The Irish Analogies for the Romano-British Barn Dwelling

I. A. Richmond

doi:10.2307/297092

The Irish Analogies for the Romano-British Barn Dwelling

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 September 2012

I. A. Richmond

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A good deal of attention has recently been paid to the Romano-British House of the type known as ‘basilican’ or ‘basilical,’ the long barn-like building with a fairly broad central nave and a pair of side-aisles, often bratticed off so as to form separate rooms, which sometimes extend right across the body of the hall. So far as we know the distribution of this type in bulk is restricted to the south of England. But it does occur so far north as Mansfield Woodhouse, in Nottinghamshire. On the Continent it is rare: but the examples are widely distributed, in such a way as to suggest that all is not yet known about the way in which these houses spread. Most of these houses, however, are situated in Britain, and here they are sometimes alone, but quite often associated with the smaller type of Roman villa, serving as outbuildings or servants' quarters.

Type: Research Article
Information: The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 22 , Issue 1: Papers Dedicated to Sir George MacDonald K.C.B. , 1932 , pp. 96 - 106

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/297092 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright ©I. A. Richmond 1932. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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^{page 96 note 1} Ward, Romano-British Buildings and Earthworks, 174–82: Haverfield, , Romanisation of Roman Britain (1922), 39 f.Google Scholar; Collingwood, The Archaeology of Roman Britain, 129–34; Atkinson, , Original papers of the Norfolk and Norwich Arch. Soc., xxiv, 2, pp. 112–24.Google Scholar The connexion with basilica is misleading, since there is no evidence for the clerestory which was the distinctive feature of basilicas.

^{page 96 note 2} Archaeologia, viii, 363.

^{page 96 note 3} Collingwood, loc. cit., quotes examples from Königshofen (Hungary), Sinsheimer Wald, Kastell Larga, Bachenau, Aulfingen, Siblingen, and Mayen (cf. JRS, xix, 261 f.); also Maulevrier, near Caudebec.

^{page 96 note 4} loc. cit., p. 134.

^{page 96 note 5} Ward, Romano-British Buildings and Earthworks, 180–1; Haverfield, , Roman Occupation of Britain (Oxford, 1924), p. 227 f.Google Scholar

^{page 97 note 1} Joyce, P. W., A Social History of Ancient Ireland (1903), vol. ii, p. 20 ff.Google Scholar

^{page 97 note 2} Macalister, , Proc. Roy. Ir. Acad., xxiv, 231–399Google Scholar, pls. vii–x; for our purpose, pp. 262–69 and pls. vii and ix are relevant. Also, by the same author, Muiredach, Abbot of Monasterboice, A.D. 890–923 (Dublin, 1914), p. 25 fGoogle Scholar.

^{page 97 note 3} This may serve as an excuse for collecting the material afresh; while, in the interpretation of it, the writer wishes particularly to acknowledge the generous assistance of Mr. M. A. O'Brien, Lecturer in Celtic to the Queen's University of Belfast, who examined with him each Irish text in question, vouching for the reading and interpretation thereof. Without this help these notes could not have been written. For illustrations, we are greatly indebted to Dr. Macalister, who procured for us, through the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, the loan of blocks used in fig. 13, and pl. xxii and xxiii, and, through the same Society and Mr. F. Welch, plate xxiv. Finally, Dr. Gerda Boëthius generously permitted a selection of her illustrations to be arranged as fig. 15.

^{page 97 note 4} Irish Texts Soc., vol. ii, sections 1–4, for our purpose.

^{page 97 note 5} Suidiugud Taigi Midchuarta, Petrie, Trans. RI Acad., xviii, pp. 196–204.

^{page 97 note 6} Ancient Laws of Ireland, vol. iv, 299–341. For our needs, pp. 305–337.

^{page 97 note 7} Facsimile, p. 418; also Petrie, , Trans. RI Acad., xviii, p. 207Google Scholar, pl. 9.

^{page 97 note 8} Facsimile, p. 29: also Petrie, loc. cit., p. 205, pl. 8.

^{page 98 note 1} ‘cleithe,’ see Glossary to Brehon Laws, vol. vi, Ancient Laws of Ireland, p. 141. The passage which settles the interpretation is vol. iv, 304, 19, ‘o suidhiugud co cleithe.’

^{page 98 note 2} Durrow, Muiredach, pl. ii; Monasterboice, ibid., fig. 34, p. 80, fig. 36, p. 82. Clonmacnois, , Journ. Roy. Soc. Antiq. Ireland, xxxvii, 294–5, also p. 218.Google Scholar Termon Feichin, Muiredach, pl. iiib.

