Aidan O’Sullivan
@AidanOSulliva15
Followers
9,043
Following
3,075
Media
4,380
Statuses
34,461
Head of School/Prof of Archaeology @ucdarchaeology Director @EArchaeol Member @RIADawson Single Dad of boys; Hurling/Camogie, Dog walker IC Member, Own Opinions
Joined May 2015
Don't wanna be here?
Send us removal request.
Explore trending content on Musk Viewer
انتر
• 408595 Tweets
دورتموند
• 406441 Tweets
Halloween
• 235984 Tweets
#LISAxLVSS25
• 178909 Tweets
#LISAxLOUISVUITTON
• 176281 Tweets
LISA LV HOUSE AMBASSADOR
• 172362 Tweets
أبيب
• 164610 Tweets
Uptober
• 146317 Tweets
President Carter
• 142256 Tweets
Jimmy Carter
• 142254 Tweets
Claudia Sheinbaum
• 105389 Tweets
Iniesta
• 77815 Tweets
Happy 100th
• 70276 Tweets
#OurBubble_Seunghanie_Day
• 69463 Tweets
#ROSÉNewAlbum
• 50738 Tweets
メガネの日
• 48854 Tweets
Acun
• 45847 Tweets
#大橋和也
• 42741 Tweets
Unions
• 41724 Tweets
LOUIS VUITTON MUSE HYEIN
• 28204 Tweets
対象作品
• 26236 Tweets
#bist100
• 24827 Tweets
集英社秋マンガチャ開催
• 24594 Tweets
#優しく強くアヌア
• 24523 Tweets
からくりサーカス
• 17349 Tweets
ITZY IS THE STANDARD
• 13274 Tweets
Pinned Tweet
The “library” finally finished, almost two years after moving in; it’s got bookshelves, lamps, candles, and …books! 🥰 📚
946
671
24K
My library photo has had 1.1 million views, 23,820 likes, & 1,000s etc. Strikingly, the 890 comments in different languages are all complimentary, often gently envious, and essentially, without exception, kind. The book-loving corner of Twitter, it seems, is a nice place. 🥰
The “library” finally finished, almost two years after moving in; it’s got bookshelves, lamps, candles, and …books! 🥰 📚
946
671
24K
309
300
8K
So, as you know I’m very fond of Hiberno-English, which derives from Irish linguistic constructions. My parents who were teachers failed to get the Wicklow mountain kids to stop saying “we do be going for the sheep”, or “me da is after getting a Christmas tree from under the wire
77
327
3K
Alan Loren-Guille, 17-year old French lad who works at Spitalfields restaurant, Dublin, wrestled attacker, managed to take the knife off him. Spitalfields' Instagram says "He was fairly unscathed but for a couple a cuts to his hand and face."
GoFundMe
39
432
2K
Those wishing to source English-Irish translations of official announcements, please do take note of this…
19
239
2K
Shocking revelation by my son C—!
So-called Chocolate “Santa Claus”, when you remove the wrapping, is actually Ireland’s St Patrick in disguise!!!
#StPatrick
#SantaClaus
70
82
1K
I. Am. Not. Going. Back. To. The. Way. I. worked. Before. Covid.
No more flying 3,000 miles to give a 20 minute lecture to 15 people in a conference hotel room.
There’s a climate crisis.
@cfiesler
Yes. It is ludicrous, and tbh in climate crisis terms, irresponsible. In last 6 months I’ve given one-hour lectures on experimental archaeology “in” USA, Canada, Israel, Poland, & shorter one at a global conference. I didn’t even a taxi anywhere, let alone fly to another country.
3
3
94
39
149
1K
So, it’s official - I’ve received the UCD President’s letter, I’m to be Head of UCD School of Archaeology from 23 January. Any advice or expertise on how to thrive/survive? 🙂
93
20
848
1/ In 1939 at start of WW2, CW. Phillips posted hand-coloured copies of
#SuttonHoo
site plans & notes to Irish archaeologist Sean P. Ó Ríordáin explaining in a letter that this was in fear of their destruction by bombs. Still held in UCD Archaeology archive today.
