Island of Saints and Scholars, oh, and Churches, Shrines and Relics

Ireland had an incredibly large and interesting collection of religious shrines, relics, ceremonial and religious artifacts, chalices, crosses, bells, monstrances, reliquaries, books, manuscripts and psalters dating from the arrival of St. Patrick in the fifth century, through the following one thousand years of Christianity. 
In its heyday, in the 9th century, Ireland was churning out books and monks in equal numbers, re-christianising dark-ages Europe 








(see 'How the Irish Saved Civilisation', by Thomas Cahill). 

Unfortunately for us many of the trappings of that immensely rich christian era have not survived to today. We lost a lot of our religious shrines, relics and artifacts when the Vikings raided our monastic settlements in the 9th and 10th centuries. They were plundering for low-hanging fruit and Ireland was an orchard of same for them. While monasteries and abbeys were generally under the protection of the local Irish chieftain or king, there was no natural enemy, save a local dispute and indeed many inter-Irish rivalries resulted in raids that  were focussed on plundering the wealth of our own abbeys and convents, just as the vikings did. 

Some monastic settlements built tall round towers, iconic, pointy-topped, stone towers, perhaps to provide a crows-nest for lookouts to identify raiding parties while still some way off. Other round towers, with their only door situated some thirty feet up the tower, accessible by a retractable ladder, served as safe-houses, immune from attack, providing protection both for the monks and for their treasured objects, which included true treasures, from gem encrusted chalices to richly decorated manuscripts. 


The Vikings were indiscriminate, opportunistic raiders, taking plunder in every form, from portable treasure, to irreplaceable books, to hostages and slaves. Mind you, lest you think we Irish were all saints, many Irish under-lords were no better in their day, striking terror into the villages along the Welsh coast in the 5th and 6th centuries, enslaving their captives, including one rather famous one, St. Patrick.





We lost even more of our ecclesiastical treasure during the reigns of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I. Monasteries with their fertile land, fish-filled lakes and brimming coffers became targets for opportunistic soldiers and civil servants in the enforced dissolution of the monasteries, destruction of the mother church and introduction of the new, imposed state-controlled established church, anglicanism.

Then finally, in the late 17th and early 18th century, came the total destruction of the old Irish order and our unique dare I say it, the non-European system of government, alliances and land use, all swept away by the English resulting in the killing of half the population in war and famine, the confiscation at gun-point of all the lands of Ireland, the destruction of the old Irish agricultural system based on cattle,  the enclosure of our fields for cultivation and rent, and finally, he slaughter of the relics, in a systematic and deliberate theft or destruction of the symbols of our christianity, idolatry to the invader, during the Cromwellian and Williamite pogrom, leading to the complete subjugation of Ireland to British Rule, and including the complete proscription of the Catholic religion during the Penal Laws. 




What had survived through the earlier difficult centuries with the help of Irish and Norman patronage, was now swept away entirely, lost forever, our past glory, gone, without trace. Churches allover Ireland burned, stripped of their glass and lead and timbers and carvings. A thousand years of Irish christianity and all that was associated with it, demonised, destroyed, stolen, eradicated.
Yet, despite these incredible odds, some church artifacts have survived, showing us just exactly how incredibly sophisticated and learned were our fore-fathers.

The Book of Kells, The Cross of Cong, the Ardagh Chalice, St. Patrick's Bell, and so many more gloriously executed items that survived, and now define our past relationship with God. Some were plundered, but survived being broken up, or melted down. Some were hidden in churches and homes, protected from destruction, but cosseted from view. Others were lost, perhaps in times of danger or attack, or simply hidden and mislaid. Either way, we are fortunate that so much has survived. We can gaze in awe at the astonishing skill and faith of our forebears. The Derrynaflan Chalice is one amazing example. 

So also is this item below, the Moylough Belt. Moylough, in the southern part of County Sligo, was under the protection and support of the O'Connors, the last high kings of Ireland and a family who more than many, oversaw the creation and ultimate survival of  so much of our church history
Just imagine if you lived in that era. What was Ireland like? Imagine what the people were like? That's the sort of conversation I have with my guests on my Walking Tours of Galway ... and hey, everyday is a school day! (Nah, school was never like this). 

