Category Archives: Cork History

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 5 February 2015

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

778a. The Discoveries Monument, Lisbon

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 5 February 2015

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 9) –Links to an Enchanting Port

 

    Through Bordeaux and being on the edge of outposts of Anglo-Norman Rule, new links for Cork were created with the Iberian Peninsula. In 1360, new trade routes were established with Spanish and Portuguese ports, especially with Lisbon and Oporto. Both countries possessed a large demand for cloth. This demand was met and in return olive oil was imported. One can imagine Cork dockers or quay workers taking jars of olive oil off ships speaking to sailors about their journey from the warmer climes of the Mediterranean to the storm ridden North Atlantic.

     It has always been a question for me what was the impact of foreign trade from other destinations on Cork. These destinations had their own cultural histories. How were the traditions and customs of exporting and importing cities such as Cork affected? What were the effects of all these connections? How did the financiers of ships, sailors, dock workers perceive maritime trade, apart from the profit of it? Were their aspects of Lisbon’s essence for example, its urbanity, its ideas of civilisation, its connection to the sea, and its maritime culture that Cork sought to emulate?

    A look at the Lonely Planet guide to Lisbon reveals it as one of the oldest cities in Europe with multiple phases of development. It has always had an international stage presence of sorts. It is steeped in legend. It is a city founded and named by Ulysses as Ulissipo or Olissopo, which has its genesis in the Phoenician words “Allis Ubbo”, meaning “enchanting port”. It is from there, according to legend, that Lisbon got its name. The city’s prominent position on the Tagus estuary inextricably bound its character with the sea.

   Its early history reveals a place that was sought after as a trophy city – those who control it have access to the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. It was a battlefield for Phoenicians, Greeks and Carthaginians. However it was the Romans who started their two-century reign in Lisbon in 205 BC. During the Roman period, Lisbon became one of the most significant cities in Iberian Peninsula and was renamed Felicitas Julia. In 714, the Moors arrived to peninsula and resisted against Christian attacks for 400 years. When the Christians finally recaptured the city, it took one more century to repel all the Moors from the peninsula. Lisbon became a place about the marrying of religion and commerce.

  Lisbon emerged as a nation state in the early twelfth century, recognition of its government and citizens’ belief and confidence in its vision for its future. It was dependent on commerce and was established on far-flung maritime empire into the eastern Mediterranean. It considered the sea as highly important and itself open to foreigners and outsiders – Lisbon was the world’s most prosperous trading centre; hence perhaps the settled Anglo-Norman communities of Britain, Ireland and France took the opportunity to try to tie in with Lisbon’s maritime profit and perhaps the vision of a city of the sea. In 1142 there had been a failed attempt to conquer Lisbon by a combined host of Anglo-Norman and Portuguese crusaders within the wider context of both the crusader movement to the Holy Land and the reconquest of Iberia.

  The importance of the sea to Lisbon was marked in the growth of naval activities and military installations. Confidence in itself led to faster and larger ships that could be provision laiden to meet long voyages. Small single-mast boats were gradually replaced by more sophisticated, larger vessels of three masts. The Portuguese pulled up their anchors to seek new lands, opportunities and colony and empire building. Eventually the caravel ship, swift and much admired abroad, enabled exploration of the far-off West African coast. The fifteenth century became, an era during which Portugal enjoyed abundant wealth and prosperity through its newly discovered off shore colonies in Atlantic islands, the shores of Africa, the Americas and Asia. Vasco da Gama’s famous discovery of the sea route to India marked this century. It also inspired also fund expeditions. Columbus led his three ships – the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria – out of the Spanish port of Palos on 3 August 1492. His objective was to sail west until he reached Asia (the Indies) where he perceived riches of gold, pearls and spices awaited.

  Long distance fishing and the preservation of fish by salting became part of Lisbon life. Portuguese merchant shipping was established all over Europe. Lisbon became a bustling sea port with 400 or 500 ships using the facilities of the harbour. The city lay strategically placed between Europe and Africa, and eventually between Europe and America. Among the cargoes carried out of the port were those of cork, olive oil, wine, hides, wax and honey.

   Cork I have no doubt profited financially and culturally from Lisbon and from its further afield connections. Indirectly Cork like many other maritime settlements in Western Europe took inspiration in aspiring to be a city of the sea, one steeped in legend, to be a trophy settlement to be fought over, one abounding in belief and confidence and willing to seek out new opportunities. Indeed, the age of the explorations was to further open Cork’s links with the wider world.

 

To be continued…

 

Caption:

 

778a. The Discoveries Monument, Lisbon; it represents a three-sailed ship ready to depart, with sculptures of important historical figures such as King Manuel I carrying an armillary sphere, poet Camões holding verses from The Lusiads, Vasco da Gama, Magellan, Cabral, and several other notable Portuguese explorers, crusaders and monks (source: Cork City Library & Jack Macolm, Lisbon, City on the Sea).

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 29 January 2015

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Uncategorized

777a. Cork City Museum Medieval pottery cabinet

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 29 January 2015

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 8)

– A Taste of France in Medieval Cork

 

       To transform people and place, the Anglo Normans used several methodologies like walled towns, market towns like those listed in last week’s column, and castles and feudal law to secure the wider physical and cultural landscape. One of Cork’s imports in the fourteenth century also embodied change and connections to a wider empire and the diffusion of new cultural products. Cork’s large wine trade was part of mass consumer culture and this is reflected in the substantial amount of French pottery turning up on medieval archaeological sites in the city. The main French ports imported from included Gascony, Bayonne and Bordeaux. Most wine was imported to serve the needs of the English colonial outpost.

