The Tailteann Games – Ireland’s ancient Olympics

Ireland’s Gaelic games have a long history. In fact, hurling is the oldest and fastest field sport in the world, dating back almost 3,000 years and featuring strongly in Irish mythology. It is inscribed on the UNESCO representative list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity. 

Gaelic games are an intrinsic part of Irish culture and this is excellently demonstrated in the GAA Museum in Croke Park in Dublin. But the island’s passion for sport goes further. Indeed, so much so that Ireland once had its own Olympics, the Tailteann Games.   

According to The Book of Invasions (a mythical history of Ireland written by monks in the eleventh century) the Tailteann Games date back 4,000 years. But it’s widely accepted that that might be a bit of Irish exaggeration. There are references to the games in sixth-century records and it is generally thought they began some time before that and are possibly as old as the ancient Greek Olympics that date from 776 BC. 

For many centuries, the Tailteann Games were an annual event held in Teltown, County Meath, and presided over by the King of Tara. The games included chariot and horse races, boxing and wrestling and in the evening musicians and storytellers entertained the crowds. 

After the Norman invasion of Ireland in the twelfth century the games stopped but they were revived in the 1920s by the new Irish Government. The first modern-day Tailteann Games took place in Dublin in 1924 and involved 6,500 competitors and a thousand medals. Teams of athletes – who were either Irish or of Irish heritage – came from England, Scotland, Wales, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina, Canada and America. 

The range of events was remarkable and included Gaelic games, swimming, rowing, boxing, billiards, chess, yachting, tennis, cycling, archery, horseracing, shooting, golf and even tug of war. In fact, the games went beyond sports to include competitions for piped bands, poetry, Irish dancing, storytelling, singing and art. 

The Tailteann Games were staged again in 1928 and 1932 and in recent years there have been calls for another revival. In the meantime, Ireland’s sporting fans can enjoy the Paris Olympics, which are set to kick off in July, and of course the island’s packed calendar of Gaelic games. 

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