Brian Boru’s Harp: Galatia

The small harp I have known and admired since childhood as Brian Boru’s harp is the national symbol of Ireland. It is a harp that symbolizes national independence — liberation from centuries of colonization. Used on Ireland’s money, its visas, in every important office — more than the flag itself — the harp lives today in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, open to visitors. Unfortunately, recent historical research suggests that the instrument long known as Brian Boru’s harp was never played by the famous king: it was built at least four hundred years after his lifetime. So people have begun to call it the Trinity College harp instead. Being of a romantic nature, I know the historical facts — and in my heart I keep calling it Brian Boru’s harp.

A marvel of art in its decoration as much as an instrument, it was a metal-strung harp adorned with brass ornament, Celtic-style carvings and jewels. One of the very few original medieval harps to survive to our day, it dates from the 14th century. The clàrsach — the traditional Irish/Scottish harp — carried strings of bronze or of precious metals like silver and gold, and was played with long fingernails. It is said that Ireland’s turn to potato farming sharply reduced harp playing; working the soil made it hard for ordinary people to keep the long nails clean and strong.

Beyond lending his name to the harp, the king is remembered in a famous piece known to every harpist. The march said to have been written for the funeral of the High King of Ireland, Brian Bóruma mac Cennétig, is one of the oldest Irish melodies to survive. To play this thousand-year-old melody on the strings of a harp from the same age carries us back in time.

Our Galatia model is a slightly modernized version of this important instrument — in overall form, very nearly a copy of the Brian Boru harp. The greatest difference is that our harp uses standard harp strings rather than steel. On the steel-strung Irish harp, the fingernail technique brought a very different playing position and much narrower string spacing; Galatia offers comfortable, modern spacing.

Galatia was a Celtic civilization that lived in Anatolia. Driven east by invasion, this people settled in central Anatolia, in the regions of today’s Ankara and Eskişehir. For this beautiful harp — taken from the Celtic tradition and born again in Anatolia — we chose the name of that Anatolian Celtic people.