As part of Cashel Arts Festival, a most interesting discussion by Trinity Assyriologist Dr Martin Worthington, will take place at Cashel Library tomorrow morning, September 13th 2024 at 11:00am sharp.
You canlocate the Cashel Library building, situated on Friar Street, Lady’s Well, Cashel, Co. Tipperary, HERE. (G487+RX) Please Note: For this free event booking is essential to Tel. No.:- 062, 63825
[Note: An Assyriologist is a person who specializes in the archaeological, historical, cultural and linguistic study of Assyria and the rest of ancient Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). The word Assyriologist derived from Assyriology, the study of the culture, history, and archaeological remains of ancient Assyria]
Ancient symbols on a 2,700-year-old temple, which have long baffled experts, have now been explained by the aforementioned Dr Worthington.
A sequence of ‘mystery symbols’ were located on view at temples in various locations in the ancient city of Dūr-Šarrukīn, present day Khorsabad, Iraq, which was once ruled by Assyria’s King Sargon II, (721-704 BC).
Late 19th century drawings of the eagle and bull symbols first published by French excavator Victor Place. From New York Public Library.
The sequence of five symbols, a lion, eagle, bull, fig-tree and plough, were first made known to the modern world, through drawings published by French excavators in the late nineteenth century. Since then, there has been a spate of ideas about the symbols and what they possibly might mean.
Same have been compared to Egyptian hieroglyphs, understood to be reflections of possibly imperial might, and suspected to represent the said king’s name – but how?
Dr Worthington (Trinity’s School of Languages, Literatures and Cultural Studies) has proposed a new solution in a paper published first last April, in the Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research.
At this completely free event at Cashel Library the public can meet Dr Worthington tomorrow morning and learn at first hand his solution to solving the mystery of these hieroglyphs.
A poem by the late great American acclaimed poet; storyteller; fry cook; street-car conductor; professional dancer; prostitute and lesbian madam; film director; nightclub performer; civil rights activist; playwright; autobiographer and professor of American studies at Wake Forest University, Dr Maya Angelou, [Latter born Marguerite Annie Johnson].
The late Dr Maya Angelou, (1928 – 2014).
“Still I Rise”
You may write me down in history, With your bitter, twisted lies. You may tread me in the very dirt, But still, like dust, I rise.
Does my sassiness upset you? Why are you beset with gloom? ‘Cause I walk as if I have oil wells, Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns, With the certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I rise.
Did you want to see me broken? Bowed head and lowered eyes? Shoulders falling down like teardrops, Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you? Don’t take it so hard, ‘Just cause I laugh as if I have gold mines, Diggin’in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words, You may cut me with your lies, You may kill me with your hatefulness, But like life, I rise.
Does my sexiness upset you? Does it come as a surprise, That I dance as if I have diamonds At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history’s shame, I rise. Up from a past rooted in pain, I rise. I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide, Welling and swelling bearing in the tide. Leaving behind nights of terror and fear I rise Into a daybreak miraculously clear I rise Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the hope and the dream of the slave. And so, I rise.
The Relics of St Bernadette of Lourdes; latter who experienced visions of the Virgin Mary, will visit Holycross Abbey, Thurles, in a couple of weeks, for two days, on September 19th and 20th 2024.
Initially born Bernadette Soubirous (January 7th 1844 – April 16th 1879), St Bernadette, then aged 14 years, claimed to have seen the Mother of God, on 18 different occasions.
St Bernadette (Sisters of Charity), as she later became known (daughter of François Soubirous (1807–1871), a miller, and his wife Louise (née Casteròt; 1825–1866), a laundress), was out gathering firewood with her sister Toinette and a friend near the grotto of Massabielle, when she experienced her first vision. While the other girls had crossed a little stream in front of the grotto and walked on, St Bernadette stayed behind, looking for a shallower place to cross, where she wouldn’t get her shoes and stockings wet. Having finally sat down to remove her shoes and stocking, she heard the sound of a rushing wind. A wild rose growing in a natural niche in the grotto, was the only foliage to move. From the dark alcove behind it, came a dazzling light, and a figure arrayed in white. This was to be the first of 18 visions of what St Bernadette later recalled as “a small young lady”. Her sister and her friend stated that they had seen nothing.
