Micheál Flatley
10.0015.00 Select options

Micheál Flatley

10.0015.00

Want unlimited access to the Irish Life and Lore Oral History Archive? Subscribe by purchasing Gold Subscription, Silver Subscription or Bronze Subscription!

Micheál Flatley has a great reputation as a stonemason. His father and grandfather also worked with stone in an age where people had to do a bit of everything because money was scarce. Micheál discusses the craft of the stonemason. He always had a great admiration for stonework because it is so technical and much professional tuition is required to master it. The dry stone wall takes more skill to build than a mortar wall, he says. Micheál recalls some Halloween traditions and the games played in earlier times. A bath of water had coins put into it, which had to be taken out by mouth and an apple hung from a string had to be bitten without use of one’s hands. He also has memories of the travelling folk from the country who exchanged tin cans for a bit of food and hay for their ponies. Micheál discusses the holy wells and the tradition of people leaving three pebbles in a mound which eventually grew into a cairn. We hear of the folklore of monasteries, the Vikings and stories of forts and fairies.

Additional information

Type:

Disk, MP3

Audio series:

Sligo Heritage Collection, First Series

Bitrate:

160 kbps

Download time limit:

48 hours

File size(s):

20.10 MB, 17.96 MB, 10.49 MB, 20.73 MB, 16.76 MB

Number of files:

3

Product ID:

CDSL01-16

Subject:

A Stonemason, Local Historian and Folklorist

Recorded by:

Joe McGowan