Ireland in the Ancient World

Date: 3000 b.c.e.-700 c.e.

Locale: Island in the North Atlantic, west of England

Ireland in the Ancient World

Twenty thousand years ago, what is now Ireland was covered with glaciers. The earliest traces of humans in Ireland indicate that people arrived from the Continent about 6800 b.c.e. At that time, the passage between Ireland and Britain was narrower, so adventurers could row across more easily than in modern times. It is not surprising that the earliest evidence of humans on the island was concentrated around Antrim, in northeastern Ireland. The closest passage was probably between Ireland and what is now Scotland, and Antrim was rich in flint, the implement used for making hunting implements in the Mesolithic Age. The population was small but relatively stable for the next three thousand years and lived a nomadic life, eating fish and any wild game they could capture.

By 3500 b.c.e., Neolithic immigrants had arrived in Ireland, and the population spread northwest to Derry, south to Down and Dublin, and west to Roscommon and Sligo. Ireland’s first farmers used new implements—polished stone axes and flint arrowheads—and kept oxen and sheep. They cleared some of the trees that had grown after the glaciers retreated and planted barley and wheat. They did not build houses but used pits as shelters.

The ancient Irish left an impressive series of megalithic (large stone) passage tombs, the most famous of which are Newgrange, Knowth, and Dowth in the Brú na Bóinne (Boyne Valley) in County Meath northwest of Dublin. A passage grave consists of a central stone tomb, used for communal burials, inside a large oval or round structure. The interior can be entered only through a narrow passageway lined by stone slabs (or megaliths). The passageway at Newgrange is almost 21 yards (19 meters) long. Many of the surrounding kerbstones and interior stones are decorated with intricately carved designs. Newgrange has been dated circa 3200 b.c.e., five centuries before the Egyptian pyramids were built. The massive passage graves are evidence of a well-organized society, with considerable knowledge of astronomy, agriculture, and engineering. The stones in the tomb at Newgrange are thought to weigh a total of 200,000 tons (181,400 metric tons), and much of the material was transported to the site from the Wicklow mountains, 80 miles (129 kilometers) away. The tomb was laid out so that the rising Sun of the winter solstice travels the distance of the entrance passageway, lighting up the central chamber. Furthermore, it was designed so that the rains drained out, and it has remained dry inside for more than five thousand years.

Beaker people

The next group of immigrants to Ireland from the Continent were known as the Beaker people. It is thought that they were early horsemen, which may explain how they dispersed so quickly across Europe. Around 2100 b.c.e., they settled in Brú na Bóinne, where the megalithic tombs had been constructed; the tombs, however, had by now been overgrown. The Beaker people were known for their decorated pottery, some of which they deposited in the graves of their dead. The Beaker people were sophisticated farmers and raised domesticated animals. Although familiar with bronze, they still made most of their tools and implements of flint. They collected gold from the rivers and used it to make ornaments and decorative items. Some early Bronze Age mines were found intact in the nineteenth century c.e., when the peat bogs that covered them for several millennia were cut up for fuel. The mines have been dated at 1500 b.c.e., plus or minus 120 years.

In County Antrim and Rathlin Island, the ancient Irish produced stone axes made of an unusual speckled stone that were traded not only to neighboring settlements but also south to Dublin and even across the ocean to the south of England. Thus, Ireland was in the export business five thousand years ago.

Cooking sites that appear to have been from the eighteenth century b.c.e. have been found in Ballyvourney and Killeens, both in County Cork. These sites are known as Fulacht Fian or Fulacht Fiadh—“cooking site of the Fianna,” or “cooking site of meat.” A site consisted of two pits: a wedge-shaped trough, into which water seeped from the surrounding bog, and a larger dry, stone-lined pit dug on higher ground nearby. In the larger pit, a fire heated layers of stones; these were thrown into the water of the smaller trough with wooden shovels, bringing the water to a boil in a short time. Meat wrapped in straw was immersed in the boiling water, and more stones were added as needed to keep the water boiling. Bones found at these sites indicate that beef, pigs, sheep, and goats were the primary meats, although horses apparently were eaten occasionally.

