"The one duty we owe to history is to rewrite it."
– Oscar Wilde, Intentions (1891) ‘The Critic as Artist’

Introduction
The hermitage of Gougane Barra is set between the village of Kealkill
and the gaeltacht village of Ballingeary [Béal Átha’n Ghaorthaidh], West Cork.
Generations of my family attended Kealkill National School. The etymology of my parents' names, O'Sullivan (ÓSuilleabháin-Mor), Barry, Costigan, and Keohane, of Lackereagh,
and Hurley, Barrett, and O'Leary of Lisheens, reveal the dynamics of the history.

Gougane Barra is the source of The River Lee -
in Gaelic, An Laoi, translated: "ford at the mouth of The Gearagh."

There is a green island
In lone Gougane Barra,
Where Allua of songs
Rushes forth as an arrow;
In deep-valleyed Desmond-
A thousand wild fountains,
Come down to that lake,
From their home in the mountains.
(excerpt) J. J. Callanan, 1826
- The Poems of J.J.Callanan 
- J.J.Callanan Biography 
- Gougane Barra map

This photo, was given to me by our friend Paul O'Donohue, of Bantry, who
escorted me to the August 2017 Heritage Week guided tour of Gougane Barra.

Our guides were Neil Lucey and his daughters, who own
the Gougane Barra Hotel, on the opposite edge of the lake.
(photo by Paul, on my iPhone)

(photo by Paul, on my iPhone)

Gougane Barra is very close to my father's O'Sullivan (ÓSuilleabháin-Mor) family farm, still in the family, at Lackareagh, along the country road (R584), where, two miles to the west, marking the eastern border of O’Sullivan Beare territory, stands Carriganass Castle, which was built during the 1540s by clan chieftan Dermot O’Sullivan Beare. Following the battle of Kinsale in 1602, many members of the O’Sullivan Beare clan, along with many other chieftains, fled to Spain, France, and Austria, while the ÓSuilleabháin-Mor clan continued their battle against English incursions. (References) “This land is the most temperate of all lands. The exhausting heat of the tropic of Cancer does not drive one to the shade. The cold of the tropic of Capricorn does not invite one urgently to the fireplaces. . . . The island is in little need of the services of doctors. You find very few ill people apart from those who are about to die. Between continuous health and final death, there is scarcely any mean.” – Richard Stanihurst (1547-1618), from De Rebus in Hibernia Gestis (Antwerp 1584)

Gougane Barra - one of 9 cells.


White marble stations-of-the-cross were added more recently.

Topography
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The lake is surrounded by 20 different tree species set within 138 hectares of forest park which narrowly escaped destruction by "Catastrophic wildfires" in April 2017, due to illegal burnoff.

The headwaters of the River Lee are located in the Shehy Mountains, and flow south east over folds of red sandstone rock-clefts, forests, fertile valleys, and wetlands, through Cork City to the Celtic Sea. The terrain is home to a rich diversity of plants, animals and bird life, set amongst Neolithic, Bronze, and Iron Age monuments, ringforts, crannogs, grottos and Holy Wells: Home to over twenty species of tree, grass and moss; badger, fox, rabbit, otter, red deer; raven, cockoo, robin, wood pigeon, coal tit, wren, blackbird, chiff-chaff, willow warbler, wagtails, rock dove, thrush, starlings, cormorants, peregine falcons, herons, moorhens, swans.

The River Lee swells at Lough Allua, a ten kilometre long chain of freshwater lakes, brimming with trout, salmon, perch, pike, and bream, situated between Ballingeary and Inchigeelagh, and runs on to expand into an even larger lake – The Gearagh, converging with more tributaries near Macroom, "a submerged glacial woodland and nature reserve. ...until recently densely populated with ancient oak trees and the last surviving full oak forest in western Europe."

Finn Barr (570-633 AD) lived near Macroom, County Cork.
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Gougane Barra is the site of a 6th century 'hermitage' founded by Finn Barr.
Details of "Saint Finbarr's" canonisation remain obscure.

The Uibh Laoire parish website (O'Leary), which featured "The Story of Finnbar" has been offline since September 2018. With gratitude, I've shared the full version of their anonymously written 'history' here:

We can probably never know the true facts of St.Finbarr's life, as there is little documentary evidence of his existence. Many of the wondrous stories associated with him were most likely invented many years after his death in order to validate the territorial claims of the diocese of Cork. However, for the sake of those less cynical I will tell the story in a reasonably conventional manner.

Finbarr was born, named Lochan, in the year 570 A.D., the son of Amergin, the Chief Metalworker (that probably means jeweler) to the court of Tighernach at Rath Raithleann, a ringfort, most likely, Gurranes Ringfort, not far from Macroom.

