Dublin holds many treasures, some of them well known, many of them hidden.
In my opinion Dublin is a living museum, with buildings and relics going back over the entire history of the city, over 1,300 years.
There's something on every street corner which tells a story of a time past. Stories of wars, heroes, invasions, tragedies and triumphs. It's also got it's love stories although the best one is largely unknown and like the ancient building you can see in Dublin associated with it, it remains hidden away.
But it can be found...
Walk to the end of Temple Bar (heading west) and cross Parliament St, which is the first big main road you come to, continue into Essex Gate and then turn right into Exchange St Lower. Behind a grill in the street is hidden Isolde's Tower, one of the towers which made up the ramparts of the old walls of Dublin, originally built by the Vikings and then rebuilt by the Normans.
The tower dates from the 13th century, when the Normans were conquering Ireland and needed the walls of Dublin in order to defend the city against the attacks of the Gaelic Irish. It was buried for centuries under the streets of Dublin and was discovered in the 1990's when a car park was being built on the site and has now been preserved but remains a secret.
Isolde's tower has links to one of the oldest stories of love and tragedy, older even than "Romeo & Juliet", in fact it is probably where William Shakespeare got his inspiration for his tragic love story.
The story of Tristan and Isolde was known in the Gaelic nations of the time; Ireland, France and Cornwall, a small kingdom in south west England known for King Arthur, Excalibur and the knights of the round table. Since the Normans originally came from France, they were familiar with the story and named the tower in honour of the tragic princess in the following story;
In the 5th century in the kingdom of Cornwall, King Mark, a predecessor of the famous King Arthur, wanted a wife.
He was a powerful and respected King, having successfully defended his lands against the invading Saxons. But he was now in his 50's and was worried that he was getting old without an heir.
He had heard of a beautiful Irish princess that lived in Leinster, near the eastern coast of Ireland (where Dublin is now), this princess also had the magical power to heal, which Mark saw as being a benefit for his people in keeping illness away from his kingdom. So he sent his most trusted knight, his nephew Tristan to find the princess and convince her to marry his mighty King.
When he sailed to Ireland and met Isolde, he was amazed by her beauty and struggled to hide his feelings for the princess. Isolde at first was not sure about marrying the old King as she was only 19, he was much older than her and she had always dreamed of marrying for love instead of for wealth or power.
Isolde's mother, the Queen of Leinster, who also had magical powers, knew it would be better for Isolde and the 2 kingdoms if the marriage took place so she advised Isolde to marry Mark. She made a love potion for Isolde in case she didn't have feelings for Mark, Isolde could drink the love potion and fall in love with the old King.
The marriage was agreed and Isolde accompanied Tristan on a great white ship with a huge white sail to cross the sea to Cornwall and marry her King. During the voyage, the two young people started to fall in love with each other and even though Tristan loved his uncle dearly, as if he was his father, he could not bear to lose the young princess to him. So he drank some of the potion and gave the rest to Isolde. They fell deeply in love and would not want to be parted. This way Tristan thought the marriage could not go ahead but when King Mark learned of the love between the two and the betrayal of his nephew, he banished Tristan from the kingdom.
Mark and Isolde got married the next morning and heartbroken, Tristan went to France where he married a French lady.
Tristan and Isolde could not forget each other and being separated brought both of them so much pain that after two years apart, Tristan came back to Cornwall and they started to meet in secret. Eventually King Mark decided to allow Tristan to return home as both these people he loved were constantly miserable without each other and he also knew that Isolde's heart would never be his.
Tristan knew he would have to return to France to tell his wife that his heart belonged to another. When he told her, she flew into a jealous rage and stabbed him in the chest with a poisoned blade. As the poison started to take effect on his body, Tristan asked his closest friend to go find the one person that could cure him, Isolde. They agreed that while Tristan lay in his castle looking out to sea, waiting for his true love to come to him, the ship would fly a white sail if Isolde agreed to come and a black one if she didn't.
As soon as Isolde heard about Tristan, she rushed to him in the hope of healing him but as he lay dying, he asked his wife to tell him the colour of the sail on the approaching ship. Still jealous she lied to him and told him the sail was black. There and then Tristan gave up hope and died thinking his love had abandoned him. When Isolde arrived and saw her dead lover, she lay down beside him and died of grief.
I can't help thinking that Shakespeare was inspired by this already centuries old story when he wrote of his tragic lovers.
But instead of Juliet's balcony in Verona, we now know that the original building lies in Dublin, down by the river Liffey, where princess Isolde once lived and I think that in this romantic city, where the bones of St Valentine can be found, this is a love story for the ages....