^{page 98 note 3} Muiredach, p. 30, fig. 6. For a general description of these shrines, see Crawford, H. S., JRSAI, liii, pp. 82–6.Google Scholar

^{page 98 note 4} Fled Bricrend, p. 4, line 5.

^{page 98 note 5} Crith Gabblach, iv, p. 304.

^{page 98 note 6} ibid., loc. cit.

^{page 98 note 7} See Crawford, H. S., JRSAI, xliv, p. 171Google Scholar, for a list and illustrations of such finials.

^{page 98 note 8} Muiredach, pl. V and p. 29, fig. 5.

^{page 98 note 9} Westwood, Facsimiles of the miniatures and ornaments of Anglo-Saxon and Irish ornaments (London, 1868), pl. 11Google Scholar = fol. 282^V (The Temptation of Jesus); reproduced in line, Muiredach, p. 33, fig 7.

^{page 98 note 10} Irische Texte, iii, 213.

^{page 98 note 11} Collingwood, W. G., Northumbrian crosses of the pre-Norman Age, p. 164Google Scholar.

^{page 98 note 12} See Muiredach, p. 26.

^{page 98 note 13} For stue, see G. Boëthius, Hallar, Tempel och Stavkyrkor, pp. 9–27.

^{page 98 note 14} Fled Bricrend, ed. G. Henderson, note on p. 147, goes into full detail.

^{page 98 note 15} Gloss. to MSH of Fled Bricrend, when imda is equated with sgeng = ‘a bed’ or ‘a booth with. a bed.’

^{page 98 note 16} Petrie, loc. cit., p. 199, 1. 11 of Irish text.

^{page 99 note 1} e.g. St. Columba's House, Kells, and St. Kevin's Kitchen, Glendalough.

^{page 99 note 2} Fled Bricrend, p. 5, sect. 3.

^{page 99 note 3} PRIA, xxxiv, pl. vii.

^{page 99 note 4} See above, p. 97, nn. 7 and 8.

^{page 99 note 5} Fouilles du Mont Beuvray, ii, 1899, 18 sqq.

^{page 99 note 6} Macalister, PRIA, xxxiv, p. 265.

^{page 100 note 1} H. C. Lawlor, The Monastery of St. Mochaoi at Nendrum, plan. Traill, and Mann, , Social England (1902), i, p. 286.Google Scholar

^{page 100 note 2} It should not be forgotten that similar houses existed in Wales. The literary evidence for these, conveniently summarised in Seebohm's English Village Community, pp. 239–42, is so explicit that Seebohm permits himself the conjecture that ‘the tribal house, built of green timber and wattle, with its high nave and lower aisles, when imitated in stone, grew into the Gothic cathedral’ (p. 241). Seebohm did not know of the Romano-British barn-dwelling, and writers on that seem to have overlooked his evidence connecting such houses with the primitive Welsh tribal organisation. The purpose of the present paper, however, is merely to review the parallel evidence for Ireland.

^{page 100 note 3} Macalister, , The Archaeology of Ireland, p. 21Google Scholar.

^{page 100 note 4} Macalister, , PRIA xxxiv, p. 246.Google Scholar

^{page 100 note 5} See above, p. 99, note 5: also Bonner Jahrhücher, 133, p. 108, Abb. 40.

^{page 100 note 6} Tain bo Fraich, 139.

^{page 101 note 1} Ancient Laws of Ireland, vol. iv, p. clxxvi.

^{page 101 note 2} Crith Gahblach, p. 305.

^{page 101 note 3} ibid., p. 305.

^{page 101 note 4} ibid., p. 307.

^{page 101 note 5} ibid., p. 309.

^{page 101 note 6} ibid., pp. 311 and 323.

^{page 101 note 7} ibid., p. 327.

^{page 101 note 8} ibid., p. 329.

^{page 101 note 9} ibid., p. 337.

^{page 101 note 10} ibid., p. 304, ‘dit itir cath diiti o suidiuga co cleithe.’

^{page 101 note 11} ‘airchenn,’ Brehon Laws Glossary, vol. vi, p. 30.

^{page 102 note 1} Crith Gabhlach, pp. 311 and 323: see also Joyce, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 39.

^{page 102 note 2} G. Boëthius, Hallar, Tempel och Stavkyrkor.

^{page 102 note 3} Crith Gabhlach, loc. cit.

^{page 102 note 4} ‘ircha’, Brebon Laws Glossary, vol. vi, p. 504: but not nearly all the examples are cited.

^{page 102 note 5} Crith Gabhlach, p. 308.

^{page 103 note 1} See p. 96, n. 3.

^{page 103 note 2} See G. Boëthius, Hallar, Tempel och Stavkyrkor, pp. 167–182.

^{page 103 note 3} Ptolemy, Geogr. ii, 2, 8.

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