The RSAI runs an annual programme of lectures, talks, outings and excursions to which Members and Guests are invited to partake. Places on all outings and excursions must be booked in advance but lectures and talks are open to all. Lectures and talks usually take place at 7.30pm in the Helen Roe theatre, which is in the basement of Society House, 63 Merrion Square, unless otherwise indicated.
Currently, due to the Covid-19 restrictions, our talks and lectures take place online via ZOOM webinars, until further notice.
The subjects of lectures and talks span all areas of the Society’s remit, history, archaeology, art history, local and social history. Excursions include day-trips and three/four day expert led tours.
If you have any suggestions for potential lectures or talks please forward this information to the Hon. General Secretary Ms. Philippa E. Barry here for consideration by the Programme sub-committee.
Here are the details of upcoming events on the 2021 programme:
LECTURES
28 January 2021 AGM
Investigating ancient foodways through environmental archaeology
Dr Meriel McClatchie, UCD
25 February 2021
The Mooghaun gold hoard – making Clare great in the Bronze Age.
Dr Mary Cahill, NUI Galway
25 March 2021 Annual Próinséas Ní Chatháin Lecture
Cnuasaigh de laoithe fiannaíochta i lámhscríbhinní iarchlasaiceacha na Gaeilge
Dr Síle Ní Mhurchú, UCC
22 April 2021
Saluting Ireland’s Antarctic explorers
Mr Michael Smith, author, polar historian & journalist – zoom confirmed
27 May 2021 Annual Helen Roe Lecture
23 September 2021
Megalithic Genomics: Hierarchy and heterogeneity in Neolithic Ireland
Dr Lara Cassidy, The Smurfit Institute of Genetics, TCD
21 October 2021 Annual Frank Mitchell Lecture
Archaeological Science and Brú na Bóinne in the 21st Century
Dr Stephen Davis, UCD
25 November 2021
Mapping Death: Burial practice in late iron age and early medieval Ireland
Dr Elizabeth O’Brien, Archaeologist and RSAI Member
9 December 2021
Viking activity in northern and north-eastern Ireland in the archaeological and literary records c.800-945 AD
Dr Darren McGettigan, Historian and Author, RSAI Member
TALKS
8 February 2021
Stained glass in Ireland: Beyond Harry Clarke
Ms Finola Finlay, Archaeologist and editor of Roaringwater Journal
1 March 2021
The War of Independence: Centenary reflections
Prof. Diarmaid Ferriter, UCD
12 April 2021
Crafting connections: domestic building in Dublin in the eighteenth century
Dr Melanie Hayes, Irish Research Council Laureate Project Fellow, CRAFTVALUE
10 May 2021
Grandeur and decline: Henrietta Street and the making of Dublin’s Tenements 1800–1900
Dr Timothy Murtagh, TCD
6 September 2021
Early Irish hand-bells revisited
Mr Cormac Bourke, Ulster Museum
4 October 2021
Functioning in early medieval Ireland: Understanding metalworking, craft and making through a detailed investigation of technical ceramics
Dr Brendan O’Neill, UCD
1 November 2021
Gaelic cultural identity and the arboreal aesthetic
Dr Peter Casby, Archaeologist