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A great capacity for forgetting — 3 Comments

  1. Ian Poulton’s story about the radio programme reminds me of Ted Nealon,former TD and Minister as well as a noted former broadcaster and the founder of Nealon’s guide to Dáil & Séanad elections…he was talking about his grandfather’s description of the French Fleet in Killala..at first I kind of dismissed it but then worked out the ages and realised that indeed ’twas more than possible..and indeed likely..the descriptions were all too real; another time in Kerry I met a very old lady of the family who had owned Ardfert Abbey and she talked about her grandmother meeting King James after the Boyne in Cork..she was 97 at the time and this must have been in the ’70s…and her family had extraordinary longevity..and as it turned out her story was verified in the memoirs of the Duchess of Tyrconnell who met the King in Cork ..when he remarked the Irish raced away and she said “well your Majesty if they did race away ’tis clear Sir that you won the race!”…(she was after all the sister of Sarah Jennings,Duchess of Marlborough..)…so memories can be perfectly accurate..

  2. One of the beauties of an aboriginal nation is that their history is entirely verbal. Told from generation to generation. Just tonight on the news there was comment about Australian aborigines being astronomers by virtue of a dreaming story that told how they found emu eggs by starlight. Thousands of years and these stories persist. Although I’ll probably google the article and see if it’s true.

  3. The lady whose grandmother remembered the famine told me another story that had been passed down to her of William crossing the Boyne the night before the battle, but I have never been able to verify it.

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