The Harp in Ireland

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIV, Issue 3, 18 January 1906, Page 27

The Harp in Ireland

The harp (says a writer in the Boston ' Pilot ') is as old as the world almost, and figures in the relics of nations that were young with the world, and are now no more. It l.s more closely connected with Ireland's song and story, ancient and modern, than with that of any other of the great national families. 1 The Aryan settlers of Ireland brought their harps with them from Western Asia and Eastern Europe, upon which the praises of the .Creator weie played, an* through all the stories of war and wassail, in great national gatherings and individual chieftain's festivities and at funerals the harper has been an important personage and the playing of the harp a regular and well paid profession. ' L'ambrensis tolls of abbots and bishops who in the fifth century travelled about with their harps utilising thoir music to help to win souls to God— to melt sinners' hearts. ' In 5i60 A.D. there -was a great three-days' national parliament or feis at Taia at which over a thousand bards were present with their harps. In the fifth and sixth centuries Irish missionaries introduced the harp into England, and even so late as the eleventh century the practice continued among the Welsh bards of receiving instruction in the bardic profession from Ireland. At the Eisteddfod in Caerwys, in ll'OO, Welsh music was codified under the direction of the Irish bard Malachy, and 24 musical canons were adopted. ' And so it went on. Not only was the harp a necessity in every Irish home, but Irish harpers were down to the very days of the English invasion, a recognised institution in England, Scotland, and Whales. The musician was generally the poet and historian, though the bard and the poet were two distinct persons the poet writing for the bard's singing. The great ' deeds of Irish kings and chieftains were thus sung at home and abroad and events of local as well as national importance kept before the people. After the English invasion the bards' missions became even more important— they kept up the spirit of rebellion to the usurper and encouraged the people to hope and to fight until the jealousy and anger of the invader were aroused and death to harp and harper became a fixed English policy. 'In the statute of Kilkenny in 1367 it was made penal to receive oi entertain Irish harpers or minstrels within the English pale in Ireland. Henry VII commissioned his marshals to imprison the harpers 'in Ireland and appropriate their goods and chattels, including their harps. '

A notable exception to the English hatred to the Irish harp was that Charles I. was partial to it and encouraged the Irish harpers. Under James I the harp, as the national emblem of Ireland, was first quartered on the English royal arms. 'Under Charles I. the harp was still commonly in the hands of the Irish people, every house having one or two. Then came Cromwell and a fierce crusade was begun against Irish music. His rage could not stand the sight of an Irish harp, and by his orders they were not only confiscated, but broken into pieces wherever found in Ireland. Archdeacon Lynch in ire land at that time, in the secrecy of his hiding place wrote a history of the Irish harp, giving the minutest details of its construction and appearance in its various forms, so that posterity might know that there had been such an instrument in Ireland in common use*