Leaving the present behind, one passes into the remotest recess of the island's past as one mounts the hill. To-day wavering misty shadows close in around me as I move upward, even as though the spirits of the ancient kings and minstrels were yet about, and the winds moan as though driven across the strings of many harps, and there seems melody all around me.
Tara is not a great hill, but a fair green mound from which the ancient kings were wont to spy out all the fair land around them. It was the most sacred spot in the kingdom and none could wear the crown who bore blemish of any sort. Cormac Mac Art, the great King, was, upon the loss of his eye, forced to retire to the hill of Skreen near-by. For twenty-five hundred years, Tara was the palace and burial-place of the kings of Ireland, who every third year met here in great convention. To-day as I stand on its summit nothing of that period, save some long mounds, breaks the green carpet of grass thrown like the covering of our holy communion over this holy of holies. Tara was mentioned by Ptolemy and he called it "illustrious." Its name by some is supposed to be taken from that of the wife of a King, Heremon, the first monarch of Ireland. "Thea" was her name and the place was called Temora (the house of Thea), but others call it "the house of music" (Thead, a musical chord, and mur, a house).
Photo by W. Leonard
Castle of King John Trim
The main hall stood nine hundred feet square and "twenty-seven cubits in height." It held its thousand guests daily and on great days the monarch sat on his throne in its centre, his flowing yellow hair bearing the golden crown, his stately form clothed in a brilliant scarlet robe laden with rich ornaments of gold. Golden shoes ornamented with red buckles and bearing stars and animals in gold, were upon his feet; the King of Leinster sat, facing him, the King of Ulster sat on his right, the King of Munster on his left, while the King of Connaught sat behind him. On long rows of seats before him were the druids, bards, philosophers, antiquaries, genealogists, musicians, and the chiefs of all the towns of the kingdom. The assembly was opened by the chief bard, followed by the druidical rites, after which the fire of Saman, or the moon, was lighted. Not until then was the business of the convention taken up. In one part of the palace, the youths were instructed in poetry and music and initiated into the hidden harmony of the universe. Evidently in those days a city must have surrounded the base of this hill, but of the houses of the people little seems to be known and nothing is left.