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 Bolton Library in the shadow of The Cathedral of St. John The Baptist, Cashel, Co. Tipp. An exceptional collection of literature, described by experts as the one of the most important of its kind in Ireland has been taken into the care of the State, by the Office of Public Works (OPW).
The Bolton Library in Cashel, Co Tipperary, was first established by an 18th century Church of Ireland Archbishop and skilled Canon Lawyer, Theophilus Bolton, (1678-1744), grandson of Sir Richard Bolton, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Educated in Trinity College Dublin, Archbishop Bolton became Chancellor of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in 1714, Bishop of Clonfert and later Bishop of Elphin in 1724, before becoming Archbishop of Cashel in 1730. The Cashel Palace Hotel directly opposite Cashel Cathedral was originally built for his convenience, as a place of residence. His rare collection of some 11,000 books maps and pamphlets were bequeathed to the Cashel Diocese following his death.
This unique collection of antiquarian European books contain the thoughts, words and deeds of mankind for over 2,500 years, and include works by Dante, Machiavelli, Homer, Herodotus, and Plato. Amongst this collection can be found an interesting letter from a citizen of Athens to the then Roman Emperor, pleading for fair and reasonable treatment of Christians and amongst the maps a Geographical Survey of Ireland printed in Dublin in 1840, which warns of the disastrous effects of continuing to plant the potato crop.
The collection, currently securely housed in the Chapter House of the Cathedral of St. John The Baptist, has been traditionally cared for by the local Protestant Clergy and despite its immediate proximity to the Rock of Cashel, this rare collection is little-known and has attracted few visitors down the years.
Continue reading Bolton Library – An Exceptional Collection Of Rare Literature
Jesuit priest, Fr Michael Bergin, William Maurice Armstrong, Sir Sackville Hamilton Carden KCMG , are just some of the Tipperary men, numbered among the many, whose heroics, Australians celebrated yesterday in their Anzac Day commemorations.
The acronym ‘ANZAC‘ stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, whose soldiers were known as Anzacs. Anzac Day still remains one of the most important national occasions for both Australia and New Zealand, who remember the thousands of soldiers from all countries who lost their lives in the Gallipoli campaign, also known as the Dardanelles Campaign, which took place between 25th April 1915 and the 9th January 1916, during the First World War.
This eight month campaign during the First World War, which was an attempt to seize obvious strategic advantage and was authorised by the British, with an attack on the Turkish peninsula, aiming to capture Constantinople.
Continue reading Lest Tipperary Forgets Anzac Day
 Sir W.Churchill RTE documentary film makers are presently investigating whether Sir Winston Churchill‘s right hand man, Tipperary born Brendan Bracken, was really his illegitimate son.
This follows some 80 years of gossip and rumour that the Tipperary native and possibly one of the most powerful Irishmen and spin doctor of the 20th century, was long suspected, by even Churchill’s own family, as their father’s illegitimate child.
The documentary possibly to be entitled “Churchill’s Secret Son” is expected to be broadcast as part of RTE1’s winter schedule, in November next.
Who Was Brendan Bracken ?
Brendan Bracken was born in 1901 in Templemore, County Tipperary. He was the son of Joseph Kevin (J.K.) Bracken and Hannah Agnes Ryan.
J.K. Bracken was a successful builder, a member of the Fenian Brotherhood that had committed itself to winning Ireland’s independence from Britain by force and a founder member of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) established in 1884 here in the Haye’s Hotel in Thurles.
His father died when Brendan was just three years old. His mother remarried one Patrick Laffan, whose ideals leaned to armed rebellion, and they moved with Brendan, his three full siblings and his two step sisters, to Dublin city.
Continue reading Did Churchill Secretly Father A Tipperary Son?
 Faddan More Psalter The National Museum of Ireland has announced that an eighth century religious manuscript, found at Faddan More, near Riverstown in north Co Tipperary will go on public display, for the first time, next year.
The Faddan More Psalter
The psalter was found in Faddan More bog, on the North Tipperary border on the afternoon of July 20th, 2006, by Mr Eddie Fogarty, a workman who was operating a mechanical digger. Mr Fogarty spotted the object in the bucket of his digger and contacted the bog’s owners, Mr Kevin and Mr Patrick Leonard, who gathered up the fragments and covered them with wet peat, before notifying the staff of the National Museum.
Trinity College manuscript’s expert Mr Bernard Meehan said it was the first discovery of an Irish early medieval document in over two centuries.
A specialist team from the museum, which later arrived at the scene, discovered that the psalter had fallen open, showing lines from Psalm 83 written in latin and clearly visible, “Quam dilecta tabernacula tua Domine exercituum,” (Translated “How amiable are thy tabernacles, O LORD of hosts! “) It should be noted that Psalm 83 then, is now Psalm 84 today.
