Bog Bodies Research Project – National Museum of Ireland

Written By: Gail Clifford | Published By: Weekend NOTES| March 30, 2022

https://www.weekendnotes.com/bog-bodies-research-project-national-museum-of-ireland/

Dublin, the largest city in and capital of Ireland, has more than forty museums to entertain, inspire, and shock its visitors. The National Museum of Ireland – Archeology, on Kildare Street, is just across the courtyard from the National Library of Ireland (which has a reading room that rivals the Library of Congress Main Reading Room in Washington, D.C.). These two grand and historic buildings are in front of Leinster House, the Seat of the Irish National Parliament. All within blocks of the wall around Trinity College – Dublin. Steeped in history, you can easily imagine yourself falling back in time with nearly 100 years making little difference in this street’s architecture.

It’s especially fitting as Ireland celebrates her centennial in 2022.

The National Museum of Ireland system includes museums that focus on Archeology, Decorative Arts & History, Country Life, and Natural History. These museums host both permanent and rotating exhibits so you’ll never be bored. Fortunately for us, many of them are free, though often require reservations.

Unlike the people found petrified in Pompeii following the Mt. Vesuvius eruption, a bog body has been mummified within a peat bog. Peat was commonly used in Ireland as a source of fuel. Most date from the Iron Age when peat bogs covered a much larger area of Europe. They’ve been found in Ireland, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.

When you first enter the exhibit, your brain tries to convince you this must be a sculpture. This shriveled human, curled on his side, arms folded. The sharp detail of a curled hand, fingernails intact with a small laceration in the right thumbnail seems heartbreaking. But they are real.

Bog people have been dated as early as 8000 B.C. and as recently as World War II. By definition, they’ve all been found in peat and at least partially preserved, like the best example, the Cashel man, from 2000 B.C. Clothes, internal organs, and even stomach contents have often been preserved in this unique environment.

What leads to the Irish lore is the association with violent death combined with lack of clothing. That’s led archeologists to consider their fate was sealed either by ritualistic killing or execution of criminals.

The variety of reasons for their sentence included being perceived as witches or social outcasts or legal hostages “killed in anger over broken treaty arrangements.”

More recently, the Gundestrup Cauldron, found in Denmark, showed images of Celtic deities on the outside, with panels inside revealing kingship and sovereignty rituals of human sacrifice. A replica can be found in this exhibit.

The exhibit’s information describes hundreds of bog bodies recovered and studied, but believe only about 45 remain intact today.