Claudia Kinmonth’s years of research in Ireland have been conducted ‘beyond the pale’. This is a field in which E Estyn Evans (Reference Estyn Evans1957) led the way, as is duly acknowledged here. In contrast to these vernacular traditions, the achievements of the Ascendancy have, for long, been very fully examined by others, most recently by the Knight of Glin and James Peill (Reference Peill2007). Reference should also be made to the late Desmond Guinness who did so much to rescue the architectural heritage of the Anglo Irish. It could be argued that both the urbane and the agricultural ways of life survived in the Emerald Isle well into the twentieth century. Perhaps this was because outside Belfast the Industrial Revolution was of far less consequence than in England, South Wales or the central belt of Scotland. It was this that resulted in a rich peasant tradition in many Celtic regions that was comparable to that of Scandinavia, and may explain how it was that one of the first students of vernacular building in Ireland in the 1930s was the Swedish ethnologist Ake Campbell.

The two cultures in Ireland engendered two lifestyles that were furnished in distinct ways. Naturally, some cultural miscegenation occurred, but the extent to which rural tradesmen crossed this divide was uneven. Some acculturation is most evident in furniture details. For example, a well-informed cornice or glazing bars with refined astragal sections are sometimes present. These features may be the result of the use of imported English moulding planes (Goodman Reference Goodman1993). On the other hand, a settle-bed adorned with fluted pilasters and even the suggestion of a Neo-Classical bat’s wing motif (figs 33 and 167) are presumably aspirational, derived from the details of joinery seen in ‘the big house’.

Influences of another kind could travel in the opposite direction from the tenantry to the gentry. The coop-dressers of the former were to be adopted in the kitchens of the latter for a practical reason. In winter it was found that egg production was greater if hens were kept in a warm room. Evolutions of form could also develop within the regional crafts. A late eighteenth-century drum-like stool turned in a balk of softwood (fig 44) was carved as a skeumorph of a similar item built-up in straw rope (fig 108).

In many ways Kinmonth’s approach is almost anthropological. This is reflected in her fieldwork, which includes interviews with individuals who were old enough to remember an almost pre-mechanised rural economy. The author’s research in the field is evident in the dozens of photographs, many of which she took in 1987 just before much of this material was sold or deprived of its original context within a given room. In examining this furniture in the circumstances of everyday life, against a background of sometimes hectic wallpaper, her eye remains constant. In one recent case a shelf in a dresser had been removed to accommodate an enormous television. Clearly the research for this book began before such ‘modernisation’ took hold.

In addition to examining this material culture in situ, we are offered alternative evidence in poetry and popular songs, which both decorate and inform the text. To this is added the accounts of travellers, from J Derricke’s Image of Ireland (Reference Derricke1581) to Arthur Young’s A Tour in Ireland (Reference Young1780). Into the twentieth century J M Synge’s articles in the Manchester Guardian in 1905, illustrated by Jack Yeats, describe and show how rooms were used and the furniture arranged. These more personal observations contrast with the bureaucratic language of the Poor Law Commission of 1836, which offers further insights. In this respect it is sometimes argued that little in the way of personal belongings survived the Great Famine of the 1840s or the earlier deprivations of 1728–9, 1740–1 and 1821–2. These events certainly depleted the range of possessions, and for these reasons the emphasis is on the century between c 1780 and c 1880, with perishable items made of straw or wicker advancing this account well into the twentieth century.

Pictorial evidence for the appearance of vernacular interiors offers a rich source. This was a theme that Kinmonth very fully developed in her Irish Rural Interiors in Art (Reference Kinmonth2006). Among the dozen artists represented in this, her latest book, we are shown works by George Mulvany (1766–1838), Erskin Nicol (1825–1904) and Howard Helmick (1840–1907). Nearly all the illustrations are in colour. Some early twentieth-century photographs are necessarily in black and white, such as those by R Welch from the archives of the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum. Of especial value are the close-up illustrations of details that give such a powerful sense of structure, texture and colour.

In most cases the geographical location or origin of a dwelling or object is provided, and for those unfamiliar with Ireland the map showing the thirty-two counties is invaluable. Although regional characteristics are referred to, these have yet to be fully defined. For this reason the book is divided into chapters on furniture types preceded with brief introductory accounts on vernacular architecture and timber, concluding with pages on small moveable items. So brief is the section on vernacular building (10pp) that this offers further scope in which Anthony Garvan’s reference to the plantations of Ulster (1951) could be relevant.

