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In Search of the Irish Dreamtime: Archaeology and Early Irish Literature
Ireland's oldest traditions excavated via archaeological, genetic, and linguistic research, culminating in atruly groundbreaking publication Following his account of Irish origins drawing on archaeology, genetics, and linguistics, J. P. Mallory returns to the subject to investigate what he calls the Irish the native Irish retelling of their own origins, as related by medieval manuscripts. He explores the historical backbone of this version of the earliest history of Ireland, which places apparently mythological events on a concrete timeline of invasions, colonization, and royal reigns that extends even further back in time than the history of classical Greece. The juxtaposition of traditional Dreamtime tales and scientific facts expands on what we already know about the way of life in Iron Age Ireland.
By comparing the world depicted in the earliest Irish literary tradition with the archaeological evidence available on the ground, Mallory explores Ireland’s rich mythological tradition and tests its claims to represent reality. 12 color photographs
By comparing the world depicted in the earliest Irish literary tradition with the archaeological evidence available on the ground, Mallory explores Ireland’s rich mythological tradition and tests its claims to represent reality. 12 color photographs
320 pages, Hardcover
First published May 16, 2016
About the author
J.P. Mallory
21 books45 followersJames Patrick Mallory is an Irish-American archaeologist and Indo-Europeanist. Mallory is a professor at the Queen's University, Belfast.
Born in 1945, Mallory received his A.B. in History from Occidental College in California in 1967, then served three years in the US Army as a military police sergeant. He received his Ph.D. in Indo-European studies from UCLA in 1975. He has held several posts at Queen's beginning in 1977, becoming Professor of Prehistoric Archaeology in 1998.
Professor Mallory's research has focused on Early Neolithic and Bronze Age Europe, the problem of the homeland of the Proto-Indo-Europeans, and the archaeology of early Ireland. He favors an integrative approach to these issues, comparing literary, linguistic and archaeological evidence to solve historical puzzles.
One consequence of this preference for an integrated approach is that Professor Mallory has been strongly critical of the widely publicised theory of Indo-European origins held by Colin Renfrew which locates the urheimat or homeland of this language family in early Neolithic Anatolia and associates its spread with the spread of agriculture. A key element of his criticism has been a vigorous defence of lingustic palaeontology as a valid tool for solving the Indo-European homeland problem, arguing that Renfrew is sceptical about it precisely because it offers some of the strongest evidence against the latter's own model. Professor Mallory recently published a new book with D.Q. Adams, entitled The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World and published by Oxford University Press, where doubtless the debate with Renfrew will resume in earnest.
He is the editor of the Journal of Indo-European Studies, published by the Institute for the Study of Man of which Roger Pearson is the founding editor.
Born in 1945, Mallory received his A.B. in History from Occidental College in California in 1967, then served three years in the US Army as a military police sergeant. He received his Ph.D. in Indo-European studies from UCLA in 1975. He has held several posts at Queen's beginning in 1977, becoming Professor of Prehistoric Archaeology in 1998.
Professor Mallory's research has focused on Early Neolithic and Bronze Age Europe, the problem of the homeland of the Proto-Indo-Europeans, and the archaeology of early Ireland. He favors an integrative approach to these issues, comparing literary, linguistic and archaeological evidence to solve historical puzzles.
One consequence of this preference for an integrated approach is that Professor Mallory has been strongly critical of the widely publicised theory of Indo-European origins held by Colin Renfrew which locates the urheimat or homeland of this language family in early Neolithic Anatolia and associates its spread with the spread of agriculture. A key element of his criticism has been a vigorous defence of lingustic palaeontology as a valid tool for solving the Indo-European homeland problem, arguing that Renfrew is sceptical about it precisely because it offers some of the strongest evidence against the latter's own model. Professor Mallory recently published a new book with D.Q. Adams, entitled The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World and published by Oxford University Press, where doubtless the debate with Renfrew will resume in earnest.
He is the editor of the Journal of Indo-European Studies, published by the Institute for the Study of Man of which Roger Pearson is the founding editor.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
July 21, 2024
Mallory is a bit of a celebrity in my bubble – one of the most notable archaeologists at our university, a former student of the renowned Marija Gimbutas, and, to top it all, famed for having Harrison Ford sitting at his early career lectures when preparing for the role of Indiana Jones. So it’s a bit shameful, I confess, that I haven’t read any of his works before now – but now this error has been rectified.
