Cross of Cong leaves Mayo Museum

Tony Candon, Manager Keeper at the Museum of Country Life, Turlough, examines the Cross of Cong  before it is transported back to Kildare Street.?Pic: Michael Mc Laughlin

Museum trades Cross for gold


Deirdre Gavin

The Cross of Cong last week made its return journey back to Dublin, after spending the last 14 months on view in the Museum of Country Life, Turlough. The Cross is one of Ireland’s greatest treasures. It was made in 1123 AD to encase a fragment of the True Cross that was brought to Ireland and displayed in different places.
The medieval Annals of Tigernach record that Turlough O’Connor, King of Connacht and High King of Ireland, asked for part of the True Cross to be kept in Ireland. On his instructions, a shrine - the Cross of Cong - was made in Roscommon to house the fragment, long since lost.
The Cross of Cong was transferred to what is now the National Museum of Ireland in the 1880s and last March was moved to the National Museum of Country Life in Turlough where it stayed until May 22 last.
Speaking on the departure of the cross, Museum Keeper Tony Candon said: “Having it here was a wonderful success right up to the very last minute of display people were running in to see a glimpse of it before it left for Dublin. It gave a great lift to the Museum and to the people of Mayo and Connacht.”
The museum however will have a new piece of history on display in September, as Tony explained: “We have a small gold hoard from Roscommon coming for the Autumn which has a very interesting story.”
The hoard of Early Bronze Age gold from Coggalbeg, Co Roscommon was unearthed in a very unusual fashion. The Early Bronze Age goldwork, formed part of the contents of a pharmacy safe stolen from Sheehan’s Chemists, Strokestown, Co Roscommon, in March 2009.
The hoard consists of a gold lunula, a crescent-shaped collar, and two small gold discs dating to the Early Bronze Age c. 2300-1800 BC. The objects had been placed in an envelope in the pharmacy safe in 1947. The thieves had cast the envelope in a skip which was then located by Gardai after the family explained the pieces of jewellery were missing.
The investigating detectives established that all the papers from the safe had been dumped in a skip in Dublin. As the refuse was due to be collected within a few hours of this information coming to hand, An Garda SíochΡna moved quickly to secure the skip and arranged for the refuse to be examined. The detectives who undertook this very unappealing task were rewarded by the recovery of the hoard, complete and intact.
Detective work of an archaeological nature undertaken by the National Museum of Ireland’s curators in the Irish Antiquities Division led to the identification of the original finder of the hoard and where the find was made. The finder was Mr Hubert Lannon, who had found it when cutting turf in his bog at Coggalbeg, Co Roscommon, in March 1945.
Tony explained the arrival of the hoard will be a nice birthday present for the Museum which will be celebrating its tenth birthday in September.