Amergin, against the wishes of his lord, had entered into a liaison with an unnamed woman, variously a slave-girl or a visiting lady. When she was found to be with child, the chief in grand christian manner, sentenced them both to death by burning. Some versions tell us that the fire was extinguished by a very heavy storm, others that the saint called out from his mother's womb. But for whatever reason the sentence was amended to banishment to a remote area of the chief's lands.

We next find Lochan at six or seven years old living happily in an area called Achadh Dorbichon, tentatively identified as the townland of Farranavarrigane, just south of Macroom. The area was a parish in its own right until it was incorporated into the parish of Kimichael. It is reputed to be the baptismal site and early home of St Finbarr. His father, Amergin, probably owned land in this area as the townland is called Farranavarrigane (the field of Amergin), the ruined church there is dedicated to St.Finbarr.

Finbarr later went on to study for the priesthood and returned to build a church in his home place. Three peripatetic holy-men had detected an air of sanctity about him and bundled him away to study in Kilmacahil, in County Kilkenny. He was renamed "Fionnbarra" (Fairhead in Irish), reportedly when being tonsured, the presiding cleric remarked: "Is fionn barr Lochan", meaning, "Fair is the hair of Lochan").

After education and reportedly travelling to many parts of Ireland, and perhaps much further afield, he returned to Co.Cork to build a hermitage at Gougane Barra.

Later he is said to have founded a monastery, university and city at what is now Cork. The monastery and university are certainly associated with his name in old documents. St. Finbarr died at Ballineadig, near Ballincollig (not Cloyne as often stated) in 633 A.D. and his remains were taken to Cork to be enclosed in a silver shrine in what is now St. Finbarr’s Cathedral.

1100 years later - "Mass Paths" and "Rounds"
The ruins we see today were erected by Rev. Denis O'Mahony, as a Catholic safe-haven following the English Penal Laws suppressing Catholics during the 1700s. People travelled on "Mass Paths" from miles around to hear Mass there.
The oratory is a more recent building, funded in 1901/2 by an Irish-American philanthropist, "in memory of locally born parents" - according to the "Life of St. Finn Barr: Founder and Patron of the City and Diocese of Cork" (1985), by Rev. C. M. O'Brien, who gives an insight into the traumatic intensity of the time – how people overcame fear by reciting mantra-like prayers to calm themselves.
Page six quotes observations of Thomas Crofton Croker,
author of Researches in the South of Ireland (1824):

The same writer describes his visit in the year 1813, when he witnessed the people, according to the ancient Irish custom, "praying rounds" - "On our approach to the lake we caught the indistinct murmur of the multitude. Soon we stood among an immense concourse of people; the interior of the cells were filled with men and women in various acts of devotion, almost all of them on their knees; some, with hands uplifted, prayed in loud voices, using considerable gesticulation, and others, in less noisy manner, rapidly counted the beads on their rosary, or, as it is called by the Irish peasant, their pathereen, with much apparent fervour; or, as a substitute for their beads, threw from one hand into the other small pebbles to mark the numbers of the prayers they had said; which such of the men as were not furnished with other means kept their reckoning by cutting notches on their stick or on a rod provided for the purpose." Though this custom, on account of the abuses which arose in connection with it, was abolished at Gougane, yet the peasants still come from time to time to pay their "rounds" on the island, and numbers of notched sticks may be seen lying about.
– T.C. Croker, 1824, quoted in O'Brien 1985, p. 6

Cork City Council provides several links on the history:
Cork Past and Present; Pre-1400 to Ostman Cork (Vikings) and Norman Cork, and on, through each historic period, to Recent Cork, 1930-1990.
Excerpt:

Traditionally, Saint Finbarre or Bairre, has been credited with the foundation of the monastery of Cork. Little is known with certainty about Bairre, as the extant 'lives' were composed long after his death, reputedly in the seventh century, and these contain mythical and folkloric elements. Padraig O'Riain, an eminent historian of early Irish history, has argued persuasively that Saint Finbarre was not a historical personage, and that the name Finbarre is another name for Saint Finian of Moville whose cult spread south into Cork. Other historians, while acknowledging that the lives give us little factual information about Finbarre, believe that he may have been a historical figure. >>> more

Pre-1400
Excerpt: In A.D. 914, there was a massive raid on Cork and Munster from Scandanavia and some historians think that members of this raiding party expropriated the Viking community that already existed there. By the twelfth century, the descendants of the original settlers had intermarried with the native Irish and become known as the Ostmen or Eastmen. . . [and, in the 12c] the Ostmen of Cork suffered a fate common to many conquered peoples before and since. Their property was confiscated and they were expelled from the city of Cork, when the city was taken by an invading army of warriors, the Normans. >>>more