 The Derrynaflan Hoard The 1,200 year old manuscript, now appropriately named the “Faddan More Psalter” will form the centrepiece of a permanent exhibition at the National Museum’s Kildare Street gallery, following completion of its restoration work by senior conservator, Mr John Gillis .
The “Faddan More Psalter” is expected to go on display to the public in the early Summer of 2011 .
This is not the first priceless treasure found in North Tipperary. An 8th or 9th century chalice, was found as part of five liturgical vessels, known as the Derrynaflan Hoard, on the 17th February 1980 near Killenaule in County Tipperary Ireland.
According to art historian Michael Ryan this hoard “represents the most complex and sumptuous expression of the ecclesiastical art style of early medieval Ireland as we know it, in its eighth and ninth century maturity.”
The chalice was found with a composite silver Paten, a hoop, which may have been a stand for the Paten, a liturgical strainer and a bronze basin inverted over the other objects.
These latter historical and priceless items are currently on display in Dublin, in the National Museum of Ireland.
It is the currently held view amongst many historians that both of these objects, or at the very least replicas of same, should now be housed in their native County Tipperary, where they would attract much needed tourism to the area. Call it a kind of decentralisation or what you will.
Renowned Poet and member of Aosdána, Teo Dorgan , sets off on a journey down memory lane, on road he’s travelled many times before, from his home town of Cork to Dublin. Now the N8 has changed and improved a lot in the last 30 years. However, instead of towns, all we see are bypasses that are the legacy of the Celtic Tiger era.
 Theo visits these towns now once again, taking the same routes he did fadó (long ago) on Bus Éireann. This week Theo stops in The Horse and Jockey, Thurles Co. Tipperary. It was always a halfway station to stop off and get a bit of grub and you on the way to a match, in the mecca of hurling, over the road in Thurles. Theo learns more about the founding of the GAA, in the place it all started, in the Haye’s Hotel. He also visits the famous Holycross Abbey, the St Mary’s Famine Museum and yes he does remember the Trip to Tipp.
‘Ar Bhóithrín na Smaointe‘ is an eight part series which airs each Wednesday at 7.30 on TG4 and this week (03/02/10) will feature the Tipperary Towns of Horse and Jockey, Holycross and our own Thurles Town.
This show is a must for anyone who travelled down this road over the years, as it features film archive of the area going back some 30 years or more.
The show is produced and directed by Brighid Breathnach on behalf of Independent Pictures for RTE for TG4.
Amongst those taking part in this programme, is retired Monsignor Maurice Dooley DD, former professor of Canon Law at St. Patrick’s College,Thurles and former parish priest of Loughmore, Thurles, Co.Tipperary.
Theo Dorgan is originally from Blackpool in Cork City, he is a poet, prose writer, editor, translator and member of Ireland’s most exclusive Arts Club, An Aosdána.
Over the past 25 years he has presented innumerable books and poetry programmes on RTÉ Radio 1, as well as the long-running interview series ‘The Inbisible Thread’ for Lyric FM. He was presenter on RTE 1’s books programme ‘Imprint’, and he wrote the scripts for and presented the RTÉ/BBC series ‘Hidden Treasures’, like ‘Imprint’ a Loopline Films production.
His more recent book, ‘Sailing For Home’ has been praised by Nobel laureate Doris Lessing as “a book for everyone.”
Dorgan’s next collection of poems, ‘Greek‘, will be published on 1st February next, and his prose account of a journey under sail from Cape Horn to Cape Town, ‘Time On the Ocean‘, will be published next October.
Reflecting on the ‘Ar Bhóithrín na Smaointe’ Tg4 series to www.thurles.info, Theo stated:-
“There is an unexpected advantage to be gained from the transformation of the Cork-Dublin road into a motorway: the traveller who turns off to explore the bypassed towns will find that life has resumed a civilised pace there. For the most part he or she will also find a distinct improvement in the quality of life in these vibrant towns. Much remains the same, of course, but as is the case with the development of St Mary’s Famine Museum, we do seem to have got a little better at preserving what is left of our heritage. There is a new sense of pride and enterprise about each town we visited, a sense, perhaps, that the past remains the past but the future is there to be made in whatever image we wish. I found also, it must be said, a profound unease about the implications of the present economic debacle — so many people we spoke to, expressed fears that what has been hard fought for, especially in terms of employment and civic life, may soon be lost again, if a new generation is forced into unemployment and foreign exile.”
This show is a must for Tipperary viewers, so get the kettle on early and switch to TG4 next Wednesday – Time 7.30 pm.
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