    An important step in the history of creating the Bordeaux wine region took place in 1152, when the heir to the Duchy of Aquitaine, known as Eleanor of Aquitaine, married the future king of England, Henry Plantagenet. Plantagenet would later become known as King Henry II. By the late fourteenth century, Bordeaux had become a large city. In fact it was so big, after London, it was the second most populous city under control of the English Monarchy. The Bordeaux wine trade began exporting to England in 1302 from St Emilion to serve the taste of King Edward 1. Circa 1305-1306, up to 100,000 tuns of wine were exported annually from Bordeaux to Britain for mass consumption.

    Much work has been written on the history of the wine trade in Europe. I draw here on some of the work of Susan Rose (2011, The Wine Trade in Medieval Europe, 1,000-1500AD). Saintonge was a former province of south western France, covering most of the present département of Charente-Maritime. Its chief city was Saintes. Saintonge was originally the territory inhabited by the Santones, a Gallic tribe. The principle pottery sites were rural workshops in the parishes neighbouring La Chapelle-des-Pots, on the wooded, limestone plateau north east of Saintes and some 50 kilometres down the river Charente from the maritime port of La Rochelle. Hence in each form of Saintonge pottery, the fabric is the same – a fine white to cream micaceous earthenware.

    Thousands of sherds of Saintonge Pottery have been discovered through excavation beneath Cork’s former medieval core. It occupies almost 65 to 70 per cent of the medieval assemblage. Pottery scholar and expert Clare McCutcheon has done amazing work in recognising the extent of Cork’s connections in trade through pottery analysis. The pottery also has been very useful in dating archaeological deposits in which it was found. Large sites Christ Church and what is now Bishop Lucey Park, in the 1970s, Dunne Stores and carpark site at North Gate Bridge excavated in the early 1990s, Grand Parade City Carpark in the early 2000s and smaller miscellaneous excavations from the 1980s to the 2000 have all revealed thousands of sherds of broken Saintonge pottery.

    The images in the published excavation books show tall, distinctive, and colourful jugs. Five types are revealed – mottled green, glazed and unglazed, polychrome, all over green, and sgraffito. One cannot be not impressed by the decoration – the glaze and design and the display of French identity and the skill of its maker. Clare McCuthcheon in a Miscellaneous excavation book on Cork City (1984-2000) points to the skill of knife trimming its spout; its pouring holes are quite small, created by fingers pushing out the clay. Perhaps on some of the sherds fingerprints still linger. In fact such is the extent of this broken pottery beneath the old medieval core, it could be argued that it was embraced in many of the fourteenth century medieval homes within Cork’s walled town.

    A tall, large in volume, glazed and mottled green Saintonge jug is on display in the cabinet of medieval objects in Cork Museum – it’s state as an object of nostalgia, is something to revere, its material form is further highlighted by the glued together cracks running through it. Found in twentieth century Cork – broken, functionless, and a wrecked shadow of its former self. Truth been told and in reality, there were hundreds of these jugs in Medieval Cork. This museum object stands empty – empty of its memories – indeed the glued back together element of the jug further highlights attempts to bring its story back to life. I’m not too sure if the jug could be filled to the top – its handle doesn’t look strong enough for someone to pour from a full jug, but certainly the idea of this French object sitting on a wooden table in a timber or stone dwelling within Cork’s walled town is intriguing.

    Saintonge jugs like this helped in the transformation process and in the vision of English cultural takeover. In one sense these jugs were metaphors for change, products of a new nation being constructed spanning Britain, Ireland and parts of France. One can just imagine such pottery arriving into Cork for the first time – the citizens looking at these designed objects, which were meant to have a functional meaning and to fulfil the everyday needs of the town’s citizens. Looking at them en masse though, these jugs connected places like Cork to the potters of Saintonge, the science of making mass pottery, the mass consumerism of purchasing such pottery, their mass diffusion and colony building.

 To be continued…

 

Kieran’s new book, Cork Harbour Through Time (with Dan Breen) is now available in Cork bookshops.

 

Caption:

 

777a. Cork City Museum Medieval pottery cabinet, fourteenth century Saintonge jug on left (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

 

 

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 22 January 2015

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, Uncategorized

776a. Kieran’s map of thirteenth century County Cork market towns

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 22 January 2015

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 7) – The Towns We Know Well

 

   In the thirteenth century, places such as the walled town of Cork, and developing towns such as Kinsale and Youghal became centres for collecting masses of local produce for export. How these towns interlinked with each other and worked for the benefit of each other for the Anglo-Norman frontier in southern Ireland are interesting questions.

      As part of the colonisation process, sub collection points in the county were deemed important. The Sheriff of Cork in June 1299 listed 38 Anglo-Norman related market towns up and running in the most fertile countryside of County Cork. Today the majority are well known settlements; some were recognised as having further potential and developed into the villages and towns we know today. The map, inset, shows a web of frontier settlements, which were strategically placed adjacent feudal manors, on important inland routeways, fordable points of rivers and near coastal access. If one overlays main roads on this map, the settlements also influenced the development of rough roads to and from them – the early lines of some of the county’s well known routeways were created, especially roads from Cork to Fermoy, Mallow, Kinsale and to Youghal. These market spaces influenced political and civil order in and around them; their presence would have influenced spaces for people to belong to, to be controlled in and would have created their own identity structures. They maintained and encouraged the creation of agriculture practices. The regulation of trade became the lot of these locations, through administration, paper work, and the granting of privileges and immunities to its traders.