#TheDig
13
164
812
One of the great & poignant stories of English archaeology: the Sutton Hoo Anglo-Saxon ship-burial dig, on the banks of the River Deben, on the brink of World War. A story of social class, ethnicity, & power in the 7th century...& in 1939
#TheDig
(finally have the TV to myself!)
25
90
615
Medieval wooden fishweirs at low tide on the Fergus estuary mudflats, hundreds of metres from dryland - windswept and eroded by the waves.
12
118
582
Grades are in. Heading west. There will be sleeping, lighting of turf fires, baking of soda bread, Atlantic swimming (with shrieking), reading WW2 books, did I mention sleeping...?
27
9
552
The young Elizabeth visiting British airborne troops during manoeuvres, May 1944, in preparation for D-Day. The things she must have seen, the people she met...
@WeHaveWaysPod
@James1940
@almurray
10
54
496
Is there a Dublin Bus protest or some kind of Bus convention in Dublin 8? 😀😳 I can see at least 26 buses in a row stuck solid in a traffic jam on Dublin’s Camden Street/Wexford Street
86
38
485
Ireland's archaeology and cultural heritage: Early medieval raths, Ballinderry, Co. Roscommon, c.6th-14th century AD (photo:
@DeptAHG
@NationalMons
)
7
96
468
Once, years ago I made a critical comment about the aftermath of Sitka forest clearfelling in Wicklow mountains. A senior Irish forester phoned me and threatened to write to UCD President. I backed down, afraid. I’m a Prof now, come at me now... you’ll get a different response...
A real forest isn't just trees, but 1,000s of wild species - plants, animals, fungi - that coevolved over aeons to function together cohesively. It is an *ecosystem*.
A monoculture plantation, by contrast, is just trees, virtually bereft of other life. It is NOT an ecosystem.
34
704
3K
9
53
467
This is almost certainly not a genuine medieval chain mail. If original, and found “in a drain”, it would be a thin, rust-red coloured deposit or ‘cake’ of iron oxide, if even it survived as that. Best guess , it was owned by a modern re-enactor? via
@rte
37
95
444
The Irish ringfort - or a critical thread on journalists not reading archaeological publications. This article is full of errors of fact. There are 4 basic errors in the first paragraph of this article alone, then multiple false assertions throughout. 1/
19
133
439
One of the saddest songs in the Irish tradition “Anach Cuan” after a disastrous loss; “Mo thrua amárach gach athair is máthair, bean is páiste atá ag sileadh súl” (‘My sorrow tomorrow, every father and mother, woman and child who are crying’)
#AshlingMurphy
7
108
425
Not everyone in early medieval Ireland lived in raths, crannogs and monastic sites! We have occupation evidence from caves, coastal middens, unenclosed huts. Who were these people? Poor tenants, labourers, or the mysterious ríascaire (“haunter of marshes or moorland, vagrant”)?
8
61
396
UCD going fully online, working from home, apart from lab and practicals that can’t be done online. We’re going straight past Level 3 (Dublin) up to Level 4 restrictions. A sensible decision,mindful of our staff and students health 👏
14
75
390
Polling station 50m in the distance! Brought my passport as a symbol and thing of memory for all those women down the years. The 8th amendment didn’t work, and caused Irish, and other, women misery and pain. Sweep it away.
#repealthe8th
#YES
we’re already
#HometoVote
2
35
352
Two Spitfires! One made by a Dad with his 10-year old boy, more than 40 years ago. The other made by a Dad with his 10-year old boy this week! 😊
12
9
355
Dalkey Island, Dublin Bay-archaeological dig on promontory to left revealed largest collection of early medieval Mediterranean pottery & Frankish glass found in Ireland. Local Dalkey residents likely consuming imported olive oil, fine wines, & exotic foods. No great change then..
