The name Tara is an anglicization of the Irish name Teamhair or Cnoc na Teamhrach ('hill of Tara'). It is also known as Teamhair na R ('Tara of the kings'), and formerly also Liathdruim ('the grey ridge').[3] The Old Irish form is Temair. It is believed this comes from Proto-Celtic *Temris and means a 'sanctuary' or 'sacred space' cut off for ceremony, cognate with the Greek temenos () and Latin templum. Another suggestion is that it means "a height with a view".[4][5]
During the late Neolithic or early Bronze Age, a huge double timber circle or "wood henge" was built on the hilltop.[9] It was 250m in diameter and surrounded the Mound of the Hostages.[6] At least six smaller burial mounds were built in an arc around this timber circle, including those known as Dall, Dorcha, Dumha na mBan-Amhus ('Mound of the Mercenary Women') and Dumha na mB ('Mound of the Cow'). The timber circle was eventually either removed or decayed, and the burial mounds are barely visible today.[10]
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There are several large round enclosures on the hill, which were built in the Iron Age.[6] The biggest and most central of these is Rth na Rogh (the Enclosure of the Kings), which measures 1,000 metres (3,300 ft) in circumference, 318 metres (1,043 ft) north-south by 264 metres (866 ft) east-west, with an inner ditch and outer bank. It is dated to the 1st century BC and was originally marked out by a stakewall.[6] Human burials, and a high concentration of horse and dog bones, were found in the ditch.[6] Within the Rth na Rogh is the Mound of the Hostages and two round, double-ditched enclosures which together make a figure-of-eight shape. One is Teach Chormaic ('Cormac's House') and the other is the Forradh or Royal Seat, which incorporates earlier burial mounds. On top of the Forradh is a standing stone, which is believed to be the Lia Fil ('Stone of Destiny') at which the High Kings were crowned. According to legend, the stone would let out a roar when the rightful king touched it. It is believed that the stone originally lay beside or on top of the Mound of the Hostages.[6]
Just to the north of Rth na Rogh, is Rth na Seanadh (the 'Rath of the Synods'), which was built in the middle of the former "wood henge".[6] It is a round enclosure with four rings of ditches and banks, and incorporates earlier burial mounds. It was re-modelled several times and once had a large timber building inside it, resembling the one at Navan.[11] It was occupied between the 1st and 4th centuries AD, and Roman artefacts were also found there.[6] It was badly mutilated in the early 20th century by British Israelites searching for the Ark of the Covenant.[6]
The other round enclosures are Rth Laoghaire ('Laoghaire's Fort', where the eponymous king is said to have been buried) at the southern edge of the hill, and the Claonfhearta ('Sloping Trenches' or 'Sloping Graves') at the northwestern edge, which includes Rth Grinne and Rth Chaelchon. The Claonfhearta are burial mounds with ring ditches around them which sit on a slope.[6]
At the northern end of the hill is Teach Miodhchuarta or 'Banqueting Hall'. This was likely the ceremonial avenue leading to the hilltop and seems to have been one of the last monuments built.[6][10]
The earliest evidence of a church at Tara is a charter dating from the 1190s. In 1212, this church was "among the possessions confirmed to the Knights Hospitallers of Saint John of Kilmainham by Pope Innocent III".[13] A 1791 illustration shows the church building internally divided into a nave and chancel, with a bell-tower over the western end. A stump of wall marks the site of the old church today, but some of its stonework was re-used in the current church.
