FOI Newsletter Summer 2026

Have a closer look at Inishmurray Island through our Summer Newsletter.

We hope you are enjoying and making the most of the beautiful summer season! We are delighted to bring you the latest edition of our newsletter, bursting with fascinating history and exciting updates. This summer, we dive deep into the island’s rich heritage with features on the Artefacts of Inishmurray and an intriguing look at a possible Inishmurray connection within St. Galen’s Manuscripts. We also share a special feature titled ‘A conversation with Inishmurray,’ alongside a report on our recent ‘A Day in the Life of Inishmurray’ initiative, which was supported by Creative Ireland. Plus, we have important news regarding our very first AGM scheduled for June 29th. Thank you, as always, for your wonderful and continued support of Inishmurray Island!

Friends of Inishmurray First Annual General Meeting

Following our inauguration as a Company Limited by Guarantee in 2025 we are happy to be holding our first AGM this June, on Monday 29th in The Old School, Mullagmore at 7 pm.  All are welcome.

The Artefacts of Inishmurray Island

Introduction

St. Molaise is widely understood to be the founder of the early medieval monastic monastery on Inishmurray island in approximately 520 AD.  His legacy is to be found in the stone, metal and wooden artifacts that were created by the monks and artisans who followed St. Molaise’s teachings.  Molaise is the connecting thread between these physical pieces and the spiritual practices they served.  When we examine these objects, we are not simply looking at tools or symbols; we are looking at the material identity of an entire community forged under the direct guidance of St. Molaise, making him one of the most vividly “present” founders in the Irish archaeological record.

Carved Oak Statue

The original carved oak statue of St. Molaise is one of the earliest and finest wooden statues in Ireland.  The statue was carved out of a single piece of oak and measures 1.27 m in length including the length of the head which is 30 cm long.  It was kept in Teach Molaise within the Cashel, until it was removed from the island for safe keeping after the last inhabitants left in 1948.

The original statue is on display in the Curators Choice area of Collins Barracks in Dublin and well worth a visit if you have an interest in Inishmurray.  Of all the thousands of items in the museum it was one of only twenty five items selected for the curator’s display, which is incredible when you think of it.  It is also the first item you see as you enter the room. The back of the display has an additional opening to show the carved out hollow at the back of the statue. It looks like only a small child could fit in, but was rumoured to be used by anyone like a canoe to escape the island if required. The reality is that the deep channel cut out of the back is to reduce cracking and shrinking which naturally occurs as wood expands and contracts with variations in temperature and humidity.

However, if you are in Sligo you can see an exact replica on display in Sligo Cathedral.  As you enter the cathedral turn left it is on the wall above Pope John Paul II candle stand.

Apparently the sculptor was requested to carve a second replica by the local clergy man at the time, a lot of fundraising was required to make this possible. 

Bell and Crozier

St. Molaise’s bell and crozier, which has a copper covering, are not in the National Museum of Ireland with his statue or anywhere in Sligo.

Where are they?

They are on display in the beautiful Alnwick castle in Northumberland in England along with one of the cross-inscribed stones from the Clocha Breaca altar. The castle is a fabulous backdrop for wedding photographs and some Harry Potter movie scenes were filmed there.  Maybe someday Harry Potter could wave a magic wand and return these items to Ireland – preferably to Sligo within a dedicated museum space for Inishmurray complete with enthusiastic curators ready to explain the legacy of Inishmurray island to all interested parties.  We live in hope.

Contribution by Martin McCluskey

A Conversation with Inishmurray

The Rights of Nature movement has gained momentum in recent decades with the growing acknowledgement of the devastating effects of human extractive activities on the natural environment.  The natural environment includes the societies of animal, plant and fungi species that have developed complex interwoven reciprocal ecosystems, along with weather, water and earth systems that regulate our biosphere.  There is an argument that these depleting human activities have led to the current increasingly irreversible environmental crisis.

The Rights of Nature movement recognises that the Western legal framework, which was founded on protecting the interests of human beings, needs its scope of moral consideration extended to include the interests of non-humans such as animals, plants and ecosystems.  Recent legal actions have been successful in recognising indigenous people’s rights to protect mountains and rivers they hold as sacred beings by granting these ecosystems legal personhood as living indivisible entities, afforded the associated duties, rights and responsibilities of a legal person.  Examples of successful cases include Uluru in Central Australia, the Whanganui River in New Zealand and the River Wye in the United Kingdom.

In Ireland, the Celtic indigenous spiritual tradition has persisted, overlaid by the newer spirituality of Christianity and currently it is undergoing a revival, encouraging deep connection and communion with nature and nature places. Celtic spirituality is founded on a monistic cosmology in which the sacred is indivisible from the environment and all is imbued with agency and thus worthy of respect and consideration.

Conclusion

I have suggested engaging in a thought experiment which asks what might happen if we perceive Inishmurray as a sentient and intelligent ecosystem.  Might we recognise the island more as a subject with personhood and less as an object?  As’ them’ rather than an ‘it’?  And if we did, might this inform the way we interact with them?  Perhaps we might then engage as with a beloved relative, with a sense of respect and obligation, and perhaps an acknowledgement of its independent right to thrive. Perhaps we might be open to learn from an intelligence more complex and ancient than ours alone could imagine.

