In the deep
gentle silence of Co. Meath lies Tara; a royal place, a sacred place, a special place for us Celts since roughly 4,000
years BC.
To my eternal shame I did not visit Tara until today, despite my stepdaughters and their
children having such a huge reverence and regard for the place that some of their
mother’s ashes were scattered from The King’s Seat
(don’t tell the OPW!). One of those grandchildren is named Cormac, in
honour of Cormac Mac Airt – High King of the legends. Cormac's Nana Muireann battled
valiantly - as valiantly as Queen Mebd would have battled, to prevent a
motorway destroying the landscape around this sacred ground. My maternal family lore has it that we are descendants of Gormflaith who was married briefly to Brian Boru (941 -1014), known as Emperor of The Gaels and one of the more recent High Kings. Gormflaith has gone down in history as being 'utterly wicked.' Maybe that's why we never talked about her!
So, armed with these connections to Tara, it being a beautiful morning, and daylight saving gifting us a fictitious extra hour I felt it a good day to visit; particularly as
we approach Samhain – the Gaelic festival that celebrates the end of harvest
and the move into the darker half of the year. Samhain is a time for ghouls and ghosts,
witches and wonders, it is a time when it was believed Aos Si (spirits
or fairies) could move with greater ease from their world into ours (if you are a gaeilgeoir please excuse my lack of fadas). I met none of these beings on my gentle amble
around the site, given Gormflaith's reputation I'd rather not meet her spirit!
I did meet some imps from England, Dublin and Northern
Ireland though - who gloried in running up and down the slopes of Tara.One little chap, Henry - aged about three, ambled about the top of The King's Seat and enjoyed himself in the
muddiest puddle I’ve ever seen. His older siblings and cousins looked on in
envy; Henry being the only one sensible enough to be shod in wellies. I’m sure
the dead buried here were delighted; children’s laughter should ring out
everywhere to remind us we are yet quick and that we should live, live, live while we can.
I stayed for about an hour, walking, contemplating the beauty and thinking of my own dead. The men and women buried
in Tara are in my DNA – maybe in only the tiniest molecule, but still part of me. It is
said we die twice – first when the physical body stops working and secondly
the last time someone says our name. To that I’d pose a third possibility – perhaps we
are actually immortal, as some tiny bit of us goes forward – in our brothers and
sisters, cousins, sons and daughters, in family.
Enough philosophizing and talking pure shite!
Seriously, if you have a chance over the coming
week take your children and loved ones to Tara, let them run and play, kick a ball or have a
few pucks with hurl and sliotair. The interpretive centre is closed but there
is a lovely coffee shop beside the site.
You’ll come away feeling thoughtful and
rejuvenated.
Promise.