From Plato to Celtic Christianity
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Atlantis from a Geographer's Perspective: Mapping the Fairy Land (2004), by Swedish geographer Ulf Erlingsson, Ph.D., 'proves' that Plato based his geographic description of Atlantis on Ireland, “Plato is the only original source that mentions Atlantis.” According to Dr. Erlingsson, Atlantis was part of the Dogger Bank landmass which sank due to a huge flood wave around 6100 BC. He affirms, with "99.98 per cent certainty," that Plato would have had access to geographical data on Ireland, sourcing Timaeus and Critias (Archive.org), 360 to 347 BC, where Plato wrote that "Atlantis was an empire in the Atlantic, an island, bigger than Libya and Asia combined, where an advanced civilisation developed some 11,500 years ago". Excerpts from the book have been generously shared HERE. The full thesis is now available as a pdf via ResearchGate. Google Map shows part of the submerged landmass: 140AD Ptolemy's Map of Ireland: Greco-Egyptian polymath Claudius Ptolemy (roughly AD 100 –170), the controversial astronomer who reinforced the idea that Earth was at the centre of the universe, created the first known map of Ireland, around 140 AD, in the form of a set of coordinates showing various geographical features. References: 1. Orpen, G. H. (1894), Ptolemy's Map of Ireland - The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 2. R. Darcy & William Flynn, (2008), "Ptolemy's map of Ireland: a modern decoding Irish Geography", March 2008, (22 pages, PDF) “Women were by no means excluded from positions of authority.” - Cornelius Tacitus (c.AD56-117), Agricola, 98AD A report published in 1774 by Irish historian and apothecary at Dungarvan Waterford, Charles Smith (1715?-1762), the author of, The Ancient And Present State of the City of Cork, gives the earliest known mention of Cork as the 140AD Map of Ireland, by the Greek astronomer, geographer, and cartographer Claudius Ptolemy (80AD?-170AD), describing a tribe known as Coriondi - a corruption of Coritani. The Gaelic word for Cork is corcach or 'swamp' which Smith links with curach - the traditional Irish wooden framed skin covered boat. "Celtic Christianity" was an ascetic interpretation of Christianity practiced across Ireland, Scotland and England from the 1st century AD, when western Druidic scholars met eastern philosophers of the Patristic Tradition, long before the Roman Emperor Constantine I (272-337 AD) established the Roman Catholic Church (RCC), at the 325 AD Council of Nicaea, Turkey. Free Will vs Original Sin: The Pelagian controversy With the 15th century invention of the printing press, translations of Classical texts became more widely available–including the Bible and the writings of Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD), "Father of the Roman Catholic Church", whose writings spurred the "Pelagian controversy" during the first two hundred years of RCC establishment: "Augustine’s impact on the Middle Ages cannot be overestimated." – James O'Donnell, 1998, Britannica In short, Augustine of Hippo promoted the dogma of Original Sin while the English Druid, Pelagius (360-420) - "The reluctant heretic" - led the debate on Free Will vs Original Sin. A letter from Pelagius (413 AD) is relevant as an example of Druidic satire of the highest order at a turning point in history when 'Roman Law' was used to enforce a new form of 'order' on the Western edges of the known world. Pelagius is chiefly remembered for defending the role of traditional Law in cultivating "Personal Sovereignty" as the key to the exercise of "Free Will" while Augustine of Hippo promoted the Manichaean doctrine - the belief that all people are predestined to commit sin as a consequence of Original Sin. (See Pier Franco Beatrice, (2013), The Transmission of Sin: Augustine and the Pre-Augustinian Sources.) Pelagius argued that through the exercise of free will, people could be free of sin when their choices were their own. In short, Pelagius is remembered for his insistence on an individual's capacity to exercise "Free Will" in taking personal responsibility for decisions and choices in the knowledge that we will be held accountable for our choices. Gallic monks supporting Pelagius’ views were branded "Semi-Pelagians" and finally condemned at the Synod of Orange in 529 which accepted Augustine's theology of Original Sin, thus diverging from the Patristic Tradition. Welsh scholar Brinley R. Rees argued, in Pelagius, a Reluctant Heretic (1988, Archive.org), that our actual inheritance from Adam's Original Sin is an example of how misuse of Free Will creates misfortune: Reviewed by Gerald Bonner (1926-2013), the “internationally distinguished scholar of patristic studies”- Gerald Bonner Graduate Research Award “certain theological positions are governed by ideological presuppositions... Pelagius probably invites the greatest sympathy, as giving the impression of a man generally averse to controversy and more concerned to devote himself to the two interests dear to his heart: the construction of an orthodox apologetic against Arianism and Manichaeism, based upon the Pauline teachings; and the cultivation of a Christian asceticism...” - Bonner, 2009, Scottish Journal of Theology, CUP The "Free Will vs Original Sin" controversy remained unresolved after the Synod of Whitby (644 AD). "The Celtic church was considered riddled with 'Pelagian heresy' almost to the end of its days." – P. B. Ellis, The Druids, 1995, p. 184 See Rev. D. R. Jennings "Defense Of The Freedom Of The Will" See also my 1996 essay:  The Hidden People: the spirit of communication and "The Craic" Pelagius, a Reluctant Heretic (1988), B.R. Rees - Archive.org screen capture

Historical revisioning
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Finn Barr, (570-633), founded his retreat in the mountains of County Cork in the 6th century, under the Celtic Christianity model.