 Contribution by Imogen O’Connor

Become a Member for a more detailed look at A Conversation with Inishmurray including audio recordings from Imogen’s A Day in the Life of Inishmurray.

Irish Scribes, Inishmurray and Viking Raids

In a land-locked library in St. Gallen in Switzerland there is a ninth-century Irish manuscript of a Latin grammar containing a poem in Old Irish that captures the dread of Viking raids that haunted the monastic settlements on coastal islands at the time. The earliest date given for a Viking raid on Inishmurray appears in Old Irish in the Annals of Inishfallen for the year 795: Orcain Iae Coluim Chille & Inse Muirethaig & Inse Bó Finne, ‘The plundering of Í Coluim Chille, and of Inis Muiredaig, and of Inis Bó Finne’.  The Annals of Ulster (Annála Uladh) mention a raid in 807 in Latin written in Irish script: Gentiles combuserunt insolam Muiredaiġ, et invaderunt ross Comain, ‘The heathens burned Inis Muiredaig and invaded Ros Comáin’.  

St. Gall (ca. 550 – ca. 645), was one of twelve monks who accompanied St. Columbanus on his mission to restore Christianity to Europe in the ‘Dark Ages’. The Abbey of Saint Gall was built on the site of Gall’s original hermitage in St. Gallen, Switzerland. The Irish manuscript of a Latin grammar now held in the library St. Gall, known as the St. Gall Priscian (Sankt Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 904), has been dated to 850-851. It is a copy in Irish script of the Latin Institutiones Grammaticae by the sixth century grammarian Priscian. The manuscript contains more than 9000 marginal or interlineal glosses or notes, of which 3478 are written in Old Irish, making it one of the most important sources of Old Irish texts. In addition, there are three Old Irish poems written in the margins, one of which refers to the Viking raids. The manuscript was probably compiled in an Irish scriptorium in the north of Ireland, possibly Bangor or Nendrum.

The crucial historical role of Irish scribes has been detailed by Thomas Cahill in How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe. By examining the handwriting, scholars have identified two main scribes, A and B, who compiled the manuscript. They have also identified two additional authors of the glosses. The poem that refers to the Viking raids was written across the top margin of page 112:

Is acher in gaith innocht fu fúasna fairggae findfolt ni ágor réimm mora minn: dond láechraid lainn úa Lothlind

‘Is acher in gaith innocht’ states there is a sharp wind tonight. The highly alliterative ‘fu fúasna fairggae findfol’ describes it tossing the white hair of the ocean. ‘Ni ágor réimm mora minn’ says I need not fear a calm route over the sea, ‘dond laochra fiáin na Lochlainne’, for the wild warriors from ‘Lochlann’. Many commentators link Lothlind to Norway or to Vikings of Norwegian origin, but the Irish historian Donnchadh Ó Corráin argues that the terms Lothlend, Laithlinn, and Lochlainn refered to Viking Scotland, comprising the Northern and Western Isles and parts of the mainland, especially Caithness, Sutherland and Inverness that were settled by Norwegian Vikings in the early ninth century.

The poem is anonymous. It appears on a folio written by scribe A, but the handwriting of the poem has been identified with scribe B. A gloss in the upper margin of page 157, written by scribe B, may reveal the identity of scribe A: hucusque calvus patricii depinxit, ‘bald Patricc has written until here’. Whether ‘bald’ is a reference to tonsure or his loss of hair is unclear.

St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 904: Prisciani grammatica p. 157 detail

There is another very intriguing gloss written on page 194 that may identify scribe B, who wrote or copied out the poem about the Vikings: do inis maddoc dún .i. meisse 7 choirbbre, ‘we are from Inis Maddoc, myself and Coirbbre’.

St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 904: Prisciani grammatica p. 194 detail

What is tantalising about the references to Inis Maddoc and Choirrbre is how close they come to Inis Muireadheach, located in the barony of Cairbre. Inis Maddoc has not been identified and some scholars have taken Choirbbre to be the name of scribe B, though there is some disagreement among scholars on the correct translation of the phrase.

Be that as it may, a mid-ninth century Irish manuscript held in a Swiss library contains an Old Irish poem that captures the dread of Viking raids that haunted the monastic settlement on Inishmurray at the time:

The wind it’d cut you tonight
it’s whipping the wild sea white:

No fear of their cruising the waters
those war hordes out of Norway.

Cahill, Thomas, How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe, Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1995.

CELT, Annals of Inisfallen, https://celt.ucc.ie/published/T100004/index.html

CELT, Annals of Ulster, https://celt.ucc.ie/published/T100001A.html

St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 904 : Prisciani grammatica p. 157, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/csg/0904/157; used by permission CC BY-NC 4.0.

St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 904 : Prisciani grammatica p. 194, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/csg/0904/194; used by permission CC BY-NC 4.0.

Contribution by Seán Golden

Become a Member for a more detailed look at Irish Scribes, Inishmurray and Viking Raids, including more detailed photos.