“I come from lands of strange things, from lands of familiar things, so that I may learn from you the spot on which died, and the spot on which were born, knowledge and ignorance.”
(from The Conversation of Colum Cille and the Youth)

These talks will use medieval tales to explore aspects of the realm of the indigenous supernatural in Irish tradition. While this realm was imagined in terms evidently rooted in pre-Christian beliefs, our sources are the work of Christian authors, who were somehow able to accommodate such ancient concepts within the framework of their faith. Although intimately linked with the landscape, the Otherworld does not exist in time and space; it is both the basis of the human community, and its antithesis. As various texts indicate, the barrier between ‘there’ and ‘here’ lies in our established ways of thinking and seeing.

The picture is Oweynagat (The Cave of the Cats), Rathcroghan, County Roscommon. Fissure at rear of souterrain.