Thirty years after Finn Barr's death, the Synod of Witby ruled, in 664AD, against the unresolved Pelagian/ Celtic interpretation of "Christ consciousness".

More than 500 years later, the RCC followed Henry II (1133-1189) in backdating claims to Irish territory. According to Maurice Sheehy (1975), sometime between November 1155 and July 1156, John of Salisbury "spent three months with Pope Hadrian at Beneventum, and it was during this visit that he obtained papal approval for the English invasion of Ireland." He describes the event himself:

[Salisbury] It was at my request that he (the Pope) granted to the illustrious king of England, Henry, the hereditary possession of Ireland, as his letters, still extant, attest: for all islands are reputed to belong by long-established right to the Church of Rome, to which they were granted by Constantine, who established and endowed it.
– Maurice Sheehy, (1975), When The Normans Came To Ireland, p.11

* NOTE:
Pre-empire, Rome traded with Continental Celts, but never 'invaded' Ireland, therefore, Rome did not have "jurisdiction precedents" over Ireland.

One land alone remained Keltic and not Roman. Far out in the western ocean, cut off from European influence not only by the sea but also by the wild highlands of western Britain... It was not till after the fall of the empire in the west that Ireland came to influence the religion and the art of the continent. That development is so remarkable and its results so far-reaching that it deserves all attention. ... How little he knew of Ireland is incidentally illustrated not only by his optimism, but by his geographical idea that Ireland lay directly between Britain and Spain.
– F.J.Haverfield, (1913), Ancient Rome and Ireland

Coinciding with the 12th century Norman Irish incursions -
400 years before the English crown seized 'legal control' from the mid-1600:
In order to establish an early precedence for papal authority in Ireland, RCC scholars reformed indigenous traditions and rewrote Irish history, bestowing sainthood on many leading figures from much earlier times. These incursions launched a brutal 700 year religio-political battle between England and the Vatican – a protracted period of violence and upheaval that shattered the foundations of traditional Gaelic order: Irish culture and language.

"When you cease to fear your solitude, a new creativity awakens in you. Your forgotten or neglected wealth begins to reveal itself. You come home to yourself and learn to rest within. Thoughts are our inner senses. Infused with silence and solitude, they bring out the mystery of inner landscape."
– John O'Donohue, Anam Cara, 1997, p. 17

Irish poet, former priest, Hegelian philosopher, and advocate for social justice, John O'Donohue sought 'intimations' and manifestations of beauty, finding it in music, color and movement, as well as in some less likely locations —imperfection and death.
His exploration of the history of the melding of ancient Irish spiritual traditions with pre-Augustinian Christian precepts in Celtic Christianity and his discovery of the traditional concept of Anam Chara, "Soul Friend" in the Gaelic branch of Proto-Celtic languages illuminated the traditional role of spiritual companionship, where we enable each other to recover from past relationship disappointments by resolving to strengthen our spiritual insight through truthfulness.

"Rather than taking us out of ourselves, nature coaxes us deeper inwards, teaches us to rest in the serenity of our elemental nature. When we go out among nature, clay is returning to clay. We are returning to participate in the stillness of the earth which first dreamed us. This stillness is rich and fecund. One might think that an invitation to enter into the stillness of nature is merely naive romanticism that likes to indulge itself and escape from the cut and thrust of life into some narcissistic cocoon. This invitation to friendship with nature does of course entail a willingness to be alone out there. Yet this aloneness is anything but lonely. Solitude gradually clarifies the heart until a true tranquility is reached. The irony is that at the heart of that aloneness you feel intimately connected with the world. Indeed, the beauty of nature is often the wisest balm for it gently relieves and releases the caged mind. Calmness flows in to wash away anxiety and worry."
– John O'Donohue, (2004), Divine Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, Ch.1, p. 27

A New History of Ireland, Vol I: Prehistoric and Early Ireland, Oxford University Press, 2005, edited by Dáibhí Ó Cróinín, gives an account of "a wide range of national and international scholars, in every field of study, ... archaeology, art, culture, geography, geology, history, language, law, literature, music, ... surveys of all previous scholarship combined with the latest research findings... Irish history from the dawn of time down to the coming of the Normans in 1169."
Included are excerpts, pp. 306-308, from "The church in Irish society, 400–800" (1987) by early Irish church historian, Kathleen W. Hughes (1926-1977), "the events of the later half of the 5th century have been extended backwards to accommodate as early a date as possible for the arrival of Saint Patrick..."