For all the above reasons, I had very high expectations from this book, some of which were met, others not so much.
Mallory’s argument is solid – he has demonstrated more than sufficiently that the tales that we have preserved thanks to a number of medieval manuscripts written in Middle Irish reflect mostly the realities of life in the period contemporary with the writers rather than the Iron Age, and enriched with whatever they felt would sound appropriately fancy.
The book starts with the introduction to the history of thought on the beginnings of the Irish culture and the antiquity of its sources – for those discussions have been going on for centuries and were often rooted in the political conflict, those preaching the British supremacy being generally inclined to undermine Irish culture, and Irish nationalists prone to overstate its ancient roots (though obviously it wasn’t always so black and white).
Then Mallory proceeds to discuss the contents of the tales in detail and to compare them with the archaeological record. The discussion and evidence are neatly arranged in short subchapters on various archaeologically traceable aspects like natural environment, architecture, tools, weapons and armour, ornaments, burial, etc.
The matter is well organised, the argument well built, and the writing itself flows very nicely. Mallory has a gift for witty humour, and I was laughing out loud when reading about anus-seeking javelins or the lack of brain being no impediment to a true Ulsterman!
So why only four stars?
With such high expectations to start with, I was a bit baffled when coming across wee bits that didn’t sound right. Once or twice wouldn’t be too bad – there’s no way one can avoid mistakes, it’s just not possible. But as I was reading and coming across more of those, and I started checking the referenced material, I realised that the number of those wee bits is not insubstantial. It wouldn’t be so disappointing if the mistakes were limited to the matters outside of the Author’s scope of specialisation – like when he says that cumal was a unit of price equal to a female slave or a cow (cumal *means* a female slave as well as a unit of price worth 3 milch cows according to most sources). But there were some passages specifically about archaeological findings – sometimes with archaeological studies referenced alongside – which seemed to skew the facts a bit. For example, he says that there were no souterrains found which dated to the Iron Age Ireland, but Mark Clinton in The Souterrains of Ireland discussed a number of probable Iron Age examples. Another example: he says that cremations were predominant up to c. 400 AD and the only exception was at Tara c. 100 BC to 200 AD, but the article he references does mention 3rd and 4th-century inhumations (later publications tend to treat the 4th century as the time of cultural shift for the burial rites).
Nevertheless, I still think that Mallory’s main argument stands strong and it would be an extremely hard job to undermine it. And, all in all, it’s just a great read – very much recommended!
For all the above reasons, I had very high expectations from this book, some of which were met, others not so much.
Mallory’s argument is solid – he has demonstrated more than sufficiently that the tales that we have preserved thanks to a number of medieval manuscripts written in Middle Irish reflect mostly the realities of life in the period contemporary with the writers rather than the Iron Age, and enriched with whatever they felt would sound appropriately fancy.
The book starts with the introduction to the history of thought on the beginnings of the Irish culture and the antiquity of its sources – for those discussions have been going on for centuries and were often rooted in the political conflict, those preaching the British supremacy being generally inclined to undermine Irish culture, and Irish nationalists prone to overstate its ancient roots (though obviously it wasn’t always so black and white).
Then Mallory proceeds to discuss the contents of the tales in detail and to compare them with the archaeological record. The discussion and evidence are neatly arranged in short subchapters on various archaeologically traceable aspects like natural environment, architecture, tools, weapons and armour, ornaments, burial, etc.
The matter is well organised, the argument well built, and the writing itself flows very nicely. Mallory has a gift for witty humour, and I was laughing out loud when reading about anus-seeking javelins or the lack of brain being no impediment to a true Ulsterman!
So why only four stars?
With such high expectations to start with, I was a bit baffled when coming across wee bits that didn’t sound right. Once or twice wouldn’t be too bad – there’s no way one can avoid mistakes, it’s just not possible. But as I was reading and coming across more of those, and I started checking the referenced material, I realised that the number of those wee bits is not insubstantial. It wouldn’t be so disappointing if the mistakes were limited to the matters outside of the Author’s scope of specialisation – like when he says that cumal was a unit of price equal to a female slave or a cow (cumal *means* a female slave as well as a unit of price worth 3 milch cows according to most sources). But there were some passages specifically about archaeological findings – sometimes with archaeological studies referenced alongside – which seemed to skew the facts a bit. For example, he says that there were no souterrains found which dated to the Iron Age Ireland, but Mark Clinton in The Souterrains of Ireland discussed a number of probable Iron Age examples. Another example: he says that cremations were predominant up to c. 400 AD and the only exception was at Tara c. 100 BC to 200 AD, but the article he references does mention 3rd and 4th-century inhumations (later publications tend to treat the 4th century as the time of cultural shift for the burial rites).