3
50
349
It’s not “unused bogland.” It’s bogland, it’s doing the job of bogland. And that attitude is the problem, Taoiseach.
Over 600,000 native trees to be planted on unused bogland
122
68
527
9
57
327
Everyone, meet Conall! His is an Old Irish name from early medieval Ireland, “He who rules dogs/wolves”... but isn’t he a dotey boy? Thanks to everyone for a terrific thread seeking his name, there were so many lovely potential names, but only one little chap!
34
6
319
Your reminder. Metal detecting for archaeological objects is completely illegal in Ireland. Completely. Illegal. The destruction of a context here is appalling.
An update from our recent post on a commercial rally company digging out a Bronze Age Hoard. Still digging it out egged on by others
@findsorguk
@PortantIssues
@pipelinenews
@Sussex_Heritage
@JSArchaeology
@Tostig1066
@spmaslin
@Tess_Machling
@PeterReavill
@LtrPrehistFinds
5
8
21
8
74
317
Our famous EMAP ‘White Book’. “Early Medieval Ireland. The evidence from archaeological excavations.” The 2021 reprint, with an enormous new post-2014 bibliographical essay as a preface! It’s gorgeous. And it’s going to be out-of-print fast, buy yours now at
@RIAdawson
!
12
54
314
“Andrimners Hemtagere”
are a fantastic Viking Living History group that did these fantastic burial reconstructions back in 2017. These poignant and beautiful images swept the Internet at the time. 1/
4
102
301
Professor Jones’ applications for research/travel grants will have been refused (he didn’t submit receipts last time, & didn’t publish), so he will spend most of movie reading 150 emails, grading essays, & figuring out the new online tasks (he needs to click that hidden button)
Harrison Ford to reprise 'Indiana Jones' role for fifth and final movie
602
530
4K
11
49
301
A striking thing to tell students? “We could all get in a bus, drive in random direct west, southwest or northwest, stop at a farmhouse and ask “where’s the nearest “fairy fort” or “rath” or “cashel”?& be directed to a thousand-year old early medieval settlement within a mile.”
"At least 60,000 early medieval settlement enclosures on the island." A quote from 'Early Medieval Ireland, AD 400-1100',
@AidanOSulliva15
et al. Where else in Europe has such an amazing landscape legacy from this period?
4
41
182
14
87
304
A story of a woman abjectly failed by a university, who then left to join industry, and upon whose scientific work, the world now depends. She couldn’t get grants, she was demoted, humiliated - and countless lives will be saved by her research.
Story of a 66-year-old researcher, an immigrant, who rarely got grants, never got her own lab, never earned more than $60K. For four decades, she kept working on mRNA—a path considered foolish. Her work is the basis for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.
828
29K
102K
2
103
299
@WallySierk
Interesting. In early medieval (including Viking Age) Ireland, hospitality was a legal, moral, ethical obligation to all travellers, regardless of rank. It did not create the burden of reciprocity, you must be given hospitality (food, a bed, washtub), for free.
4
18
299
Bronze Age & early medieval Dún Dúchathair ('Black Fort')-most foreboding of Aran's stone forts - darkness overlooking windswept Atlantic
8
88
258
And I don’t/can’t pronounce “th” (eg “dere are tree trees over dere”), as there (dere) is no “th” sound in Irish. Thosaigh, to begin, sounds like this “huh-sig”). So dere ye go now.
14
15
287
Traditional Irish hedge chair. Glorious thing, very old, originally from a cottage in Wexford -
@ClaudiaKinmont1
has written brilliantly on Ireland’s folk furniture
4
27
283
This is in my (apologies, expert) opinion the best reconstruction image of an early medieval crannog. It achieves that sense of performative remoteness yet high visibility key to high-status crannog residences, as described in several early medieval hagiographies.
