I was, as they say, gasping for a cup of tea at the National Museum in Dublin on Friday. I was following the signs to the café, when I came around the corner and saw the Gundestrup Cauldron. Not what I was expecting to see to say the least – last I’d heard it was in Copenhagen! My mind was spinning . . . I can’t believe the Danes would let it out of the country. What’s it doing in Dublin and why isn’t that big news? Where were the banners on the outside of the museum announcing it? Why didn’t I know about it?
Finally I calmed down enough to look at the label, and sure enough, it’s a replica. When I told Barry about it later he told me it’s been there a long time. I don’t know how I missed it before, but it was a huge treat to see it. It’s an astonishingly compelling vessel. I would love to know how it was replicated. As so often happens with things only seen in pictures, I had no idea of the real scale of the object. I had always imagined it about a foot across and maybe 8 inches high, when in reality it’s over double that in both dimensions.
The cauldron was found in a bog in Denmark in 1891, and is generally estimated to have been made between 200 BCE and 200 CE. It is an invaluable source of information on Celtic mythic iconography. The interactive video display at the museum explained the gods and goddesses represented in terms of their functions – goddess of war, goddess of death, etc. Some scholars believe that the images relate to Queen Medb and the Cattle Raid of Cooley. The big bull in the base of the bowl is the Brown Bull of Cooley. The goddess figure with a man over each shoulder is Medb with her lover Fergus and her husband Ailill. The goddess with the birds above her shoulder is Medb as Morrigan.
Here is the shot I took of Medb with lover and husband. Below that is probably the best known panel which shows Cernunnos, or maybe Cuchulainn.