Origins of Cork City
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Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Waterford, Wexford are all Norse place-names, and were the first Norse settlements in Ireland, from 795 AD, when Viking longships began raiding the coast of Ireland. Viking Network Ireland has a comprehensive overview of Nordic settlement in Ireland. Professor of Viking Studies at the University of Nottingham, Judith Jesch explained, in her April 6, 2017 article, What does the word 'Viking' really mean?: There are actually two, or even three, different words that such explanations could refer to. "Viking" in present-day English can be used as a noun ("a Viking") or an adjective ("Viking raid").

According to archaeologist Dr. Maurice Hurley, as reported in The Irish Times, September 26, 2017, 1,000-year-old Viking sword found at Cork Beamish site, recent discoveries of "exceptional significance" include,

"The perfectly-preserved wooden sword is a little over 30cm in length, made entirely from yew, and features carved human faces typical of the Ringerike style of Viking art, dating it roughly to the late 11th century. . . 'The sword was used probably by women, to hammer threads into place on a loom; the pointed end is for picking up the threads for pattern-making. It's highly decorated - the Vikings decorated every utilitarian object,' he said.
One of the other artefacts found was a wooden thread-winder carved with two horses' heads, also associated with fabric weaving." >>>more

Origin of Irish Linen
During the Protestant Reformation (1515-1648), French Huguenot 'refugees' sought refuge around the world, including Ireland, following The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (pdf), where their contributions to the linen industry is legendary.
Cork became a prosperous commercial centre: The port of Cork had become a key trading post for exports of linen, wool, hides, iron, salt, wine, butter and beef.

Ireland, set in stone
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First-hand overview of Cork:
Thomas Crofton Croker, in Researches in the South of Ireland (1824), opens with this observation:

"Intimately connected as are the Sister Islands of Great Britain and Ireland, it is an extraordinary fact that the latter country should be comparatively a terra incognita to the English in general, who, notwithstanding their love of travel and usual spirit of inquiry, are still contented to remain very imperfectly acquainted with the actual state of so near a portion of the British empire."
...
"Cork Harbour is considered one of the best and most frequented ports in Ireland; its mouth is narrow, probably not more than half a mile from side to side, and is commanded by two forts named Camden and Carlisle, passing which the view opens on a magnificent expanse of water resembling a bay." - p. 184. >>>more

Carmel McCaffrey and Leo Eaton state, "In Search of Ancient Ireland: The Origins of the Irish from Neolithic Times to the Coming of the English" (2003), Ch 3, Ireland and the Celtic Culture, The Irish Celtic Language, (archived here):

"In spite of the lack of archaeological evidence we do know that the Celtic language and culture came to Ireland. There is ample evidence to show that by around A.D. 100 Ireland was a Celtic speaking country. One major source in support of this is Ptolemy's map of Ireland dating to about A.D. 150, which shows the country to be Celtic speaking. Ptolemy was a Greek geographer, and Professor Donnchadh O' Corrain, medieval historian at University College Cork, believes that this is the strongest evidence for the arrival of the Celtic or Gaelic language into Ireland. Written texts from the sixth century show the vernacular language in Ireland to be the Irish language, Gaelic. The pre-Celtic language, whatever it was, was gone by this time, leaving only traces behind. These old texts also describe a Celtic society similar to that found on the Continent with comparable gods and goddesses."

Carmel McCaffrey (2003), continues, in Ch 3, stating that Professor Barry Raftery (1944-2010), who held the Chair of Celtic Archaeology at University College Dublin from 1996 - 2007, believed isolated continental Iron Age findings in Ireland may have been a result of trade and smaller migratory settlements, rather than evidence of mass 500BC Continental Celt Iberian/Milesian 'invasion' and that

"wider cultural significance should not be exaggerated" because these artefacts "clearly belonged to an aristocratic elite who may have travelled to Ireland and settled there alongside the already established community" and that "nobody believes in large-scale migration into the country." >>>more

The Cork Historical and Archaeological Society (CHAS), founded in 1891, provides digitised Indexes of the Journal (1892-2005).
E.g. Historical and Topographical Notices of Cork, compiled chiefly from Manuscript Sources, 1906 (pdf), By Colonel T. A. Dunham, C.B., M.A., M.R.I.A.
Screen capture-opening paragraph:

The Royal Irish Academy, founded in 1785, continues to publish anthropological and archeological discoveries. In this 1942 report, which aims to clarify Finbarr's origins, the scholars referenced are of the clergy:

... known to archaeologists and historians because of the publications of the late Canon Lyons [1893] and the late Canon O'Mahony [1913].  The site was further described by the present writer in the course of a paper on "The Place Names and Antiquities of Kinalmeaky Barony, Co. Cork [1930]." Because of the researches of Canon O'Mahony the site has been identified with Ráth Raithleann, the seat of the rulers of the Ui Eachach, a branch of the Eoghanacht, and consequently has been regarded as the birthplace of St. Finbarr, the patron saint of the Diocese of Cork [1936]. – Seán P. O'Riordáin and Rev. J. Ryan, 1942, The Excavation of a Large Earthen Ring-Fort at Garranes, Co. Cork, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature, Vol. 47 (1941/1942), p. 77

National Inventory of Archaeological Heritage...
The purpose of the NIAH is to identify, record, and evaluate the post-1700 architectural heritage of Ireland.

