Irish Bog Oak Hand-Carved Abbey Brooch c1900 Start Price USD 55.00 Current Price USD 55.00 Time Left - Bid Count 1 Buy It Now Price - Reserve Price - Start Time Sunday, November 16, 2008 End Time Sunday, November 23, 2008 Location West Coast of Clare See more about 'Irish Bog Oak Hand-Carved Abbey Brooch c1900' Description   Irish Bog Oak Hand-Carved Abbey Brooch c1900   Click to View Image Album      Hand-carved three dimensional Abbey or Ancient Old Irish Castle, surrounded by Shamrocks - in a pin-back brooch.  Great example of Antique Irish Folk-Art BOG-OAK Ornaments This black hardwood is almost like ebony and was dug out of the bogs of Ireland. Bog oak was used for the manufacture of small articles, intended mainly for the tourist or souvenir trade, from the 1820s for over a century, reaching a peak from about 1850 to 1860. The range of products was amazingly diverse, extending from the simple to the elaborate, often carved, or embellished with gold, silver or gems. In general they comprised of three main categories: 1) Personal or dress ornaments, for example, brooches (many similar in form to the Tara Brooch), bracelets, ear-rings, buttons and studs (some in the form of shamrocks or harps). 2) Household ornaments such as models or representations of Irish antiquities, monuments, abbeys, round towers, High Crosses and sometimes caricatures of historical Irish personalities, Brian Boru, Henry Grattan etc. 3) Functional articles like work-boxes, card cases, book stands, candlesticks, pen holders, snuff boxes and jewellery boxes. The earliest reference to the ornamental use of bog-oak is a walking stick carved with shamrocks by Patrick McGurk which was given to King George 1V in 1821. John Neate (1796-1838) trained his relations, the Goggin brothers and Denis Connell, in carving depictions of the picturesque ancient ruins of the region. The Goggin family specialized in bog oak jewellery and were in business in Dublin as early as the 1860's. Queen Victoria, on an Irish visit wore a bog oak brooch mounted in Wicklow gold and set with Irish gems. (How well she might!) Cornelius Goggin now enjoyed the title "Irish Bog Oak carver to her Majesty". Bog-oak can be embellished with other materials, silver gilt mountings and national emblems, the jewels being Irish diamonds (iron pyrites) and amethysts. The poet, Thomas Moore owned a harp of bog oak which is now on display in the National Museum of Ireland. In later advertisements it was claimed that the bog-oak used was from the Lakes of Killarney and the Bog of Allen. Bog oak jewellery was produced in the greatest quantity around Killarney, the most popular Irish beauty spot of the nineteenth century. There was a heavy demand for souvenir items and bog oak was plentiful in the area. Bog oak was also a profitable line for Dublin jewellers who often advertised themselves as "Jewellers and bog oak ornament manufacturer". BOG-OAK Bog oak is a form of timber unique to the ancient peat bogs of Ireland. The unique acidic conditions of the peat bog helped preserve giant trees that formed the great oak forests which covered the island thousands of years ago. The bogs themselves formed as rotting vegetation collected in swamps where it was broken down by micro-organisms. Timber that happened to fall into the swamps sank slowly and was gradually buried beneath semi-solid layers of peat. The low pH levels acted as a preservative, effectively pickling the wood and preventing it from rotting. As the bogs have been reclaimed for agriculture or exploited for fuel in recent times huge trees have been thrown up. These trees, miraculously preserved, emerge blinking into the sunlight after thousands of years of slumber. If a piece of bog oak has had the time and special conditions necessary for its preservation it attains a jet black hue akin to ebony. In the past bog wood had many uses. It was an important resource particularly during the famine. It was often the only timber that people had access to - timber was not available outside the estate woods of the gentry in the 18th and 19th century in Ireland. The preservation of the wood in the bog gave the timber strength and durability. Uses for bog wood included structural timber for houses, rope, fuel, deal torches, thatches and salmon spearing. Occasionally people made a living from the sale of bog wood splits. The method used to find tree trunks in intact bog remains unexplained today. People would search bogs for areas wherever the early morning dew, frost or snow disappeared first, these areas suggested the presence of buried wood. A long metal probe was used to confirm the presence of timber. It is said that an experienced hand was able to tell the size, the way in which the timber lay, the tree species and the quality of the timber, all with a metal pole. Nowadays bog wood is mainly found through activities such as turf cutting and land drainage. In bogs where peat is being extracted commercially, tree stumps and trunks are dragged out of the peat with a mechanical digger to the edge of the bog. This is essential as the wood remaining in the bog would block peat milling machines. Buried trees and forests are common and widespread in Irish bogs. In extensive areas of the west of Ireland entire forests of pine lie preserved underneath the blanket bog. In raised bogs pine forest is part of the natural vegetation succession from lake to bog. The three important types of wood found preserved in bogs today are Scot's pine, oak and yew. They can be from 4,000 to 7,000 years old. Scientifically, bog wood has proved invaluable as a dating tool and for studying climate change. This is made possible because of annual variation in the diameter size of tree rings. Tree rings are wide in a good and narrow in a poor growth year. Studying variation in the pattern of tree rings is known as dendrochronology. By studying and matching the patterns in tree rings from a wide range of bog wood samples, a year by year chronology can be built up. Queens University in Belfast has a tree ring record compiled from 4,000 bog oak and other ancient oak timbers that spans 7,000 years. A pine chronology for Ireland is also under development. The tree ring chronology allows accurate dating of anything made from oak or pine in Ireland. The annual growth rings in bog wood timbers also give a record of past climatic conditions. The basis of these studies lie in the fact that in a favorable growth year the tree lays down a wide growth ring. In unfavorable years, a narrow ring and so on. The patterns in the rings analysed using statistical packages and related to calendar years give a detailed record of climate change over time. Measures:      1.35" (greatest) Condition:   Very Good - No problems.  Good original surface patination.   PLEASE NOTE WORLD WIDE SHIPPING RATE  Add $5.00 to total for insurance, packing and shipping. IF YOU LIVE ON THE ISLAND OF IRELAND DIVIDE THE above RATE IN HALF. Good Luck! Payment       I accept the following forms of payment: PayPalPersonal Check       FREE scheduling, supersized images and templates. Get Vendio Sales Manager.  FREE scheduling, supersized images and templates. Get Vendio Sales Manager. Over 100,000,000 served. Get FREE counters from Vendio today! Place a Bid!