Episode 3 Great Irish Journeys with Martha Kearney

Ireland's beauty has captivated artists and writers for centuries.

It's easy to see why.

I'm Martha Kearney, and I was born in Ireland

but I left when I was a small child.

So in the course of this series, I'm hoping to rediscover the land

that I once called home.

My guide is going to be a 19th-century Irishman.

He was an artist and a surveyor and he made it his life's work

to chronicle the country's landmarks and treasures.

His name was George Victor Du Noyer.

Du Noyer was part of a team which undertook a ground-breaking series

of surveys in Ireland, mapping its landscape and its geology.

But Du Noyer was also an accomplished artist,

and he was inspired by all that he saw on his travels.

His work is like a memory map of the country as it once was.

Du Noyer made thousands of drawings. Aside from the landscape, he also

drew the country's most striking churches, castles and stately homes.

One legacy of this is that his sketches traced

the rise and fall of power in Ireland.

Those buildings can still be seen today.

This is Ireland's famous capital, Dublin.

Founded by the Vikings, the city flourished during the Georgian era.

Much of the most distinctive architecture dates from that period.

James Joyce, who was famously ambivalent about his birthplace,

did once say, "When I die, Dublin will be written on my heart."

Now, I can't quite say the same thing, because I did leave here

when I was four years old, but it's certainly true that Dublin

has very powerful childhood memories for me.

I'm very fond of St Stephen's Green, in the centre of Dublin.

My mother lived here as a student.

My parents were married in the university chapel on the square.

And as a child I was often brought here with my brothers

to feed the ducks.

I'll always remember being here one afternoon

with my dad and my little brother, Jamie.

We were feeding the ducks and then a television crew came along

and started filming us.

The result of it was,

I ended up on the very first night of Irish television -

even before the President!

Artist and geologist George Victor Du Noyer was born in Dublin.

He spent his life documenting mostly rural landscapes all over Ireland

for the great Ordnance and Geological Surveys of the age.

But he spent time in the urban centres, too.

This is Dublin Castle, once the centre of English rule in Ireland.

In modern times, Dublin has its own seat of power,

here at the Parliament or Dail Eireann, at Leinster House.

But the city wasn't always at the heart of the country's political,

economic or ecclesiastical power.

In fact, it's fascinating, if you look back, just how many

other places have played such a central role in Ireland's history.

Du Noyer captured many of these places, from Neolithic monuments

to 18th-century grand estates.

His images give us an insight into who ruled Ireland, and when.

But they also tell the story of how man created power bases

with the help of the landscape itself.

There's many different ways

of looking at landscapes of power in Ireland.

In many ways, all you needed to do was step out into the landscape

and just start reading it.

What you need, in a way, is a toolkit.

How do you decode it?

How do you understand it and how do you actually log

and register what this actually means?

I suppose we can see places of power at different times

but in all cases there are

two components to this - one is site

and the other is situation.

If we take a site, we're looking at strategic sites

that would have allowed for control of some particular feature

like a river crossing point.

But we're also looking at situation, where we look at the wider context

for the success of a particular place.

I think, myself, that you cannot really understand

Irish history, and appreciate Irish history,

without having these monuments

as the backdrop to the whole scenery

of Irish history.

I mean if you look at, for instance, Newgrange, you can take Newgrange

as the very beginnings of Irish art and architecture

because there is nothing earlier than Newgrange and Knowth

to go and show just precisely what power was all about.

This is Newgrange, a passage tomb

older than the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge.

5,000 years ago,

it was the epicentre of spiritual life in Ireland.

Du Noyer was very taken by the artwork of Neolithic monuments.

He recorded several of the decorated stones at nearby Loughcrew,

before coming to Newgrange to do the same.

Newgrange was sited here because it really is one of the most

fertile parts in Ireland.

We have a river down here

which provides direct access to the Irish Sea.

So people, communities, could travel

freely up this river.

And once they had that strong foundation, they could put their

energies into building a monument of this prominence.

And this is definitely

one of the most IMPRESSIVE prehistoric tombs in Europe, OK?

It's famous for the precision and magnificence

of its winter solstice,

and also for the perfection and quality of its stone carvings.

And you'll see those carvings all around the kerbstones of the mound

and in the burial chamber itself.

And these are the carvings that Du Noyer himself...

-Yes.

-..came here to sketch, didn't he?

This is a fascinating drawing by Du Noyer in the 1860s

because he was able to depict

the complete artwork on this entrance stone

which was a powerful barrier between the living and the dead.

And really he's shown the triple spiral here, which is really

the iconic symbol of Newgrange.

