Ireland's Pre-Celtic Archaeological and Anthropological Heritage [Kietas viršelis]

The Celtic heritage of Ireland has been an important element in maintaining cultural and political independence from England for at least the past century, but Thompson (Irish-Scottish studies, Trinity College, Dublin) kept findings discrepancies between the national legend of Celtic origins and local and regional traditions. He begins by setting out how Celtic Ireland was constructed as an ethno-national mythology. Then he looks at some evidence for people on the island before the Celts came, from the fields of history, archaeology, genetics, linguistics, folklore, and unofficial discourse. A case study involves Tory Island. He ends by suggesting how to integrate Celtic and pre-Celtic Ireland in a new image. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Drawing on a wide range of disciplinary outlooks, the author asserts that the pre-Celtic people's cultures, and their contributions to traditional and modern Irish life, have been vastly under-appreciated. This work seeks to understand why this is so, and to redress that balance by partaking in an investigation of the evidence as well as by demonstrating how that evidence was constructed.