     Both Kinsale and Youghal have striking and beautiful built heritage, both were founded in the early thirteenth century. In the last number of years, in Youghal the Heritage Council and Town Council have worked up an insightful report (Conservation Plan, 2008) in an attempt to conserve and showcase its town walls. Youghal received its charter of incorporation from King John in 1202. It was mostly populated by new settlers from Bristol, a city that retained strong trading links with Youghal during the medieval period. These links are also inherent in the town’s coat of arms, the same as Bristol’s – a tower and a ship. In the thirteenth century growing trade and the presence of native Irish living outside the town required the citizens of Youghal to enclose an area of approximately 17 hectares with a wall.

    In 1224, Maurice Fitz-Gerald founded a Franciscan monastery on the south side of the town, which was the first religious foundation of the order in Ireland. It is recorded that he originally intended the building for a castle, but that, in consequence of some harsh treatment which the workmen received from his eldest son, he changed his design and determined to devote it to religious uses: but, dying in 1257, it was completed in 1260 by his second son, Thomas, whose son, in 1263 or 1271, founded a Dominican monastery, called the Friary of St Mary of Thanks. At this time the town had attained some commercial eminence, for in 1267 the amount of customs paid was £103. By the late thirteenth century and early fourteenth century Youghal was the sixth largest port in Ireland, after New Ross, Waterford, Cork, Drogheda and Dublin, trading timber and wool for spices, grain and wine with the rest of Ireland, England, Wales, and Europe. The principle ports of England and Wales supplied the town with the products of their different industries.

    In 1226 King Henry III granted permission to Andrew Blundus to have a weekly market at his manor in Kinsale. In the years following this grant, extant town records tell of Irish attempts to subvert the new feudal systems. These factors led in the course of time to the establishment of an Anglo-Norman garrison in the area. Believed to have been commenced during the mid-thirteenth century, Kinsale’s town walls were repaired in the mid-fourteenth century, damaged in the battle of Kinsale in 1601, largely destroyed in the siege of 1690 and subjected to some repairs in the eighteenth century. Samuel Lewis, in his Topographical Directory of Ireland in 1837 notes that “three of the gates were remaining till near the close of the last century; Nicholas gate was removed in 1794, Friars gate in 1796, and Cork gate in 1805”.

   The fourteenth century in Cork marked further progression in the development of the town as an Atlantic port. In 1326, Cork became a “staple” town. In otherwords, it was required by English law that Cork became an official market place. Dublin and Drogheda were also made staple towns. The regulations attached to a staple town in summary were far more attractive to foreign merchants than to the Irish themselves. Foreign trade was encouraged under this new system and it suppressed any profit making initiatives on the part of the native Irish. This new law was only one of several laws enacted in order to attract more foreign trade into Ireland. Such was the success of the Irish laws, in 1353, Bristol became a staple town as well as several other ports in England.

 To be continued…

 Kieran’s new book, Cork Harbour Through Time (with Dan Breen) is now available in Cork bookshops. 

Caption:

 776a. Kieran’s map of thirteenth century County Cork market towns/spaces, as listed by the Sheriff of Cork, June 1299 (source: information collected in A F O’Brien’s chapter Politics, Economics and Society, c.1170 to 1593 in P O’Flanagan & C Buttimer, Editors, 1993, Cork History and Society, pp-93-94).

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 8 January 2015

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes

774a. Walled Town of Cork , c.1575 from Pacata Hibernia

Article 774 –8 January 2015

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 5) –Tales of Two Cities

 

      With the Irish Channel being a type of maritime motorway in its day, the connection between Cork and Bristol was close during the early thirteenth century. I think sometimes, we view the historic development of Irish cities as self contained but settlements such as Cork have always drawn on ideas of place making put forward elsewhere in western Europe.

     Continuing on from just before Christmas, in the early 1200s, the number of religious and charitable establishments in Bristol and Cork grew rapidly. From the earliest times of the Anglo-Norman conquest of England and of Ireland, they were interested in exercising control over the Church (for use in assimilation purposes and for its land). General history books in Bristol library such as Peter Aughton’s book, Bristol, A People’s History (2003), detail that a Dominican Priory was established in 1227-9 while a Franciscan Priory in 1234. Both were founded to the influence of Anglo-Norman family of Berkely who possessed territory near St. Mary’s Church, Redcliffe. Other church associated institutions established at the time included St Mark’s Hospital, St Bartholomew, St Lawrence, St John’s Hospital for sick poor, St Catherines, St Mary Magdalene for lepers And Brighbow for male lepers located outside the town’s eastern boundaries.

    In 1250s, the order of Augustinians was founded near Temple Gate while in 1267 a Carmelite Friary was founded. In Cork, a Dominican and Franciscan Friary were both established in 1229 while an Augustinian abbey was founded much later between the years 1275 and 1285. The Cork establishments still have very elaborate and beautiful churches in our city.