Long before the Great Famines, Ireland was devastated by deforestation. This not only served the interests of British timber merchants but also reinforced the scorched-earth policy of military suppression. Consequently, carpenters, joiners and cabinet makers were deprived of their basic raw material. A resulting dependency on imports was augmented by sources gleaned from elsewhere. These included mahogany from the West Indies, which was reserved for the elite, while the majority of provincial woodworkers were confined to the use of imported softwoods or native timbers like elm or other hedgerow materials. In relationship to softwoods, the term ‘deal’ requires greater precision than is shown here. The word is Scandinavian in origin and originally signified a measure or a scantling. Only in the late eighteenth century did it gradually become a synonym for the softwoods. Among the alternative sources of timber employed by these rural tradesmen that which was scavenged from shipwrecks or driftwood was important. This is sometimes confirmed by the origin of some furniture in coastal districts or by the presence of holes bored by the toredo marine worm. A remarkable example of the use of such flotsam is the primitive dug-out chair hewn in best quality mahogany – a curious concatenation of the polite and the vernacular. In addition to the well-known use of oak derived from the bogs of Ireland, yew from this source was also used. Of all the timbers extracted from such morasses fir was ubiquitous. In addition to its use by joiners, this saturated timber could also be pounded with beetles and macerated for conversion into the ropes used to support a mattress in a bed.

Chairs made using the principles of ‘hedge carpentry’ (joinery?) in Ireland, like the stick-backs found in various regions of England, Scotland and Wales are dependent on the simplest of joints: namely the round peg in a round hole that could be inserted at various angles so as to conform to the human body. This resulted in seating that was both cheap and comfortable. It was also a system of construction that involved the use of bent timber and natural ‘knees’, features with which wheelwrights were familiar, men like Thomas Murphy (1839–1937). These ostensibly simple chairs could also be quite complex. In contrast, the time-consuming and therefore expensive mortice and shouldered tenon of the joiner is most appropriate for case furniture. When applied to chairs its rectilinear tendency offers little comfort unless created by a specialist chairmaker who had the ability to depart from the right-angle. In traditional hedgerow chairs it is their elm seats that form the hub into which legs and stick-backs are thrust. If the seat is thick enough, stretchers are unnecessary. So fundamental is this aspect of construction that it is not true to assert that this feature is confined to the Irish tradition.

The dwellings of these agricultural communities ranged from the two-storeyed houses typical of ‘the planters’ in Ulster, to the cabins of the rural population that contained two or three ground floor rooms in which space was at a premium. It follows that in such circumstances furniture was limited in quantity and tended to serve a multiplicity of functions. Of these, the bed outshut and settle-bed were important, but bedding was also disguised as cupboards and even masqueraded as sideboards or chests of drawers. All these are explained in drawings and photographs showing such items both open and closed. Lack of space may also explain the paucity of tables. One answer to this need was the ‘falling table’ which was, in effect, hinged to the wall with a single folding leg to support the top when open. In some examples these tables are attached to a wall-mounted rail so that they could be moved to left or right and, when folded up, could serve as a window shutter.

The wide variety of woods used in vernacular furniture was often given some visual unity by means of paint. This was a widespread practice with regional joiners, but in Ireland it became insistent as a direct consequence of the suppression of Catholicism. This compelled priests to become itinerant. Their ministry resulted in services known as ‘the stations’ taking place in a village dwelling selected for the purpose. In advance of such a visitation the chosen house was tidied and cleaned, while the furniture was given a coat of gloss paint. Over time this could result in as many as two dozen layers of paint, which inevitably submerged such details as mouldings and carved decoration. Subsequently, furniture dealers and ‘even some museums’ stripped these accretions, an almost archaeological exercise that owed little to the sociological importance of this tradition – one that is fully acknowledged in this publication.

One of the underlying problems that many rural dwellings were subject to was rising damp through earth, clay or stone floors. This encouraged furniture makers to construct their work so that the components in contact with the floor could be easily replaced when they rotted. One photograph shows a replaced sledge-foot dovetailed into a dresser base. Wedged stool or chair legs could also be easily substituted. In this respect, where the leg emerged through the seat, it was important that the wedge be inserted on the opposing axis to the grain in the wood of the seat as this limited the possibility of the latter splitting.

In the concluding pages we are shown a wide variety of plenishings such as noggins and piggins and other coopered work. Of the various types of treen wrought in the solid, the mether is perhaps the most typically Celtic. In the regular use of the Irish language the glossary is helpful. Above all it is the drawings and photographs of structural details that are invaluable, as is their interpretation. As a furniture maker herself, Dr Kinmonth has the ability to ‘read’ such details and understand their significance. It is in this that she offers layers of understanding not always evident in books on furniture.