Brian Nolan, Galway Walks - Walking Tours of Galway www.galwaywalks.com or @Galwaywalks on Twitter and Instagram 

The Moylough Belt

"Dating from the 8th century AD, the Moylough belt shrine is one of the great treasures of early Ireland. Fashioned out of bronze and silver, it was found in 1945 by Mr John Towey as he dug turf on his father’s farm at Moylough, Co. Sligo. Slicing through the soft peat, he unexpectedly hit something hard at depth of c. 4 feet below the surface. Presuming it was a large stone, John bent down and cleared away the soil with a small garden trowel. To his amazement, what was revealed was not a stone, but instead, a glistening, metallic object. The Moylough belt shrine had been discovered.

The belt consists of four bronze segments, each of which enclose a strip of plain leather. The bronze sections are richly decorated and are also hinged together, so that the components are flexible. This means that the belt could, if desired, be placed around the waist. Indeed, wear patterns visible on its surface suggest that it was often worn/used.

Each of the bronze segments contain a centrally placed medallion featuring a ‘Celtic cross’, while their ends are further ornamented with panels of stamped silver foil or openwork bronze. The most elaborate decoration is seen on the two front segments, which take the form of a false buckle and buckle plate. These are embellished with silver foil, glass and enamel, as well as animal and bird head motifs.

This beautiful artefact more than likely represents a shrine that was specifically made to encase the leather segments. It is these simple leather strips then, and not the costly casing, that are the real treasure. They were probably associated with a local saint and must have been important relics to have been so richly adorned.

Photos: National Museum of Ireland

Sources

Duignan M.V. in O’Kelly, M. J. 1965 ‘The Belt-Shrine from Moylough, Sligo’ in The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, Vol. 95, No. 1/2, Papers in Honour of Liam Price.

O Floinn, R. 2003 ‘The Moylough Belt-shrine’ in J. Fenwick (ed.) Lost and Found, discovering Ireland’s past, Wordwell, Bray"

The Emergency

Military ‘attack’ on Loughrea, February 18, 1943. The report in the Connacht Tribune on the 18th of February 1943 reads as follows; "From 2p.m. to 6p.m. on last Sunday, large-scale exercise in which all of the voluntary services of the district took part, were carried out in Loughrea. The town was “attacked” at 3 o’clock from all sides by L.D.F. units from neighbouring villages, while units from the town defended. Incidents arising from these engagements brought the L.S.F. into action and this branch had a busy time dealing with attempted “bank robberies”, “looting of food depots”, etc."

I think this photograph may have been taken on that day the mock invasion 'exercise' took place. 

The photo reminds me of that BBC TV series, 'Dad's Army'. It was taken outside the Court House on the Fair Green, by the lake in Loughrea. It shows the Loughrea LDF, or Local Defence Force, taken some time during 'The Emergency'. The 'Emergency is the Irish euphemism for WW2. Most cars were banned from the roads for the duration of the war. Travel was severely restricted. Food and other necessities such as tobacco and tea were rationed. Men and some women, who did not toe the line or were known firebrands were interned in the Curragh military camp without trial. Strangers, were all treated with suspicion, as potential spies. The army was beefed up and our borders and ports protected. We were at war in all but fact. 
As a country, we Irish tried to stay out of the war, though it waged all around us for 6 years. We remained 'Neutral' during the second world war, mainly because our government under Eamon DeValera could not countenance or stomach the idea of Irish men fighting for the Union Jack, only 20 years after our own war of revolution against the British and then our Civil War, which like all civil wars, was not civil in any way. Suffice it to say, while the Irish love a good fight, this fight (WW2) was not ours. 

Some men from Loughrea went to Northern Ireland or took the boat to England and signed up for military service, and while the country officially vilified them, privately, many Irish people supported or even envied them, despite the danger, they wanted to see an end to Hitler's tyranny and were willing to risk their lives to see that it happened. Loughrea had a history of fighting, having had many men serving in the British regiments in WWI, or engaged in the Volunteers during our war of independence and our civil war. Loughrea even had men volunteering to fight in the Spanish Civil War, on both sides. By 1943, fully half of Loughrea's men-folk were enlisted in the professional Irish Army, or were volunteers in the LDF, the volunteer local defence force (later the FCA). I remember my dad telling me that the LDF group he joined in Tynagh and Duniry placed huge trunks of trees across large fields in the locality to deny the enemy a landing field for aircraft, much to the annoyance of the local farmers. 