    In Bristol, the early 1200s marked conflict between the Berkelys of Redcliffe and the civic administrators over accessibility to the town. The Berkelys felt that they were discriminated against. Consequently in 1239, a new bridge was built which connected Redcliffe to the walled settlement. By 1247, the Redcliffe area became part of the town when it was walled in. In addition, a new harbour was dug at the junction of the River Froom and the larger River Avon. Between 1275 and 1300, Bristol’s seal or Coat of Arms was created, Bristol castle with a ship seeking refuge under its gates and walls and a sailor. My own gut is that Cork’s coat of arms is linked to Bristol’s one. I cannot prove it with historical detail but the close links and similar culture of development between the two cities do point to it.

    The late thirteenth century coincided with Cork expanding rapidly as a municipal centre. In 1273, the first Mayor named Richard Wine was appointed. This was a sign that Cork was taking its place amongst other up and coming English settlements. As a city we are also lucky that historical developments of the thirteenth century have survived the test of time. Concerning trade links, the oldest and richest in historic research and detail is the insightful Economic History of Cork by William O’Sullivan (1937). The historical evidence describes that the port at Cork was a wealthy earner. The customs returns of Irish ports in the period 1276 to 1333 show that Cork was the third most important port in Ireland, after New Ross and Waterford and that it was estimated that Cork possessed 17 % of total Irish trade. In addition, it is recorded that the main export duties were paid on wool, wool-fells and hides. These figures highlight Cork’s growth as a premier North Atlantic port.

    In 1284, the townscape of Cork’s walled settlement was critiqued by King Edward I. He authorised the collection of additional murage tolls or taxes on the land so that walls of the southern island i.e. around South Main Street area could be improved. He described the bridges of the town to be ruinous and the port as being so deteriorated that a swift response was needed to revamp it. The monarch also detailed that there was a vacant place, Dungarvan or the northern island, which should be built on and that it would be of great advantage to the citizens of the town. In time this area was built upon and North Main Street emerged.

    In 1317, paving and the repairing of facets of Bristol’s walled town began. In the same year in Cork it was decided to enclose with stone walls, the southern and the northern island (Dungarvan) of Cork. Hence a 16 acre settlement site across two marshy islands was created. Access into this town was via three entrances – two drawbridges and an eastern portcullis gate which lifted up and down on water. A channel of water was left between both islands; the western half was dominated by a millrace, the eastern half by an interior dock within the walled town.

    As the thirteenth century progressed, commercial leaders in Bristol and Cork began to hold chief places in civic government. For example John de Bristol became Mayor of Cork in 1336. After the extension of the wall circa 1300, several taxes are listed in subsequent royal charters granted to the city which refer to numerous traded articles. In the thirteenth century, Bristol was to open up trade with France in the form of the Gascony wine trade. Subsequently links between Ireland and other French ports through Bristol’s contact grew steadily.

 To be continued…

 

Happy New Year to all readers of this column

 

Caption:

 

774a. Pacata Hibernia view of the walled town of Cork, c.1575 (source: Cork City Library)

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 18 December 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, Uncategorized

773a. Cork Coat of Arms, Custom House, Cork

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 18 December 2014

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 4) – The Bristol Connection

 

      As Cork developed in the twelfth century, from historical and archaeological perspectives, one of its earliest known connections to another port city was with Bristol. Bristol Ham Green Pottery has been found in large numbers beneath our old medieval core; our coats of arms are similar – Bristol has one tower and a ship; Cork’s first English charter in 1185 refers to similar privileges. It was these issues that encouraged my visits to England’s largest western city, Bristol in recent years.

       On first approach, topographically, Bristol is a city of hills with sharp slopes but no great altitudes. The outskirts of the settlement cover a series of low ridges. Indeed, the approach from the south is similar to the approach from Cork Airport to Cork City, involving panoramic views of a large connurbation. Bristol grew initially as a Roman bridging point and this is reflected in its original name, Bristow. The growth of its port occurred in the middle of the first millennium AD. By 1,000 AD an Anglo-Saxon town was well established. The advent of the 1060s coincided with conflict in Anglo-Saxon England in the form of the Anglo-Norman invasion and their famous historical victory on the battle-fields of Hastings in 1066. By 1069, it is argued that many Saxons were unprepared to accept the Anglo-Norman conquest as final and fled England to Ireland to regroup. From Dublin, they made two attempts to re-establish themselves in England. Bristol was the main focus of this attack. As a result circa 1087, a motte and bailey structure was built by Anglo-Normans in Bristol. This was restructured in the 1110s by a more substantial stone structure. Surrounded by the River Froom, the castle itself has been described as a large fortified manor. By 1083, Bristol was in Royal possession.

     The 1086 Domesday Book regarded Bristol as not unlike medieval London, an area thinly peopled and unfertile in itself, but containing a settlement of some size which rendered a substantial revenue from its surrounding hinterland. Economically, the city was ranked as been on par with York, Lincoln and Norwich. Indeed, from the twelfth century onwards, many western European cities experienced rapid urban growth. In most cases, the growth of towns was in conjunction with a mercantile class and the growth of internal and external trade. Indeed, the growth of maritime trade was a general European trend (of which Cork was also part of).

      As the Hiberno-Norse developed towns in places in Ireland such as Cork, the 1100s in Bristol coincided with conflict and change. In the 1130s and 1140s further rebellions against Anglo-Normans by Anglo-Saxons occurred while the first of the royal charters to Bristol was granted in 1155. Primarily, a grant was given towards creating toll toll-free passage through King Henry’s dominions in England, Wales and Normandy. Between 1164 and 1170, another charter was given in favour of those who dwelt in the marsh by the bridge of Bristol. A new parish church was also created in the form of St’s Mary’s Redcliffe. From here Redcliffe pottery was created, some of which is found in Cork’s medieval layers. Pottery is still made in Redcliffe today.

