The Medieval Irish History Podcast

REPEAT. ICYMI. Hope you’re all having a great summer. We didn’t get a chance to record another podcast episode recently and I don’t quite feel ready to call it quits on this season just yet, so we might release a couple of new episodes over the summer, you’ll just have to watch this space. In the meantime, I wanted to re-release this episode with the incredible Dr Sparky Booker, Assistant Professo...

This week we are back with part two of our mammoth session with Fr Conor McDonough OP, an exceptional Research Ireland funded PhD researcher in Classics, University of Galway. Conor tells us all about the new mendicant orders in 13th century Ireland: the Dominicans, Franciscans, Carmelites and Augustinians. Conor explains that these new orders were like 'networks of mass communication' and...

Welcome back all! This month we are joined by Fr Conor McDonough OP, an exceptional Research Ireland funded PhD researcher in Classics, University of Galway. Conor elucidates the variety of religious life in the Middle Ages focussing on the new religious orders introduced as part of wider church reforms in the 11th and 12th centuries. This episode touches on a number of big themes such as the conf...

Some extra time with our resident expert on all things Irish kingship Dr Seán Ó Hoireabhárd (Bergin Scholar, School of Celtic Studies, DIAS, & author of Medieval Irish Kings and the English Invasion ). This episode accompanies the main episode on the life and career of the supposed last Irish king of all Ireland, Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair, aka Rory O'Connor. Here Seán tells us how King Ruaidrí...

In this month's episode we welcome back the learned Dr Seán Ó Hoireabhárd (Bergin Scholar, School of Celtic Studies, DIAS, & author of Medieval Irish Kings and the English Invasion ) to elucidate the life and career of the supposed last Irish king of all Ireland, Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair, aka Rory O'Connor. Somehow in less than one hour Seán also manages to deftly explain complex topics s...

This week we are joined by the brilliant Dr Brigid Ehrmantraut, Associate Lecturer in Latin and in the History of the British Isles, c .1100-1500, University of St Andrews, author of Classical Myth in Medieval Ireland. We learn all about the immrama, medieval Irish voyage literature, and where medieval Irish authors found their inspiration. Dr Ehrmantraut takes us through the otherworldly adventur...

Happy St Patrick's Festival one and all! Did you know that St Patrick's writings are unique as the only surviving Latin narrative texts of his age to have been composed anywhere outside of Roman imperial territory? This month we bring you a glimpse into the fascinating world of Royal Irish Academy lexicographer Dr Anthony Harvey. It is often thought that linguistics has to be very technica...

This week Prof. Ruairí Ó hUiginn (Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies) gives us a masterclass on the Ulster Cycle and all the elements and stories that are part of it, including its most famous tale, Táin Bó Cuailgne (the Cattle Raid of Cooley). Known for its dramatic and complicated protagonists Fergus mac Roich, Cú Chulainn and Queen Medb, Prof. Ó hUiginn explains how this literature is not a...

In addition to our regular episode (on St Brigid abroad with Prof. Jean-Michel Picard) we have a little extra treat! Starring Prof. David Stifter performing some gorgeous early Irish poetry praising St Brigit. Interpolated with the English translations recited by Dr Niamh Wycherley. Big thanks to Tiago Veloso Silva for editing and co-writing the intro. You can find our regular full length episode...

Happy St Brigit's day! This year's celebration of Ireland's most beloved female icon comes a bit earlier to the podcast, but keep tuned as we have prepared a surprise for you to be published this weekend! This week we are joined by the amazing linguist and historian Jean-Michel Picard, Professor Emeritus at University College Dublin, whose work has inspired generations of scholars stud...

On the podcast this week we explore Niamh's favourite primary source material: hagiography! We are joined by the multilingual Dr Sarah Waidler, of Glucksman Ireland House, NYU, expert in medieval Celtic languages including Irish and Welsh. Sarah guides us through these fascinating religious texts which were arguably the most popular literary genre in the 'European' Middle Ages and how Irish hagiog...

** We are taking a week off and will be back January 16th!** Happy Stephen’s Day and Happy New Year! I hope everyone is having a very lovely Christmas break. This week we are joined by the incredible Dr Sparky Booker, Assistant Professor in Medieval Irish History, Trinity College Dublin. Sparky enlightens us on the legal systems in force in 14th and 15th century Ireland, how to keep your land and...