Nevertheless, I still think that Mallory’s main argument stands strong and it would be an extremely hard job to undermine it. And, all in all, it’s just a great read – very much recommended!
March 12, 2017
The argument is very thorough and well constructed. While I think many readers would have shared my hope that Mallory would find that the Irish tales do reflect real memories of the Iron Age and earlier, it's better to learn the facts based on detailed study and comparison with the archaeological record. Mallory also does a great job breaking up some of the drier parts with funny asides and analogies.
January 15, 2017
I was a little disappointed with the book. It pretty much says that all the ancient stories set around 100 BC to 100 AD do not reflect reality at that time in any way. Instead they reflect the time the stories were written down, about 1000 years later, mixed up with details stolen from the Bible and items stolen from a Medieval Spanish Encyclopedia.
The author also makes it a point that the monks could not have stolen any ideas from sources written in Greek, only Latin, which I found confusing since there were Irish monks who were famous for still knowing Greek when Charlemagne was king and communication with the Byzantine Empire was cut off by the Islamic invasions and Arab pirates taking over the Mediterranean.
Accepting these conclusions, the book was well organized and clearly written. The information seems accurate and well supported. I cannot spite the author for telling me that unicorns and mermaids aren't real.
The author also makes it a point that the monks could not have stolen any ideas from sources written in Greek, only Latin, which I found confusing since there were Irish monks who were famous for still knowing Greek when Charlemagne was king and communication with the Byzantine Empire was cut off by the Islamic invasions and Arab pirates taking over the Mediterranean.
Accepting these conclusions, the book was well organized and clearly written. The information seems accurate and well supported. I cannot spite the author for telling me that unicorns and mermaids aren't real.
May 30, 2016
Who would've thought I would roll from my chair reading this book. Mallory has such a witty writing style, I love it. Besides that it was an interesting read, with, to me, not too shocking results. I was wondering though why he did not take into account the fact that in the Middle Ages many stories (incl. Bible) we put in a contemporary setting as regards clothes etc ... just look at pictures where you might find eg a blonde Maria, or Roman soldiers fitted out with mediëval weaponry. I am not surprised then that the same happened to the stories of the Mythological and Ulster cycle.
May 9, 2019
4/5
Excavating the Dreamtime of the Ancients: The medieval Irish world-builders may well be the greatest imaginative creators and storytellers in history. In their anonymity and across centuries they compiled a lore, a Secondary World (which they believed to be based on real events descended from Bronze-Iron Age oral traditions) that has scholars to this day completely at odds - baffled as to what is an imagined world, and what is Ireland's prehistoric past. Endless tales that depict inspired events, ancient recollections and current (as in from the Medieval Irish cultural lense) projections back into the past of these collective stories - thereby generating a huge imaginary world based upon the residual traces and echoes of the real worlds of antiquity long forgotten and vanished entirely if not for what the Gaelic Cycles have preserved.
Regardless of the truth the contributors to these scores of hundreds and thousands of tales created and/or built upon (from millennia past) an immense and culturally interlinked written tradition the likes of which is not seen anywhere else. This book itself is fascinating scholarship. It is quite like 'Why Homer Matters' in examining the etymology of ancient, heroic epics. Particularly the Táin, and the Ulster Cycle is investigated. Cross-examined between the literary archaeology (never heard of this field before, sounds very attractive) and the physical archaeology of which there is a distressing lack with regards the Iron Age (plenty remains of the Neolithic and Bronze Age though!) where the Ulster Cycle is meant to be based.
The etymology of words is used to establish chronological markers, like whether they are descended from ancient Celtic language or if some parts/phrases are loanwords from later on. The material culture, the built environment, all the components of these tales are discussed and compared with the physical evidence in an effort to asses the validity and the truth of what is been conveyed. Of which there is much left to be discovered.
I felt I enjoyed this book so much but it indicates inescapably so, all that is left to be done. All that is not yet understood, and what might not ever been absent innovative and creative methods. A grand inspiring read for would-be creators too! Especially when all conclusions are gathered and cross-compared.
