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A TEAM OF archaeologists are undertaking a dig at the Hellfire Club in the Dublin Mountains, where they hope to uncover some of the secrets of famous site.
Four archaeologists, as well as students from UCD, are taking part in the Hellfire Club Archaeological Project, which is supported by South Dublin County Council (SDCC), Coillte and Abarta Heritage.
The dig is aimed at uncovering the story of Montpelier Hill, where the ruins of the Hellfire Club are located.
Neil Jackman of Abarta Heritage told TheJournal.ie that they’re aiming to discover the condition of what is believed to be a passage tomb near the Hellfire Club ruins.
“The tomb itself is quite large, over 30m in diameter,” he explained. “It was largely destroyed when they were building the Hellfire Club.” It’s believed that stones from the tomb were used in the creation of the building, which has long been linked by some to supernatural happenings.
Even for those who don’t visit to be spooked out, the site provides a remarkable view of Dublin.
The archaeologists are opening a quarter of the tomb and have already dug a strip of about 2m wide across the area. They’ve taken off the grass and topsoil from this area and will soon begin to dig deeper into the site.
“Then we will start opening a bigger area and find out the complexity of the area,” said Jackman, pointing out that they need to do it “in a very manageable way” as the site needs to be returned to as it was when the dig concludes at the end of October.
They’ve already made a few interesting finds – no bones, but they have found everything from bags of crisps from the ’90s to pottery from the early 1800s. They’ve also found the remains of sparklers and fireworks.
“We’re finding quite a lot of stuff which shows how many people have come up there to enjoy the view,” said Jackman. “It’s the sort of rubbish you can imagine from people partying up there, which is part of the Hellfire Club story.”
As they get deeper through the layers, they are hoping to find prehistoric items. The holy grail, so to speak, would be a piece of bone or charcoal which could be dated.
It’s thought the passage tomb at the site is one of a string of such tombs which goes through the Dublin/Wicklow Mountains.
They include the Seefin tomb in the Wicklow Mountains:
“They’re very interesting sites,” said Jackman. “The last one of these to be excavated in the Dublin Mountains was only done in the 1920s.”
It wasn’t done using modern techniques – there was no radiocarbon dating, for example.
Before [the tomb at the Hellfire Club] was largely destroyed, we believe it would have once been a large circular mound, with a stone lined passageway that led to a burial chamber.
“We know quite a lot about tombs in Boyne Valley but we know nothing about tombs in the Dublin Mountains, we don’t know how old they are,” said Jackman. “The big hope is a bit of charcoal, a bit of bone, something we can date. Are they older than the tombs in Boyne Valley, are they younger?”
It’s an exciting and unusual opportunity to get to excavate a site like this, said Jackman.
“It’s really exciting to get a chance to answer a few of these questions. It’s a beautiful place to be when you’re digging.”
Besides the age of the tomb, they’re also trying to figure out what is left of the site. “Did they completely destroy it or are we going to see the chamber area?”
The dream is to find the original passageways within the tomb. “The ultimate dream is if we can get something to date it – perhaps some megalithic art.”
Passage tombs largely date to about 5,000 years ago, but they became important places once more around 1,000 years later, during the Bronze Age.
Members of the public are invited to visit the site to see how the archaeologists are getting on, but those who can’t pop up can also keep up to date through the Abarta Heritage website, Twitter and Facebook.
In addition to the dig, Jackman is also taking part in a folklore project with schools and SDCC, which involves gathering the local stories people tell about the Hellfire Club.
The dark history of the Hellfire Club
The Hellfire Club was built as a shooting lodge for the politician William Conolly in around 1725.
Explained Jackman:
To build the lodge, his workmen destroyed two large tombs, and utilised their stone as building material. The destruction of the tombs marks the beginning of the association of the building with the supernatural.
Legend has it, that a devil was so enraged by the desecration that he blew off the original wooden roof of the new building. As one of the richest and most powerful men in Britain or Ireland, William Conolly was not to be deterred by a mere phantom, and had the roof reconstructed in stone, giving the lodge its unique appearance.
The building is thought to have been idle until 1735, when it is said that his widow, Katherine, leased the building to Richard Parsons, the Earl of Rosse. Parsons was one of the leading figures in what was known as ‘Dublin’s Hellfire Club’, ‘The Blasters’ or the ‘Young Bucks of Dublin’.
This was a group of aristocrats, described at the time by the famous Jonathan Swift as “a brace of Monsters, Blasphemers and Bacchanalians”. The Earl of Rosse in particular was infamous for obscenity, blasphemy and for his habit of receiving guests in the nude. The main meeting place for the Hellfire Club appears to have been The Eagle Tavern on Cork Street.
Though no direct records explicitly state that they met on Montpelier Hill, it was certainly a plausible meeting place given that it was leased to their leader the Earl of Rosse, and that it was far enough outside the city for their debauches to go unnoticed.
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And here’s me thinking that email offering me $26,000,000 was fake
In 1950,Nigeria had a population of 33 million.In 2100,the UN estimates their population at somewhere between 500 million – 1 billion.From 2006 up to this year,their population grew a staggering 42 million to 182 million people.There is a lot of extra mouths to be feeding annually.
Sounds like it’s a condom factory they need!
Drinking another animals milk has little nutritional benifit.
Cows milk is for calves.
Hopefully the Nigerian people will give these useless powders the elbow.
They are only relatively new in the western world, a farce form the feminist propaganda era, when “Doctors Smoked Camel”
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/89/09/02/89090293865260abb7284c730f3cd85b.jpg
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/65/a7/42/65a74232f6e985875ad444e97e34eda4.jpg
Who’s taking the bloody horse to Lagos
Tralee Co.Kerry an unemployment blackspot,let’s build a factory in Nigeria!
