Unlike shamrock pins and green beer, Guinness drinking really is a longstanding tradition in Ireland.

Since the nineteenth century, peat (or turf) has brought social consciousness to art. In the 1800s, Pre-Raphaelite paintings focused on the fact that the poor harvested it.

Wooden Bog Butter Barrels are possibly the most beautiful things you can find in a bog.  But why did people throw their butter into bogs?

James Joyce remains a novelist whose characters are imbued with a Catholic world view, despite declaring himself to be a freethinking heretic.

Edmund Burke (1729-1797) is one of the philosophical fountainheads of modern conservatism. But he didn't start out that way.

Many Irish holidays blend the Catholic faith with ancient Celtic tradition and mythology. Some original pagan holidays are still practiced in Ireland today.

A century after being executed as a traitor, Roger Casement continues to fascinate.

Soda water is a popular beverage now, but it was once considered a cure, among other things.

June 16th is Bloomsday, the day on which James Joyce's sprawling Modernist novel Ulysses takes place. Celebrate literature, Dublin, and, well, pubs!

Northern Ireland is seeing a resurgence in tourism, due, ironically enough, to a TV show about political violence between kingdoms: Game of Thrones.