How The Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe The author Thomas Cahill was in 1940 in New York City and had Irish-American parents that raised him in Queens and the Bronx. He is said to be a lifelong scholar by the Penguin Random House Speakers Bureau. He studied ancient Greek and Latin literature as well as medieval philosophy, scripture, and theology at Fordham University where he completed his Bachelor of Arts degree.
In the late 800’s King Alfred the Great was a great influence to Anglo Saxon literature because his “military and political success” (Amodio) led to a period of stability where culture and literature thrived, but that period of time did not last very long. The English were fearful of the Vikings coming to attack
Why did Sir John Davies only criticize the inability of Irish people themselves rather than England’s imperial colonization method in explaining why Ireland was never subdued? Why doesn't Davies see a fault in the approach? In the beginning Davies brings up a “defect that hindered” was that “a barbarous country must first be broken by a war before it will be capable of good government; and when it is fully subdued and conquered, if it be not well planted and governed after the conquest it will soon return to the former barbarism.” Davies claimed that the Irish were “like wild fruit trees” in their old traditions to become one with England. When I read the document I expected details such as military faults in leadership and strategy, but it
The oppressive past that the Scots-Irish faced in their home country optimalized the isolated geography of the Greater Appalachian region, as they were able to construct a society that was rooted in individual liberty as opposed to materialism. When living in Great Britain, the Scots-Irish were forced out due to a large increase in rent put upon by the landlords. As noted by a Scot-Irish in American Nations, “We having been, before we came here, so much oppressed and harassed by under landlords in our country, from which we with great losses, dangers, and difficulties came [to]... this foreign world to be freed from such oppression” (Woodard 104). Thus, as evidenced, the Borderlanders travelled to the New World in search of a life free of oppression.
Gender role is basically an arrangement of societal standards directing what sorts of practices are by and large viewed as satisfactory, suitable or alluring for a man in view of their real or actual sex. In this paper I will focus on the gender roles with reference to the mini-epic” the tain” This piece of Irish literature presents a very good distinction between the old period and the medieval time period. Formerly, men were the protagonists, leaders or the saviors in the literature. A man had to go to the wars and fights, to preserve the territory and honor (women) was their duty.
The British had the “us and them” mindset which goes along with the classification stage. The Irish were mostly apart of the Irish Roman Catholic religion and the British did not suppose that such person existed, which goes with dehumanization. Lord Chancellor Bowes in Dublin made a published ruling that ``the law does not suppose any such person to exist as an Irish Roman Catholic” (Gallagher). The British to this day deny anything happened.
9th century, Ireland was invaded by the Vikings. The Vikings are the red-haired pirates from Scandinavia. They were great travelers who loved raiding, trading and settling in other lands. The Vikings enjoyed pretty things and loved to express their status via golden jewellery, gemstones and valuable materials. They brought coinage which was something the Irish and Celts had never had before.
Answering the question ‘When did St. Patrick die? ’ is of crucial importance in understanding the way in which Early Medieval History works. The debate over the potential death date of St. Patrick shows that (for this period at least) there is no such thing as a historical fact for an Historian to rely on. When studying any period in History, there is a heavy reliance on sources. However, with the Medieval period, there are question marks surrounding the reliability of the sources.
Religion conquered many individual’s opinions and mindset during the 1800’s, but religion became the biggest conflict between the Irish and the Natives. The country at the time possessed mainly Protestants, but with the accumulating Irish population, the Protestants felt their religion would decrease and become the minority. In Nativist New Yorker Disparagers Irish Arrivals, George Strong describes the churches of the Irish and the conflicts they faced, because of the differences in both religions. “Met a Know-Nothing procession moving uptown… They looked as if they might have designs on St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and I think the Irish would have found them ugly customers”
Overall, these elements all aid in emphasizing the vast ‘superiority’ of the Normans. Firstly, when examining their respective feasts the Anglo-Saxons are depicted as immoral while the Normans are depicted as righteous. In the feast Harold and his men are pictured drinking, two of which with drinking horns. These drinking horns were “often shown in the hands of morally weak or evil characters and had become symbols of vanity and sin”.
I chose this chapter for many different reasons. I feel that this chapter is well written, controversial and will always remain relevant within Irish history and among Irish historians.
For Peers, representations of ‘this childlike state confirmed the superiority of the Europeans, a superiority which even the sepoy was alleged to acknowledge’ (134). Yet, the evil-looking sepoy standing in front of Canning has nothing of the innocence of a child or the submission of an ‘inferior’ being. This contrast suggests that being merciful toward him on the grounds that he is not fully
(Bois, 2005 [1903]) But, much of their identity was pressurised by feeling the need to assimilate and conform to religious structures and certain standards in the Anglo-Saxon (Solomos, 2005) society to which they belonged. (Bois, 2005
Thus, in Merlin, we see a rebirth of the old, dead Celtic culture. Cohen argues in his third monster thesis that “Because of it ontological liminality, the monster notoriously appears at a time of crisis.” Considering Geoffrey was born in 1100, a mere thirty-four years after the Norman Conquest, it does not seem far-fetched to point to the imposition of a new regime as such a crisis. Further, it should also be noted that the Norman Conquest took place concurrently alongside the “creative surge” subbed the renaissance of the twelfth-century. Perhaps these two factors threatened to sweep away the culture of Celtic tradition – leading Geoffrey to revive Celtic tradition through Merlin.
The planners of the rebellion were Irish landowners that included Gaelic Irish and Old English. In examining the depositions taken at the time, the issues surrounding land is an integral determinant for the outbreak of