       In 1169, Bristol was to become the staging point of the Anglo-Norman Invasion of Ireland under the direction of Henry II. Such was the swiftness of this invasion that by 1171, documentary evidence shows Bristolians living in Dublin. However, it is noted by Bristol historians that the city used to engage in slave trade with Viking ports in Ireland. Perhaps, the Irish connection was already strong and maybe slave ships came into Cork Harbour to shelter. An Anglo-Norman charter was also granted to Dublin in this year. Though London was developing as the principal city in England, Bristol became the main key to Anglo-Norman boroughs in the west. In 1188, Bristol became the model for the civic constitution of the Anglo-Norman boroughs and trading centres in Ireland. Indeed, it could be said that it was these places that Bristol had more links with than with London. Anglo-Norman Lords were quick to see that the major Danish Viking trading ports had the potential for large financial success. Consequently, Dublin, Waterford, Limerick and Cork in time became royal boroughs.

         In the case of Cork, the Hiberno Norse settlement was taken for the Anglo-Norman King by Milo De Cogan and Robert Fitzstephen and fortified. In time a large, stone wall, on average eight metres high enclosed the South Main Street area, a circa six acre site. Bristol was chosen by the Anglo-Norman Monarchy as the model to be followed by these Irish towns regarding liberties, privileges and immunities. The year 1185 has been accepted as the date of Cork’s first charter. All customs and rent structures in the initial years of Anglo-Norman Cork were the same as what the citizens possessed in Bristol’s walled town. Dublin received its second Bristolian charter in 1192 while Limerick received its first Bristolian charter in 1199 and Waterford in 1205. These settlements were to prosper with similar privileges as English Anglo-Norman Towns. They were also to become centres of political and administrative control but also provided defence and security. It was a combination of both political and economical factors that promoted growth of these towns.

To be continued…

 

Happy Christmas and happy new year to all the readers of this column

Caption:

 

773a. Cork Coat of Arms, Cork Custom House (picture: Kieran McCarthy)

Cork Harbour Through Time

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

Cork Harbour Through Time

Ten Historical Items about Cork Harbour

(extracted from Kieran McCarthy’s and Dan Breen’s New Book)

 

 

  1. Dating back over 1,000 years to Viking times, from the Anglo-Norman time of a walled town to the present day, boats of all dimensions have been travelling through Cork’s riverine and harbour region, continuing a legacy of trade.

 

  1. Cork’s Marina, originally called the Navigation Wall, was completed in 1761. In 1820, Cork Harbour Commissioners formed and purchased a locally-built dredger. The dredger deposited the silt from the river into wooden barges, which were then towed ashore. The silt was redeposited behind the Navigation Wall. During the Great Famine, deepening of the river created jobs for 1,000 men who worked on creating the Navigation Wall’s road – The Marina.

 

  1. At one time, approximately fifty mansions in the south-eastern suburbs of Cork City overlooked Cork Harbour. One of the largest was that of Lakelands, owned by the Crawford family. By 1792, William Crawford Snr had moved from County Down to Cork, where he co-founded of the successful Beamish and Crawford brewery. He occupied a fine residence – Lakelands at Blackrock – to the east of the city, overlooking the widening River Lee.

 

  1. The imposing Blackrock Castle is the third structure on the site. The original fort (or castle) was built in 1582 by the citizens of Cork to safeguard ships against pirates, who would come into the harbour and steal away the vessels entering the harbour. In 1722 and 1827, the old tower was destroyed by a fire and a new one built.

 

  1. The history of fishing and fishermen in Blackrock dates back to the early 1600s. In 1911, sixty-four fishermen, ranging in age from fourteen to seventy, are listed in the census as living in Blackrock village and operating in and around the castle, Lough Mahon and harbour area.

 

  1. The District of Douglas village takes its names from the river or rivulet bearing the Gaelic word Dubhghlas or dark stream, which enters the tidal area nearby. As early as the late thirteenth century, King John of England made a grant of land to Philip de Prendergast near the city of Cork. On 1 June 1726, the building of the Douglas Factory commenced. Samuel Perry & Francis Carleton became the first proprietors.

 

  1. The Cork, Blackrock & Passage Railway opened in 1850, and was among the first of the Irish suburban railway projects. The original terminus, designed by Sir John Benson, was based on Victoria Road, but moved in 1873 to Hibernian Road (as shown above and now built upon). The entire length of track between Cork and Passage was in place by April 1850 and, within two months, the line was open for passenger traffic.

 

  1. With the establishment of a dock and shipyard in Passage West in the nineteenth century, many merchants became shipowners, and carried on an extensive trade in their own vessels. Three of these individuals were well-known entrepreneurs – William Parker (who engaged in foreign speculations in shipping), Thomas Parsons Boland and the Brown family.

 

  1. During the nineteenth century, many merchants in Passage West built their own big houses and terraces. This town recorded upwards of 100 covered cars called jingles engaged almost daily in the transport of people between Passage and Cork. Steamboats and several small boats also ploughed the waters between Cork and Passage several times daily.
  2. A letter from Vice-Adm. Thornborough of Trent, Cork Harbour, dated 28 August 1813, was read to the Ballast Board on 2 September 1813. In this letter he pointed out the danger vessels frequenting Cork Harbour were put in, as a result of the lack of a lighthouse at the entrance to the harbour. This small lighthouse was working by June 1817, but its tower was not conducive to a major harbour of refuge and port and, in 1835, it was replaced by the present larger tower.

