{"id":6173,"date":"2015-07-10T09:00:03","date_gmt":"2015-07-10T13:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/?p=6173"},"modified":"2015-07-15T11:45:07","modified_gmt":"2015-07-15T15:45:07","slug":"the-bon-ton-skellig-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/2015\/07\/10\/the-bon-ton-skellig-list\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bon Ton Skillig List"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here is a recently cataloged “Skellig list” broadside from the city of Cork, Ireland. A Skellig (or Skillig) list is a poem pairing up local bachelors and unmarried women, giving the subjects false names; but they were easily identifiable to local residents, given their age and physical descriptions (flattering or insulting), how long they have been unmarried, street of residence, and other personal details. The couples are supposed to take themselves to the island Skellig Michael off the Kerry coast and be married; Lent came ten days later on the Skelligs and gave the couples more time, as marriages were supposed to take place before Lent. Skellig lists were composed and circulated or posted for public viewing on Shrove Tuesday in Cork, Kerry and elsewhere. The humor in the (anonymous) Skellig lists “consists of associating the most probable and improbable persons.1<\/sup>”\u00a0“Skillig” is a variant spelling of “Skellig” in this form of poem.<\/p>\n

\"Skillig\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Some favorite descriptions:<\/p>\n

\u201cHanna Bolster and Tom are the next that will dash on,
\nThose ladies that think they\u2019re the pink of the fashion,
\nThey say they\u2019d ne\u2019er stoop to move with the trash,
\nWho throng the Parade, Patrick-street and the Marsh
\nBut as proud and as stale as they are to be seen,
\nTo Skillig they\u2019ll drive in their corn machine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMiss E. Doyle is the next that appears,
\nShe\u2019ll take Parker the Chandler tho\u2019 stricken in years,
\nPrue Thornhill comes on with a pawn office ticket,
\nShe vows that with Nat Swan she will certainly trip it,
\nAnd certainly they are a great pair of friskers,
\nPrue is constantly praising her Nat for his whiskers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPoet Meagher he finds himself left on the shelf,
\nAs he has no one to go with he\u2019ll go by himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Possibly P. J. Meagher, County Cork poet and author of Zedechias, a Hebrew tale.)<\/em><\/p>\n

The poet closes with a gentle reminder:<\/p>\n

\u201cNow that my task is o\u2019er as I intended
\nI hope no lad or lass has been offended,
\nI\u2019m sure to them no harm I could have done,
\nBut if I have, I humbly beg their pardon,
\nI have said some funny things perhaps on many,
\nBut I have nothing said too severe on any,
\nAnd as I have got no more to say
\nI bid farewell \u2018till next Skillig day.
\nOld maidens, bachelors, beaus and nymphs divine,
\nAs I found out all your names I pray you find out mine.\u201d<\/p>\n

With thanks to Inez Fletcher , Librarian, of the National Library of Ireland, and Cr\u00edost\u00f3ir Mac Carthaigh, Archivist, of the National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin.<\/p>\n

See also: http:\/\/www.irishcultureandcustoms.com\/ACalend\/SinglebyAshWed.html<\/a> \u00a0A wonderful post by Bridget Haggerty on the Irish Culture and Customs website.<\/p>\n

1. James Coleman, Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, Series 2, Vol. 1., 77-78.<\/p>\n

The Bon Ton skillig list: <\/em>EB8.A100.830b, HOLLIS number 14408708<\/p>\n

Thanks to Cataloging Assistant\u00a0Dana Gee for contributing this post.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here is a recently cataloged “Skellig list” broadside from the city of Cork, Ireland. A Skellig (or Skillig) list is a poem pairing up local bachelors and unmarried women, giving the subjects false names; but they were easily identifiable to local residents, given their age and physical descriptions (flattering or insulting), how long they have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1761,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[64929],"tags":[116678,588,131809,131808],"class_list":["post-6173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-houghton-library","tag-broadsides","tag-humor","tag-ireland","tag-irish"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5TUly-1Bz","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1761"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6173"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6196,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6173\/revisions\/6196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/houghtonmodern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}