974279
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Located on the western edge of Europe, Britain and Ireland have been seen as Mesolithic outliers, deviating from the broad three-fold lithic typological sequence visible across much of Europe, their people and practices subject to the peculiarities of island insularity and isolation. In Britain, while the earlier parts of the technological sequence echo those known in continental Europe, the trapezes and transverse arrowheads, as well as the associated technological transformations of the Second Mesolithic (Perrin et al. 2009), are absent. This has been suggested to be a product of cultural isolation, following sea-level rise and the severing of Britain from mainland Europe (Clark 1958, Jacobi 1976). In Ireland
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallInsularisation and isolation? Aligning the Mesolithics of Britain and Ireland2025-11-14text/htmlen-USInsularisation and isolation? Aligning the Mesolithics of Britain and Ireland2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1279112026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Land, lineage and power: Connecting dynastic conflict and climate change in late medieval Tír Chonaill
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974280
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In 1454, Domhnall Ó Domhnaill, slew his cousin and rival, Rudhraige Ó Domhnaill by striking him on the head with a rock thrown from the walls of Inch Castle in Inis Eoghain.2 With this sweep of his arm, Domhnall had not only made himself king of Tír Chonaill but also struck a blow at the main Ó Domhnaill kindred that stood in opposition to his rule. His reign was to be short lived however, as within two years Domhnall would be dead, cut down in battle, and Rudhraige's brother would have possession of the kingship. These violent incidents were not anomalies, but part of a far larger pattern of dynastic violence that dominated the lives of many of the Uí Dhomhnaill kings of medieval Tír Chonaill. This violence was
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallLand, lineage and power: Connecting dynastic conflict and climate change in late medieval Tír Chonaill2025-11-14text/htmlen-USLand, lineage and power: Connecting dynastic conflict and climate change in late medieval Tír Chonaill2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1678432026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Medicine, illness and disease in the lordship of Ireland, 1177 to 1541 A.D.
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974281
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The period from the late-twelfth to the early-seventeenth century was dominated by a clash of two cultures and two nations on the island of Ireland. An Irish-speaking Gaelic population inhabited the western and northern regions of the country and across the North Channel into the west of Scotland, while the Anglo-Normans or the 'English-of-Ireland' dominated the eastern and southern parts of the island.1 The latter, who spoke a variant of English known as Hiberno-Middle English, were ruled by a justiciar and powerful lords who derived their authority from the English king in a polity known as the lordship of Ireland;2 as Robin Frame noted it was more a patchwork of lordships than a unitary state.3 No physical
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallMedicine, illness and disease in the lordship of Ireland, 1177 to 1541 A.D.2025-11-14text/htmlen-USMedicine, illness and disease in the lordship of Ireland, 1177 to 1541 A.D.2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®2548532026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Ogam, cryptography and healing charms in the nineteenth century: Observations on 'The Minchin Manuscript'
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974282
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Ogam is well known as a writing system invented to represent the Primitive Irish language and used extensively for inscriptions on stone monuments across Ireland and parts of Britain that had Irish settlements (including what is now Scotland, the Isle of Man, Wales, Cornwall and Devon) between the late fourth and seventh centuries.2 In this three-dimensional format, the script consists of strokes or scores arranged along the edges (arris) of stones and occasionally portable objects; the letters are arranged in four groups (sg. aicme, pl. aicmi), each of which is characterised by a specific type of stroke that occurs one to five times, depending on the letter. The first three groups all consist of consonants denoted
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallOgam, cryptography and healing charms in the nineteenth century: Observations on 'The Minchin Manuscript'2025-11-14text/htmlen-USOgam, cryptography and healing charms in the nineteenth century: Observations on 'The Minchin Manuscript'2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1948432026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Dynamism, use and reuse at an Irish portal tomb: Excavations at Tirnony, Maghera, Co. Derry/Londonderry
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974283
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In the winter of 2009/2010 the west portal stone of the Tirnony portal tomb, undermined and cracked by roots from a nearby ash tree, slumped sideways. It hit into the east portal stone, causing the capstone, which had previously rested on the two portal stones, and the east sidestone, to dislodge hitting the west front sidestone, fracturing it in two. In advance of the repair of the tomb, the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (now the Historic Environment Division of the Department for Communities) asked the Centre for Archaeological Fieldwork at Queen's University Belfast to carry out an excavation in case repairs disturbed archaeological deposits.Here we report on this excavation and its findings, which helps
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallDynamism, use and reuse at an Irish portal tomb: Excavations at Tirnony, Maghera, Co. Derry/Londonderry2025-11-14text/htmlen-USDynamism, use and reuse at an Irish portal tomb: Excavations at Tirnony, Maghera, Co. Derry/Londonderry2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1732672026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Reassessing the Mesolithic 'shell middens' of Rockmarshall, Co. Louth
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974284
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Some 75 years ago, workers busy extracting gravel from a moraine a few hundred metres from the north shore of Dundalk Bay noticed worked flint among a dense layer of shells in the side of the gravel pit. At a time when the existence of a Mesolithic in Ireland was not commonly acknowledged even among archaeologists, naturalist George Francis 'Frank' Mitchell, newly appointed Fellow of Trinity College, was intrigued by the site, and excavated it in the summer of 1946 and 1948. One year later, Mitchell published what would be the second, and last, excavation report on what he dubbed the three Mesolithic 'kitchen-middens'1 of Rockmarshall, Co. Louth (Mitchell 1949). His work was fundamental in the academic genesis and
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallReassessing the Mesolithic 'shell middens' of Rockmarshall, Co. Louth2025-11-14text/htmlen-USReassessing the Mesolithic 'shell middens' of Rockmarshall, Co. Louth2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1402702026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14The more, the merrier: Irish (and Scottish) bishops in fourteenth-century collective indulgences from Avignon
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/974285
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Between circa 1310 and 1364, it was not uncommon for bishops who were present at the Papal Curia in Avignon to collectively issue indulgences for the remission of sins. These collective indulgences were granted largely, though not exclusively, by bishops of titular sees who, in some instances, remained at Avignon for many years as so-called 'curial bishops'. However, for the periods 1322–37/8 and 1353–63 in particular, a number of bishops of dioceses in Ireland are also recorded among the grantors of collective indulgences at Avignon. The purpose of this paper is to present the evidence of those collective indulgences issued by Irish bishops and examine what new light these documents throw on the history of the
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallThe more, the merrier: Irish (and Scottish) bishops in fourteenth-century collective indulgences from Avignon2025-11-14text/htmlen-USThe more, the merrier: Irish (and Scottish) bishops in fourteenth-century collective indulgences from Avignon2025-11-142025TWOProject MUSE®1629202026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-11-14Editorial
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/977539
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This volume brings together a diverse collection of papers entwined with recurring themes of reinterpretation, politics and healing. The first two papers take us back to the Mesolithic, the earliest period of Ireland's known human settlement (notwithstanding the emerging and tantalising signs of Palaeolithic occupation). Chantal Conneller and Graeme Warren make a case for reconciling the terminology for Mesolithic periodisation presently used in Ireland and Britain: in essence, what constitutes 'Earlier Mesolithic' in Ireland is thought to equate better with Britain's 'Late Mesolithic', while the Irish 'Later Mesolithic' has no comparandum in Britain. The nomenclature of the chronological frameworks, argue
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-19T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/813/image/coversmallEditorial2025-12-13text/htmlen-USEditorial2025-12-132025TWOProject MUSE®145652026-05-19T00:00:00-05:002025-12-13