Death Customs In Rural Ireland

Ceremonial death is the focus of a major rite of passage, leading the individual from the world of the known to that of the unknown. This book describes funerary traditions and superstitions in the midlands, in particular in counties Roscommon, Longford, Westmeath and Offaly and also in adjoining areas of Galway, Leitrim, Mayo and Sligo. Folklore collected by James Delaney, a full time collector in the midlands, from the 1950s to the 1980s, is the primary source. Material from earlier folklore collectors has also been used. The book describes Death, Wake, and burial customs, in particular, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Fear of death had a major influence on funerary rites and traditional customs were employed to overcome and control that fear. The role of the community in rites-of incorporation and in transitional rites of passage from the home to the grave is emphasized, while the centrality of the role of women in relation to death rituals is highlighted.

Do you know what a Brideóg is? What could you cure if you licked a lizard nine times? Why is Whit Sunday the unluckiest day of the year? From the author of The Irish Cottage comes a new book, exploring old Irish customs and beliefs. Chapters focus on the quarter-day festivities that marked the commencement of each season: ‘Spring: Imbolc’; ‘Summer: Bealtaine’; ‘Autumn: Lughnasa’ and ‘Winter: Samhain’, and also major life events – ‘Births, Marriages and Death Customs’ – and general beliefs in ‘Spirituality and Well-Being’ and ‘The Supernatural’. Focusing on the period from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries, Irish Customs and Rituals discusses a time during which many of the practices and beliefs in question went into decline. Many of these customs were rooted in residual pre-Christian beliefs that ran parallel to, and in spite of, conventional religion practised in the country. Some customs were so deep-rooted that despite continued disapproval from the Roman Catholic Church they remain with us today. It is wonderful to see so many traditions still with us, as many are worthwhile remembering, commemorating, or even reviving today. Irish Customs and Rituals will appeal to all those with an interest in Irish history, folklore, culture and social history. Marion McGarry is the author of The Irish Cottage: History, Culture and Design (2017). She has a PhD in Architectural History and an MA in History of Art and Design and is currently a lecturer at Galway–Mayo Institute of Technology. She frequently writes articles about Irish social history and customs.

Some of the poorest regions of historic Britain had some of its most vibrant festivities. Between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, the peoples of northern England, Lowland Scotland, and Wales used extensive celebrations at events such as marriage, along with reciprocal exchange of gifts, to emote a sense of belonging to their locality. Bride Ales and Penny Weddings looks at regionally distinctive practices of giving and receiving wedding gifts, in order to understand social networks and community attitudes. Examining a wide variety of sources over four centuries, the volume examines contributory weddings, where guests paid for their own entertainment and gave money to the couple, to suggest a new view of the societies of 'middle Britain', and re-interpret social and cultural change across Britain. These regions were not old fashioned, as is commonly assumed, but differently fashioned, possessing social priorities that set them apart both from the south of England and from 'the Celtic fringe'. This volume is about informal communities of people whose aim was maintaining and enhancing social cohesion through sociability and reciprocity. Communities relied on negotiation, compromise, and agreement, to create and re-create consensus around more-or-less shared values, expressed in traditions of hospitality and generosity. Ranging across issues of trust and neighbourliness, recreation and leisure, eating and drinking, order and authority, personal lives and public attitudes, R. A. Houston explores many areas of interest not only to social historians, but also literary scholars of the British Isles.

This text develops a new perspective on Late Bronze Age (LBA) Ireland by identifying and analysing patterns of ritual practice in the archaeological record. The bookends of this study are the introduction of the bronze slashing sword to Ireland at around 1200 BC and the introduction and proliferation of iron technology beginning around 600 BC.

Literary depictions of drowning or burial at sea provide fascinating glimpses into the often-conflicted human relationship with memory. For many cultures and religious traditions, properly remembering the dead involves burial, a funeral, and some kind of grave marker. Traditional rituals of memorialization are disturbed by the drowned body, which may remain lost at sea or be washed up unrecognized on a distant shore. The first book of its kind, Literary Drowning explores depictions of the drowned body in twentieth-century Irish and Caribbean postcolonial literature, uncovering a complex transatlantic conversation that reconsiders memory, forgetfulness, and the role that each plays in the making of the postcolonial subject and nation. Faced with fissures in cultural memory, postcolonial writers often identify their situation—and their nation’s—with that of the drowned body. Floating aimlessly without a grave, unmemorialized and perhaps unremembered, the drowned corpse embodies the troubled memory of the postcolonial nation or individual. Boeninger follows a trail of drowned bodies and literary influence from the turn-of-the-century Irish playwright J. M. Synge, through the poems and plays of St. Lucian Nobel laureate Derek Walcott, to the lesser-known work of Guyanese British novelist and poet David Dabydeen, and finally to the contemporary Irish plays of Marina Carr. Each author, while borrowing from those who came before, changes the image of the drowned body to reflect different facets of the project of remembering postcolonially.

Explores concepts of performance, modernity and progress by combining performance studies and historical research with contextualised readings of Synge's plays.

For much of the 20th century, Catholics in Ireland spent significant amounts of time engaged in religious activities. This book documents their experience in Limerick city between the 1920s and 1960s, exploring the connections between that experience and the wider culture of an expanding and modernising urban environment. Síle de Cléir discusses topics including ritual activities in many contexts: the church, the home, the school, the neighbourhood and the workplace. The supernatural belief underpinning these activities is also important, along with creative forms of resistance to the high levels of social control exercised by the clergy in this environment. De Cléir uses a combination of in-depth interviews and historical ethnographic sources to reconstruct the day-to-day religious experience of Limerick city people during the period studied. This material is enriched by ideas drawn from anthropological studies of religion, while perspectives from both history and ethnology also help to contextualise the discussion. With its unique focus on everyday experience, and combination of a traditional worldview with the modernising city of Limerick – all set against the backdrop of a newly-independent Ireland - Popular Catholicism in 20th-century Ireland presents a fascinating new perspective on 20th-century Irish social and religious history.

This book describes the history and development of palliative care services in the Republic of Ireland. Written from a multi-professional perspective the book appeals to anyone with an interest in hospice and palliative care in Ireland. In attempting to explore what is different about Irish palliative care, this book delves into the cultural, religious and social factors particular to modern Ireland, from the historical roots of the Irish palliative care movement through to the publication of the Government’s ‘blueprint’ for the future development of services. Palliative Care In Ireland explores the provision of palliative care services, bereavement, the influence of folklore, holistic care, faith, religion and spirituality, and the important contributions of the voluntary sector. The changing face of Ireland is described and challenges ahead are considered. This is the first book to truly capture the Irish dimension and is essential reading for those in emerging services worldwide where similar challenges are faced and where local and national influences determine the uniqueness of a particular model of service delivery. The book is key reading for students and researchers as well as all those involved in the delivery and management of palliative care services. Contributors: Jide Afolabi, Maria Bailey, Frank Brennan, David Clark, Sinéad Donnelly, Matthew Farrelly, Stephen Higgins, Jacqueline Holmes, Kaye Kealy, Michael Kearney, Ann Keating, Orla Keegan, Christy Kenneally, Philip Larkin, Peter Lawlor, Julie Ling, Anna-Marie Lynch, John McCormack, Regina McQuillan, Michael J. Murphy, Tony O'Brien, Eileen O’Leary, Liam O’Síoráin, Maeve O'Reilly, Patrick J Quinlan, Deirdre Rowe, Siobhan Sheehan, Geraldine Tracey, Onja Van Doorslaer, Eithne Walsh.