Day 16: Dublin (Baile Átha Cliath)

APRIL 19 - The hotel we are staying in is by far the fanciest place yet. Wouldn’t know it from the price, which is more or less on par with every other room we’ve stayed in recently. It is within easy walking distance of all the things we wanted to see in town. Park the car in a lot and don’t use it today. First go across the bridge to Burgh Quay and into the grounds of Trinity College. It was established in 1592 by Queen Elizabeth I, and sports both Victorian and Georgian buildings.

My original idea was to see the Book of Kells (well, the page they leave open for tourists), for which there was a formidable line. Not only that, but tickets were available only online. Decided to worry about that later and instead walked around the campus.

“A sphere within a sphere”, a creation by Arnaldo Pomodoro, on the Trinity College campus. The inner sphere represents the earth, while the outer represents Christianity. It seems mechanical and conflicted, so I’m not sure what the artist was really trying to say.

Down the street from this is the National Museum of Ireland - Archaeology. I originally though to just stop in here for a bit and look at some Neolithic history, but the layout was really interesting and the building itself was like a piece of art, so we ended up there for hours.

A decorated stone from near Youghal (close to Ardmore). The swirling, labyrinth-type design is common in Neolithic tombs. Apparently the idea was to hypnotize the viewer, thus transporting them into the spiritual world.

Some discussion of the most legendary battle in the history of Ireland: the Battle of Clontarf.

This day-long battle took place on April 23, 1014, in what is not central Dublin (or it could have been slightly northeast, there is no known archaeological evidence to help). It is one of these clashes that has come to symbolize so much, hence the myth has overwhelmed the factual information available. In the mythic retelling, it is a victory by the Irish high king Brian ‘Boru’ mac Cannetig over the Viking invaders, in which Brian dies heroically defending his homeland.

Brian was the king of Dal Cais, which is in present-day County Clare (the location of the Cliffs of Moher), and was, at the time of battle, the most influential king on the island. He was supported in the battle by Mael Sechnaill mac Domnaill, the Irish king of Tara (northwest of Dublin). They were arrayed against Sitric (Sigtryggr Olafsson), who was the Viking king of Dublin, Mael Morde mac Murchada (king of Leinster and brother-and-law to Brian Boru), and Sigurdr Hindvisson (Jarl of Orkney, and the most powerful Viking leader in the Irish Sea region).

Sitric had decided to fully control the area of Dublin, and Mael Morde mac Murchada allied with him. Brian decided to fight him for this control, but before he got there with an army, Sitric had forged an alliance with Sigurdr Hindvisson and thus gained more Viking warriors to defend the town.

The battle itself is undocumented in any detail, but historians assume the two sides pretty much just lined up and charged each other, using brute force to break the opposer’s ranks. When this eventually occurred late in the day, it was Sitric who fled. Only two of the leaders listed above lived (Mael Sechnaill and Sitric), suggesting that the battle was intense and that both sides lost a significant number of combatants.

In the end, Mael Sechnaill became the most powerful king of the Irish, and Sitric remained leader of Dublin. Both were weakened by the battle, but by all appearances, the event was a stalemate.

One interesting aside one may take from the above account is that sometimes Irish kings sided with ‘outsiders’ to crush fellow Irish kings. This also occurred during the Anglo-Norman invasion starting about 50 years later.

One of the most impressive torc necklaces in the museum. Some of the gold work is very detailed, and gained complexity once artistic influence from Europe began to seep in through trade. Some of the pieces that are normally exhibited here are currently in London, at the Stonehenge exhibit we saw on Day 2.

FUN FACT: “Beyond the Pale”. This odd saying is one I’ve always understood to mean “something so bad that there is no way to excuse it happening”. It actually refers to geographic boundary, that of the Anglo-Normans when they occupied Ireland. What they controlled, including the lands around Dublin, was called ‘The Pale’. So everything outside of that was considered a dark chaos.

This museum has one section, named the Bog Bodies Research Project, dedicated to the bodies recovered from bogs (bog mechanics are discussed on Day 15). A number of preserved corpses are on display, including the Oldcroghan Man from County Meath (or at least what is left of him). I present no pictures of them here, and I noticed that some people couldn’t deal with looking at them in their display cases. Unlike skeletons, the presence of recognizable arms, faces, and hair seems to cross the boundary from curious to creepy. All appear to have been killed in nasty ways, suggesting that disposal of bodies in bogs was a sort of ritual following execution.

A view of Stephen’s Green, just a few blocks south of Trinity College. I can say it was a really pleasant park partly because of the weather. It gave me a moment to reflect on the state of present-day Ireland. For much of its history, the island has been battered by conflict. This very park is an example of that. Until modern times, the grounds (it used to be a marshland) have seen public hangings and other violent activities, as well as battles during the 1916 Easter Uprising. It is difficult to feel those times now, sitting on a bench and watching the children race around the playground.

Christ Church Cathedral, founded in the 11th Century under the Viking king Sitric, who ironically was portrayed as the antagonist in the Battle of Clontarf (described above). It has obviously undergone several renovations since that time.

A view of the River Liffey, facing downstream.

In our never-ending quest to find different things to eat, Janet seeks out the Brazilian restaurant Tucano! about two blocks from our hotel. The vibe is quite a change from the street, with Brazilian lounge music and nearly all the diners speaking Portuguese.

Republic of Ireland