A rigorous new study of Blarney Castle has caused controversy this week, writes Barry Roche, Southern Correspondent
It may well be, literally, the stuff of legend lost in the mists of time but, as this week's kerfuffle about the real Blarney Stone has shown, it is also very much part of the modern tourist consciousness, which can make headlines not just in Ireland but across the globe from America to Australia.
Indeed, according to Fáilte Ireland's figures for 2005, Blarney Castle was the fifth most popular fee-paying tourist attraction in the state and, even when free visitor attractions are added to the list, it still makes the top 10, with 385,000 visitors - ahead of both Bunratty Castle and the Rock of Cashel.
Of course, the origins of this week's inadvertent bit of an auld barney about Blarney lie in the publication of arguably the most rigorous study of the castle yet, by English authors Mark Samuel and Kate Hamlyn, who offer a detailed account of the development of the historic MacCarthy stronghold. Published by Cork University Press and launched this week, Blarney Castle: Its History, Development and Purposelooks at the castle and the forces that shaped it over almost 600 years - to the point where, today, it is one of the most visited and established tourist attractions on the island.
Of course, as befits experts in archaeology and architecture, the authors point out that Blarney Castle technically isn't a castle at all but rather a tower house - a form of building much favoured by the Irish clans in the late Middle Ages, particularly in lands they had recaptured from the Anglo-Normans.
Drawing heavily on the works of historians such as Kenneth Nicholls and Dr Katherine Simms on medieval Ireland, Samuel and Hamlyn assiduously describe the Gaelic clan system from which the castle developed to become the premier stronghold of the Mac Carthys of Muskerry.
The Mac Carthys of Muskerry were the wealthiest of three septs of the Mac Carthy clan and, from 1200 to 1600, various chieftains sought to expand and consolidate their power and lands in the midst of cataclysmic change as the English made various attempts to colonise Ireland.
Samuel and Hamlyn describe the various inter-sept rivalries, the inter-clan hostilities, the conflict with Anglo Norman families such as the de Cogans and later the Fitzgeralds of Desmond, as various Mac Carthy chieftains also tried to stay on the right side of the English crown.
Various attempts by pretenders to that crown, such as Lambert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck, as well as the English War of the Roses, the later conversion of Henry VIII to Protestantism, along with the rising of the Ulster chieftains, O'Neill and O'Donnell, ensured Blarney experienced turbulent times.
Samuel and Hamlyn agree with Nicholls's suggestion that the stone structure existing today was built sometime in the 1480s, though they aren't entirely convinced all the work was done by the eighth Lord Muskerry, Cormac Laidir Mac Carthy, as is generally reputed to be the case.
One of several Mac Carthy strongholds in Muskerry - where the clan also built tower houses at Kilcrea, Carraignamuck, Carrignadrohid, Mashanaglass, Macroom and Carrigaphooka - Blarney emerged as the premier clan fortress because of its proximity to Cork city, five miles away.
Indeed, Blarney's position on the very edge of English rule in Ireland in the middle ages and later in the 16th and 17th century made it necessary for the Mac Carthy chieftains to be "bilingual" in both speech and legal matters as they sought to perform a balancing act between the law of two lands.
It was one such balancing act that is credited with giving rise to the term "blarney" to describe coaxing flattery, when the 16th Lord Muskerry, Cormac Mac Dermot Mór Mac Carthy, refused to hand over Blarney to the English so they could use it as a garrison against the rebellious Ulster chieftains.
Mac Carthy had sworn his loyalty to the crown during the rebellion but he repeatedly refused to hand over the castle to the new president of Munster, Sir George Carew, coming up with a variety of excuses on each occasion - leading to the criticism he was talking "blarney". It is at this point that the term "blarney", meaning persuasive talk, is thought to have come into the English language, as Queen Elizabeth I is supposed to have said, on receiving another self-justifying communiqué from Cormac Mac Dermot Mor: "Blarney, Blarney, I will hear no more of this Blarney."
Within 50 years, Blarney Castle was captured by the English when the Mac Carthys chose to side with the Royalists in the English Civil War and ultimately lost their lands in Blarney, going into exile in the late 1600s following the defeat of James II by William of Orange at the Battle of the Boyne.
