Nick Maxwell In October 1996 the foundations of what is thought to have been the thirteenth-century Augustinian priory of St Mary were located during building work for a new shopping-centre at Mullingar, County Westmeath. During the archaeological rescue excavation under the direction of Michael Gibbons, more than thirty burials were discovered, two of which contained scallop shells, … Read more
With the outbreak of the Crimean War in 1854 a requirement for additional training areas for the British Army was recognised as an urgent necessity by the government in London. Early in the following year it was announced that camps would be established at Aldershot in Hampshire and on the Curragh of Kildare. Tradition of … Read more
In some humble céili house in the west of Ireland long ago the musician put his fiddle down to give the dancers a rest. It was time for the ‘singer of the household’ to take the floor, drawing from oral tradition sustained down the centuries in elemental form by echoes of ancestral voices. An itinerant … Read more
George Orwell an agent of British Intelligence? Public records released in July 1996 reveal that the British writer in 1949 had supplied a secret propaganda unit in the Foreign Office, the Information Research Department, with a list of about a hundred writers, artists and intellectuals who should not be invited to become covert cheerleaders in … Read more
For many people archaeology is primarily concerned with Ireland’s prehistoric past, and many archaeologists do indeed investigate and interpret monuments associated with our earliest ancestors. Other archaeologists concentrate on the Early Christian and medieval period—on sites associated with Ireland’s early historic past—when documentary sources become available to assist, compliment or contradict the evidence revealed from … Read more