ISSUE 20 • 2016 1 Contents Project Team 3 The Illumination of a Wake Project Manager: Dr Tomás Mac Conmara By Billy McCarthy Research Director: Dr Clíona O’Carroll Editorial Advisor: Dr Ciarán Ó Gealbháin 4 ‘Very great plantations’ – A Garden History of Cork City Design and Layout: Dermot Casey Editorial Team: Dr Tomás Mac Conmara, Dr By Séan Moraghan Ciarán Ó Gealbháin. Project Researchers: Tara Arpaia, Aisling Byron, 6 A Personal Memory of Mick Lynch Dermot Casey, Stephen Dee, Jamie Furey, By Mark Wilkins Penny Johnston, Louise Madden O’Shea, Michael Moore, Tim McCarthy, Seán Moraghan, Laura Ann Murphy, Mark Treacy. 8 A Tale of Two Masons By Michael Moore Acknowledgements The Cork Folklore Project would like to thank: Dept 10 ‘Irreplaceable and precious’: A reflection on architectural of Social Protection, Susan Kirby; Management conservation in 2016 By Aisling Byron and staff of Northside Community Enterprises; Fr John O’Donovan, Noreen Hegarty; Roinn an Bhéaloidis / Dept of Folklore and Ethnology, 11 The Outsider Perspective University College Cork, Dr Stiofán Ó Cadhla, Dr By Dr Tomás Mac Conmara Marie-Annick Desplanques, Dr Clíona O’Carroll, Ciarán Ó Gealbháin, Bláthnaid Ní Bheaglaoí and 12 The Choctaw Nation’s Donation to the Irish People Colin MacHale; Cork City Council, Cllr Kieran McCarthy; Cork City Heritage Officer, Niamh By Dr Jenny Butler Twomey; Cork City and County Archives, Brian McGee; Cork City Library, Local Studies; Michael 14 Sound Excerpts Lenihan, Dr Carol Dundon. LGBT Archive Collection Disclaimer The Cork Folklore Project is a Dept of Social 17 Cork’s Horse Trams Protection funded joint initiative of Northside By Pat Walsh Community Enterprises Ltd & Dept of Folklore and Ethnology, University College Cork. Material in The 18 Reflections of the Changing Spiritual Landscape of Cork Archive (including photographs) remains copyright By Laura Ann Murphy of the Project, unless otherwise indicated. Individual opinions expressed in journal articles are not necessarily those of the Project. 21 ‘Ag trácht dom ar Amhránnaíocht Dúchas na nGaeil’ By Peadar Ó Riada Cover Images Mick Lynch. Photo by Ciarán Ó Tuama 22 A view of Cork from Audley Place A view of Cork from Audley Place By John Butts, c.1750 Courtesy of The Crawford Art Gallery By Geraldine Healy John Barr chiseling a stone. Photo by James Walter Chapman-Taylor via Wikimedia Commons. 23 Cork City Hall: A historical reflection By Louise Madden O’Shea The Archive printed by City Print Ltd, Cork www.cityprint.ie 25 Book Reviews Local history and folklore publications 26 Reflections on 20 years of The Cork Folklore Project The Cork Folklore Project Northside Community Enterprises Ltd Note from the Project Manager St Finbarr’s College, Farranferris, Redemption Road, Cork, T23YW62 Ireland The twentieth edition of The Archive is a milestone in the Cork Folklore Project. In the phone +353 (021) 422 8100 previous nineteen editions, almost 300 articles have explored aspects of Cork folklore, email [email protected] both by researchers on the project and contributors from across Cork and beyond. web www.ucc.ie/cfp Archive 20 builds on that commitment to reflect, examine and present for the people of Cork, their folklore, heritage and history. The content of this year’s journal has retained its expected high level of scholarship. facebook.com/corkfolkloreproject However, the layout and design, carefully undertaken by our graphic designer Dermot Casey, deserves special mention. His creativity, dedication and skill have ensured that @bealoideascork the quality of presentation mirrors fully the substance of our journal. Tomás Mac Conmara 2 The Archive The Illumination of a Wake by Billy McCarthy The graphic above was drawn by Ciara Murphy studying Arts at U.C.C. and coloured by Dermot Casey of the Cork Folklore Project. Ciara Murphy is the granddaughter of the author and the great-granddaughter of Patrick McCarthy, who was the original bearer of the story, drawing three generations of McCarthys into the telling of the story. he townland of Ballygurteen is no known relatives or close friends. The local most was to visit his friendly publican where he located in the quiet countryside vicar was experiencing some difficulty finding purchased a dozen pint bottles of porter and T between Clonakilty and Dunmanway, even one volunteer who was willing to spend a a packet of twenty Woodbines. Next he called West Cork. Here in the year of 1904 night minding the corpse. Normally one would on his close pal, Jimmy Casey, and together was born Patrick McCarthy (later to become expect most of the men of the parish, and some they laid out their plans. my father), the youngest of thirteen children women, to visit the home of the deceased