@AidanOSulliva15
@NiallCorby
@everyringfort
@ucdarchaeology
With apologies to Billy, our recurring model for scale
2
2
66
9
45
270
In the Irish phase, you’d look “a bit shook” too if you were a year-old Hallowe’en turnip? Time to carve a new one...
11
28
261
Every year I carve a Hallowe’en turnip, and by Christmas they look fierce shook altogether; here’s this year’s one. 😥🎃 🙂
26
16
267
We laughed merrily, the boys and myself, at this sign in Dublin Zoo
2
46
258
And yes, I have books ABOUT books, much thumbed through the years when my books were in cardboard boxes. If anyone wants to buy me an original medieval Book of Hours (a facsimile also acceptable) I’ll swap you for one of my three copies of “The Name of the Rose” 😳
14
3
252
Terrific news! EMAP “white book” on early medieval Ireland to be re-printed by
@RIAdawson
! RIA editors are kindly enabling us to insert a short bibliographical essay as foreword to the second edition! In YOUR opinion, what are the key early medieval publications since 2013/14?
13
41
254
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a man in pursuit of a good Irish Halloween Jack o’lantern, must be in want of a good turnip.”
#Halloween
#Samhain
#Ireland
#Halloween2023
15
44
253
The dark nights of Hallowe’en / Oíche Shamhna approach, so it’s time to carve a traditional Irish turnip Jack O’Lantern. My inspiration is the model in the NMI Folklife Collection of an original turnip from Baile na Finne (Fintown), Donegal Gaeltacht, collected in 1903
@NMIreland
6
50
247
This Fantastic Mr Fox and myself would like to wish everyone a good morning from Portobello, Dublin 8, Ireland.
11
18
251
Loutro is a tiny village, only reachable by ferry or mountain hiking path, in Sfakia, on the south coast of Crete. There’s not much to do.. swim, read books, eat Greek food, look at a sky full of stars at night. Everyone goes to sleep about 10pm, lulled by shushing waves on beach
15
14
249
About to start writing a popular(?) book about people and everyday life in early medieval Ireland... without academic references.. 😬😳. What non-fiction books about people in the past successfully achieve the tricky task of writing something interesting, intriguing, readable?
68
23
240
Oíche Shamhna shona daoibh! The 2023 version of our
#Halloween
turnip, latest in a series …
#OicheShamhna
10
35
242
Conall is not only “Head Dog of UCD School of Archaeology”, he has now been formally recognised by UCD students as “The Best Dog in Ireland” 🐕🥰
8
15
241
Urquhart House, where General Roy Urquhart commander 1st Airborne hid from Germans for a time in the Battle of Arnhem. (Personally, I think having his name on the house was a dangerous hint to Germans but that’s just me).
#OperationMARKETGARDEN
@WeHaveWaysPod
@almurray
@James1940
9
13
234
Conall, chief of all dogs and wolves in Ireland, moving into his new UCD office
13
5
224
This is shocking. You can be sacked by
@uniofleicester
for "questioning authority", for discussing "radical alternatives" , for doing research not "aligned with School's strategic priorities", for researching 'political economy ' while being a Prof of Finance & Political Economy
I had previously been of the impression that
@uniofleicester
was sacking us because of our union activism and work critical of management, business, and/or capitalism. I see now however that the common denominator is that we are HOT AF.
#BoycottLeicester
69
355
1K
11
87
221
Seamus Caulfield told us a story in north Mayo cottage last year: his father remembered talking in 1930s to an elderly man who himself remembered corpses in ditches by the Belmullet road in 1847. We all fell silent, each thinking of the horror in that countryside, outside..
The Republic of Ireland's population increase in 2018 may have been the 7th highest annual rise since the Famine.
8
44
88
13
102
212
RTE Homeschool: let us not forget when “this is all over” the extraordinary public service provided by
#RTE
to our country through news, analyses, interviews, broadcast speeches, & even lighter moments. It’s Public. Service. Broadcasting
@drivetimerte
@morningireland
@TodaySOR
4
22
215
Ireland's archaeology and cultural heritage: Early medieval rath, Cappeen, Co. Cork (photo:
@DeptAHG
@NationalMons
)
1
46
207
@lingerie_addict
The Iron Age Lendbreen tunic, Norway made of sheep’s wool, took 760 hours to make in an Experimental Archaeological Project. Estimated cost c.$40-45,000.
