UCD LIBRARY CULTURAL HERITAGE COLLECTIONS
Welcome to the UCD Library Cultural Heritage Collections blog. Discover and explore the historical treasures housed within our Archives, Special Collections, National Folklore Collection and Digital Library
Have you ever placed something in a book? Perhaps you placed an item there for a specific reason, to mark your page, to temporarily keep an item safe, or perhaps because there was a connection between the item and the book which you were reading. You may have remembered placing the item there or perhaps …
Continue reading "What lies within: a look beyond the pages"
You never really know what you’re going to find on a shelf in the Special Collections store room. Most shelves are laden with antiquated books in shades of autumn: rich brown leather, letters picked out in gold, threads of red and gold, all square edged and standing to attention like soldiers in formation. But there …
Continue reading "Bound Without Restraint: Artists’ Books in UCD Special Collections"
Today is a small note on two items in Special Collections that both explore creativity,its challenges, and its beauty. The first is Jack B. Yeats' Modern Aspects of Irish Art(1922), (1.V.10/6) , and the second is the artist's book of Róisín Stack's performancepiece No Woman is an Island (2024), (W2.J.4/7). Modern Aspects of Irish Art …
Continue reading "Advice, Old and New: On Creation and Attention"
The Murphy Family Papers (UCDA P141) were deposited in UCDA in 1996. They concern several members of the Murphy family: Cornelius ('Conn', b.1869), his wife Annie Byrne, and their children, Annie Mary Constance ('Connie'), Kathleen, Feargus and Conn. Conn married Annie Byrne in 1895, and they settled in Rathgar. He was staunchly anti-Treaty and was …
As part of the unique relationship between UCD and the Irish Franciscans (UCD-OFM Partnership), UCD Archives curates many elements of the Franciscan manuscript patrimony. This process began with the transfer of the immensely significant collections of non-Franciscan private paper collections in 1997, including the papers of Eamon de Valera, Kathleen O’Connell, Seán MacEoin, George Gavan …
Continue reading "17th Century Irish Franciscan Manuscript Transferred to UCD Archives"
There is nothing quite like an old photograph, personal correspondence, or tangible artifact to get secondary students excited about learning history. It is easy for students to understand the human dimensions and historical significance of past events when they interact with sources of this nature. Unfortunately, primary source material is not always so exciting. Notable …
Continue reading "From Archive to Classroom: Creating a Workbook on the Downing Street Declaration"
A selection of Songs from UCD's Special Collections Reference was made to the poet MacDara Woods and the setting of his poetry to music at a concert in Dun Laoghaire’s Pavillion Theatre last December. This was a name I recognised having mentioned the poet’s name briefly in a previous blog post. The poet read his …
Continue reading "Waxing Lyrical: Songs, Poems & Singing in Special Collections"
As of late, I’ve noticed the same fox walking by where I live each night. As I watched him go by, it brought me back to something, or rather someone, I had come across while creating an index for the Urban Folklore Project, as part of my work in the National Folklore Collection. The Urban …
Continue reading "Adolphus Cooke in the Urban Folklore Project"
(Cur L 30) Ink and crayon drawing at the head of the letter by A. E. 1867-1935 As it is nearing the end of my fifth month here in Special Collections, I have come across the ways in which the collection greatly inspires people in their academic endeavours, however, I believe the collection can also …
UCD Archive's first post of 2026 concerns one of its small collections: a letter from Alice Hillstead Mušek, Hradec Králové, Czechoslovakia, to J. Grierson, 1 Herbert Street, Dublin. Daniel Samek has written an interesting article on Czech-Irish cultural contacts in the first half of the 20th century that began with a visit by British and …
Continue reading "Czech-Irish cultural contacts in the first half of the 20th century"