What does the triple spiral indicate, do you think?

GERALDINE LAUGHS

Well, that is the key question. These, this is abstract art.

Obviously, this symbol - the triple spiral -

was very important to the communities who lived here

in the same way that the cross today,

we associate with Christianity.

But because this art, it's just abstract,

it's totally open to interpretation.

The stones, though, aren't the whole story.

The real power of Newgrange lies in an ingenious piece

of Neolithic construction work.

This box is perfectly placed to harness the sun

in a spectacular show of light

to mark the passing of the darkest days of winter.

From day one, they wanted this monument

to align to the winter solstice.

From day one.

From when they set the first backstone in the chamber there,

they wanted this alignment, OK?

And then, to make it more precise, they built the roof box here

which narrows down the light.

We know that that still works, 5,000 years on.

You can come here and you can see the sun come over the hill there,

and the first beams of light are captured in this roof box

and light up the burial chamber. So it still works!

This became a major focus of pilgrimage. They would never

have seen anything like this monument, where they came from.

So this became a Mecca

and we can see that in this array of monuments within this sacred area.

And it's still a Mecca, in a way.

It still has a magnetism.

5,000 years on, people are still

coming from all over the world to Newgrange.

You've been studying this place since the 1970s

and you're STILL full of enthusiasm.

Because it always produces new things.

If you look at the landscape...

I've been trying to read the landscape for years,

and I still find out new things.

It was really nice to see these drawings.

I hadn't really looked in detail at these drawings before.

So when you learn something new about a place that you love,

that makes it all worthwhile, doesn't it?

Newgrange is a World Heritage Site and, as such,

is so carefully preserved that our film cameras are forbidden.

But I'm thrilled to follow Geraldine inside for a privileged glimpse.

Above our heads is an intricately carved stone -

as impressive today as it was when Du Noyer sketched it.

There's such a contrast between this enormous mound of earth

and what you actually find inside Newgrange.

You go through this tiny passageway which climbs steadily upwards

so you can barely get through.

It opens up into the most beautiful burial chamber -

an incredible construction, looking up at the roof.

And then you get a sense of what it must be like on the winter solstice

when that shaft of light pierces through the darkness - for just

20 minutes and illuminates the tomb. It's incredible!

What it must have meant in prehistoric times

and what it means for all the thousands of visitors

who still come here today.

While the sun is the source of Newgrange's power, the Irish people

have also used other natural phenomena to their advantage.

The Rock of Cashel is a geological oddity rising high in the landscape.

On top of it is a range of impressive buildings,

with so commanding an aspect that the early rulers of Ireland

chose this place as their seat of power.

The Rock fascinated Du Noyer.

He made several drawings of it, including one

from the ruins of Hore Abbey, which sits just below it.

You know, the view today is remarkably unchanged

from Du Noyer's time.

You can even see some birds above the ruins of the abbey

just as there are in his picture.

And also, this drawing really shows his skill as a draughtsman.

Look at the detail of the stonework.

Some of the masons who worked on Hore Abbey

would also have been responsible for the cathedral up on the hill,

up on the Rock of Cashel,

which is in the background of Du Noyer's picture.

The rock may seem to be in the background of this picture

but actually, this was once one of the most powerful places

in Ireland, a place where kings were made.

SEAN DUFFY: Early medieval Ireland was a very hierarchical country.

To such an extent that we had loads of kings. Each province

had its own king.

And below the level of the province,

there were local kings again.

Cashel was the traditional

headquarters, as it were, of the ancient kingdom of Munster.

They inaugurated their kings there,

all to do with the fact that

a king was a sacred figure.

But there were certainly

some very sacred and ancient activities

that took place in connection with the inauguration.

The most exotic of which is the account of Giraldus Cambrensis,

in the late 12th century,

who describes what he says is how the king up in the Donegal area

would have been inaugurated.

Which involved him

mating with a white mare,

and then they chopped up the white mare

and boiled the mare in a huge broth,

and then he bathed in the broth and they drank of the broth.

Ultimately the objective being to show that this man

was their rightful king.

The power of Cashel hit its highest point

when one of the most famous and iconic Irishmen was crowned

High King of all Ireland over 1,000 years ago...

Brian Boru.

'Brian Boru is the first person to have claimed a kingship of Ireland

'that had any semblance of actual authority throughout Ireland.

'To be a king of Ireland, you had to have actual

'authority over 200 or so kingdoms within Ireland, so really'

when Brian's dynasty seized, or usurped,

the kingship from Munster

in the late 10th century,

he was very much...