Excerpt:
1. Granada Convention
The Council of Europe, in Article 2 of the 1985 Convention for the Protection of the Architectural Heritage of Europe (Granada Convention), states that 'for the purpose of precise identification of the monuments, groups of structures and sites to be protected, each member State will undertake to maintain inventories of that architectural heritage.' The Granada Convention emphasises the importance of inventories in underpinning conservation policies.
The NIAH was established in 1990 to fulfill Ireland’s obligations under the Granada Convention, through the establishment and maintenance of a central record, documenting and evaluating the architectural heritage of Ireland. ... >>>more

"the greatest Irish scholar of his age"
John O'Donovan (1806-1861). Wikipedia 'snap-shots' of legendary scholars includes legendary Kilkenny topographer John O'Donovan: "Ordnance Survey’s expert on placenames for the first survey in the 1830"

Compassion, gratitude, and admiration is called for as we come to understand the scope of efforts involved in interpreting cultural and linguistic sources within a complex 'foreign' language, such as those transcribed from Old Gaelic to Latin, and then to English.

A 1849: "Letter from John O'Donovan to Dr. James Hentorn Todd in which he talks about the differing viewpoints on the origins of the four cities inhabited by Tuatha Dé Danann before they came to Ireland" exemplifies the honesty of efforts made by so many scholars across the centuries. (The original hand-written letter is available on the National Library of Ireland Catalogue.)

Flattened by historiography
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In order to overcome 'flattening by historiography' we need to understand the perspectives of our interpreters.

Following Catholic Emancipation in 1829, the RCC was able to own property:
Funding for land and construction of cathedrals, churches and schools came from supporters across the international Irish diaspora. While undertaking extensive research on RCC foundraising campaigns, Northern Irish researcher Dr. Sarah Roddy was awarded a Future Research Leaders grant (2016-18) by the UK Economic and Social Research Council for a project investigating Irish Catholic fundraising, 1850-1921.

In The Devotional Revolution in Ireland, (1972), American scholar of Irish history Emmet Larkin (1927-2012) attributed a sea change in Irish Catholicism to Cardinal Paul Cullen (1803-1878), known for his role in crafting “ultramontane” supporting papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council (1868 to 1870), and for leading the devotional piety 'revolution' that followed the “Romanisation" of the Catholic Church in Ireland.

The peak period of mass starvation, death and emigration during the Great Famine (1845-1852) saw increased interest in the origins of Irish culture. An ongoing effort to achieve accurate understanding is seen in the Introduction to The Book of Rights published by The Celtic Society, Dublin, in 1847.

A selection of articles on revisionism in Irish history, written by American Legal Librarian James V. Mullin, author of The Irish Famine Curriculum, are shared HERE

"Untilled Fields of Irish History"
On 29 August 1998, Peter Beresford Ellis presented a lecture to the annual Desmond Greaves Summer School on the history of Irish medical literature, "Untilled Fields of Irish History" which was published in the September 1999 edition of the legendary Irish journal An Phoblacht.

Excerpt: Before the turn of the 19th Century, the Irish language contained the world's most extensive collection of medical literature in any one language. Just think about that fact. The great medieval Irish medical books are scattered in many repositories. These books survive from the 13th and 16th Centuries.

One would have thought that within the modern vogue for alternative medicine, these books would be examined by scholars and students producing their countless works on the ancient medicines of the world and medical histories. They are not.

There are many Irish medical works that are not even catalogued. From the time of Charlemagne, Irish medical men have spread through Europe. Niall O Clacán (c. 1501-1655) trained in medicine in the old Gaelic tradition and became not only physician to Louis XIII of France but Professor of Medicine at Toulouse and Bologna, writing some of the leading medical works of his day, such as Cursus Medicus. The University of Bologna, where he taught, holds several Irish manuscripts and even printed books from his personal library. ... Until we can rescue all of the material that has been neglected in these European repositories, covering over 1,000 years of Irish history, we will only have glimpses of Irish historical reality and never a total picture.
>>> more

The Gifts of Autobiography
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"a chronology of Irish autobiographical writing from the fifth century to the contemporary era, the first of its kind to be published."