We have a special episode today with recent Maynooth graduate Emily Little winner of the NUI Mansion House prize for her BA in Irish history. Emily is currently a secondary school teacher and studying for her Professional Masters in Education and makes an inspiring appeal for a reevaluation of the junior cert History curriculum. Recent reforms in historiographical approaches and archival practices...

This week we welcome back Prof. Alex Woolf (University of St. Andrews) to the podcast to question whether ‘the Vikings’ is a useful concept that helps us understand history. We explore why certain people left Scandinavia in the late 8th century and what they were called in the various places they raided and eventually settled. Alex warns us against the telescoping of medieval history and argues fo...

Who were the Scotti? The Féni? The Gaels? We were delighted to get Dr Patrick Wadden, from DCU and Belmont Abbey College, NC, USA on the podcast this week to explore the evidence for the existence of the Irish nation as a concept in the early medieval period. Dr Wadden guides us through a variety of texts, in both Latin and the vernacular, which depict the people of Ireland as a community of birth...

"Great was the darkness of that night and its horror, and demons would appear on that night always." Oíche shamhna shona daoibh go léir! Happy Hallowe'en! To accompany you on any trick or treating or early morning/late night wakenings this weekend we bring you our spooky Samhain special! Dr Hannah Mac Auliffe, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Maynooth University, explains how the fest...

This week Prof. Deborah Hayden, our Head here in the Dept. of Early Irish, Maynooth University, explains what it was like both to go the, or become a, doctor in medieval Ireland! Taking us through a chronological development from the early medico-legal texts through the surge in scientific writing in the later Middle Ages she explains everything from how to cure a broken heart and how much to pay...

Welcome back for season three! Hope you missed us as much as we missed recording our chats on all things medieval Ireland! Today we have Dr Elizabeth Boyle back for the first episode of the new season (as is becoming tradition) to learn about poets and poetry. We discuss everything from Poet-President Michael D. Higgins, the power of satire, constrained poetical forms, and the high status of poets...

Welcome to the last episode of season two! Thank you everyone for their continued support. Today we chat to one of the foremost experts on the Penitentials, Dr Elaine Pereira Farrell, who explains how these prescriptive documents list various sins and the corresponding recommended penances (e.g. fasting, prayers, fines). We learn how the Penitential texts are valuable sources to the historian as t...

We are back this week in the National Museum of Ireland, Archaeology, on Kildare Street, in Dublin City centre, which is open 7 days a week and free to the public. We are joined by Maeve Sikora, Keeper of Irish Antiquities, and Assistant Keeper Matt Seaver. In addition to chatting more about the Words on the Wave exhibition, Maeve and Matt tell us about their jobs preserving Irish material heritag...

This week Matt Seaver, Assistant Keeper of Irish Antiquities and Dr Diarmuid Ó Riain, curatorial researcher, welcomed us in to the National Museum of Ireland, Kildare St. to see the unique new exhibition: Words on the Wave. This is an incredible display of precious manuscripts from the Abbey of St Gall, Switzerland — some returning to Ireland for the first time in 1000 years — alongside spectacula...

In this episode, we chat about the incredible academic and public resource that is the Library in the Royal Irish Academy. Academy Librarian Barbara McCormack tells us all about the collection of medieval manuscripts including some of Ireland's oldest manuscripts the Cathach of Columba and the Stowe Missal. Please visit the library yourself or check out the collections: https://www.ria.ie/libr...

Dr Victoria McAlister from Towson University, Maryland, on everything you ever wanted to know about castles! Featuring all the big hits, Maynooth Castle, Bunratty, Blarney, Trim, the Rock of Dunamase, Clonard castle, Ferrycarrig, Carrickfergus, Irish castles, Anglo-Norman castles, Tower houses, colonialism, we cover it all. Dr McAlister busts some myths and explains how new advances in technology...

This week we are delighted to talk to the always enlightening Dr Christian Schweizer about his Research Ireland funded research on Dicuil, an Irish scholar who was prominent in the Carolingian Court in Aachen in the early 9th century. Dicuil wrote many fascinating texts covering a variety of disciplines including geography, astronomy and computistics, some of which, Dr Schweizer explains were annu...

Apologies for the poor sound quality in this episode! This week Dr Janel Fontaine (Treasure Trove Officer, National Museums Scotland) talks us through some of the evidence for slavery in medieval Ireland. From the accounts of St Patrick in the 5th century to Gerald of Wales in the 12th century she explains how slavery was built into the social and economic fabric of Irish society. Suggested readin...