Currach
It is suggested that the prototype of this wooden boat was built on Inishnee around 1900 and based upon a tender from a foreign vessel seen in Cleggan harbour.
Its framework was constructed of hazel rods and sally twigs, covered by a single ox-hide, which not only insulated the currach, but also helped dictate its shape.
During the Neolithic period,[3] the first settlers landed in the northern part of Ireland, likely arriving in boats that were the ancestors of the currach.
Development in joining methods of wood during the Neolithic period made it possible to eventually create what the currach is today.
One of these is the Latin account of the voyage of St Brendan (who was born c. 484 in the southwest of Ireland): Navigatio sancti Brendani abbatis.
This contains an account of the building of an ocean-going boat: using iron tools, the monks made a thin-sided and wooden-ribbed vessel sicut mos est in illis partibus ("as the custom is in those parts"), covering it with hides cured with oak bark.
An Irish martyrology of the same period says of the Isle of Aran that the boat commonly used there was made of wickerwork and covered with cowhide.
[6] Tim Severin constructed such a ship, following as best they could the Brendan descriptions and drawing on the skills and knowledge of a few traditional craftsmen, and showed that the result was quite seaworthy by sailing it from Ireland to the new world.
Gerald of Wales, in his Topographia Hibernica (1187), relates that he was told by certain seamen that, having taken refuge from a storm off the coast of Connacht, they saw two men, long-haired and scantily clad, approaching in a slender wickerwork boat covered in skins.
A 17th-century account in Latin by Philip O'Sullivan Beare of the Elizabethan wars in Ireland includes a description of two currachs built in haste to cross the River Shannon.
The larger was constructed as follows: two rows of osiers were thrust in the ground opposite each other, the upper ends being bent in to each other (ad medium invicem reflexa) and tied with cords, whereupon the frame so made was turned upside down.
Planks, seats and thwarts were then fitted inside (cui e solida tabula, statumina, transtraque interius adduntur), horse hide was fixed to the exterior and oars with rowlocks were supplied.
[10] The construction and sailing of a seagoing curach of the 17th century, a hybrid of the skin-covered and plank-built boat, was depicted in some detail by an Englishman, Captain Thomas Phillips: "A portable vessel of wicker ordinarily used by the Wild Irish".
The forestay is shown as passing over a small fork above the yardarm, which supports a square sail: a branch is tied to the mast-top.
[18] The Connemara currach is also distinguished by a double gunwale and by a particular form of pivoting block or "bull" attached to one side of the squared region of the loom of the oar.
The halliard was rove through an iron ring near the masthead, hoisting a small lug sail, and this was controlled by a sheet and tack.
LNBHA,[24] a community group on Lough Neagh, has made a number of Kerry naomhógs and Dunfanaghy and Tory Island currachs.
[26] He wrote of Columba: In the Statistical Account of Scotland of 1795 we read of The Spey currach would thus seem to be similar to the Welsh coracle in design, being used on a river rather than in the open sea.
But twenty years earlier, we read of bigger ones, in Shaw's History of the Province of Moray (1775): A more detailed description can be found in Scottish court records (1780): Spey currachs were used in the timber trade there, as described in Ainslie's Pilgrimage etc.
In the annual London Great River Race,[28] Currachs have regularly performed outstandingly in the Overall rankings (fastest boat on handicap), notably in 2007,[29] 2008,[30] and 2010.
This event is held by the Irish Currach Club of Milwaukee in late August of every year and it features two races that are available for the public to view during the festival.
