Henry O'Brien (classicist)

[1] In 1833 O'Brien published an essay in the Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy entitled "On the Origin and Use of the Round Towers of Ireland" which won a second place reward of £20.

[2][3] Henry O'Brien thought however that he should have won first place and in a lengthy preface to his published essay in book form entitled The Round Towers of Ireland, or the Mysteries of Freemasonry, of Sabaism, and of Buddhism (1834) attacked archaeologist George Petrie who won the £50 first place reward.

[4] O'Brien later translated Joaquín Lorenzo Villanueva's Hibernia Phoenicea into English as Phœnician Ireland but soon after died, on 28 June 1835,[5] at only 27 years of age by "bad health, aggravated by his studious habits", he was later buried in Hanwell, Oxfordshire.

[6] Henry O'Brien first proposed that the Irish round towers were created by a pre-Christian phallic cult among the Tuatha Dé Danann who he connected to the daughters of Danaus.

[7] His theory when first published caused a lot of controversy at the time, as well as sparking criticism.