Because he was King of Cashel

and because he was King of Munster, he would have seen himself as

rightfully a king of Ireland because of sort of this area,

history and this image of Cashel as a seat of kingship of Ireland.

For centuries, Cashel was the place of great royal power in Ireland -

the home of kings.

But it also became a seat of power for the Christian church.

From its earliest inception,

Cashel was a Christian seat of kingship,

in the sense that its kings were almost certainly Christians.

In around about 1100, Muirchertach Ua Briain, who was a descendant

of Brian Boru, was able to grant the Rock of Cashel to the church.

What he seems to actually have been doing was creating in Cashel

a seat of secular power,

a royal centre for a kingdom of Ireland

and a structure of church and state

entwined in one ceremonial complex.

While kings were still crowned here,

the Rock of Cashel evolved from a political centre of power

to a religious one.

And it is the surviving ecclesiastical buildings

that give the rock its distinctive profile today.

In medieval times the Rock of Cashel truly was a spiritual landmark.

For miles around, people only had to look up here

to be reminded of their faith and also of the dominance of the church,

because religion has been an overwhelming force

in Irish society and culture for centuries.

In fact, it's only in the last 20 years or so

that its power has really begun to diminish.

Cashel stands as a monument to power.

It speaks of a land dominated by the great early kings of Ireland.

They used the landscape, the sheer size of the rock,

as a means of taking control.

Landscape has always been used in this way.

As an island, Ireland is well used to invaders

crossing the sea to take charge.

In the 12th century, the Anglo-Normans landed,

and they set up their power base

in the port of Waterford on the east coast.

When Du Noyer came here in the early 1850s,

he decided to paint a watercolour of this view

across Waterford Harbour.

And it's a charming picture actually.

You've got a mother and her young family...

sailing boats, just as there are today.

I think the coastal road is a bit busier, to be honest.

But you still get

a very good impression of what was going on here.

But this is much, much more than a beautiful site.

This place is strategically extremely important,

which is why it led to the creation of Ireland's oldest city -

Waterford - which in itself was fought over for centuries

in a battle for power that reflects a great deal of Ireland's history.

Those power struggles often took place around Ireland's ports,

because whoever controlled them dominated trade.

Waterford's deep harbours provided a gateway into Ireland.

A great stream of merchant ships sailed back and forth from England

and France and, as the city's fortunes grew, so did its power.

This harbour has really been the key to Waterford's wealth

right down through the ages.

Now when Du Noyer came back here for a second time, that was in 1863,

he went to visit one of the treasures of the medieval city

and decided to paint it. This was a plea to the King of England

to protect Waterford's prosperity from a new trading rival.

This is Du Noyer's drawing of that treasure.

The Waterford Charter Roll -

a brightly coloured document dating back to the 14th century.

The charter celebrates Waterford's

historic links with the great kings of England.

ADRIAN LE HARIVEL: Like other antiquarians,

Du Noyer was interested in the ephemera of the past,

and it seems that when he went to

Waterford, he saw the now famous Waterford Charter.

His drawing has a sort of curved profile to it,

as if he's just literally unrolled it, and the colours are very fresh.

I think above all else,

the Waterford Charter Roll

is a declaration by the citizens

of Waterford of their Englishness.

The modern citizens of Waterford might be disappointed to know

this but they were... Waterford

and the other Irish towns were bastions of

Englishness in late-medieval Ireland.

Basically it's like a medieval PowerPoint presentation,

the documents here. It's not a work of art,

it was never intended to be a work of art.

The documents are legal documents.

They were brought to show the King of England.

They added all these wonderful illustrations to the legal documents

to keep his attention while they

-were explaining the case to him.

-To win the rivalry

-against the nearby town.

-So that the King would come down on

the side of his royal city of Waterford.

OK. Tell me about these extraordinary illustrations.

The top is really interesting because you've got the King,

which is Edward III of England,

and he's being presented, by a key,

to the gates of the city.

It was a walled city, so he's being presented.

Therefore they were recognising that

the King is the overlord of the city.

And then we have portraits all down the side.

Yes, beginning with the first English king to come to Ireland.

King Henry II came to Waterford, landed in Waterford in 1171.

King John, who came here twice. And then of course,

King Edward II's son, it was presented to him, King Edward III -

a magnificent portrait of him here on horseback.

So this was the king who was given the charter roll,

so of course he has a very good portrait.

Yes, and it is even slightly bigger.

And then this glorious image here of King Edward.

You can see the gold on this one still survives,

whereas it's gone black on the earlier ones.

-And you can see he's wearing tights.

-And fabulous shoes.

-Yes.

-They are kind of Vivienne Westwood style.

