Ancient Celtic History and Mythology abound with references to the Corncrake. The magnified letter "V" shown is from one of The world's oldest manuscripts - "The Book Of Kells" - A.D.792, in Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. It reputedly depicts two of Ireland's most prolific birds at the time - The Corncrake and The Heron - intertwined. The Book Of Kells was written by cloistered Monks on the Island of Iona for their mother Abbey Of Kells, later pillaged by Oliver Cromwell. Thanks to The Lord Protector of England, and his fanatical Puritan armies, most of Ireland's ancient manuscripts were destroyed, but a few were hidden and survived.
The Corncrake gets a "mention in dispatches" in another more recent, if less illustrious, book by Charles Darwin - The Origin Of The Species. It features on the '97 Latvian stamp and at least two Scientific Theses have been written on the subject. It is also famed in modern song and story by The Pogues, Silly Wizard, Flann O'Brien and that other indefatigable survivor - Gerry Adams - President of Ireland's oldest Political Party Sinn Fein. In his autobiographical novel - Before The Dawn Mr. Adams poignantly describes how in more peaceful times he lay on the grassy banks of Cave Hill and the Bog Meadow, on the outskirts of Belfast, listening to the mating calls of the corncrakes and dreaming about a better future for his people. Forty years later the corncrake is no longer a feature of the Cave Hill or the Bog Meadow, having officially been designated as extinct in Northern Ireland in 1993, and Mr. Adams still has not secured the future that he covets, but the effort continues and the future looks infinitely brighter for both. This year a single corncrake was heard at Lough Neagh for the first time since 1986. In Mr. Adams's own immortal words: "They haven't gone away you know".