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 11 December 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, Uncategorized

772a. Carved toy boat, found at archaeological excavations on South Main Street

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article, 

Cork Independent, 11 December 2014

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 3) – Recovering the Vikings

    The recent publication Archaeological Excavations at South Main Street 2003-2005, edited by Ciara Brett and Maurice Hurley, brings many nuggets of information to the public realm on early to mid twelfth century Cork. Amongst several objects found was a little toy boat (p.202), about 10cm in length (with one half missing), with one side grooved out and the other having a very elaborate tracery design. Here is an object lost in the fragmented timber wreckage found on South Main Street, found at the old seeping and reclaimed edges of a marshy island. One can almost imagine a young person playing with the boat at the water’s edge – and the bobbing up and down action in the water of this cherished object.

    The boat, small though it is, was once a part of someone’s daily landscape, their life, and their surroundings. Perhaps, the owner regularly played with it; perhaps there was a mini fleet of toy boats. It inspired someone to think differently about their surroundings. The young owner may have envisioned the immediate meeting of land, river and sea as a space of recreation, of possibilities, of dreams and a place of re-imagining old and new worlds. Perhaps the long rushes and reeds created a hiding space for imagined enemies. The boat may have meant so much to someone and held their ideas, future prospects and hopes when they played with it.

     However for us, in the present, the memory of the boat is beyond our personal memory. The knowledge of living in twelfth century Cork has not survived the test of time. This fragment of an artefact from their landscape offers us a way to identify with them, their perception and their lives. We can broaden, narrate and animate more parts of their story. It’s like a window into the past but it is also a looking glass because it innately tells us something about ourselves. It also allows us to contrast and compare cultural evolution through time and space, centuries ago children were plying with model boats. That being said with all the developments, the cultural transformations, the changes to the landscape, to our identity, taking all of this into account, it’s amazing that children still play with model boats. So much is different yet some things remain unchanged.

      The toy boat is rooted culturally in wider European Viking age settlements. This year coincided with a large exhibition on their life and legacy in the British Museum during the summer and which now is on display in Berlin. Entitled Vikings, Life and Legend, the exhibition brings together the various strands of thought on Viking colonisation a thousand years ago in north west Europe and beyond. What is revealed is the depth of their culture, their interest in arts and crafts, their ability to practically own the ‘sea highways’ of their day. Ships on the seas were central to how their culture spread, was maintained and framed for their ancestors. In the exhibition, the organisers detail that the first Viking campaign in England took the form of scattered attacks, but in 865AD the Vikings arrived, and in successive years conquered almost all of eastern England, the Dane-law. In France and Germany the Vikings met a strong monarchy. Nevertheless they attacked the Frankish coastal areas in the early ninth century.   

    Around 920AD they controlled much of Britain disparate parts of Ireland. By the eleventh century, they had conquered enormous tracts of England and founded and built towns. Cork was part of these networks of flows of knowledge between different Viking ethnic towns in north-west Europe. The extent of the networks of Cork’s Hiberno-Norse society (Viking ancestry and Irish Viking relationships) is relatively unknown though.

     The other remarkable aspect of the toy boat object is its ‘clinker style’ look and the carved Celtic like tracery on its base. Ongoing re-construction work at Roskilde Ship Museum in Denmark reveals that Viking Age ships were clinker-built. Characteristic of this construction technique of that the ship’s shape is created as an empty shell of strakes or longitudinal strips of timber, after which internal stiffening beams are added. The overlapping planks are caulked with wool and tar and are riveted together with iron nails. Over the last 1,000 years the Scandinavian clinker technique has been preserved in the traditional Danish, Norwegian and Farose boats used for fishing and transportation and the construction technique has left traces in the French, German and British and Irish boatbuilding culture.

    Three re-used timbers, interpreted as possible ship timbers from clinker-built vessel, were revealed at excavations at 40-48 South Main Street. The tree ring and scientific analysis of one of these timbers reveals that it was “derived from a mature oak felled after 1037 AD from southeast England, probably in the London area” (Nigel Nayling, p.203). The presence of iron fastenings securing oak planks at an overlap with luting of animal hair and tar were also present. The timbers had been reused as a base pad for one of a number of large upright posts, possibly part of a timber-framed house – the very first settlement foundations of Cork City are sitting on ship’s timbers and link to stories and culture further afield.

    The publication Archaeological Excavations at South Main Street 2003-2005 is available in Liam Ruiseal Bookshop, Cork and Waterstones Bookshop, Cork.

 

Caption:

772a. Carved toy boat, found at archaeological excavations on South Main Street (Illustration by Rhoda Cronin and Courtesy of Cork City Council)

 

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town, 4 December 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, Uncategorized

771a. Archaeologists from Sheila Lane & Associates digging at the Grand Parade City Car Park 2004

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town Article,

Cork Independent, 4 December 2014

Cork Harbour Memories (Part 2) – The Wreckage of the Past

 

   The amount of boats that have plied Cork Harbour is immeasurable. The large volume of extant admiralty charts from different periods of time point to negotiation around rocks, shallows and islands, and show carved out navigation routes. Whereas today, every metre of the harbour is mapped, what about those who rowed around it thousands of years ago exploring its corners and niches, hunting and fishing, and where the stars and landmarks were their mental maps.