A History of Irish Autobiography
2018, Cambridge University Press
edited by Professor Liam Harte
[Google Books scan]

Abstract
A History of Irish Autobiography is the first critical survey of autobiographical self-representation in Ireland from its recoverable beginnings to the twenty-first century. The book draws on a wealth of original scholarship by leading experts to provide an authoritative examination of life-writing in the English and Irish languages. Beginning with a comprehensive overview of autobiography theory and criticism in Ireland, this History guides the reader through seventeen centuries of Irish achievement in autobiography, a category that incorporates diverse literary forms, from religious tracts and travelogues to memoirs, diaries and digital narratives. Chapters are structured around key subgenres, themes, texts and practitioners, and each features a guide to recommended further reading. The volume’s extensive coverage is complemented by a chronology of Irish autobiographical writing from the fifth century to the contemporary era, the first of its kind to be published.

Many 'hidden' women's stories:

“...the vexing question of why historians have virtually ignored the important contribution of Irish women to the main political, literary and social events in their country’s history”.
– Jane Côté, (1992), "Writing Women out of History: Fanny and Anna Parnell and the Irish Ladies' Land League", Etudes irlandaises Année, 17-2, pp. 123-134

The Irish Women’s Writing (1880-1920) Network provides extensive references, and "facilitates international and interdisciplinary connections and exchanges between researchers recovering and studying the lives and work of Irish women writers, artists, historians, scientists and more."

“Just as many of the works of Irish women writers have been hidden, so have, or indeed, still are, the primary sources that would foster greater understanding of the women and their work.”
– Kathleen Williams, John J. Burns Library, Boston College

WIMIC Women in Modern Irish Culture:
A Database of Irish Women’s Writing: 1800 – 2005
“A bibliographical database of 9647 Irish women writers, who wrote in both Irish and English, between 1800 and 2005. ... Every known edition of a book, play, or film is listed, along with details of printers and publishers for each work.” >>>more

"purposely eclectic"
Mary S. Pierse edited Irish Feminisms, 1810-1930 (Routledge, 2010):
Five volumes featuring 180 documents. "The scale of editorial endeavour here, was clearly immense… (including political manifestoes, crusading journalism, new educational agendas, as well as poetic and fictional reimaginings of personal and social responsibility) appears even more compelling."
– Reviewed by Margaret Kelleher, author of The Feminization of Famine, (1997), an investigation of writings by women on the Great Irish Famine.

“Women are systematically seen as less authoritative, ...
And their influence is systematically lower.
And they’re speaking less.
And when they’re speaking up, they’re not being listened to as much, and they are being interrupted more.”
– Brittany Karford Rogers, BYU Magazine, Spring 2020 Issue

Selected Online Resources
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The UCD Chair of Archaeology and Irish History was established in 1854 by legendary "philologist and antiquarian" Eugene O'Curry (1794-1862), who helped to explain the centuries of unresolved confusion surrounding 'interpretations' of the works of Irish folklorists and "profound" scholars".

The Irish Texts Society was founded in 1898.
HISTORY IRELAND was founded in 1963: The Origins of the Irish Text Society provides an overview of mid-1800s works by a broad range of writers, scholars and folklorists:
"Bodies such as the Irish Archaeological Society (founded in 1840), the Celtic Society (founded in 1845) – amalgamated from 1862 as the Irish Archaeological and Celtic Society – and the Ossianic Society (founded in 1853)."

UCD historians Marc Caball and Benjamin Hazard, in keeping with the tradition of "Annalese historians", are in the midst of reviewing "early English translations of a seminal work of seventeenth-century Gaelic historiography" –

Gaelic Ireland in the seventeenth century was paradoxically characterised by a remarkable degree of cultural vibrancy . . . It is suggested that Geoffrey Keating’s canonical history of Ireland, which circulated extensively in manuscript format in Gaelic Ireland in the seventeenth century and beyond, is emblematic of concurrent vitality and vulnerability. . .
– Caball, M., & Hazard, B. (2013). Dynamism and decline: Translating Keating's "Foras Feasa ar Éirinn" in the seventeenth century. Studia Hibernica, (39), 49-69. (Download pdf)

CELT Project: University College Cork's "Corpus of Electronic Texts" (FAQ), includes historic documents such as the Annals of the Four Masters, a chronicle of ancient Irish history up to 1616. The first substantial English translation (from AD 1171) was published by Owen Connellan in 1846, and includes the annals from the eleventh to the seventeenth centuries.

