Dublin, Old and New

One of our guides in Dublin said "In America, 100 years is long and 100 miles is short; in Ireland, 100 years is short and 100 miles is long."

I thought of this as I read our guidebook's discussion of Dublin, which starts out "Until 500AD, Dublin was little more than a crossroads..."  Its first name, Baile Atha Cliath (City of Hurdles) was given it by Celtic traders in the second century AD.   Hard to imagine for this immigrant to Virginia, where "Old Town" Alexandria was founded in 1695.  By 1695, Dublin had been invaded by (among others) Norsemen (837), Anglo-Normans (12th century) and Cromwell (1651). 

We could hardly cover all of that history in the short time we had, so we took the "hop on, hop off" bus from our hotel to get the big picture and visit a few sites--Kilmainham Gaol, Trinity College, the Book of Kells, the Ha'penny Bridge, Temple Bar, and St Stephen's Park.

 The bell tower and front green at Trinity College.

Almost mandatory when visiting Dublin is seeing the Book of Kells, a 9th-century illustrated set of the gospels, at Trinity College's Old Library.  We highly recommend taking one of the student-led tours of Trinity which includes entry to the Book of Kells (and why not?--it's only another Euro over the price of a ticket to see only the Book).  Our guide was a recent graduate of Trinity who pointed out the oldest student housing on the campus--no heat, one shower facility and no WiFi!  

The Book of Kells is a magnificent work of art.  You can see, at any one time, four of the pages, and they are incredible.  There is a wonderful exhibition that examines the artwork in detail.  Sorry, no pictures allowed at the Book of Kells, you'll have to Google it to see it.

Trinity College (chartered in 1592 by Queen Elizabeth) is home to the Old Library (above), which has the right to a copy of every book published in Ireland and the UK, kind of like our Library of Congress.  The books are stored by size.  The Old Library also has a very early Irish harp and one of the original 1916 Proclamations of the Irish Republic.  And a very nice gift shop.

  

The struggle for Irish independence was a recurring theme and constant companion on our tour.  Reminders and memorials are everywhere you look in Ireland, many of the streets, bridges and buildings have been renamed after the heroes, and the people live and breathe it still.  It's one of the reasons Gaelic sports are king here and soccer, not so much.

We visited the 1795 Kilmainham Gaol (pronounced "jail"), where 14 of the 15 executions from the 1916 rebellion took place, and where the leaders of every uprising since it was built (1798, 1803, 1848, 1867 and 1916) were imprisoned.  Our guide there was an amateur historian (shown below in the courtyard of the prison) who told us, over lunch, that his wife couldn't believe he got paid to talk.

The tour, which began and ended in the Irish language, was intense and fascinating, taking us through the prison's history from a debtors' prison through the famine years and ending in the courtyard with the executions of the 1916 Rising.  An unexpected tidbit was that one of the famous scenes from the original Italian Job starring Michael Cain was filmed at Kilmainham in the main cellblock:

We skipped the highly touted (and expensive) tour of the Guinness Storehouse and opted instead to go buy a Guinness in one of the pubs of the Temple Bar district. :D  Before arriving, I thought the Temple Bar was, well, a bar.  But it's a district within the city, like Greenwich Village or Georgetown.  Lively, lots of pubs and artists.  When we were there, there was a lot of liquid prep for the Ireland vs Sweden hurling match to take place at the Croke Park stadium (thankfully, after we left town).

Just outside Temple Bar is a statue to Dublin's legendary fishmonger Molly Malone, or, as our tour guide called her, "The Tart With the Cart."  We were told that she's somewhat controversial and that some want her removed.  We were also told she might have been selling more than fish.

In Dublin's Fair City

Where the girls are so pretty

I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone

As she wheel'd her wheel barrow

Through streets broad and narrow

Crying cockles and mussels alive, alive-o

Alive, alive o!, Alive, alive o!

Crying cockles and mussels alive, alive o!

Next: Belfast...