According to legend, five ancient roads or slighe meet at Tara, linking it with all the provinces of Ireland. The earliest reference to the five roads of Tara was in the tale Togail Bruidne Da Derga (The Destruction of Da Derga's Hall).[14][15]
The passage of the Mound of the Hostages is aligned with the sunrise around the times of Samhain (the Gaelic festival marking the start of winter) and Imbolc (the festival marking the start of spring).[16] The passage is shorter than monuments like Newgrange, making it less precise in providing alignments with the Sun, but Martin Brennan writes in The Stones of Time that "daily changes in the position of a 13-foot long sunbeam are more than adequate to determine specific dates".[17] Early Irish literature records that a royal gathering called the 'feast of Tara' (feis Temro) was held there at Samhain.[18]
By the beginning of Ireland's historical period, Tara had become the seat of a sacral kingship.[18] Historian Dibh Crinn writes that Tara "possessed an aura that seemed to set it above" the other royal seats.[19] It is recorded as the seat of the High King of Ireland (Ard R) and is "central to most of the great drama in early Irish literature".[18] Various medieval king lists traced a line of High Kings far into the past. However, John T. Koch explains: "Although the kingship of Tara was a special kingship whose occupants had aspirations towards supremacy among the kings of Ireland, in political terms it is unlikely that any king had sufficient authority to dominate the whole island before the 9th century".[20]
Irish legend says that the Lia Fil (Stone of Destiny) at Tara was brought to Ireland by the divine Tuatha D Danann, and that it would cry out under the foot of the true king.[18] Medb Lethderg was the sovereignty goddess of Tara.[18] The cult of the sacral kingship of Tara is reflected in the legends of High King Conaire Mr, while another legendary High King, Cormac mac Airt, is presented as the ideal king.[18] The reign of Diarmait mac Cerbaill, a historical king of Tara in the sixth century, was seen as particularly important by medieval writers. Although he was probably pagan, he was also influenced by Christian leaders and "stood chronologically between two worlds, the ancient pagan one and the new Christian one".[21]
Tara was probably controlled by the rainn before it was seized by the Laigin in the third century.[18] Niall of the Nine Hostages displaced the Laigin from Tara in the fifth century and it became the ceremonial seat of the U Nill.[18] The kingship of Tara alternated between the Southern and Northern U Nill until the eleventh century. After this, control of Dublin, Limerick, and Waterford became more important to a would-be High King than control of Tara.[20]
According to Irish mythology, during the third century a great battle known as the Cath Gabhra took place between High King Cairbre Lifechair, and the Fianna led by Fionn Mac Cumhaill. The Fianna were heavily defeated; many of the graves of the Fianna covered the Rath of the Gabhra, most notably the grave of Oscar, son of Oisn.[22]
During the rebellion of 1798, United Irishmen formed a camp on the hill but were attacked and defeated by British troops[23] on 26 May 1798 and the Lia Fil was allegedly moved to commemorate the 400 rebels who died on the hill that day.
In 1843, the Irish nationalist leader Daniel O'Connell hosted a peaceful political demonstration at Tara in favour of Irish self-governance which drew over 750,000 people, highlighting the lasting significance of Tara.[24]
British Prime Minister John Russell inherited the Tara estate during the 19th century. At the turn of the 20th century, Tara was vandalised by British Israelists who thought that the British were part of the Lost Tribes of Israel and that the hill contained the Ark of the Covenant.[25] A group of British Israelists, led by retired Anglo-Indian judge Edward Wheeler Bird, set about excavating the site having paid off the landowner, Gustavus Villiers Briscoe. Irish cultural nationalists held a mass protest over the destruction of the national heritage site, including Douglas Hyde, Arthur Griffith, Maud Gonne, George Moore and W. B. Yeats. Hyde tried to interrupt the dig but was ordered away by a man wielding a rifle. Maud Gonne made a more flamboyant protest by relighting an old bonfire that Briscoe had lit to celebrate the coronation of Edward VII. She began to sing Thomas Davis's song "A Nation Once Again" by the fire, much to the consternation of the landlord and the police.[26][27]
The religious order Missionary Society of St. Columban had its international headquarters at Dalgan Park, just north of the Hill of Tara. The order was named after the Saint who was born in the Ancient Kingdom of Meath. The land Dalgan Park lies on was once owned by the kings of Tara. The seminary is also situated on the path of the Slighe Midluachra, one of the five ancient roads that meet at Tara.[29]
The Hill of Tara was included in the World Monuments Fund's 2008 Watch List of the 100 Most Endangered Sites in the world.[35] The following year it was included in a list of the 15 must-see endangered cultural treasures by the Smithsonian Institution.[36]
The Hill of Tara is an ancient Neolithic Age site in County Meath, Ireland. It was known as the seat of the High Kings of Ireland, the site of coronations, a place of assembly for the enacting and reading of laws, and for religious festivals.
The oldest monument at the site is the Mound of the Hostages, a Neolithic passage tomb, dating from c. 3000 BCE. The ring forts and evidence of other enclosures, such as the Banquet Hall, date from a later period. The Lia Fail (stone of destiny), by which the ancient kings were inaugurated, still stands on the hill. The site is also associated with the Tuatha De Danaan, the pre-Celtic peoples of Ireland and with the mystical elements they came to embody.
The great sabbats of pagan Ireland were announced by a bonfire on the hill which, at an elevation of 646 feet (197 m), would have been seen for many miles in every direction. It is said that St. Patrick announced the arrival of Christianity in Ireland by lighting his own large bonfire across from Tara at the Hill of Slane before going there to preach before King Laoghaire in 432/433 CE. The name comes from the Gaelic Cnoc na Teamhrach, which is often translated as "place of great prospect", though it has also been argued it comes from a corruption of Tea-Mur or Teamhair, burial place of the ancient queen Tea. 152ee80cbc
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