Why would it be packaged in Ireland, when its going to be sold in Africa?
The Kerry Group has always been a lot more interested in its shareholders than its employees, Kerry, or Ireland.
Dev, is there a connection between Tralee and Ornua?
Kerry Group have nothing to do with Ornua. Tralee has no connection to Ornua. Why drive yourself out of the market by packaging in Ireland and incurring cost. Uninformed comment is worse than no comment.
No, as far as I’m aware.Kerry Group HQ is in Tralee.They should have some social/corporate responsibility and give more jobs to Kerry.
Arma, Kerygold is a public listed company, so its answerable to its shareholders, who invested money into the company, and not to people of Kerry or Ireland. Same way as Apple, Intel, Facebook, Ebay, Paypal, Dell are answerable to their share holders, or people in their native country of the United States.
Building this packaging factory in Africa makes economic sense. If the products is going to be packaged in Ireland, then you have extra shipping weight, which will increase your shipping costs, making your product more expensive, and less competitive on the shelf. That competitive edge may allow Kerrygold to expand, and increase production in Ireland, where the milk powder comes from. if the packaging was done in Ireland,What happens if the packaging gets damaged in transit? Do they dump it, or send it back to Ireland to be repackaged?
Well then do something to mark Tralee more attractive to employers, rather than just giving out about the employers.
Dev kerrygold is produced by ornua, this article has nothing to do with Kerry group.
*make
Dev Boyjonauth
Look at a map long long way expensive & I assume cold storage way to Nigeria
The Kerrygold brand and the Kerry group have no relationship to each other
Dev Kerrygold and Kerry Group are two separate companies.
BTW In case you did not know Kerry Group has plants all over the world such Ireland, UK, USA, Brazil, Europe, Turkey, Singapore etc.
Armin __ I know that large multi-nationals couldn’t give a toss about the countries where they kick-started their operations, and in the case of the Kerry Group, they’ve long since forgotten that if it weren’t for the original Kerry Co-op members deciding to change the co-op status, there wouldn’t be a Kerry Group. The Kerry farmers probably couldn’t care less either, because their original shares are worth a considerable mint.
Dev,
import or raw materials to make good locally, reduces the amount of excise and duty payable on importing finished goods
Anyhow, it’s an expensive business setting up a factory in Nigeria, having to bribe everyone with a pulse to make it happen. A fella who set up a factory there some years ago, was telling me that he even had to pay people at the docks when machinery was arriving, and that it would be sitting there until a wad of cash was handed over to someone with the power to release it.
The Nigerians, a great bunch of lads ted!
All they need now is jam
Shur what would I know, I’m from Donegal.
Sad that they are trying to convert a breast feeding continent to a bottle feeding one similar to this country.
It’s not baby formula though.
Exactly, refrigerators aren’t widespread in Africa so powdered milk is popular there.
True, but traditional cows milk is perfectly acceptable from 12 months and on average Nigerians breast feed for 18 months. Also baby formula contains powdered milk, the picture in article is misleading as to the product range.
Ye becsuse the continent is a booming beacon of success thanks to all their breastfeeding.
?
Look I know it’s a touchy subject for many as they feel they’re being judged but I doubt the kerrygolds marketing/financial board gives two hoots so long as its profitable like many other corporations. Infant formula is a huge money spinner and the success of its market nation is irrelevant to to them.
Swing and a miss Mark….that is not baby formula. Powered milk and baby formula are actually different you may be surprised to learn
How dare they give African women the same choices that those in the first world have. Is nothing sacred?
Swing and miss to you gene, you might be surprised to learn https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powdered_milk
Mark….so a single ingredient equates to the sum of ingredients I.e., the final product??
The article is not on about a single product, it says “powdered milk products”. So I fail to see where you are trying to go with this line of argument.
Same reason Guinness is brewed in Nigeria..
If you want access to the Nigerian Market you have to Employ locals/ Source your materials and make your product there.
Good in theory, but by the end of the process only the wrapping is the same.
The biggest Guinness brewery in the world is in Nigeria. They believe it is a Nigerian drink. I kid you not!
Good move. The UN population projections for Nigeria are eye-opening. Their population will go from 180 million now to 650 million by the year 2100. That’s a lot of milk we can export.
I can’t believe it’s not milk.
Will Ornua disclose the salaries of their senior management and CEO? You can bet they won’t, because they’re HUGE! If you thought the salaries in the IFA were bad…..
Ornua is owned by farmers in the same way as the IFA, so farmers have a right to know.
“We work hard to deliver a strong and sustainable return to the Irish dairy farmer.” that’s a laugh!!
“As a co-operative, owned by Ireland’s dairy processors, and in turn by Ireland’s dairy farmers, Ornua’s core aim is to deliver a sustainable, high return for the Irish dairy farmer.” Rubbish. They are only interested n paying themselves as much as they can get away with.
Pet lovers would never deny their pet milk from it’s mother’s breast.
Why do humans?
That’s true Human, but I still wouldn’t fancy it on my cornflakes!
I wouldn’t mind trying a drop.
As long at was from a clean healthy Lass though.
Couldn’t do with a gob full of Toxic Fake Tan, Aerosols, Make Up, Contraception Pills/Medication, Botox, Silicone, Processed Food, Pesticides, Booze and Fags etc.
Ah.. They still won’t have the crusty turnover to put it on!
Nothing like a bit of crusty bread to spread your powered milk on
If Ireland was not part of the EU the amount of food deals we could of did Africa , my partners family are small diary farmers they had opportunity to send milk to Southern Africa but cause of EU quotes and export/import controls could not do.
Even with some of our crops have better nutrients. And African countries wanted them to,
have your say