take shelter in, though in considerable discomfort.
It was in this remote place that St Colman spent seven years of his life with only one companion, sleeping in the cave. Before retiring to his hermitage he founded churches on Inishmore, one of the Aran Islands, and the monastery at Oughtmama. It was for the saint and his companion, slowly dying of starvation in Keelhilla, that angels spirited away the Easter banquet of King Guaire Aidhneach, founder of the Monastery of Kilmacduagh. And it was across the water-eroded beds of karstic limestoneknown thereafter as Bothar na Mias (the Road of the Dishes) that the King and his followers pursued their banquet, all the way from his castle on the shores of Kinvarra Bay. Here, a patron , or parish celebration, is still held on the last Sunday in July.
It was now three-thirty and the sun had left the Hermitage. I retraced my steps across the Road of Dishes, found my bike and continued to climb the awful hill, to a ridge between the Doomore and Gortaclare mountains, where the road, to my horror, began an endless descent into the great, verdant Carran Depression through the whole of which I was pursued by a really savage dog. From it I climbed onto a great, grass-grown plateau that looked like a golden sea in the light of the setting sun, then down again and up again, the map giving no inkling of these awful undulations. On the way I passed a wonder called the Caherconnell Ringfort, but was dissuaded from visiting it by yet more wretched dogs which came streaming out of the neighbouring farmyard to attack me at a time when any reasonable dog would have been watching television. By now the sun had gone from the Burren and its expanses were, apart from the dogs, silent and mysterious. By now I was fed up with hills and was grateful for what followed, a wonderful, five-mile descent from the escarpment all the way to Ballyvaughan in the dusk, to find that Wanda’s lobster catch had failed to appear. It didn’t matter – we still had half a sack of mussels to get through.
The following morning, with fully laden bikes, we embarked in the farmer’s Volkswagen van, bound for the town of Ennistymon. The sky was overcast, the wind now westerly and it looked like rain. In other words it was a grand, Irish day.
There was another passenger – a friend of the farmer’s who was, he alleged, ‘just going up the road a bit to take a look at his sheep’. In fact his ‘up the road a bit’ comprehended almost the entire journey. He settled himself firmly in front next to the driver,so that I found myself, having paid for the van hire, crouching in the back holding up the bikes and trying to avoid being stabbed to death by brake levers. As a result, I saw nothing and he got an additional eyeful of the scenery he saw every day of his life.
The driver, who was short on conversation, was in a hurry to return to his fields, so I failed to get him to stop at Cahermacnaghten, yet another ringfort with immensely thick, high walls which stands high up in the Burren, five miles from anywhere. All I saw of it as we roared past was a gateway, a white farmhouse and a grove of windswept trees. Just as with Caherconnell, I had never had any luck with Cahermacnaghten. The last time I had tried to visit it I had been beset by a tribe of tinkers and their flaxen-haired children who were camped with their carts close by, and had literally had to run for it.
It was a pity. Cahermacnaghten was more than just another Irish fort. From mediaeval times until late in the seventeenth century it housed within its walls a law school run by the O’Davorens, known as O’Davoren’s Town, as unlikely a situation for a law school as the middle of Dartmoor. It was here that Dubhaltach MacFirbhisigh studied, the distinguished compiler of Craobha Coibhneasa Agas Geuga Geneluigh Gacha Gabhala dar Ghabh Ere , otherwise The Branches of Kindred and Genealogical Boughs of Every Plantation in Ireland , which he completed in 1650.
It was in this remote place that St Colman spent seven years of his life with only one companion, sleeping in the cave. Before retiring to his hermitage he founded churches on Inishmore, one of the Aran Islands, and the monastery at Oughtmama. It was for the saint and his companion, slowly dying of starvation in Keelhilla, that angels spirited away the Easter banquet of King Guaire Aidhneach, founder of the Monastery of Kilmacduagh. And it was across the water-eroded beds of karstic limestoneknown thereafter as Bothar na Mias (the Road of the Dishes) that the King and his followers pursued their banquet, all the way from his castle on the shores of Kinvarra Bay. Here, a patron , or parish celebration, is still held on the last Sunday in July.
It was now three-thirty and the sun had left the Hermitage. I retraced my steps across the Road of Dishes, found my bike and continued to climb the awful hill, to a ridge between the Doomore and Gortaclare mountains, where the road, to my horror, began an endless descent into the great, verdant Carran Depression through the whole of which I was pursued by a really savage dog. From it I climbed onto a great, grass-grown plateau that looked like a golden sea in the light of the setting sun, then down again and up again, the map giving no inkling of these awful undulations. On the way I passed a wonder called the Caherconnell Ringfort, but was dissuaded from visiting it by yet more wretched dogs which came streaming out of the neighbouring farmyard to attack me at a time when any reasonable dog would have been watching television. By now the sun had gone from the Burren and its expanses were, apart from the dogs, silent and mysterious. By now I was fed up with hills and was grateful for what followed, a wonderful, five-mile descent from the escarpment all the way to Ballyvaughan in the dusk, to find that Wanda’s lobster catch had failed to appear. It didn’t matter – we still had half a sack of mussels to get through.
The following morning, with fully laden bikes, we embarked in the farmer’s Volkswagen van, bound for the town of Ennistymon. The sky was overcast, the wind now westerly and it looked like rain. In other words it was a grand, Irish day.
There was another passenger – a friend of the farmer’s who was, he alleged, ‘just going up the road a bit to take a look at his sheep’. In fact his ‘up the road a bit’ comprehended almost the entire journey. He settled himself firmly in front next to the driver,so that I found myself, having paid for the van hire, crouching in the back holding up the bikes and trying to avoid being stabbed to death by brake levers. As a result, I saw nothing and he got an additional eyeful of the scenery he saw every day of his life.
The driver, who was short on conversation, was in a hurry to return to his fields, so I failed to get him to stop at Cahermacnaghten, yet another ringfort with immensely thick, high walls which stands high up in the Burren, five miles from anywhere. All I saw of it as we roared past was a gateway, a white farmhouse and a grove of windswept trees. Just as with Caherconnell, I had never had any luck with Cahermacnaghten. The last time I had tried to visit it I had been beset by a tribe of tinkers and their flaxen-haired children who were camped with their carts close by, and had literally had to run for it.
It was a pity. Cahermacnaghten was more than just another Irish fort. From mediaeval times until late in the seventeenth century it housed within its walls a law school run by the O’Davorens, known as O’Davoren’s Town, as unlikely a situation for a law school as the middle of Dartmoor. It was here that Dubhaltach MacFirbhisigh studied, the distinguished compiler of Craobha Coibhneasa Agas Geuga Geneluigh Gacha Gabhala dar Ghabh Ere , otherwise The Branches of Kindred and Genealogical Boughs of Every Plantation in Ireland , which he completed in 1650.
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