Identity Statement
| Title | The National Museum of Ireland Collection |
| Archive Reference | IE IFA/10 |
| Web Link to this Entry | https://iar.ie/archive/national-museum-ireland-collection |
| Creation Dates | 1930s-1970s |
| Extent Medium | 217 films; silent + black & white; several on 35mm, the remainder on 16mm |
Context
Creator(s): National Museum of Ireland and the Irish Folklore Commission
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Administrative History ↴
The films were commissioned by the National Museum of Ireland [NMI]’s Folklife Division, in association with the Irish Folklore Commission. The Folklore Commission had been established by the Irish Government in 1935 to study and collect information on the folklore and traditions of Ireland. The film collection was intended to be a record of rural crafts, practices and traditions in decline. The key filmmakers were producer John C. O’Sullivan, a former NMI Curator, director Dr. A. T. Lucas (1911-1986), who was a former Director at the Museum, and cameraman Brendan Doyle. Doyle also served as the Museum’s resident photographer throughout the sixties, and is known for his black & white photographs of rural Ireland during this period. Some of the films were shot and donated to the NMI by Kevin Danaher, an ethnologist and employee of the Irish Folklore Commission, who later became a folklore lecturer at University College Dublin. -
Archival History ↴
National Museum of Ireland -
Immediate Source Acquisition ↴
Donation
Content & Structure
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Scope & Content: National Museum of Ireland and the Irish Folklore Commission ↴
The films depict a range of traditional trades, crafts and traditions widely practised in rural Ireland from the 1850s to the 1950s. They emphasise the self-sufficiency of rural householders and crafts specialists, through their use of everyday materials to make objects for practical use in their daily lives.
The films include a number of different subjects:
Handcrafting of objects from a wide range of materials including straw, wicker, wood, leather, rope, reeds, clay, textiles and stone.
Trades of travelling tinsmiths, blacksmiths, thatchers, wheelwrights, cobblers and cart-makers.
Pre-industrial agricultural practices, including grain-threshing, turf-cutting, tillage, and straw and seaweed gathering.
Fishing and related crafts, include oyster dredging, river-fishing, lobster pot making, fishing weight & line making, and the building and maintenance of fishing boats, including coracles and curraghs.
The collection also includes films on folk traditions, for example Straw Boys, which shows celebration of Wren Day in Athlone.
Many of the films depict the same activities conducted at different times in different places, for example “Making Wooden Sieves” (Naul, Dublin, 1948 & Tuam, Galway, 1953).
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Appraisal Destruction ↴
Permanent Retention -
Arrangement ↴
The films depict a range of traditional trades, crafts and traditions widely practised in rural Ireland from the 1850s to the 1950s. They emphasise the self-sufficiency of rural householders and crafts specialists, through their use of everyday materials to make objects for practical use in their daily lives.
The films include a number of different subjects:
Handcrafting of objects from a wide range of materials including straw, wicker, wood, leather, rope, reeds, clay, textiles and stone.
Trades of travelling tinsmiths, blacksmiths, thatchers, wheelwrights, cobblers and cart-makers.
Pre-industrial agricultural practices, including grain-threshing, turf-cutting, tillage, and straw and seaweed gathering.
Fishing and related crafts, include oyster dredging, river-fishing, lobster pot making, fishing weight & line making, and the building and maintenance of fishing boats, including coracles and curraghs.
The collection also includes films on folk traditions, for example Straw Boys, which shows celebration of Wren Day in Athlone.
Many of the films depict the same activities conducted at different times in different places, for example “Making Wooden Sieves” (Naul, Dublin, 1948 & Tuam, Galway, 1953).
Conditions of Access & Use
| Access Conditions | By appointment |
| Creation Dates | 1930s-1970s |
| Extent Medium | 217 films; silent + black & white; several on 35mm, the remainder on 16mm |
Allied Materials
| Related Material | The 1998 four-part documentary series Hidden Treasures (Loopline Films) makes extensive use of footage in the collection. The Irish Film Archive holds VHS copies of the series. The 35 beta transfers in the collection were made by Loopline during the making of this series. The Archive’s file on the donor includes two articles written by A. T. Lucas in 1971 about his experiences on the films Wooden Sieves, and Making Mud Turf. The Country Life division of the NMI in Turlough has an exhibit of objects and crafts represented in this film collection. |
Descriptive Control Area
| Archivist Note | Gavin Martin |
| Rules/Conventions | ISAD(G): General International Standard Archival Description. 2nd ed. Ottawa: International Council on Archives, 2000. |
| Date of Descriptions | 40575 |