    The names of two islands, Haulbowline and Foaty Island, hark back nearly a thousand years to the first know group of sailors – the Vikings and their ancestors, who harnessed the harbour for survival. The name Haulbowline may come from the Old Norse áll-boeli meaning an ‘eel dwelling’ whilst Foaty may comes from the Irish fód te, meaning ‘warm soil’; it could also comes from Old Norse fótey, meaning ‘foot island’, maybe referring to its location near the end of the river.

    The recent publication Archaeological Excavations at South Main Street 2003-2005, edited by Ciara Brett and Maurice Hurley, brings the reader back to a time where the natural environment of forests, the River Lee’s estuarine silt and the sheltered harbour were explored and mined for their resources. It is the eighth carefully researched and thought provoking book on the archaeology and history of Cork to be published by Cork City Council. This publication outlines the results of two large-scale excavations which took place at 36-39 and 40-48 South Main Street. Both sites are located in close proximity to the South Gate Bridge, one of the main entrances to the medieval walled town of Cork. The results of the excavations are significant as they have added to our knowledge of the formation and development of the City.

   There are many fantastic revelations in this book about reclamation from the swamp to outlining in detail the material culture from pottery to the use of wood for housing to gaming pieces.  The excavations were undertaken by Sheila Lane and Associates and the Department of Archaeology, UCC. Cork City Council. The various contributors work hard to paint a picture of their respective sites across several centuries. In particular in this book they place a large focus on Cork in the early twelfth century, a period before the Anglo-Norman invasion. By that time, the Hiberno-Norse, those living in Ireland with a Norse ethnic background, were rooted and settled in places such as Cork, Waterford, Wexford, Limerick and Dublin. Indeed, in all the latter places, excavations have taken place and the role of the Hiberno-Norse society debated in books and articles. The role of their early ancestors in piracy is much portrayed in the nation state’s Irish history books but their role in creating early towns not as much. The general collective memory within Cork’s history has, over several centuries, reduced them to the date of the first attack on Cork’s monastery (820AD) and an almost passing nod to the fact that they built a settlement on a swamp. The new book by Ciara and Maurice continues the pursuit of putting the Vikings on the academic history map and also implanting them into the popular imagination of Cork’s past – the latter perhaps being a harder task when it comes to changing the present day collective memory of a city.

    For whatever reason, the people of Cork, through several centuries, chose to forget the Vikings, their history and ultimately their legacy. For all intensive purposes, the excavated South Main Street sites and everything found from the twelfth century, belongs to the wrecking ball of time and to the wreckage of forgetting. On troweling back the earth, the archaeologists pealed back different temporal contexts. Two to three metres underneath our present day city, they exposed the remains of timber structures lingering, intrusive and protruding through the mud – these were ruinous, abandoned, broken, segmented, mixed up, rotting, crumbling, and aged on the edge of a swamp. The timbers were the sinking roots, cultural products and ideas of a long lost settlement – an enigmatic space where no written documentation existed for bar the variations in the rings of the timbers. The rings alluded to growth and resilience, an age before use and being part of a woodland at one stage in their life. Despite their decaying image, the intensity of construction and some details in the skilled carpentry work remained for all to see.

           At this crossroads of time, according to expert David Brown (p.525 in the book) there is an indication from the dendrochronological dates of the timbers found on the site that there was a continuous felling of trees and construction of buildings and reclamation structures from just a few years before 1100AD to 1160AD. So here on a swamp 900 years ago, a group of settlers decided to make a real go at planning, building, reconstructing and maintaining a mini town of wood on a sinking reed ridden and wet riverine and tidal space. One has to admire their intent, vision, tenacity and of course their legacy is the eventual reclamation of other marshy islands and the creation of the city of Cork.

    The publication Archaeological Excavations at South Main Street 2003-2005 is available directly from the City Archaeologist Ciara Brett (ciara_brett@corkcity.ie, 021-4924705) and is also available in Liam Ruiseal Bookshop, Cork and Waterstones Bookshop, Cork.

More on this next week…

Captions:

771a. Archaeologists from Sheila Lane & Associates digging at the Grand Parade City Car Park 2004; in the picture from the top right, South Gate Bridge Debtor’s Gaol (c.1713), thirteenth century town wall (centre), thirteenth century house foundations (right of centre), and twelfth century revetments (bottom right) [picture: Kieran McCarthy, 2004]

Kieran’s New Book, Cork Harbour Through Time, November, 2014)

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

Cork Harbour Through Time By Kieran McCarthy and Dan Breen

 

   How do you capture a harbour in all its beauty? Being the second largest natural harbour in the world brings a focus and energy that Cork Harbour has always been open to. The ebb and flow of the tide through the ages has carved a unique landscape of cliffs, sand and gravel beaches that expose an underlining geology of limestone and sandstone. Invigorating this landscape are multiple monuments from different ages, many of which the postcards in Kieran McCarthy and Dan Breen seek to capture.

