Nick Maxwell A South Wind Blows production, directed by Nuala O’Connor (in selected Irish cinemas from November 2018) By Conor McNamara An unprecedented popular interest in the history of the Irish Revolution has generated a plethora of documentaries and television series in recent years, kicked off by the uniquely emotive centenary of the 1916 Rising. Keepers of … Read more
Ulster Museum, Belfast www.nmni.com/our-museums/ulster-museum By Tony Canavan To mark the twentieth anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, the Ulster Museum has set up a new exhibition exploring the history of the Troubles, which examines Northern Ireland’s recent past through a range of objects reflecting diverse perspectives and experiences. Many objects were contributed by the public … Read more
BY AODHÁN CREALEY SEPTEMBER 16/1937 Ten male seasonal potato-gatherers, aged 13–23 years, from Achill Island perished in a fire in Kirkintilloch, near Glasgow. The group had only arrived in the village the previous evening. The females were lodged in a cottage and the ten males in a nearby bothy, which was basically a cowshed, … Read more
By Joe Culley @TheRealCulls During the Six Nations rugby championship we are regularly—even tediously—asked to contemplate battle with our ‘Celtic cousins’, yet a recent genetic study of Britain revealed no common link between the ‘Celtic’ peoples of these islands. As Caomhín De Barra explains in his intriguing The coming of the Celts AD 1860: … Read more
By Michele O’Dea The rocky outcrop that dominates the Cashel skyline has been both a royal fortress and an episcopal seat, distinguished today by the ecclesiastical structures that date from the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The Rock of Cashel’s origins as a centre of power go back to the fourth or fifth century AD, when … Read more