Having suffered a bout of cholera in her childhood, St Bernadette had been left with severe, chronic asthma, and eventually she contracted tuberculosis (TB) of the lungs and bones. She died in 1879 at Nièvre, in France and was declared blessed on June 14th 1921, by Pope Pius XI. She was canonized by Pius XI on December 8th 1933, latter the feast day of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Her body was first exhumed on September 22nd 1909, in the presence of representatives appointed by the Church, (two doctors and a sister of her religious community). They claimed that although the crucifix in her hand and her rosary beads had both oxidized, her body appeared fully preserved from decomposition (incorrupt). This was cited as one of the miracles to support her canonization. Her body was washed and re-clothed, before re-burial in the Chapel of St Joseph, in a new double casket.
The church again exhumed her body a second time, on April 3rd 1919, on the occasion of the approval of St Bernadette’s canonization. Then, what struck those present during this examination, was the state of perfect preservation of the body’s supple and firm fibrous tissues, and the totally unexpected state of the liver, after 40 years.
In 1925, the church again exhumed her body for the third time, taking relics, which were then sent to Rome.
The relics coming to Ireland are parts of her body that were removed after she was exhumed. These relics include bones, muscle tissue, and hair samples. Same will arrive at Ireland West Airport, (Knock Airport, Co. Mayo), on Wednesday September 4th next.
A full itinerary of where Saint Bernadette’s relics can be viewed, can be found HERE.
Work on the new restaurant conversion in Thurles Park’s car park area, latter situated close to‘The Source’ building in Cathedral Street, has temporally ground to a halt due to the presence of the Common Pipistrelle and Soprano Pipistrelle bat species. Following a survey, ecologists have found that a small number of these Pipistrelles Bats, together with house sparrows were using the building. Recent surveys indicate that since 2003 the soprano pipistrelle has increased significantly, while the common pipistrelle has also increased, albeit more slowly.
Pic 1: The Pipistrelles Bat Species. Pic 2: Closed car park area with 8 year old landscaping including trees removed. Pics: G. Willoughby.
Construction work begun by the contractor has now been paused temporarily until a Derogation License can be issued by the National Parks and Wildlife Service. Ireland remains listed under Annex IV of the EC (Birds and Natural Habitats) Regulations and as a result of this work, which could capture, kill, damage or destroy their roosts or disturb them at an important part of their life cycle, cannot take place without first obtaining a Derogation Licence. This licence is issued under Regulation 54 of the Regulations, and strict criteria must be met before such a licence can be fully approved.
The project being undertaken in the area had been expected to take 12 months to fully complete, at an estimated cost to the Irish taxpayer of €3.4M. Modification of the building in question will see a mid-19 century farm yard shed being converted into yet another 83 seater Thurles café, with a canopy planned to be erected over the open car park area, thus reducing current existing car parking from 49 to 33 spaces (including 2 disabled parking spaces).
The area had been totally revamped, at great expense, just 8 years ago. Same upgrade had included a partially bricked footpaths area, including steps, safety railings, flowerbeds and 10 X 4.5 metre (14.5 foot) high trees; latter fully planted with various shrubs, thus greatly enhancing this area. All this landscaping has now been ripped up and removed (See Image above) and the car park closed for use by the public for 12 months, greatly affecting footfall within the town centre.
Thurles.Info’s ‘Eye in the Sky’, swooped down to take a closer look this morning at the most recent re-designing of streets in Thurles. Robert Emmet Street (often spelt ‘Emmett‘ situatedimmediately to the rear of Tesco) has been the scene of the latest attempts by a motorised vehicle to change the Thurles landscape.
Badly damaged ‘Watery Mall’ Famine Wall. Pic: G. Willoughby.
This time the object of someone’s attention was the Great Famine 1847 stone river wall. This wall in recent years; during the Spring and Summer seasons, has successfully hidden the noxious weeds, the dumped plastic wrappers, the tin cans and the glass and plastic bottles.
Biodiversity sign hidden by supposedly biodiversity duringthe‘No Mow May Ever’ season. Pic: G. Willoughby.
I hasten to mention that this same wall has also hidden the inability of town officials to undertake the cutting of the grass and noxious weeds, which in turn grants cover to water rats, allowing them to frolic freely of an evening; and all in the name of biodiversity which of course includes every bacterium that makes up our natural world.
Does Thurles still needs a Ring Road before 2040 I ask?
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