The writers Jonathan Swift and Oscar Wilde stand out, as well as the four Nobel Prize winners in Literature: George Bernard Shaw, WB Yeats, Samuel Beckett and Seamus Heaney. Also the only Nobel Prize winner in Physics, Ernest Walton, who shared it in 1951.
Robert Boyle, born in Lismore Castle (County Waterford) in 1627, among other important works, formulated the famous law that bears his name, relative to ideal or perfect gases, according to which the product of pressure times volume of a gas remains constant: PV = k
William Thompson, on the other hand, was a famous inventor, founder of thermodynamics and forerunner of electromagnetic theory; and William Rowan Hamilton who was a renowned 19th century physicist and mathematician.
One of the busiest areas in Dublin is the so-called Temple Bar (the old part where you can meet people from all over the world) or places with a diverse theme like the trendy Thunder Road Café. Riverdance stands out in the dance show area. The first physician with a noble degree, Sir Hans Sloane, was an Irish physician whose hobby was botany and whose collection is the core of the British Museum.
Literature
The island of Ireland is famous for the Book of Kells, also known as the Great Gospel of Saint Columba, which is an illustrated manuscript with ornamental motifs, made by Celtic monks around the year 800. A main piece of Irish Christianity and Irish-Saxon art, constitutes, despite being unfinished, one of the most sumptuous illuminated manuscripts that have survived the Middle Ages. Due to its great beauty and the excellent technique of its finishing, this manuscript is considered by many specialists as one of the most important vestiges of medieval religious art. Written in Latin, the Book of Kells contains the four (New Testament) Gospels.
Irish poetry represents the oldest vernacular poetry in Europe. The earliest examples, as we have seen, date from the 6th century, and generally consist of small lyrical works dealing with religious or naturalistic themes. They were frequently composed by scribes in the margins of illustrated manuscripts that they themselves copied.
Also here were born writers such as Jonathan Swift, Brendan Behan, Douglas Hyde, Flann O’Brien, Sheridan Le Fanu, Sean O’Casey, George Berkeley, James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Oliver Goldsmith, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker, WB Yeats, Samuel Beckett, Seamus Heaney, Herminie T. Kavanagh, CS Lewis, and others.
Society
The national holiday is March 17 in honor of the patron saint of Ireland: Saint Patrick (Saint Patrick in English or Pádraig in Irish), who fostered Christianity on the island. It is said that he drove the snakes from all over the country. The harp, which appears on the coat of arms of the province of Leinster and the three-leaf clover, are also symbols with which the Irish are identified. One could also speak of the color green as a color with which the Irish and immigrants around the world from Ireland identify themselves. The three-leaf clover is a symbol because it is said that Saint Patrick used it to explain the Holy Trinity.
True lovers and friends seal their alliance with the Claddagh Ring. Mystical and beautiful, it has its origins 300 years ago in an old fishing village in Claddagh, just outside Galway City, on the west coast of Ireland. The ring is given as a symbol of friendship or as a wedding ring.
The day after Christmas, December 26, Saint Stephen is celebrated. February 1 is the Celtic festival of Imbolc, the feast of the fertility of the Earth and of the goddess Bríd, the goddess of fire. Today, it is the feast of Saint Bridget (Saint Brigid in English or Bríd in Irish), the second patron saint of the country. The Irish put the crosses of Saint Bridget in their houses to prevent fire. Other pre-Christian celebrations retain their pagan names in Irish and are the name of some of the months of the year: Bealtaine (May) the early summer festival, Lúnasa (August) the harvest festival and Samhain (November) the festival. of the dead and the new year. The latter, similar to the feast of All Saints.
Idiom
The official languages are Irish (Gaeilge), a native Celtic language, and English, which is constitutionally described as a secondary official language. Learning Irish is compulsory in education, but English is widely predominant. Public signs are generally bilingual and there are also national media in Irish. The population belonging to predominantly Irish-speaking communities (the Gaeltachts) is limited to just a few tens of thousands of people in isolated pockets, mainly towards the west coast.
Sports
The most widely practiced and followed sports in Ireland are hurling and Gaelic football, which the Irish simply call football; indigenous sports organized by the Gaelic Athletic Association, which also organizes other minority national sports.
Because these sports are practically only played in Ireland (there are only two teams from outside the country that play the interprovincial hurling championship: one in London and one in New York), the sports for which Ireland is best known internationally are rugby (he is a founding member of the tournament currently known as the Six Nations Tournament, winning it several times), and soccer, with its own national championship, the Irish Soccer League. In addition, the Irish soccer team has managed to qualify three times for the Soccer World Cup, obtaining its best result in 1990 where it was eliminated in the quarterfinals.
Other sports include Dave Finlay and Sheamus, famous WWE wrestlers, the latter a two-time world champion in his first year; the former Snooker world champion, Ken Doherty, the first boxing heavyweight champion, John L. Sullivan, the also boxing world champions Barry McGuigan and Steve Collins or the first Irishman to win the Tour de France, Stephen Roche.
Also, although it is a sport of minority interest in Ireland, it is worth noting the presence of their national team in the 2007 Cricket World Cup where they spent the first round eliminating Pakistan. In the motor world, the former Irish Formula 1 team, Jordan Grand Prix, won several world championship competitions; and the Rally Ireland held in 2007 was part of the World Rally Championship with an influx of approximately 200,000 spectators.
