Armagh and the royal centres in early medieval Ireland

the long version

Armagh and the Royal Centres in Early Medieval Ireland investigates the manner in which the monumental remains of earlier human activity within the Irish landscape were perceived and invested with meaning and value during the early medieval period. Of specific interest are the construction of 'mytho-historical' pasts around monuments and the use of those constructed pasts in promoting political aspirations. This includes the secular association of mythological and historical kings and kingdoms with monumental sites and religious ideological interpretations by ecclesiastics, particularly Armagh's claim to primacy. The incorporation of monuments within cosmological schemes, involving the ordering of the cosmos and its constituent elements, is at the heart of this study, a study that is truly inter-disciplinary. Using archaeological data and historical texts, drawing parallels from social anthropology and comparative religion, Armagh and the Royal Centres in Early Medieval Ireland offers original thoughts on part of Ireland's past which continues today to be the centre of much myth.