On our second day in Dublin we walked down to the National Museum of Decorative Arts and History. This museum is in the old Collins Barracks on the north side of the River Liffey to the west of downtown. To get there we walked past the Arbour Hill Memorial and cemetary. The Memorial was a former cemetery for the military barracks that now houses the museum across the street. It is also the burial place of the 14 executed leaders of the 1916 Uprising. Oddly enough, the 14 were buried quickly in a mass grave so that the site would not become a shrine that would further their political aims.
Arbour Hill Cemetery
Interior courtyard at Collins Barracks
Tired jet-lagged smiley boy
Giant Irish Deer
One rainy afternoon we wandered into the National Museum of Natural History, known to Dublin school children as the dead zoo. It was awesome and so very Victorian. It was built in 1857 and has changed little since an expansion in 1877. It made me think of the explorers of that era I've read about who collected specimens to bring back home. This is where some of them would have ended up. The website describes the place as "a museum of a museum". We saw skeletons of the now extinct giant Irish deer, old bones found in the bogs of Ireland. They are truly massive with an antler spread of up to 12 feet. We also found pandas, and giraffes upstairs in the exotic animal exhibit.
My boy with his favorite animal
Me with mine
High on every must see list for Dublin is the EPIC Irish Emigration Museum. In front of the museum is this set of sculptures depicting the massive emigration during the great famine. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I would certainly put this in the category of "experience" rather than exhibition. There were lovely displays in a series of rooms about the history of Ireland and the reasons people have emigrated at different times as well as the modern culture and the impact the emigrants have had on the world. One of my favorite displays showed dual screens, one with a woman singing traditional Irish tunes to a fiddle and one with a man singing Appalachian Bluegrass tunes to a banjo. Not much difference.
Famine Memorial Sculptures
The Jeannie Johnston
Dublin Custom House
On another day we went to the National Archaeology museum. The museum is housed in a stunning Victorian building. The star of the show was the prehistoric gold. It is quite impressive given that there are no significant gold deposits in Ireland. I also really liked the Treasury which displayed the exceptionally fine craftsmanship of gold and silver religious artifacts from Celtic and early Christian Ireland. The second gallery displayed portions of a book of Psalms from around 800 AD that was recovered from an Irish bog. My girl really liked seeing the different versions of the Viking and Celtic cloak pins. There were also plenty of Celtic and Viking swords. One particular item was pretty odd, bog butter. It's kind of what it sounds like, butter or other animal fat buried in bogs as a means of preservation. Some samples have been found from the 15th and 16th centuries.
Gold collars
Another "museum" was the National Leprechaun Museum. It was less museum and more story telling experience for tourists. We had a very entertaining guide and enjoyed it. We heard stories of the Leprechauns, faeries, the Fianna, and Fionn McCumhail (Finn McCool) My girl liked the story of how he got wisdom from sucking a bit of salmon off his thumb.
My Leprechauns
Another tourist experience on the not-to-be-missed list is Dublinia. It tells the story of Viking and Medieval Dublin. This is primarily geared toward kids, but also enjoyable for adults. I'm not going to retell the whole history of the city here, but we tried on helmets, wrote in runes, visited a Medieval market, and played with swords. Well done. The building is across the street from Christ Church Cathedral in the former synod hall and previous location of St Micheal's church. The building is connected to Christ Church by a stone archway and includes St Micheal's tower.
My Viking girl
Medieval punishment
Mmmm... pies
Spectacular views of Christ Church from St Micheal's tower.
One last museum, the GPO, or General Post Office. This building was the center of the 1916 Easter Uprising. The interior was completely burned and later restored, but the original facade, complete with bullet holes, still stands. The museum at the site of the post office tells the story of the uprising and it's aftermath. It is a tragic story since the uprising was not successful and the leaders were executed. It wouldn't be until years later that Ireland became a free state. After many years as a constitutional monarchy under the King of England the Republic of Ireland was formally declared in 1949. (I think I got that right, maybe not)
One display was particularly touching. It told of the boy scouts, Na Fianna Eirann, who were message boys and fighters during the Uprising and later civil war. They even participated in the gun running of 1914. There may have been other groups of boys involved with the different organizations, but all the same, the boys were there in the middle of it. The organization still survives with a decidedly more political and military bend than our version of scouting. John's great uncle, Packy Joe's dad was one of these scouts for a time. Those who worked for the republic were awarded positions in the Garda, police force, after the war.
Ireland is both very old and very new. People have been here for a very long time, since before the Vikings settled Dublin. But, the country as we know it today is actually quite new. Life goes on as the political world swirls around. People and ships continue to come and go, Borders and rulers change, but life goes on.
So many museums so many churches and so little time. We would like to come back to Dublin and Ireland. We most certainly will return for visa renewals and other such things, but it is a lovely place to spend some time.
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