THE BLARNEY ESTATE, comprising some 1,400 acres, was sold to the Hollow Blade Sword Company of London in April 1702 but, less than six months later, was sold on to the Chief Justice of Ireland, Sir Richard Payne, who within two years sold it to the Governor of Cork, Sir James Jeffereys.
His son, James St John Jeffereys, inherited the estate in 1740 and set about developing industry in the village, building an inn, a new church, 90 houses and some flax mills - a development noted with approval by the English agronomist Arthur Young in his Tour of Ireland.
It was James St John Jeffereys who also laid out ornamental gardens influenced by the Italian designer, Garzoni, as well planting trees around the boulders to create the Rock Garden, thus laying the foundations of the picturesque romantic landscape that began to attract visitors in the 18th century.
"It is not clear when any of the rock groupings there predate Jeffereys's work, but a number of names, such as Witches' Kitchen, Wishing Steps were attached to these groups, suggesting greater antiquity and a connection with the druids," observe Samuel and Hamlyn.
Crofton Croker noted in 1824 that "a stone in the highest part of the castle wall is pointed out to visitors which is supposed to give whoever kisses it the peculiar privilege of deviating from veracity with unblushing countenance whenever it might be convenient - hence the well-known phrase of blarney."
Various legends account for the stone. One claims it was once part of Jacob's Pillow and was brought from the Holy Land by crusaders, while another claims it was part of the Stone of Scone in Scotland and given to the Mac Carthys by Robert the Bruce in thanks for giving him troops to fight Edward II. A third story records that Cormac Láidir Mac Carthy, the reputed builder of the castle, rescued an old woman from a river. The old woman turned out to be a witch and, in gratitude, she told him of a magic stone that already formed part of his castle.
Robert Gibbings in Lovely is the Lee recounts how the Queen of the Fairies tells Cormac Láidir to kiss the first stone he sees upon waking by the riverside as it will confer the gift of eloquence and enable him to win an important litigation. He then takes the stone and hides it in the castle so no one can match him in eloquence.
But Samuel and Hamlyn warn visitors to Blarney to realise that the stone that they now kiss, just below the southern battlements, was not always "the Blarney Stone", with historians in the early 19th century describing it as a stone set high in the north-eastern tower of the castle. This is disputed by the present owner of the castle, Sir Charles Colthurst, who promptly issued a statement to rebut Samuel and Hamlyn, assuring the millions that have kissed the stone that where they've kissed "is the exact location and has been since as far back as all historical records show".
WHATEVER THE ORIGIN of the legend and whether people came to kiss the stone or see the grounds, early tourism to the castle was an elite activity, with a visit by novelist Sir Walter Scott and his friend and fellow novelist, Maria Edgeworth, in 1823 giving Blarney Castle cachet as a tourist destination.
The Romantic movement, with its love of dramatic scenery, helped develop tourism among the educated classes in Britain and Ireland but, with much of continental Europe out of bounds because of the Napoleonic wars, many were forced to content themselves with more local sights.
Blarney's development as a tourist attraction was due to a number of factors - the most significant of which was its proximity to Cork city, where an urban population, with sufficient disposable income to take the occasional outing, began visiting the village.
The growth of mass tourism in Blarney can be attributed to the development of the railways - firstly through the opening of Blarney Station on the main Cork-Dublin line in 1849 and later the establishment of the Cork and Muskerry Light Railway. An arrangement was reached between the rail company and the owner of the castle, Sir George Colthurst (whose family had acquired the estate in 1846), which saw train passengers admitted at half price.
While the Muskerry Light Railway fell victim to competition from the more flexible motor bus and closed in 1934, Blarney Castle's popularity as a tourist attraction has continued to grow to the point where it is now the principal visitor attraction in the south-west.
A 2004 report commissioned by Cork City Council on the economic contribution of tourism to Cork City and its hinterland found that Blarney Castle continues to be a major attraction, accounting for almost one-third of the 1.1 million visitors to heritage sites in the area.