Geoffrey Keating, (1569-1644): Foras Feasa ar Éirinn text, aka The History of Ireland (1634), was digitised by CELT Project

The Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI), at Trinity College Dublin, a national repository for Ireland’s social and cultural data, includes biographical notes for Geoffrey Keating (1569-1644), the highly revered Anglo-Norman historian, from Tipperary, writing in the Irish language, and a Catholic priest, trained in Bordeaux.
Excerpt from Biographical notes:

GEOFFREY KEATING stands alone among Gaelic writers: he has had neither precursor nor successor nor, in his own domain, either equal or second. His works show the fullest development of the language, and his historical treatise, with which we are here concerned, marks an epoch in our literature, a complete departure from the conventional usage of the annalists. . . .

Keating's works showed his strong Catholic faith and the influence of Counter Reformation thought on his writing, but he was also keen to glorify Ireland. He took it upon himself to right the wrongs that he claimed had been done by historians who came before him, and accused them of selecting the bad aspects of the Irish and Ireland to write about, while ignoring all the good things.

From the "Editor's Preface" to Keating's The History of Ireland, an informative excerpt:

In his Literary History of Ireland, Dr. Douglas Hyde thus contrasts the O'Clerys and Keating: – As if to emphasise the truth that they were only redacting the Annals of Ireland from the most ancient sources at their command, the Masters wrote in an ancient bardic dialect, full at once of such idioms and words as were unintelligible, even to the men of their own day, unless they had received a bardic training. In fact, they were learned men writing for the learned, and this work was one of the last efforts of the esprit de corps of the school-bred shanachy which always prompted him to keep bardic and historical learning a close monopoly amongst his own class. Keating was Michael O'Clery's contemporary, but he wrote – and I consider him the first Irish historian and trained scholar who did so – for the masses, not the classes, and he had his reward in the thousands of copies of his popular History made and read throughout all Ireland, while the copies made of the Annals were quite few in comparison, and after the end of the seventeenth century little read.

Geoffrey Keating's poetry reveals his love for "beauty-fretted Erinn" 
– sourced and translated here:

SLAN LE H-ERINN - Farewell to Ireland
Geoffrey Keating (1569-1644)

My blessing with thee letter,
To beauty-fretted Erinn
Would I could see her highlands
Though crimson dyes oft wearing.

Fond blessings to her nobles.
And priesthood holy. fonder,
Her maidens and her sages
Who o'er her pages ponder.

Best wishes to her truest,
Her blue of bluest mountains,
My love to those within her,
Her lakes and linns and fountains.

Her woods with berries drooping,
Her sparkling pools with fishes,
Her moors and meadows greenest
To these my teeming wishes.

My heart's best memories to her
Broad bays and surest harbours,
Her yellow harvest bending,
Her songs in blending arbours.

Though passionate the people
In the saints' meetest island,
Athwart the billows rearing
My blessing bear to Ireland.

Full Circle: 
Birthing visionary literary culture.
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The documentation of Irish history provides an archetypal example of closely examined transition from unwritten to written language and back via the complete destruction of an ancient and complex cultural heritage - language, music, arts, philosophy - under force of British law (O'Sullivan-Beare, 1625 / 2009). The lineage offers a model case-history for scientists exploring cultural fortitude - courage in pain or adversity - leading to cultural resilience: Over the last 30 years, a burst of research on the interaction between slow and fast brain waves has led to the discovery that Gamma brain waves –The Insight Wave, the fastest brain waves, are associated with breakthrough intuition, perception, and insight – sudden insights, subtle hunches, serendipitous associations – and high-level information processing: We process learning while sleeping (see Sleep Studies) helps us to heal and grow.

In the midst of research for his exquisite 1998 masterpiece, The Alphabet vs The Goddess (download pdf, or see dedicated page here) the late Dr. Leonard Shlain(1937-2009), University of San Francisco Professor of Medicine specializing in blood-flow to the brain, explained the implications for those breakthroughs in brain research: how the visual cortex's holistic visionary capacity evolved before the process of learning alphabetic literacy rewired the human brain, and that literacy reinforced the brain's linear, abstract, predominantly masculine left hemisphere at the expense of the holistic, iconic feminine 'mind'.
Professor Shlain explained,

This shift upset the balance between men and women initiating the disappearance of goddesses, the abhorrence of images, and, in literacy's early stages, the decline of women's political status. Patriarchy and misogyny followed. 
– Leonard Shlain, 1998, The Alphabet vs The Goddess
See Study Notes HERE

The good news is that Professor Shlain also described how we have developed our analytical capacity to the point where we can reengage our visionary capacity, with profound consequences for culture in that our evolving interdisciplinary, visionary, and analytical thinking will be directed to finding 'holistic' solutions for our 'evolutionary' needs.

©2017 Maireid Sullivan

Go to: - late 1800s Irish diaspora 'freedom movement':
–: The Irish National Land League & Michael Davitt
–: 1600-1800 Irish land law history references HERE
–: The Irish Connection, Professor Gaffney "The Corruption of Economics, 1994, CH 6

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