North Cork Field Trip

Well this is a few days late, but, in my defense, we have a test coming up.  Currently though my brain has kinda hit the wall on studying so I'm finally going to write about our field trip on Thursday.

On Thursday we were all actually assembled before the arrival of our professor.  Although this isn't that surprising as there are now two babies in his household.

Labbacallee Wedge Tomb

Our first stop on our trip was the Labbacallee Wedge Tomb.  Wedge tombs date to the Chalcolithic (Copper Age) which was 2500-2000BC.  The wedge tombs get their name from their wedge shape.  They all have large capstones.  Labbacallee's capstone weighs 10 tons.  There tends to be very few bodies in wedge tombs.  In this one there were three bodies found.  In the main chamber there were the remains of a child and a young man as well as the head of an older woman.  The rest of the woman was in a chamber farther back.  The bones show that the woman was about 50 years old when she died, this was incredibly old for the time.  Interestingly, Labbacallee means something along the lines of 'the fields of the witch/wise woman,' so it seems that the woman's legend continued after her death.

Me in the Wedge Tomb

After our professor told us about the site, he let us wander around it to take photos.  We all began to wonder if we could go inside it.  Our professor then climbed on top and hopped in, saying that he couldn't risk undergrads.  After we got the okay most of us went inside the tomb (by the way the bodies are at the National Museum).

View from Outside Mitchelstown Caves

Then it was time to see the Mitchelstown Caves.  There was no archaeological significance to this part of the trip...it was just cool.  Sadly though we weren't allowed to take photos inside the caves, but the view from outside them was beautiful.  Besides the fact that concerts are held in them the coolest part was probably when they turned out the lights...it was intensely dark and none of us had any idea how the guy who discovered the caves made it down with only a candle.

Munster's Flag

Our final stop was the Rock of Cashel.  We had lunch at the bottom of it at Bru Boru.  In the room for lunch there were flags for all of the provinces.  I liked that the one for Munster looks like a smiley face.

The Rock of Cashel (plus Scaffolding)

Tipperary Plain

We definitely needed the lunch before we hiked up the steep hill to the Rock of Cashel.  It was an incredibly beautiful site.  The fact that it is on top of a rocky prominence not only made it a naturally defensive site, but it made for some great views of the Tipperary plain.  Sadly, part of it was under construction or restoration or something...there was a lot of scaffolding.

Cashel

Fresco in Cormac's Chapel (Possibly 3 Wise Kings)

To quote a bit from my syllabus Cashel "was chosen as the main stronghold of the Eoganact kings of Munster during the early medieval period.  It was given to the Church by Muircheartach Ua Briain in 1101 and was made an archiepiscopal centre soon afterwards."  The chapel and cathedral were both very beautiful, but the chapel had some of the only surviving 12th century fresco in Ireland.

While this was a great trip, I think we're all looking forward to our last trip to Galway on Tuesday/Wednesday.