Praxiteles

Re hydraulic lift under the Pro Cathedral throne, I think that would be a wonderful idea and a very cost effective means of dealing with the declining or rising stature of the Dublin Archbishops. Looking at the fine job Cathal O’Neill did with the foot-bridge over the Dublin – Belfast railway line at Drogheda railway station with its dignified, symetrical and elegantly proportioned steel-cased lifts, I cannot think of a better person than himself to deal with this unexpected side-effect of his ruination of the sanctuary in the Pro-Cathedral.

Somebody, however, should tell the administrator of the Pro Cathedral that canopies, if not original or of artistic value, are not allowed by the post Vatican II liturgical rules. Even if a canopy were allowed, the colour should be an “ecclesiastical” colour (that is either red or green) and not some piece of raggady tribal totemism. After all, the Archdiocese of Dublin also includes the diocese of Glandalough – that is, large areas of Wicklow, Kildare, Carlow, Laois and even Wexford. The positioning of the Dublin colours overhead the present Archbishop does not seem to demonstrate much of the kind of diplomatic souplesse normally associated with major practioners of that particular art, such as the Cardinal D’Ossat, but perhaps gives the impression of a not too unconscious retreat to the Danborg and Dublin’s foreign ecclesiastical roots.

Re message 192.

If the the 2003 renovations in Thurles Cathedral involved the installation of what appears to be a copper-pan baptistry in the side aise of the Cathedral, does anyone know what has happened to the free standing Baptistry which is based on Pisa? This is the only example of a free standing external Baptistry in an Irish Cathedral. Is it too much to hope that it is now a potatoe store or trinket shop?

A small treat for viewers on to-day’s Feast of St. Colman of Cloyne (c.530 -604)

The great West Window of Cobh Cathedral whose subject is the Vision of the Throne of God taken from the Apocalypse of St. John (4:1-11). The subject is Our Lord seated in glory, sourrounded by the elders, clad in white teguments and crowns of gold. Around the throne are the the four living creatures (symbolic of the found evangelists): the lion, the ox, the man, and the soaring eagle. As they cry out Holy Holy Holy is the Lord God Almighty Who was, Who is, and Who is to come , they cast down their crowns before the throne and pay homage to Christ. The inner circle depicts the twelve Apostles. The outer circle depicts the saints in glory.

Have you got one of Cobh Cathedral with the doors closed and of Fagan’s wrought iron hinges in all their glory?

The foregoing pictures of Thurles Cathedral show only too well the vairous petit obsessions that the Liturgical Commission of the Irish Episcopal Conference has gone through over the past twenty years.

In the mid 1990s, the great discovery was the ambry. Hence, we have the Holy Oils now hawked about in several Cathedrals thoughout Ireland in a wide ranging series of eccentric compositions.

Enniscorthy chose to locate them high up on a bracket in the wall of the North transept. Most inappropriately, they are housed in a Victorian Tantulus.

Cashel seems to have gone for another spirited theme: the guarded liquids.

Surprisingly, none of the liturgists seems to have been aware that the Holy Oils are to be veiled in cloths of three different colours.

I would suggest that a visit to the Armenian Catholicos at Ekmiadzin in Armenia would teach the Archbishop of Cashel a thing or two on the proper reservation of the Holy Oils.

Dear Boyler,

Not to worry. You may be interested in an article on the frescos in Cormac’s Chapel published in The Irish Arts Review Yearbook, vol 18 [2002], pp. 25-29 by Roger Stalley. A fragmentary inscription ite et interrogate diligenter de puero, ironically quoting Herod’s words to the Wise Men, seems to suggest that the frescos depicted the nativity cycle and especially the Three Kings – a theme appropriate to Royal cashel.

I have no idea of what the official guardians of Irish heritage intend to do with the Chapel and its frescos. The last time I visited Cashel, I was subjected to the ahistorical twaddle of an official guide who knew next to nothing of the place.

A fuller picture of the 2003 restoration work is available here:

http://www.catholiccommunications.ie/Pressrel/3b-october-2003.html

Finally, I have located some photographs of the original interior of the Pro-Cathedral with Peter Turnerelli’s High Altar as intended by the artist. I think the occasion in question was the consecration of Archbishop McQuaid in 1942.

Closer inspection of the photograph will explain why the Ciborium, in its current form, looks wrong. It is wrong because it is an ungainly malformation. Professor O’Neill, in his devastating reordering, capped the original Ciborium with the canopy used for the crucifix (which, as can be seen from the photograph, was above the Ciborium). Clearly, had the Ciborium been retained in tact, the problem of the focal void would have been greater. In a brutal attempt to disguise this problem, even the Ciborium of Turnerelli’s Altar had to be jack-hammered.

The Ciborium had its own smaller domed finial (as is clear in the photograph). What now sits in the sanctuary of the Pro-Cathedral is merely an assemblage of bits and pieces.

William Henry Bartlett’s (1809-1854) series of prints appeared in The Scenery and Antiquities of Ireland . I have scanned a few of his steel engravings of the lupi in fabula!

The view of Cobh was engraved almost twenty years before the building of the Cathedral.