Our Rick Steves tour officially started yesterday at dinner. First thing this morning we headed to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells. No photography of the Book is allowed, of course, but we were able to photograph the Long Room in the Old Library. The Long Room is 213 ft (nearly 65 meters) in length and houses around 200,000 of the Trinity Library's oldest books.
Next we toured Dublin Castle.
The castle is used as a place of national prestige, hosting important State events including the inauguration of the Irish President every seven years.
This is the dining room .....
... and the drawing room.
This is in the Throne room (as you might have guessed).
This is St. Patrick's Hall.
And this is the impressive State Corrider.
The Chapel Royal is associated with the castle. It no longer has a religious function.
Two special items were on display at the castle: The Royal Sword of State (1660) and a shamrock shaped box (1861) that was a gift to King George IV.
We then toured Christ Church Cathedral.
These are some of the floor tiles.
This bridge is attached to the cathedral.
And under the Cathedral is the crypt. It is the largest cathedral crypt (208 ft/63.4m long) in Britain or Ireland and was constructed in 1172-1173.
On our way out of town we stopped at Kilmainham Gaol which held some of the most famous political and military leaders in Irish history between 1796 when it opened and 1924 when it closed. Leaders of the rebellions of 1798, 1803, 1848, 1867 and 1916 were detained here.
“Proclamation” by Rowan Gillespie is a permanent outdoor sculpture honoring the leaders of the Easter Rising and the authors of the Irish proclamation of Independence. It stands across the street from the gaol where the proclamation scribes were executed in 1916.
It features abstract and faceless bronze statues standing in a circle around a pillar, the words of their proclamation engraved into the metal ("... We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland, and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. ..."). These blindfolded statues each have an execution order or a verdict carved into their base, and their torsos are riddled with holes to represent where they were hit by the firing squad.
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