All across Ireland LDF men were engaged in making sure that house lights were covered at night so that overflying aircraft would not be able to identify which part of Ireland they were flying over. More were tasked with taking down and hiding all local signposts, or worse, putting them back up in entirely irrelevant places, or pointing them in the wrong direction. They even painted over the names on schools and halls, so that the invaders wouldn't be able to orient themselves in an invasion. Others were keeping watch should aircraft attempt to land, or catching any spies who may have been abroad on the roads at night. It gave folks a sense of being involved...don't forget Europe was at war and though we were neutral, many men felt we should have been involved, on the British side, though a minority were republican and German sympathisers. Thus, by definition, the expected invaders would be Germans, not British. Ironic eh!

Dermot Harrison (RIP) who owned a drapery shop on Main Street in Loughrea, once told me of the night in April 1944 that Loughrea was 'invaded', though this attack was not a planned LDF exercise. 
The LDF in Loughrea only had one 303 Lee Enfield rifle in their 'arsenal', and though a relic from the British army in WWI, it was still a lethal weapon. Some of the LDF men had shotguns and 22 rifles, but there was only one big gun in town, and everyone of the men wanted to be carrying that weapon when the invasion actually happened. Consequently, that sole 303 rifle was rotated amongst the volunteers, passed by rota, from one LDF member to another LDF member each night, to the person who was to be the nightwatch sentry, 'on duty' that night. To add insult to injury, they also only had one clip of five 303 bullets as ammunition for said Lee Enfield, and there were strict instructions from 'on high' that those five bullets should only be fired if the town was in 'mortal danger'. 

And so it came to pass on that April night in 1943 that it was Paddy Bowes' turn to stand guard. (Bowes house is now Beatty's, beside AIB, and formerly Nolan's, my parents home for 50 years). Paddy Bowes was not your average guy, in fact one could say Paddy Bowes was prone to excitement, and certainly not to be trusted with even a toy pistol, not to mind a Lee Enfield Mark III 303 rifle with a range of 2 miles.

Dermot Harrison described to me the absolute shock and terror of being woken from his slumber around 4am by a volley of shots from a few doors up the street, Paddy Bowes's house. It had finally happened, the long threatened German invasion of Ireland had started and Loughrea was in the thick of it. And wouldn't you know it, Paddy Bowes was the lucky man 'on duty' with the 'big gun'. Dermot related to me the thrill he felt, the adrenaline rushing through him as he tripped down the stairs in his under-clothes and out into pitch dark Main Street, ready to do his bit and die for Mother Ireland, or at least surrender gracefully, hopefully the latter.  

Up and down the town the story was the same as the brave, and the not so brave LDF men leapt out of their comfortable Main Street beds, bidding goodbye to their still slumbering wives, while gainfully pulling up trousers and galoisses, and grabbing hurley sticks or broom handles or kitchen knives, before rushing out onto the street as they's been drilled to do, to mount a defense and stop the Nazi invaders in their tracks at the entrance to the town at West Bridge or Bride Street, only to find a wide-eyed Paddy Bowes, in his undershirt, barefoot, still waving the rifle around, and obviously delighted with himself, thumping his chest, totally on a high. 

Men gathered around Paddy on the rapidly filling street, excited, relieved that the danger had passed, leaning into the knot of men, and him telling anyone who'd listen that he'd gotten two of the bastards, shooting one right between the eyes, the other in the back, loosing off the remaining three bullets in the clip, before the third one fled over a gate into the laneway behind Sweeney's hardware. 

"I got them lads, I got them, killed two of them winged another!' A great hurrah from the men, though some were still nervous, still expecting that a squad of German stormtroopers would round Brogan's corner any minute, or worse, a tank and they'd be looking for vengeance, out for blood, all because of trigger-happy Bowes.

Finally some order began to descend. An NCO from the Hibernian Bank arrived on the street, and it was noted by some that like all NCO's, he hadn't been first to answer the call, to risk all for the town. No, he'd waited 'til the worst of the fighting was over before coming to claim the credit, and the rifle!. He cleared a path to the now famous Paddy Bowes and in officer fashion, took the rifle from Paddy's hands. 'I'll take that Bowes, Good man, now, which way did they go, how many did you see, where are the bodies of the two dead Germans?' 

"Germans? Germans? Whaddya mean Germans?
It's cats I shot, not krauts, I shot the bleddy tom cats on McInerney's roof, had me awake all night with their squealing and wailing! Well they won't be doing that again, no-sir-ee ... bang, bang, bang, ya should've seen 'em fly, deadly, jeez I'm buzzin'!' 

Well, I dunno if Paddy Bowes is in that old LDF photo or not, but if he is, then it was definitely pre-April 1944.

Photo credit to Laurence Smyth for the LDF photo via Loughrea Memories on Facebook.