Robert M Chapple, Archaeologist

I don't really keep a list of archaeological sites that I'd love to see fully excavated, but if I did Tullyhogue Fort, Co. Tyrone would be up there! Today, it's a series of grassy banks with a wonderfully waterlogged ditch. It would be a pain to excavate safely, but the potential for well preserved organic artefacts and environmental evidence could be huge! The site probably started off in the prehistoric period (it's a hill in Tyrone - I defy you to not find evidence of prehistoric activity!), and by the Early Medieval a ringfort/rath had been built there. It was, evidently, an important place in the landscape as each new O'Neill was obliged to schlep over to Tullyhogue from Dungannon to be formally inaugurated by an O'Cahan wielding a shoe. The origins and significance of the 'shoe ritual' are obscure, but appear to derive from the 1979 epic movie Monty Python's Life of Brian. OK ... I'm joking, but have you read the nonsense some prehistorians...

  Killadeas is a little town in Co. Fermanagh, on the eastern shore of Lough Erne. In the little graveyard of the modern Church of Ireland church. Our little 360-degree tour starts near the large upright Early Christian Cross inscribed stone (with possible bullaun mortar holes on its the back), moves on the pillar/standing stone, past the cross-base (that looks like a large stone donut set on edge in the ground*), and onto the ‘Bishop’s Stone’. The latter has a depiction of a bishop – identified by his bell and crozier – on one broad side and a ’grotesque’ mask on a narrow side. The stone is dated to the Early Christian/Early Medieval period, around the 9th to 10th centuries. When the light is just right and the shadows fall in a particular way, the bishop appears to have a slight wistful smile and almost a twinkle in his ancient eye. I’ve visited this site on many occasions over the years and am always taken by his exquisite, pointy topped shoes. Taken together, these remnants i...

In the previous instalment to this series of 360-degree video posts I took you to see the remains of the Early Medieval house at Rinnaraw [ here ]. The back story to this was that I’d left the rest of the family on the beach at Portnablagh and walked back to Rinnaraw on my own. Partly, this was because I didn’t think they’d be all that interested in such an apparently ‘slight’ monument that would require trudging across a field to go see. The other part was that I felt the visit should be a solo encounter with the site and an opportunity for personal reflection and meditation, which is hard to achieve when each of the Chapples Minor are trying to throw the other off the edge of the precipice. All went well. I completed my filming and ruminations in perfect peace and eventually dandered back to where the rest of the family were on the beach. I had hoped that all would have run through their fascination with sand and seawater by now and we’d soon be on our way to see more archaeology. Tu...

As part of our Summer excursion to Donegal, I wanted to bring the family to see the incredible views from Horn Head. Back in 1989, when I was working at Tom Fanning's excavation at Rinnaraw , we used to walk out here of an evening. For the unwary, I would note that there are two different routes on this little jut of land. One brings you to this World War II lookout post with modest parking and spectacular views. The other fork in the road will bring you to equally gorgeous vistas, but will involve driving along a road that is literally terrifying - precipitous drops, no hard shoulder, and definitely zero space to allow two cars to pass. This is the route we took first and I'm not too proud to admit that I stayed in the car while the more adventurous members of the family walked about calmly outside like it was perfectly safe and I wasn't totally over reacting! anyway, once we got on the right path, parked and got to the crest of this little rise, the whole of Horn Head was...

Let’s be honest, folks – there are a lot of bad things happening in the world right now … pretty much wherever you are, politics is a roaring dumpster fire of awfulness … we’ve got universities that protect plagiarists on their staff (I see you UCL!) … Keepers of Antiquities that believe private citizens can be ordered about like medieval serfs and claim that you’re an embezzler for expecting something so outlandish as being paid for undertaking work (waves at Maeve Sikora!) … and then there’s the pandemic … it’s all just so depressingly awful. But do you know what’s brilliant? Piggy Back Rides! Sure, they don’t solve any of the above problems, but they are great. That feeling of being carried about is reassuring and throws us back to memories or fantasies of happy, carefree childhoods. How could you improve on all the great things that are encapsulated in the simple joys of the piggy back ride? How about this: a piggy back ride through a great archaeological site! And that is exactly ...

Programme Monday, 5th November Location: Kilkenny 12am-7.30pm             Delegate registration at The Set Theatre 1pm-3.30pm               Tour of Medieval Mile Museum, Rothe House Garden and Talbot's Tower with Cóilín O'Drisceoil 3.00pm-4.30pm         Tour of the Heritage Council with Colm Murray 7pm-8.15pm               Archaeology and society. Lecture by Prof. Brian Fagan (Venue: The Set Theatre) Tuesday, 6th November Location: Kilkenny 9am                              Delegate registration in The Set Theatre 9.45am-4.30pm         Creativity and community and well-b...

I am very lucky. I have cancer. These are two sentences that on first analysis don’t fit particularly well together. At least, until recently, I didn’t think they did, but they do. Perhaps I should be more specific. I had cancer. Past tense. Earlier this summer I underwent a small procedure to excise a lesion from my forehead. The biopsy confirmed that I had squamous cell carcinoma. It’s gone now, but it might be back. While I won’t require chemotherapy or radiotherapy, I will be under intense monitoring for at least the next year. Appropriate Beach Wear As cancers go, this isn’t a bad one to have. It could have been so much worse. I really am very lucky. It all started about a year ago when I got a spot on my forehead. Not a big deal! … except that it didn’t heal up. I realised that this was my fault – I kept picking at it. Not deliberately of course but I’d frequently find that, despite my best efforts, I’d have picked at it in a distracted moment and th...

I was recently browsing for something completely different in The Met’s online catalogue when I thought ‘I wonder if they have any Irish stuff?’ Not only do they hold Irish material in their collections, they generously make photographs available under a Creative Commons Zero Licence. These 20 items are all of metal (bronze, copper alloy, silver, and gold), and represent finds from 10 counties (Antrim, Cavan, Cork, Down, Dublin, Galway, Limerick, Tipperary, Westmeath, & Wexford) along with five merely provenanced to the island of Ireland. Together they are ascribed to three archaeological periods: Bronze Age (9), Iron Age (1), and Early Medieval (10). The Met does hold a number of other ancient Irish pieces, but all are without images so I've decided to omit them from this post. The one story that strikes me immediately from putting this collection together is to wonder who one  Patrick O'Connor of New York was and how he amassed his little collection of metalwork and h...