And the real big, long, pointy shoes,

like they were wearing in the 1950s, only longer.

They had to walk backwards up the stairs

in order to get up the stairs, because they could be...

-two feet long, these shoes.

-So this is quite a spectacular

-document, isn't it?

-Oh, it is very, very...important.

How would they have presented it to the King?

They obviously met the King and his ministers and counsellors,

and they would've rolled this out in front of him and said,

"Ever since England's involvement in Ireland,

"you've always taken the side of Waterford,

"so by diminishing the power and the scope of Waterford

"you're diminishing the other royal cities

"and your own powers in Ireland."

-And so, did all their efforts pay off?

-Yes.

We got away with it, and really we didn't have any documents

which said we had rights over the port of New Ross.

The Waterford Charter offers a remarkable window

into the politics of medieval Ireland. And, thanks to Du Noyer,

we have a reminder of what the original would have looked like

before time had faded it.

Its story tells us about the power of English kings in Ireland,

a power that would grow in the centuries to come.

Generations of monarchs gave land to their supporters.

Wave after wave of rich men arrived from England

to set up large estates.

They had made their fortunes in the service of the King,

and their grand stately homes reflected their status.

Du Noyer drew many of them.

In the first part of the 18th century,

the wealthiest man in Ireland decided to build a country house

in the Liffey Valley, not too far from Dublin.

But the house he designed, the very first Palladian one in Ireland,

is a testament to extravagance and spending power on a scale

you see very rarely, even today.

This self-made man was called William Connolly,

and he decided to name his house Castletown.

William Connolly was the Speaker of the Irish House of Commons,

the most powerful political position in 18th-century Ireland.

He intended to make his home a showpiece,

to reflect his fortune and status.

Castletown House has such an imposing presence.

Clearly it must have been quite extraordinary

when it was first built in the 18th century.

But in the 19th century, when Du Noyer came here,

it clearly caught his eye.

He did a rough pencil sketch in one of his notebooks,

which does convey the scale of the place which, I have to say,

is still pretty impressive today.

One awestruck 18th-century visitor to Castletown said,

"This I believe is the only house in Ireland to which the term

"'palace' can be applied."

'It was the first of a type of building which showed

'that this was not a place that was at war.

'And this was put up by Speaker William Connolly, who came into'

a very considerable amount of money

and was able to get the architect of

the facade of St John Lateran, in Rome,

in the shape of this man, Galileo,

to go and design his grand mansion,

which is said to have 365 rooms - one for every day in the year.

He was showing that he was a master of power

but not in any military way,

but in doing the right thing...

but also showing off his wealth in building such a mansion as this.

And it, of course, led the way to so many other

of the larger houses,

some of which fortunately still survive in this country.

We're sitting here in an absolutely magnificent gallery,

and I suppose it's indicative of the kind of money

that was spent on Castletown House.

Yes, it was a showpiece in the whole Dublin area at the time.

The beautiful Pompeiian style murals,

as you can see. That was very much in line with

what was being discovered in Pompeii at the time.

So clearly Speaker Connolly had an immense amount of wealth.

But he wasn't from a wealthy family himself?

No, he was the son of an innkeeper in Donegal

on the wild west coast.

And he trained as a lawyer.

And then was in the right place at the right time, in the 1690s,

when a lot of land was confiscated

and sold after the Battle of the Boyne.

He built this house because he wanted to make a statement.

It had to be near Dublin,

and I think he was also making a statement

that somebody from the Gaelic world

could succeed and, in fact, do very well

in the apparently unpleasant... conditions of a conquest.

What part do you think that Castletown House

played in the political life in Ireland in the 18th century?

Well, I think quite a large part.

First of all, it was an impressive backdrop if you were meeting

the Connollys for the first time.

And then beyond that, you have a lot of areas and rooms

where you can do deals or pull people away for a quiet chat.

And I think that again is quite an important fact. Also,

from its sheer size, you can entertain several hundred people

and park their carriages out the front without the slightest problem.

So a lot of power broking would go on in this very room, probably?

Very much so. Yes, I think so.

In its heyday, Castletown was

Ireland's 18th century equivalent to Chequers,

the most charming and luxurious of environments

for William Connolly to rally opponents to his causes.

And today, it's a lasting reminder of a wealth so great

that it had the power to conjure up

an Italian style palace in the Irish countryside.

The Irish poet John Montague once wrote of Ireland

that the whole landscape was

"a manuscript we've lost the skill to read."

Du Noyer, however, could read the landscape

and his drawings of ancient sacred places, of the seats of Irish kings,

of political documents and of manor houses help us to do the same.