Cllr D'Arcy urges public to have say on Heritage Plan

Anyone with a stunning sibling might know what it’s like to be in the shadows, unappreciated because your beauty isn’t so apparent.

Out in Fore there is such a plain Jane, not as striking as the Abbey or as photogenic as the ancient church. But resting in the little village green you might notice the brickwork is striking, and your interest is suddenly piqued.

“One of the items I will be putting forward under built heritage to the consultation for the Westmeath Heritage Plan will be the Gaol Wall in Fore,” said Cllr Una D’Arcy of Fore.

“I know nothing, in fact, less than nothing about architecture or built heritage, but I was told that Henry VIII found the people in the kingdom of Meath so reckless, so wild, so feral and unmanageable that he divided the kingdom into Meath and Westmeath, deemed Westmeath unbiddable, built a gaol in Fore for them and decided to recognise them for a race of people he couldn’t conquer.

“Imagine that: the people of this area were indomitable – how fantastic,” says Cllr D’Arcy, who serves on Westmeath’s County Heritage Forum and who was the only person who fancied taking on cultural heritage when, just like Henry VIII, people were being divided up – with the other committee members opting for either built, natural or archaeological.

“I will be putting forward the Gaol because its story is stunning. I also will be putting it forward because there are no detailed masonry studies of it. We have a building that may be of significant importance sitting in plain sight for all to seem but unseen because of all the other wonderful sights in Fore.

“Our wonderful new Heritage Officer, Melanie McQuaid, would no doubt tell you about how it is built of roughly coursed limestone and it lacks jambs or quoins. I don’t know what that means, that's why I’m not on the built heritage sub-committee.

“The point I’m trying to make is that you do not have to be an expert, a historian, an archaeologist, an ecologist to make a submission to the Heritage Plan consultation. You can be as clueless as me about pre-1700 structures and be able to fit what you know on a stamp with room for the Lord’s Prayer.

“The world is filled with experts but you may know something about where you live, just like the Gaol Wall in Fore that is so important for the county and you may be the only person that can get that information into us.

“Most of the items that I will be putting forward will be things that I believe are intricate parts of the rich fabric of our society in Westmeath. I would love to see a study undertaken of all the wonderful names in this area: Tonashammer, Srunahella, Scurlockstown, Clonkill, Knockdrin. I would love to see how our history and heritage and ancient landscapes are still there inside the names for lanes, fields and townlands.

“I am also going to ask that we catalogue all the wonderful cultural heritage that the council owns, like our art collections and have a way to make sure its not hanging on hallways that no one walks along.

“I’d also like to see a county museum developed – even if it’s only a pop-up one, where we have invested in the specialised containers needed to allow us to display borrowed Westmeath artefacts that are elsewhere.

“I’m also a massive fan of our natural landscape and our beautiful county. I will be asking that our heritage strategy includes getting access into beautiful areas, creating wonderful sightlines and even exploring the possibility of dark sky areas and interaction with our ancient landscapes and ancient societies through stories and culture.

“I would love to see a study on the amazing cures that are held both by people and places, and I think there is potential for a literary trail exploring the wonderful writers in the area past and present and the places that inspired them.

“A history degree isn’t needed to look at any of these things in a Heritage Consultation. The bottom line is that heritage is what we inherit – and that we is all of us. So I really hope that lots of people get involved with this consultation and put forward any ideas that they have about Westmeath’s heritage.”

For further details on the Westmeath Heritage Plan log on to: www.westmeathcoco.ie/heritageplan.