2
19
211
But of course, then you start looking again at the sitting room. Once you start…
17
4
211
@laurahelmuth
Archaeologists are always described in media as “shocked”, “surprised”, “stunned” when they uncover new archaeological evidence in a dig. They almost certainly were not, and knew what they were doing.
7
21
199
.., and so it begins, 17th September 1944, airborne landing ground at Grave bridge, The Netherlands
#OperationMARKETGARDEN
@WeHaveWaysPod
7
2
200
The remarkable early medieval oratory of Teampall Bheanáin, reputedly associated with a disciple of St Patrick, at Cill Èinne, Aran
0
64
193
Iron Age bog body discovered at Bellaghy, Co Derry, Northern Ireland, including parts of skeleton, partial skin, fingernails of the left hand, toenails and possibly a kidney - and c14 dated by our colleagues in
@arcpalqub
6
53
200
You got to admire a man proudly wearing his Carlow jersey in Nowlan Park this evening 🤣🤣👏👏👏
9
3
201
The Reek at sunset, Croagh Patrick, Co Mayo, Ireland.
3
11
200
University College Dublin is becoming a wildflower haven, bees buzzing on a summer morning. Congrats and thanks to
@UCDEstates
@ucddublin
4
30
198
Mesolithic hunter-gatherer foods meet Neolithic farming - crab meat and barley bread - on the Céide coast, Mayo
8
16
195
In North Mayo with my little lads. The light. The colours... what a country we live in.
10
20
196
In early Irish law, the prosperous farming household must always have a fire alight. UCD's early medieval roundhouse reconstruction.
3
94
191
I’m a Professor of Archaeology in UCD, and an early medievalist, & I would warmly support the idea of a Bank Holiday for “Lá Fhéile Bríde” on 1st February! 1/
5
26
196
Early medieval Irish monks thought they were the vanguard of Christianity, defending the world from the demons of hell from the abyss that lay across the sea, beyond the western horizon. It’s hard for us to imagine their world, and the intensity of their beliefs.
Cad a spreag na manaigh dul síos le fánaigh sléibhe, a n-aghaidh a thabhairt ar an anacra agus a mbeatha a chur i mbaol, in áit ná raibh aon lascaine ná teasaíocht ón ngréin? Sin ceist ná fuil a freagra le fáil ó scoláirí léinn. [Micheál Ó Sé, file]
6
17
202
10
30
191
Battle of Arnhem, Sept 1944. Walking the Oosterbeek perimeter. Then and now, 1st Battalion Borders, mortar pits and foxholes.
#OperationMARKETGARDEN
@WeHaveWaysPod
@almurray
@James1940
7
8
191
The mysterious Late Bronze Age post-and-wattle structure, 40m length, Islandmagrath, Fergus estuary, Co Clare, c14 797-551 BC. I once thought it was a trackway, then thought it could be a fishweir; now I’m just not sure what it is. It once dropped 1.5m down a mudflat shore..
7
27
190
@neilhimself
My little boy in Ireland is reading it: And tells me then at breakfast about Loki, and Midgard and etc. I’m not sure as a parent whether to 1) stop him 2) or be delighted
10
8
185
There are two types of person in Ireland this morning;
1) Those who saw the Northern Lights
2) Those who signed up for geomagnetic storm alerts, at warned his friends about what was coming, and then fell asleep…
via
@rte
9
15
188
Raths have survived because Irish farmers protected them. Generations before may have cultivated their soils, e.g. see here, but modern farmers knew their machinery could be far more damaging. Leo Swan’s photo of rath preserved at Lisnabin, Co Westmeath.
