Bridging Appalachia

A common feature in Irish vernacular architecture is the west room, a parlour in the west of the house, opposite the hearth.  This room, which was not often utilised, contained well-honed furniture, religious items, representations of deceased and emigrated relations and pieces symbolising important rites of passage (Arensberg 1959).  This cold and lonely room, associated with death and the setting sun, stood in stark opposition to the fiery heart of the home to its east and provided an appropriate atmosphere for the laying out of corpses (Ó Reilly 2011).  The whole room functions as a tomb for memory and official devotion, a place of liminality that is kept strategically separate from the vitality of the rest of the home.  Building traditions and other west room practices are essential to the luck of the house and vocalise a continued respect for the ‘good people’ even after fairy faith is often no longer openly admitted.  No buildings are constructed through ‘fairy paths’ to the west of the house and offerings of food and water are left to appease supernatural beings (Arensberg 1959).  Pursuance of these conservative traditions in the face of supposed superstition communicates a deep-rooted sense of responsibility and reciprocal relationship with the landscape.  These contexts of creation, communication and consumption come about via negotiating tensions between popular and official religion through embodied experience of material culture and interaction with the landscape that facilitates the simultaneous existence of potentially conflicting beliefs (Glassie 1999). 

This spiritual agency is furthered by the placement of a kitchen shrine in the room most often employed in the Irish vernacular home, as ‘objects intuitively gathered together were a powerful means of meeting with the sacred unknown’ and creation of kitchen shrines allows for daily family devotion outside of the church (Turner 1999, 7).  These shrines were sites of everyday interaction, including the performance of the rosary, and both their construction and complexity evolved over time.  Early shrines generally included a few simple devotional objects, like a plaster statue in a cross-crested shelter or a Sacred Heart image and a Blessed Lamp.  The complexity of the shrine shelter originally depended on financial limitations with the most intricate casings being made of oak, however, the introduction of plywood made decorative shelves available to more families.  The red votive lamp went from a candle to a lamp with the availability of electricity, but although accessibility initially increased, obtainability of red bulbs decreased as use of kitchen shrines diminished.  Traditionalists assimilated by purchasing similar bulbs from China (Kinmonth 2020).  These diversities of form have developed via changes in materials and technologies, which have in turn shaped everyday interactions with individual and communal folk-religious devotions.

Foundation sacrifices of horse-skulls are sometimes found under hearth-stones or the floors of Irish vernacular houses and barns.  Most justifications for this practice are attributed to amplification of dance steps, music or rhythmic threshing, however, Ó Súilleabháin posits that this echo function is a ‘secondary one,’ which came about after collective memory of the skull’s purpose faded (1945).  This assimilated and innovative meaning, which aligns with inclinations for céilithe and rhythmic communal manual labour, encouraged a continuation of the practice with musicality in mind, but some intergenerational recollections ascribe the sacrifices to preserving the luck of the house and ensuring an abundant harvest (Ó Súilleabháin 1945; Buchanan 1956; Harris 1957).  One skull was found under a parlour, bringing it into relationship with the symbolism of the west room and the overall cosmology of the home.  The creation of these three elements of Irish vernacular houses communicates a general apprehension and respect for the unknown, which is approached by giving figurative agency to the inhabitants as they navigate an unpredictable landscape.

Bibliography

Arensberg, Conrad M. 1959. The Irish Countryman: An Anthropological Study. Gloucester, Mass: Peter Smith.

Ballard, Linda M. 1991. “Is It Traditional.” Irish Arts Review Yearbook, no. Journal Article, 223–28.

Buchanan, Ronald H. 1956. “A Buried Horse-Skull.” Ulster Folklife 2:60–62.

Glassie, Henry. 1999. Material Culture. Bloomington, Ind: Indiana University Press.

Harris, K.M. 1957. “Buried Horse-Skulls: A Further Note.” Ulster Folklife 3 (1): 70–71.

Kinmonth, Claudia. 1993. Irish Country Furniture 1700-1950. London; New Haven, CT; Yale University Press.

O’Reilly, Barry. 2011. “Hearth and Home: The Vernacular House in Ireland from c. 1800.” Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. Section C: Archaeology, Celtic Studies, History, Linguistics, Literature 111C:193–215.

Ó Súilleabháin, Seán. 1945. “Foundation Sacrifices.” Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 75 (1): 45–52.

Turner, Kay. 1999. Beautiful Necessity: The Art and Meaning of Women’s Altars. New York: Thames & Hudson.