in who as a teenager, moved to Cork city. There the course of the night discussing, and indeed At about 9 o’clock that night they went to the he claimed to be older than he really was, sometimes greatly exaggerating the virtues of home of the deceased. They placed two securing a job as a tram conductor. Working the poor man. Glasses of whiskey and porter chairs close to the table on which the corpse at various jobs throughout his lifetime he died would be drunk as a matter of respect for the was laid out and stood a lighted candle near unexpectedly in 1985, in his eighty-second year. dead. Boxes of snuff were passed around the right shoulder of the man they referred and pipes of tobacco smoked. This practice to as the guest of honour. When they had Throughout my childhood years and into my was all part of the normal custom, but no such pulled the corks from the first two bottles they adult life, I recall my Dad and his brothers, rituals were to be observed on this occasion. proceeded to deal the cards for a marathon Johnny and Dan, relating tales of fairies and session of ‘25’. the Banshee. We heard stories of strange Having abandoned all hope of recruiting happenings in and around fairy forts and of someone from his own flock, he approached a Almost unnoticed, the witching hour passed, people being unable to find their way out of a local man by the name of Shamus Ó’Braonáin and by the early hours of the morning when certain field at night, even though they had the with a proposition, that he wake the corpse six or eight empties had been consigned to a benefit of a bright starry sky and a full moon, offering the princely sum of 2/6 (that’s two corner of the room, the game took on a new and had lived in the locality all their lives. shillings & six pence, old money), should he momentum as the cards were played with accept this singular honour. Not one to pass growing enthusiasm: in keeping with regular From an early age, I had a morbid fascination up an opportunity to earn some extra cash, custom, when a participant plays a trump card with all matters supernatural, and I enjoyed Ó’Braonáin admitted to being interested in he allows his knuckles to strike the table with so much the long winter nights sitting before watching over the deceased throughout the some force and, as the game progressed and an open log fire listening to stories from past night, but he could not forfeit a full night’s the porter was having its effect the force of the generations. It seemed to me that life in the sleep for anything less than 7/6. After much blows increased accordingly. When the table old days was far more exciting than it is now, debate and haggling, the vicar offered to pay was struck in such a manner, the candle would despite the perceived benefit of comfortable 4/-, prompting Ó’Braonáin to suggest that keel over causing great consternation between surroundings with central heating, hot and 6/- would be closer the mark. It appeared at the two men, until Shamus found a simple but cold water and indoor bathrooms. this stage of negotiations that the Vicar was effective solution to the problem. Utilising the standing firm on his final offer, so Shamus sug- corpse, Shamus wedged the candle between One of the yarns I heard back then has stayed gested the names of some dubious characters the deceased fingers, allowing the card game in my memory to the present day – a yarn I in the parish who might be anxious to earn a to continue to its conclusion at sunrise, with still love to tell. The story relates to the early little extra money. Ultimately, a compromise the guest of honour providing a steady hand years of the twentieth century, following the was reached and a figure of 5/- was agreed. to illuminate the proceedings! death of a member of the Protestant com- munity, an elderly man who never married Shamus set out immediately to prepare his Billy McCarthy is a former researcher with and who lived alone for many years, having programme for the night ahead. First and fore- the Cork Folklore Project. ISSUE 20 • 2016 3 ‘Very great plantations’ – A Garden History of Cork City By Seán Moraghan Postcard for Hartland’s Seed Cork. [Public Domain], via Wikimedia Commons. arden history is a relatively under- School, founded in 1699 for boys of Protes- observed how the banks of the Lee presented examined aspect of Irish history. tant families in reduced circumstances, had the eye ‘with plain neat houses, small pleasant G Old buildings and streets survive for a garden, which may have supplied some of gardens and pretty plantations’. Nearer Cork, long periods of time along with the the green peas and potatoes which are known John Dennis, merchant, had a good house folklore and the history associated with them.