The New Annals
How lasting are floppy disks, cds, memory sticks, chatgpt, data centres ? Clouds evaporate. As our ancestors relied on ink for centuries to chart their annual joys & sorrows we do again, a tried & trusted means of time-capsuling for the amusement or horror of our own descendants.
Our Project
Unlike other historical texts, something truly unique about the Annals was the focus on both the macro (the goings on of kings and chieftains) and the micro (the day to day life of the common folk, and happenings of Ireland).
Our revival of the Annals seeks to bridge the gap of Lost Knowledge from 1591 to the present, and to continue it into the future - capturing the hidden history of Ireland, as well as her diaspora all around the world.
We capture important moments for the Island of Ireland and her people wherever they are, both big and small. At times tongue in cheek, and often poetic. Unlike a dry textbook, our modern Irish Annals are a living, dynamic collaborative project with several aspects to it.
- The practice of gathering knowledge and facts: our head scholar Colum travels the Island of Ireland, and to key locations around the world studying texts and histories of the Irish people.
- The Physical Manuscript: De Reir Book of Moytura, is the physical manuscript we are continuously creating (see examples below.
- The Location: In the foothills of Sligo, in the setting of the beautiful ecolodge Brú Moytura, is where our head scribe Renato, creates the physical Book of Moytura. Learn more about the significance of the location here.
- Workshops: Currently in development, we are creating an interactive exhibition that can be housed both onsite in Sligo, but is also mobile. Allowing us to create a pop up museum anywhere, so more people can learn about, and contribute to the Annals, both old and new.
The New Annals
The New Annals: De Reir Book of Moytura
The old Annals logged clann brawls, deaths of minor kings, passings of abbotts mostly; our latter day Annal's aim is to log VIP ongoing goings-on as well as keeping abreast of regular Jo-citizens. De Réir is the Irish for ‘according to.’ Whoever is quoted gets their due, their citation, their “according to.” Our tome is a here-comes-everybody of events with a seasoning of fact-checked hearsay. We tend to yoke the present continuous with shadows and gleams from the past annals.
Left: 1st page of 2020AD
Our year on year noting of pertinent and/or poignant annual facts is written on giant pages at the Scriptorium at Bru Moytura, at the northern extremity of the plateau of Moytura, Co. Sligo. We commenced the renewal of the Annals across the isolation of 2020. It takes us almost a full year to complete an Annal; currently we are scribing what will likely be fifty plus facts for 2023. Naturally it is a big exercise to shrink the oodles & googles of information. The old Annals were terse e.g. "plague for half a year" we must learn from that discipline, our 8 parchments for 2020AD, a busy year with its 64 facts, 2021 had but 52 ( its illustration is completed), 2022AD 60, 2023 62 (its calligraphy is progressing).
2 X IMAGES OF MUSK ITEMS FROM 2021 Annals
The latter day Annals, as they were the offspring of a world chronicle, we therefore have some facts from the big world & we choose those that have some Irish links. The sources of our information and the audience we interest are all those on the Island of Ireland plus its diaspora. In homage to the fact that the extant Annals spent a sixth of their life in Iona, Scotland, we always pepper our log with items from those cousins.
De Reir Book of Moytura, Ireland’s latest Annal seeks
News, Facts, Incidents from students of History in Ireland & its diaspora for the Annals missing years:
1591-2019AD
The most recent censuses on our Island (north + south) count a few folk short of 7,000,000 boys and girls, that is a lot of goings-on to tally, a lot of activity of both celebrity and regular Jo-citizen. Imagine shrinking all that human activity, isolating the most pertinent facts that represent a slice of present us to pass on to our descendents, centuries into the future.
BACKGROUND: On the island of Ireland from the first quarter of the 5th century to the last decade of the 16th century there was a tradition that saw the prime facts of a year inked on vellum. There are some tiny gaps: Viking raid here, pestilence there but the continuity is extraordinary, the words that illustrate proven links to real moments of time across those twelve centuries are obstinately accurate, if betimes slanted. No other country in Europe has such a fantastic wealth of fact and the odd yarn in such an extensive yet compact work.
Odd that our past Annals which mostly dwell on mens’ actions should kick off with the arrival of forty nine women, the supposed first humans to arrive on our shores. Four of the existing Annals of Ireland commence with the same obscure event, the arrival of Noah's grand daughter with her “ark” of women. There had been one fellow, Fintan, but no sooner had he spied land but he jumped ship in the shape of a salmon.
Odd too that just when the world turned from being flat to round The Annals of Ulster for 1497A.D. relate that the Borgia Pope, Alexander VI blocked up the only entry to Purgatory in that changing world; where, at Lough Derg in Donegal ? Only proof that this took place is in the our very own Annals. It is to this we seek your inputs. Choose items that you or your class or society or your locality resonate with.
Bru Moytura has created a new Annal at their Scriptorium at their big round wooden HQ in the uplands of Sligo. For 2020 sixty four facts were put to giant parchment that covered parish, provincial, national and cosmic news for that eventful year. 2021 had 52 events. 2022 is having its facts reduced for preparatioon for calligraphy as we speak, looks to be around 45 facts We are working on 2023 but central to our present call is our immense mission to close the 430 year gap between the old extant Annals and our contemporary log.
Items can be English, Irish or Latin or a mix of all three. Ideally keep them as short and simple as possible. Please can you footnote background details to your chosen facts to help us understand the context of your chosen facts to be logged but ideally the item should be related in a crisp way that allows easy comprehension. It is hard to be neutral. De Reir means “according to” so please if you are citing.
Despite our being based in the North West, we want the purview of the Annals to be all-Island. Choose a Year/ a Fact/ a Subject Matter/ a particular Community/ a Family name and forward it to us. Processing fee is €15 per item as we need to vouch for each new event item.