Dr Niamh Wycherley
Biography
Dr Niamh Wycherley works in the Department of Early Irish as a medieval historian, specialising in the early Irish Church. She previously held IRC and NUI postdoctoral fellowships in UCD and NUI Galway. She won the NUI Publication Prize in History in 2017 for her first monograph, The Cult of Relics in Early Medieval Ireland. She is the Principal Investigator of the 4-year SFI-IRC Pathway project 'Power and Patronage in Medieval Ireland: Clonard from the sixth to twelfth centuries'. She contributes regularly to RTÉ Brainstorm and television programmes such as the RTÉ 1 documentary Finding Brigid (with Siobhán McSweeney).
Research Interests
The cult of saints; medieval Irish history; the early church; language and history
My primary area of research is early medieval Irish history, specialising in the areas associated with the early church, such as the cult of the saint, the cult of relics, and the interactions of the church with society. My research explores the early medieval history of Ireland in a wider European context. The approach is interdisciplinary, drawing on all the available historical sources (annals, law-texts, church canons, sermons, letters, penitentials, martyrologies, genealogies, toponyms), Old-Irish and Hiberno-Latin literature (especially hagiography), and material culture.
My primary area of research is early medieval Irish history, specialising in the areas associated with the early church, such as the cult of the saint, the cult of relics, and the interactions of the church with society. My research explores the early medieval history of Ireland in a wider European context. The approach is interdisciplinary, drawing on all the available historical sources (annals, law-texts, church canons, sermons, letters, penitentials, martyrologies, genealogies, toponyms), Old-Irish and Hiberno-Latin literature (especially hagiography), and material culture.
Book Chapter
Consultancy
| Year | Publication | |
|---|---|---|
| 2022 | Niamh Wycherley (2022) St Brigid of Kildare. CONS [Link] |
Media
Radio Presentation
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Outreach Activities
| Description | |
|---|---|
| RTÉ Brainstorm, April 16th, 2019, ‘Notre-Dame's rescued relics, faith and Paris’. [Link] | |
| Live radio interview, April 12th, Dublin City FM on St Valentine and Dublin’s relics. | |
| RTÉ Brainstorm, Updated March 16th, 2021, ‘Meet St Patrick’s spin doctor’ [Link] | |
| RTÉ Brainstorm, Updated March 11th, 2021, ‘CSI St Patrick: just where is the saint’s body?’ [Link] | |
| RTÉ Brainstorm, October 31st, 2019, ‘The cult of the dead in medieval Ireland’. [Link] | |
| Newspaper feature in The Independent (Weekender June 2nd, 2018) on the veneration of relics in modern Ireland. | |
| Article 'What was Christmas like in Medieval Ireland?' [Link] | |
| Talk to 600 primary school pupils about medieval Irish history |