http://hdl.handle.net/10468/425 2017-10-12T01:44:17Z http://hdl.handle.net/10468/2539 Too beautiful for thieves and pickpockets: a history of the Victorian convict prison on Spike Island McCarthy, Cal; Ó Donnabháin, Barra Spike Island holds a unique place among the world’s prisons: a welcome necessity for the prison authorities of Ireland, a remote and dangerous posting for its staff, a grand hell for those convicted to stay behind its walls. For almost four decades the Victorian prison on Spike Island was home to Ireland’s most serious and notorious criminals. Established in the midst of one of the worst famines in global history, this huge facility became the largest prison in what was then the United Kingdom, dwarfing institutions like Dartmoor, Pentonville, Mountjoy and Kilmainham. High death rates during its formative years meant that many of its malnourished inmates were laid to rest beneath its sod. Yet Spike Island was to become a beacon of penal reform, influencing modern correctional systems in countries as far apart as the USA and Germany. The story told in this book is one that is, in turn, dramatic, shocking, touching and humorous. The life of the prison was vibrant, peopled by the unfortunate of the society alongside those who committed serious, sometimes gruesome, crimes. This is the story of the establishment and evolution of the prison over 36 years, the often fascinating lives of prisoners and staff and of a time when a renowned Irish fortress of British military power entered the annals of penal infamy. 2016-05-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10468/2655 An archaeology of female monasticism in medieval Ireland Collins, Tracy E. This thesis considers the archaeological evidence for female monasticism in medieval Ireland, with a particular emphasis on the later medieval period. Female monasticism has been considered from an archaeological perspective in several countries, most notably Britain, but has yet to be considered in any detail in Ireland. The study aims to bring together all the currently available evidence on female monasticism and consider it through an engendered archaeological approach. The data gathering for this research has been deliberately wide, and where gaps have been identified in the Irish evidence, comparative material from elsewhere has been considered. Nunneries should not be expected to conform to what has become the male monastic template of a claustrally-planned monastery. The research conducted shows a distinct and varied archaeology and architecture for medieval nunneries in Ireland which suggests that a claustral plan was not considered an essential part of a nunnery scheme. Nunneries provided an enclosed environment where women, for a variety of motives could become brides of Christ. Through the performance and celebration of the daily Divine Office, the Mass and seasonal liturgy, spaces used by the nunnery community were negotiated and transformed into a sacred Paradise on earth. However, rather than being isolated in the landscape nunneries in later medieval Ireland were located either within or close to walled towns, larger unenclosed settlements and settlement clusters and would have been well known throughout their hinterlands. This research concludes that nunneries were an intrinsic part of the medieval monastic landscape in Ireland and an essential component of patrons’ portfolios of patronage, at a particularly local level, and where they interacted closely with their local community. 2016-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10468/3532 The Baltinglass landscape and the hillforts of Bronze Age Ireland O'Driscoll, James Around 1400 BC, Bronze Age communities in many parts Ireland began to construct large enclosures, known as hillforts, on strategically positioned hilltops overlooking broad expanses of lowland. The enclosing elements acted as the visible manifestation of elite authority and power, and the perceived ownership of the land, people and resources within a particular territory. As a central place in the local landscape, the hillfort performed multiple functions for a disparate community, and became a symbol of communal identity. Evidence for the comprehensive destruction of some hillforts suggests they were targeted by rival groups who may have sought to seize control of a local routeway, resource or people. Hillforts are often considered indicative of Late Bronze Age warfaring practices. In Ireland, the emergence of this monument type coincided with the first appearance of the sword and shield, and can be linked with a European-wide warrior tradition. This coincided with a sudden and severe intensification of hillfort construction on the Continent, many of which, upon excavation, have shown evidence of destruction and violence. The Late Bronze Age in Ireland and Europe is generally regarded as an important period of social, economic and political re-organisation, with the construction of hillforts at the centre of these changes in society. They can provide information about the socio-political and economic climate of the period, as well as the nature and scale of conflict, inter-personal violence and power. Despite this, research of Irish hillforts is a neglected field that has not kept pace with hillfort studies in Britain or the Continent. The project will focus on a group of monuments near Baltinglass, Co. Wicklow, described by Condit as ‘Ireland’s hillfort capital’. This will be the first comprehensive interdisciplinary study of that landscape and the first detailed study of any hillfort cluster in prehistoric Ireland. The Wicklow cluster comprises nine of the largest hillforts in Ireland. The project provides an opportunity to expand our knowledge of this unique grouping, as well as the entire corpus of Irish hillforts. The results help contextualize the significance of this area on a national level, assessing its socio-political, economic and ideological importance in contemporary society. More specifically, it assesses the form, functions, economy and strategic positioning of these monuments, using a combination of desk-top research, GIS (Geographic Information Systems), LiDAR (Light Detecting and Ranging), geophysical surveying techniques and conventional fieldwork. 2016-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/10468/2107 Skin and bone: the face in the archaeological imagination Beatty, Katherine E. Thirteen unique archaeological countenances from Ireland were produced through the Manchester method of facial reconstruction. Their gaze prompts a space for a broad discourse regarding the face found within human and artefactual remains of Ireland. These faces are reminders of the human element which is at the core of the discipline of archaeology. These re-constructions create a voyeuristic relationship with the past. At once sating a curiosity about the past, facial reconstructions also provide a catharsis to our presently situated selves. As powerful visual documents, archaeological facial reconstructions illustrate re-presentations of the past as well as how the present can be connected to the past. Through engagment with Emmanuel Levinas’s (1906- 1995) main philosophical themes, the presence of the face is examined in a diachronic structure. The ‘starting point’ is the Neolithic period which has been associated with the notion of visuality with a reconstruction from the early Neolithic site of Annagh, Co. Limerick. The following layer of analysis appears with attention to intersubjectivity in the early medieval period with facial reconstructions from Dooey, Co. Donegal and Owenbristy, Co. Galway. Building upon the past concepts, the late medieval period is associated with the notion of alterity and paired with faces from Ballinderry, Co. Kildare and a sample of males from Gallen Priory, Co. Offaly. The final layer of examination culminates with the application of response and respons-ibility to the post-medieval Irish landscape with facial reconstructions from the prison on Spike Island, Co. Cork. These layers of investigation are similar to the stratigraphical composition of both the archaeological landscape and the skeletal/soft tissue landscape of the face. The separation of the neglected phenomenon of the face from the overwhelming embrace of the field of craniometrics is necessary. Through this detachment a new manner in which to discuss the face and its place within the (bio)archaeological record is possible. Encountering the faces seen in mortuary contexts, material culture, and archaeological facial reconstructions, inform and shape the archaeological imagination. 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z