  Colourful villages provide different textures and cultural landscapes in a sort of cul-de-sac environment, with roads ending at harbours and car parks near coastal cliff faces and quaysides. The villages are scattered around the edges of the harbour, each with their own unique history, all connecting in someway to the greatness of this harbour. Walking along several junctures of fields, one can get the feeling you are at the ‘edge of memory’. There are the ruins of old structures that the tide erodes away. One gets the sense that a memory is about to get swept away by the sea, or that by walking in the footsteps trodden by photographers 100 years ago, one could get carried away by their curiosity. This new book tracks the space and historical context of 100 postcards in Cork Harbour, many of which were taken c. 1900–20.

Cork Harbour Through Time can be bought in many Cork bookshops.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ireland-Europe-Countries-Regions-Books/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=node%3D279716&field-keywords=cork+harbour+through+time&rh=n%3A279716%2Ck%3Acork+harbour+through+time&ajr=1

Kieran’s New Book, Cork Harbour Through Time, 20 November 2014

Cork History, Kieran's Council Work, Landscapes, S.E. Ward Local History, Uncategorized

Cork Harbour Through Time By Kieran McCarthy and Dan Breen

Kieran’s Our City, Our Town,

Cork Independent, 20 November 2014

Kieran’s New Book – Cork Harbour Through Time

 

     How do you capture a harbour in all its beauty? Being the second largest natural harbour in the world brings a focus and energy that Cork Harbour has always been open to. The ebb and flow of the tide through the ages has carved a unique landscape of cliffs, sand and gravel beaches that expose an underlining geology of limestone and sandstone. Invigorating this landscape are multiple monuments from different ages, many of which the postcards in my new book with Dan Breen seek to capture.

     Colourful villages provide different textures and cultural landscapes in a sort of cul-de-sac environment, with roads ending at harbours and car parks near coastal cliff faces and quaysides. The villages are scattered around the edges of the harbour, each with their own unique history, all connecting in someway to the greatness of this harbour. Walking along several junctures of fields, one can get the feeling you are at the ‘edge of memory’. There are the ruins of old structures that the tide erodes away. One gets the sense that a memory is about to get swept away by the sea, or that by walking in the footsteps trodden by photographers 100 years ago, one could get carried away by their curiosity. This new book tracks the space and historical context of 100 postcards in Cork Harbour, many of which were taken c. 1900–20.

     Many of the sites have been written extensively on over centuries, while others await proper exploration and critique. Chapter 1 begins in the city and takes the reader from Ireland’s southern capital of Cork City eastwards into the River Lee’s tidal estuary. This city is built on a shifting landscape of sand, gravel, rushes and reeds, a wetland knitted together to form a working port through the ages. In Cork City Through Time (2012), we showcased the old postcards of Cork City. Moving eastwards past the port, the river begins to spread in width, creating vast scenic vistas along areas like the marina, extending to the late seventeenth-century structure of Blackrock Castle and beyond, to the reed beds of Lough Mahon and Douglas Estuary. All are hidden places of beauty, much of which may be explored by the amenity walk along the old Blackrock & Passage Railway Line. When the line opened in 1850, it hosted 200,000 people in the first six months. In 1903, this line was later extended to Crosshaven. The resonances of such a venture are echoed along the walkway as old platforms, ivy clad stone-arch bridges provide legacies to admire. Passage, the first terminus for the railway, was once a shipbuilding centre of the south of Ireland. Nowadays, old quaysides and eerie, abandoned warehouses haunt the area. One can almost hear the hammers and whispers of workers’ repairing and patching together ocean-going ships. Further along the river, Monkstown provides insight into the past with its colourful Victorian mansions.

     The same can be said about the scenic wooded village of Glanmire, the iconic Father Mathew Tower and Fota House. All exist as rich storehouses of memory and are awe-inspiring to walk around at any time of the year. Chapter 2 takes the reader on a journey through some of the landscapes on Great Island, and naturally Cobh is a central focus. Drawn through several centuries and photographed since the invention of the camera, it is difficult not to be drawn to the town’s rich architectural steeple and exterior artwork on the late nineteenth-century construct of St Colman’s Cathedral. Cobh has stunning scenic quay vistas and a colourful selection of buildings. The town is also known for its stories of emigration and the legendary Titanic. One can feel its journey across the ocean and the role the town played in its part in the North Atlantic’s human history.

    The sites and spaces seen from Cobh’s specifically constructed building parapets are explored in Chapter 3. The harbour islands such as Spike Island and Haulbowline have histories dating back over 400 years. They were first fortified by star-shaped forts and secured for the expanding British Empire. Two more forts exist near the entrance to the Harbour, Camden Fort Meagher and Fort Davis. Originally built in the 1780s, one can explore the town’s military history and connections to a far-flung British empire through the harbour’s role in securing its might and power. However, one is humbled by stories of the Irish War of Independence and how these forts in time were secured by the Irish Government as Ireland’s last lines of defence. Today, these represent large community-based tourism projects.

    Chapter 4 explores the eastern shores of Cork Harbour. Here lies the great market town of Midleton, the old large malthouses of Ballincurra, the ancient tower at Cloyne, the quaint spaces within villages at Rostellan and Whitegate, and the ruins of old houses. Connect these with industrial projects such as Whitegate Oil Refinery, and family holiday centres such as Trabolgan, and all reveal rich stories. However, standing overlooking all within the harbour is the great lighthouse at Roches Point, warning ships of imposing rocks and providing a grand entrance gateway to the harbour. On a clear day, the views show a canvass of stories and memories.

Caption:

769a. Cork Harbour Through Time by Kieran McCarthy & Dan Breeen (published by Amberley Press, November 2014)