Excavating the Dreamtime of the Ancients: The medieval Irish world-builders may well be the greatest imaginative creators and storytellers in history. In their anonymity and across centuries they compiled a lore, a Secondary World (which they believed to be based on real events descended from Bronze-Iron Age oral traditions) that has scholars to this day completely at odds - baffled as to what is an imagined world, and what is Ireland's prehistoric past. Endless tales that depict inspired events, ancient recollections and current (as in from the Medieval Irish cultural lense) projections back into the past of these collective stories - thereby generating a huge imaginary world based upon the residual traces and echoes of the real worlds of antiquity long forgotten and vanished entirely if not for what the Gaelic Cycles have preserved.
Regardless of the truth the contributors to these scores of hundreds and thousands of tales created and/or built upon (from millennia past) an immense and culturally interlinked written tradition the likes of which is not seen anywhere else. This book itself is fascinating scholarship. It is quite like 'Why Homer Matters' in examining the etymology of ancient, heroic epics. Particularly the Táin, and the Ulster Cycle is investigated. Cross-examined between the literary archaeology (never heard of this field before, sounds very attractive) and the physical archaeology of which there is a distressing lack with regards the Iron Age (plenty remains of the Neolithic and Bronze Age though!) where the Ulster Cycle is meant to be based.
The etymology of words is used to establish chronological markers, like whether they are descended from ancient Celtic language or if some parts/phrases are loanwords from later on. The material culture, the built environment, all the components of these tales are discussed and compared with the physical evidence in an effort to asses the validity and the truth of what is been conveyed. Of which there is much left to be discovered.
I felt I enjoyed this book so much but it indicates inescapably so, all that is left to be done. All that is not yet understood, and what might not ever been absent innovative and creative methods. A grand inspiring read for would-be creators too! Especially when all conclusions are gathered and cross-compared.
September 20, 2025
I paused this book until I felt like reading it. It goes into great detail regarding the interaction between linguistics and anthropology. Some in Irish, some in Latin - most in English. Difficult to read at times. Believe it has tons of information but reads kind of like a textbook. The 4 stars is because of the immense amount of research that was done.
July 19, 2023
Excellent!
This book is well written and very enlightening. The logic is sound. Well worth reading, but you must have a grounding in Irish literature so as to comprehend what the author posits.
This book is well written and very enlightening. The logic is sound. Well worth reading, but you must have a grounding in Irish literature so as to comprehend what the author posits.
November 9, 2023
A very interesting study of the world depicted in the Ulster cycle of Irish tales, comparing it with archaeological evidence and considering whether each iota might have been original to the Irish or borrowed from elsewhere, and what time frame it may have arisen in.
December 1, 2024
Mallory has done very important work for a Medievalist Irish studies long pondering the notion of the “window to the Iron Age.”
This book was, however, a bit of a slog, and an editor should have cut out every instance of the word “obviously.” Otherwise, interesting content.
This book was, however, a bit of a slog, and an editor should have cut out every instance of the word “obviously.” Otherwise, interesting content.
February 17, 2026
Well organised, easy to follow and clearly accessible to the non-specialist with an absolute wealth of footnotes/ references providing an entry point to the literature.
January 11, 2017
Please see my review at Celtic Scholar's Reviews and Opinions
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December 21, 2016Surprisingly readable and in places even funny, for an academic book, although some of the more detailed archaeological info was hardgoing for me as I haven't got any preexisting knowledge in that area beyond what I've picked up along the way. I can imagine it would make a pretty useful resource for someone trying to write a historical novel inspired by medieval Irish Lit -- it explores the potential realities behind the literary tropes in a fair amount of detail, insofar as that's possible.
Unfortunately, I can't remember why my dissertation supervisor told me to read this, and since I only found about one sentence in the whole thing that was directly relevant, I'm wondering if he did so at an earlier stage before we narrowed down my topic. That said, the general approach to dating and understanding texts is probably helpful, it's just not as immediately useful.
Unfortunately, I can't remember why my dissertation supervisor told me to read this, and since I only found about one sentence in the whole thing that was directly relevant, I'm wondering if he did so at an earlier stage before we narrowed down my topic. That said, the general approach to dating and understanding texts is probably helpful, it's just not as immediately useful.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews