The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1889-01-12
Pagan Ireland.

1aSau AelaAu,
The frst of a series of articles from
the pen of Charles DeKay. on Ireland,
in the January number of the
Century, from which we quote the fol-
lowing: 1.-THE pagan survives in archl-
lecture. Buildings were generally
square and of wood, or round and of
wattles plastered with Cay and painted
IN bright colors. After Christianity
was established and the use of stone
became less rare in religious and mill
tary life, the conservative bent of the
people kept form Of tower no longer
represented in Great Britain and the
mainland. As early as the twelfth CEN
fury, when the Norman-Welsh began
to make stone the rule instead OF the
exception, Giraldus, the travelled pre-
late, talks of ecclesiastical towers,
which according to the custom of the
country are slender and lofty and more
over round.' He knew that they were
peculiar, but did not suspect that this
form of tower represented an inherit.
ance from a pagan religion any more
than he saw the pagan1s.n Of the rites
at the shrine of St. Bright. Yet inlet
tered Irish tradition has kept the thread
of fact without being able to give the
historical sequences. In its immediate
use the round tower was a sort of mill
tary necessity, and came after the ruin
Of monastic settlements by the pagans
from the Baltic. During sudden raids
it was a place of security which could
not be burned down like the timber
churches near by Or the waited cabins
Of monks and clerics within the cashel
wall. 1t was belfry whence hand
bells were rung to call the students to
school and the faithful to prayer. 1t
was a watch tower and beacon. But it
reaches through military usage back to
pagan times. In polished and highly
artificial shape, due to Byzantine
science in architecture, it represents
the rude waited house Of Gauls. Sec
ing how the Irish kept heather ideas in
other things, we can perceive how the
round wicker house Ct the Celt, such as
we see it carved on the column Of An.
toninus at Rome, developed into the
wood and wicker outlook tower aid
beacon, and in sklllful hands became
the Irish round tower, perpetuated to
our day by the hundred or more shafts
of cut stone which lend charm to as
many Irish landscapes. Christian in
usage, they are pagan in design. The
Mortimer caused the demand. heath.
enism supplied the pattern. and Bvzan-
tine craftsmen, driven from the East
by the bigotry Of the image-breaking
emperors, supplied the science to rear
towers more durable, useful, simple.
yet stately, than anything ireland had
seen before or has seen since. The his
tory of towers i'm Mohammedan coun.
tries which can be derived from a wor-
ship Of the heavenly bodies supplies a
very remarkable parallel which the
archmologists of the last centnry per-
ceiyed but could not define. In Amer
lea the round tower, with its high en-
trance and adaptation to watchers and
sun worship, is found among The ex-
tinct cliff dwelling. Indians. Towers
in Mexico and Yucatap were in use FOR
the same purpose. Observe in the
round tower preserved at Ardmore the
bands which repeat, without any USE
full object in stone, the horizontal bands
that strengthened the tall wicker house
of Gauls. Such apparently trivial
points weigh heavily in favor Of she in
digenous character Of the round tower
of Ireland"