Celts

While Ireland was still in the Bronze Age, iron was coming into common use in Europe. Iron-using tribes led by wealthy chiefs came into power in Europe, speaking a language that was the precursor of modern Irish Gaelic. The tall, pale-skinned barbarians—called Keltoi by the Greeks—had distinctive dress, language, and lifestyles. The Celts dispersed widely—to Spain and Asia Minor was well as into England and Ireland. The Celts came to Ireland from the Continent to Ireland’s west coast and from northern Britain to the northeast of Ireland. Although the Celts did not have an advanced written language, they prized education and were skilled in art, music, and poetry. However, they were also fierce warriors. By 150 b.c.e., they were firmly established in Ireland and had displaced the island’s historical inhabitants. By the fifth century c.e., at which time modern Irish history can be said to have begun, the whole island shared a common culture and the Gaelic language.

Religion

The pagan Celts worshiped a number of gods and goddesses. The deities had specific territories with which they were associated and also had specific, often contradictory roles. For example, Macha was a goddess of both crops and war, believed to live at Emain Macha, now called Navan Fort. Áine was a benevolent fertility goddess who could shape-shift into an old hag who brought bad luck to people who defied her; she was thought to live in an island in Lough (Lake) Gar in County Limerick.

By the fifth century c.e., there were Christians in Ireland, but the displacement of the pagans by Christians was minimal until a young man named Patrick was captured in an Irish raid on Roman Britain. After several years of slavery in western Ireland, he escaped back to Britain, studied for the priesthood, and returned to Ireland as a missionary. He not only converted many Irish to Christianity but also set up Ireland’s first monasteries. These monasteries became important both to the religious life of the island and as centers of learning.

Language and scholarship

The pagan Celts’ only written language was the cumbersome twenty-character Ogham alphabet, a system of lines and bars varying in number and position. It was useful only for short inscriptions, not for transmitting literature. The advent of Christianity brought the use of Latin, and one of the main monastic occupations was the study and transcription of sacred scriptures and classical writings. Irish and Latin cultures were most eloquently combined in the illuminated manuscripts of the Irish monasteries, of which the most outstanding remaining example is the Book of Kells. The scholarly life of the monasteries was disrupted in the late eighth century c.e. when the Vikings began invading Ireland, stealing the monasteries’ gold and silver treasures and destroying their holy books.

Government and law

By the eighth century c.e., Celtic Ireland had become an agricultural society of nearly half a million inhabitants. The island was divided into five regions, called “fifths”: Ulster in the north, Connacht in the west, Munster in the south, Leinster on the east coast, and the smallest province, Meath, between Ulster and Leinster. The fifths contained some 150 tuatha, or small kingdoms. A king had two main functions: to lead his people in war and to preside over the óenach—a public meeting at which business was transacted, games were played, and horse races were enjoyed. There were three social classes: the unfree (slaves, laborers, and some entertainers), freemen, and nobles. One’s rank was not fixed at birth; it could go up or down if one’s wealth, level of learning, or ability to practice a trade changed. The tuatha were the basic political unit; the social unit was the fine, the family unit consisting of all relatives in the male line of descent for five generations. One’s legal rights were dependent on one’s membership in the fine, and the relationships and rights of the fine were codified in an elaborate system.

Bibliography

Fry, Peter, and Fiona Somerset Fry. A History of Ireland. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1993.

Moody, T. W., and F. X. Martin, eds. The Course of Irish History. Rev. and enlarged edition. Dublin, Ireland: Mercier Press, 1994.

Scherman, Katherine. The Flowering of Ireland: Saints, Scholars, and Kings. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1981.

What Life Was Like: Among Druids and High Kings. Richmond, Va.: Time-Life Books, 1998