Ahenny stone

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Photo-request.svg
 Image wanted 
BW

The Ahenny Stone is a tombstone with both an inscription made of Ogham characters and an English inscription made of Latin letters . It was erected in 1802 for a 17 year old girl in the church graveyard in Ahenny , County Tipperary , Ireland by two Celtic high crosses . The stone is still in its original location today.

Description of the stone

The Ahenny stone is made of gray-green slate and is 1.26 m high, 89 cm wide and 5 cm thick. The vertical outlines are completely straight. The head part is rounded upwards and arched downwards on both sides (see photo in the web links). This upper part of the stone is filled with a sun with a halo, with an IHS Jesus monogram in the center of the sun . At the ends of the lowest spreading rays are two human hearts, each with a small arrow, which points to the center of the corresponding heart. In addition, the letter J is carved into the left heart and the letter D into the right. Immediately under the sun is a third heart.

Underneath these pictorial representations, the seven-line English text is carefully and expertly engraved. Below the English text is the equally precise and precise engraved Ogham text in Irish , which extends over two lines.

Inscriptions

Ogham inscription:

᚛ᚃᚐᚐᚅᚂᚔᚌᚄᚑᚅᚐᚂᚒᚐᚈᚐᚋᚐᚏᚔᚅᚔᚇᚆᚔᚋᚒᚄᚐ᚜
᚛ᚑᚋᚁᚐᚂᚂᚔᚅᚐᚌᚉᚏᚐᚅᚔᚁᚆ᚜

Transmission:

FA AN LIG SO NA LU ATA MARI NI DHIMUSA
O MBALLI NA GCRANIBH

Translation:

Mary Dempsey lies under this stone
from Ballycranna.

Inscription in English:

Beneath this sepulchral tomb lie the remains
of Mary Dempsey who departed this life
January the 4th 1802 aged 17 years
Dear parents murn not for me
I am only dead to live eternally
then rising from my dusty bed
I hope to reighn with Christ our head

Translation:

The remains are in this tomb
by Mary Dempsey on January 4, 1802
passed away at the age of 17.
Dear parents, do not mourn me.
I am only dead to live forever.
Then I get up from my dusty bed.
I hope to rule with Christ our Head.

Specialty

The Ogham script was mainly used from the 4th to the 10th centuries. The majority of the finds date from around 400 to 700 AD. The specialty of the inscription on the Ahenny stone is that it was only made around 1100 years after the heyday of the Ogham script. The stone is a testimony to the fact that knowledge and knowledge of the Ogham script and its practical application was still present in the early 19th century. “There is a whole series of modern tombstones that contain a line or even more of Ogham script that has been incised. One of the oldest is this one in Ahenny [...]. "

The Irish archaeologist and celtologist Barry Raftery (1944-2010) writes about the Ahenny Stone: “The stone is an eloquent testimony to the continued existence and knowledge of the Ogham alphabet among the rural population of Ireland in the early 19th century ... The use This writing on the tombstone of a 17-year-old girl in a simple and touching formula clearly shows that the Ogham script is not just a cloudy oral tradition, but a real continuation. "In addition:" The man who that Ogham carved so carefully into the Ahenny stone carried on a time-honored tradition that dates at least from the time of St. Patrick and perhaps actually goes back further into the pagan times of Ireland. "

literature

  • de hÓir, Siobhán: The Mount Callan Ogham Stone and Its Context , in: NMAJ (North Munster Antiquarian Journal) 25 (1983), pp. 43–57
  • Patton, John-Paul: The Poet's Ogam. A Living Magical Tradition, Belfast 2010
  • Raftery, Barry: A Late Ogham Inscription from Co. Tipperary, in: JRSAI (Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland) 99/2 (1969), pp. 161-164. JSTOR 25509718
  • Ziegler, Sabine: The language of the old Irish Ogam inscriptions. Historical Linguistics, Supplement 36, Göttingen 1994

Web links

References and comments

  1. ^ Raftery, p. 163
  2. ^ Description according to Raftery, p. 163; the details are unfortunately no longer visible in the photo in the web links (taken over 40 years after Raftery's description).
  3. ^ Prescription of "mourn" by the scorer; the repair was carried out by o
  4. ↑ Spelling mistakes of the scorer; what is meant is "reign"
  5. ↑ Ziegler, p. 1
  6. ↑ de hÓir, pp. 49–50
  7. ^ Raftery, p. 164
  8. ^ Raftery, p. 164

Coordinates: 52 ° 24 '45.2 "  N , 7 ° 23' 36.1"  W.