11
56
183
Ireland does grey very well: green greys, blue greys, luminously grey clouds laden with rain, even yellow greys over the sand. It is Autumn, the season of mists & mellow fruitfulness. For all the chill in the air, there is hopefulness too. After all, from little acorns...
8
21
180
Jan van Eyck’s ‘The Arnolfini Wedding’ re-imagined.... This, for me, wins Twitter today (look at the detail. The bin-hat, thé convex “mirror” behind them, the sumptuous, exorbitant use of green cloth/duvet). Genius!
This is inspired.
Can't stop laughing
107
2K
8K
6
42
181
And the Wicklow mountain kids were just speaking Hiberno-English “present habitual” from the original Irish - they “do be” saying it still I hope, unless they’re after changing? 😀
12
8
181
Generations of Irish farmers have protected medieval ringforts, once because of folklore beliefs, now because they understand their antiquity & heritage. Look at this image, amidst wide open fields, the farmer has protected the site. We have 47,000 ringforts because of farmers!
6
35
180
The Dept of Archaeology at University of Sheffield is world class. I am External Examiner of its MA in Archaeology, & MA in Cultural Materials. I would strongly encourage all archaeologists to read the below and support the Dept. and our colleagues as you see fit.
2
91
179
Car is banjaxed, so have to stay another night in Belderrig, north Mayo. These skies...
8
8
180
My Dad, like many Irish, worked in London in the 1950s (e.g. once in a chocolate factory). He also worked as a London bus conductor. He told me once that in the evenings, as the empty bus drove back to the depot, he would stand at the back door singing Irish rebel songs 🙂
11
8
180
Some Irish post boxes in the Republic of Ireland - painted green, but their original royal inscriptions and crowns still visible. A classic bit of modern archaeology
17
9
169
UCD Archaeologists, working with colleagues from Serbia and Slovenia, have uncovered a previously unknown network of massive sites in the heart of Europe that could explain the emergence of the continent’s Bronze Age megaforts
5
34
170
Ireland’s James Lowe & Iron Age Clonycavan Man in
@NMIreland
- 2,300 years apart but surely related?
#IREvSCO
16
19
166
Baking Irish Soda bread in the west of Ireland - a lot easier than making sourdough, for sure. On holiday in my friend’s cottage, Belderg, Co Mayo. His hedge carpenter’s wooden chair is an amazing thing.
14
12
164
@Phil_Baty
@timeshighered
I’ve seen “research stars” in my time. They were all strangely uniformly negligent in their Dept admin, service and pastoral care, leaving to others... funny that...
2
7
161
Why is Archaeological writing so boring (including my own 😊)? I love to read WW2 histories, travel literature, historical biographies. I enjoy stories that knit together evidence... can anyone suggest an enthralling, fascinating, unputdownable, archaeology book?
65
21
158
A thrilling afternoon exploring a spectacular archaeological landscape at Glencullen/Newtown, Co. Dublin, with landowner Phillip Maguire. A Bronze Age standing stone, barrow, a Bronze Age (I think) settlement enclosure; a classic early medieval ringfort; medieval field systems?
7
11
160
“Usually yes” in an Irish house? Are you joking me - we’ll pursue you down the street with apple tart, tea, coffee while you’re waiting for the tea, etc...
This is blowing people’s minds, so as an amateur historian and sociologist I’m going to try to explain this development/ cultural artifact.
2K
14K
83K
24
15
159
6
15
161
Hello, I’m an archaeologist. You may know me from my greatest hits, including: “No, that’s a geologist”, and “No, that’s a palaeontologist”, and “No, we don’t sell the things we find”...and “No, I don’t make any money from my books. No, really...I don’t”
Hello, I'm a scholar of Early Irish Christianity. You may know me from my greatest hits, including: "The Historical Patrick was a self appointed Bishop, he says so himself, in his own fucking writings"; and, "There's no such thing as, and never was, a fucking 'Celtic' Church".
11
38
204
2
28
155