Papers by Dr Gerard J O S E P H O'Keeffe BA, MA, PhD.
By the early seventeenth century, almost all of the archival and documentary records of the Irish... more By the early seventeenth century, almost all of the archival and documentary records of the Irish Conventual Franciscans were lost. Additionally, since the Conventuals were, for the most part, confined to the Anglo-Norman parts of Ireland, their friaries were among the first to be dissolved during the sixteenth-century Irish suppression campaign, leading to the dismantlement and reconfiguration of their ecclesiastical precincts. This paucity of written records, and of extant built-fabric, has contributed to the lack of scholarly attention given to the medieval Irish Conventual Franciscans, especially when compared with their Observant confrères. However, the fortuitous survival of primary source materials within various repositories, historically situated at Kilkenny, offers a research path to explore the worlds inhabited by Kilkenny's Conventual Franciscans, present in the town between c. 1230 and 1606. This paper seeks to exploit these sources by presenting a fresh synthesis of the materials, some of which have not been accessed for well in excess of a century, to illuminate the intersecting social, intellectual and physical worlds of Kilkenny's medieval Franciscans. The friars mined a rich vein of urban and rural benefaction throughout their 400 year history in Kilkenny and members of their community rose to the highest echelons of the medieval Irish hierarchy. They were priests and confessors, intellectuals and chroniclers, civil engineers and medical practitioners, who were deeply interested in the world around them. The documentary evidence that they left behind reveals something of their diverse and interesting personalities. Though the Dissolution portended the end of their worlds, the artefactual and documentary evidence suggests that the process was nuanced, and not at all sudden. The Archer chalice, thought lost but relocated in the course of this present research, attests to these nuances. Indeed, the post-Dissolution civic rental documents, detailing the secularisation of the Kilkenny Franciscan medieval precinct, has allowed that same precinct to be virtually reconstructed, further enhancing academic insight into Ireland's Conventual Franciscans and Kilkenny's medieval urban topography.
This paper examines the emergence of cultural nationalism in late nineteenth century County Kilke... more This paper examines the emergence of cultural nationalism in late nineteenth century County Kilkenny and seeks to explore how that ideology was represented in the efforts of the local branches of the Gaelic Athletic Association and the Gaelic League to reimagine Irish national culture and reconstruct the social category of ‘Irishness’ at a local level.
In the socio-religious milieu of the Middle Ages a symbiotic relationship existed between the chu... more In the socio-religious milieu of the Middle Ages a symbiotic relationship existed between the church and state, temporal and secular worlds whereby lines of functional demarcation, though they existed, were at best blurred. Within the context of the historic evolution of medieval urban Kilkenny, this paper seeks to present an understanding of how religion was administered to its citizens.
This paper is an archaeological survey of a cluster of early medieval enclosures situated to the ... more This paper is an archaeological survey of a cluster of early medieval enclosures situated to the east of Tullaroan Village, Co. Kilkenny in the Townlands of Remeen Evans and Baunnaraha, respectively belonging to the civil parishes of Tullaroan and Ballycallan, in the barony of Crannagh. Whilst the more detailed discussion focuses on two specific enclosures, the grouping and potential interrelationship of enclosures in the wider spacial context is also analysed.
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Papers by Dr Gerard J O S E P H O'Keeffe BA, MA, PhD.