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The Mother Of All Cultural Rip-Offs For Ireland?
by W. Finnerty. Wed Aug 30, 2006 15:21
 
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An e-mail was sent yesterday to several senior public officials in the European Union, and in the Council of Europe (which deals with human rights law, and cultural heritage issues).
 
This was an attempt to try and make those concerned aware - while there is still time - that there are important links between the Hill of Tara, Brehon Law, and the Cultural Heritage of the Irish People.
 
As some people will already know, though not nearly enough (at the present time) to "save" Tara perhaps, the stamping out of Brehon Law in Ireland (roughly between 1169 and 1650 AD), and its replacement with "Roman" Law, was the most cruel injustice in recorded history that the people of Ireland ever suffered, and that none has had more far reaching consequences for Irish people.
 
In effect, it was this forced switch-over of legal systems which enabled the bulk of the land of Ireland to be taken away from the people of Ireland, during the lengthy period in question. It really does appear to be as simple, as basic, and as important as that.
 
Assuming the writers of the "Annals of Ireland by the Four Masters" got things right, the origins of Brehon Law first appeared on the Hill of Tara at some time during the 40 year reign of King Ollamh Fodhla, which they claim was between 1317 and 1277 BC.
 
As many who have visited the Hill of Tara will know, strong traces of what many believe are the remains of the foundations of "The Great Banqueting Hall" associated with the triennial meetings used - primarily it seems - for updating and maintaining Brehon Law, can easily be seen on top of the Hill of Tara; and, it really does seem to have been "Great" in terms of size at least - as can be judged from the photograph at the following location: http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/post/32463 .
 
One of the several problems with digging things up around the Hill of Tara at the present time is that there are many valuable Brehon Law documents which remain untranscribed in places such as the British Museum, the Bodleian Library (Oxford University, England), and Trinity College, Dublin. Among other things, some of these documents may contain direct references to the Hill of Tara which nobody doing the digging around Tara at the present time knows anything about. All things considered, and for whatever reason, there appears to be an amazing lack of "joined-up" thinking between the historians and the archaeologists who are at present directly involved in the excavations near Tara.
 
One other point about Brehon Law which is not as well known as it might be perhaps, is that in terms of producing and sustaining social justice, and the genuine peace associated with a high-quality social justice system, Brehon Law seems to have been many times more efficient than Roman Law. For example, Brehon Law does not appear to have relied to any great extent (if at all) on such things as police, prisons, lawyers, and politicians - certainly not to anything remotely like today's situation. The reason for this appears to be simple: Brehon law was widely accepted by the vast majority of Irish people, and deeply appreciated by the vast majority of them - so much so that the judges ("brehons") were easily able to deal satisfactorily with most crimes and disputes by applying fines (called "erics") where appropriate, which were very finely tuned to "make the punishment fit the crime", and which took full account of both the perpetrators' and the victims' social status and circumstances.
 
Last, but not least, there is the almost completely forgotten matter of the Celtic Christians, who are sometimes referred to by such names as "Ceile De" (roughly meaning "Partners of God" in the Irish language), and by other anglicized versions of these two Celtic words such as "Culdees", "Colidei", and so on. Unfortunately, when Brehon Law was stamped out, the Celtic Christians were stamped out with it - as were their monasteries. One of several sad and regrettable aspects of this is that it was the Celtic Christian monks who were responsible for the fabulous works of art produced during the so called Dark Ages in Europe. Such items included "The Book of Kells", for example, and a sample page from this particular work can be viewed at the following address: http://homepage.eircom.net/~williamfinnerty/protest/nov21_stone.htm#bmkells .
 
Clonmacnoise, founded in 548 AD, and destroyed (almost completely) in 1552 AD, was probably the most famous of the Celtic Christian monasteries to be very deliberately "decommissioned" in order to make room for Roman Law in Ireland; and, many might strongly argue that Clonmacnoise was the first major Christian university in the world - not least because of the fact that many members of its student population in the first millennium AD came for countries all over Europe, and some from as far away as present day Russia it is believed.
 
For anyone interested, a copy of the full text of the e-mail sent yesterday to the European Union and Council of Europe officials, and to 16 Irish MEPs (Members of the European Parliament), can be seen at the following address:
http://www.europeancourtofhumanrightswilliamfinnerty.com/Politicians/EuropeanUnion29August2006/Email.htm
 
It is my hope that the senior public officials working in Strasbourg and Brussels might now show more respect and more regard for the Hill of Tara than our own senior public officials here in Ireland are doing. I further hope the officials in Strasbourg and Brussels will assume, until (and if) someone proves otherwise, that the authors of the "Annals of Ireland by the Four Masters" got things right: and that The Great Banqueting Hall on top of the Hill of Tara really was the birthplace of Brehon Law (sometime around 1300 B.C.) - in addition to being its "home-base" for several centuries afterwards.
 
Related Link: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/74630#comment141435
 
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The above text has been copied from the following Indymedia (Ireland) location:
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/78059?comment_limit=0&condense_comments=false#comment165178