Hares

Kay Davenport – Creativity in West Cork

Writer, sculptor, ceramicist, historian . . .  the creative community here in West Cork rolls all these things into one person: Kay Davenport. For me, another side to Kay is one of the most important – she is, like me, a complete Hare Fanatic! You can tell because, when you drive past her entrance gates on the road between Ballydehob and Bantry, you are greeted by some wonderful hares which she has sculpted.

When we first met Kay – many years ago now – her Hare Pottery was in full swing, producing bespoke plates, ceramic trays, trivets and canvases with all the images inspired by the ‘marginalia’ in a series of 14th century French manuscripts. Most of these feature hares in various poses, usually turning the tables on the human world. Kay elaborates:

. . . the hare is a principal actor and unique in these books in her animosity towards the hunter/tailor who would kill her for her pelt to line hoods and cloaks. A number of marginal scenes revolves around the subject of the hare exacting revenge on the hunter and these could be described as the hunter hunted or the world upside down. The hare is also shown fighting with her old adversary, the hound, using shield and sword, or defending a castle against him and his troops. In one instance, the hare triumphs and bears him home, presumably to eat . . .

Upper: memories of Kay’s Hare Pottery, Ballydehob. Lower, a tile on the left – the title reads . . . The hare hunted for her pelt to line the hoods of ordinary people here wears the hood (lined with 100% human hair?) . . . Lower right – another of the marginalia illustrations from The Bar Books: here the hare plays a horn

2018 has heralded new ventures. She has become a prolific writer! Firstly, in March of this year she released a magnum opus: The Bar Books – a completely comprehensive study of the manuscripts illuminated for Renaud de Bar, Bishop of Metz between 1303 and 1316. It is these manuscripts that contain the hare marginalia which have always fascinated and inspired Kay. The study is about far more than the marginalia – it’s a very concentrated slice of a very particular historic period and a way of life lived then; and the book contains 242 black-and-white illustrations and 45 colour plates.

Top – from The Bar Books – examples from the colour plates. Middle – marginalia illustration, showing a hare being pursued by a boar (or, perhaps, a dragon?). Bottom – the marginalia have been used by Kay to illustrate her pottery: here the hares are making use of a temporary structure erected in the open for the king to have a bath while on the road. Hares of course are always on the road and have seized this ideal opportunity to give their baby a bath (with the baby swaddled like royalty)

As if such a magnificent achievement wasn’t enough for one year, Kay has surprised us all by suddenly launching a series of illustrated books for children – and just in time for Christmas! But it would be wrong to say that these books are only for children: we were thoroughly entertained by them – as will anyone be who has a sense of humour. And the suitable age group? Well, my grandchildren who range from 8 to 18 will be getting them – and enjoying them, I have no doubt. After all, there are terrible toddler tantrums, fierce wolves, and a hip-hop hero – what more could anyone want?

Above: the covers and a page from Sweet Dreams, in which a nightmare of a child learns the pitfalls of eating too many sweets. Kay’s rhyming text and illustrations are hilarious. below, the book Hip Hop Aesop – a wonderfully unique variation on the ‘cry wolf’ story.

Just to add to the melee, Kay has also provided the illustrations for a book by Michael Neill, Macdonald the Tiger. In my household, we always had to have books about tigers – especially those who ate children. This one would certainly have fitted the bill – and a few mothers get eaten along the way, too! But all ends well, of course.

Well, I hope this post has inspired you to go out and get some of Kay’s work. The books are available from Amazon, and they are also on sale in the Post Office in Ballydehob – what an easy way to fill your Christmas stockings!

The Fortunes of the Hare

There was an old man whose despair
Induced him to purchase a hare:
Whereon one fine day he rode wholly away,
Which partly assuaged his despair.

(Edward Lear 1872)

We have been writing this Journal pretty regularly for five years now: to date we have published 460 posts – roughly half by Finola and half by me. It’s December, and at this time of the year we review what we have written and it’s always interesting to see the topics have been most popular amongst our readers. We’ll be exploring all that as we lead up to Christmas, but today I have been reviewing our post titles over the years to see what has appealed to me personally during our lives online.

John James Audubon – Northern Hare, 1843

I have a long held passion for the hare – a creature which has inhabited the world unchanged for millions of years: we know this from fossil finds. We can therefore safely conclude that this beautiful animal is perfectly adapted to its natural environment, and hasn’t needed to evolve in any way.

In July 2015 – about halfway through our blogging career – I penned an article, Hares in Abundance, inspired by an exhibition held at the Heron Gallery in Ahakista. I was delighted to see so many images of hares by a number of artists: there were drawings, paintings and prints; ceramic sculptures and ceramic ware; jewellery, felt-work and even cushion covers. I would happily have kitted out the whole of our house with work from this exhibition, but long ago Finola declared we had ‘enough’ hares around the place, so I have to keep myself under control (although, it has to be said, hare imagery here at Nead an Iolair does seem to increase year by year).

Illumination from the 14th century Macclesfield Psalter, now in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

As I mention in that post from 2015, I have kept a ‘hare calendar’ during our time in West Cork, and any hare sightings are recorded. There is definitely a downward trend in the numbers I have spotted. In 2017, for example, I have recorded only one and a half hares (the half was the backside of an animal disappearing into a hedge, which I felt sure was a hare), whereas in past years I have recorded five or six. Back in the 1990s, when I stayed regularly with my friends Danny and Gill in Ballybane West –  just over the hills from here, I saw relatively large numbers of them. Something is surely amiss – and I don’t think it’s my eyesight.

The Irish Hare was portrayed on the Irish Three Pence coin: the design was by the artist Percy Metcalfe, and the coin was continuously produced between 1928 and 1969

On a recent visit to Finola’s cousin in Mayo we were introduced to (and immediately purchased) a new book: The Way of the Hare by Marianne Taylor. If you are in any way inclined to hare adulation, I thoroughly recommend this book as being the most readable and comprehensive study of all aspects of the animal’s place in the world: history, biology and folklore. To my delight, the author even suggests that, in terms of creature relationships:

…we humans are more closely related to hares than we are to cats, bats, dogs, elephants, whales, sloths and most other mammals on earth…

Left – the new book by Marianne Taylor and right – one of the author’s wonderful photographs, showing the ‘mad’ springtime behaviour of two brown hares in the UK

Perhaps unsurprisingly, one of my very first posts on Roaringwater Journal was this one – Two Hares. Written back in November, 2012, it tells of an encounter with two Irish Hares in Ballybane West. Irish Hares – Lepus timidus hibernicus – are peculiar to this country but closely related to Mountain Hares that are found in Scotland, Scandinavia and Northern Europe; they are said to be Ireland’s longest established indigenous species of mammal. They are probably outnumbered today in Ireland by the Brown Hare – Lepus europaeus – which is not indigenous: Brown Hares were brought to Britain by the Romans and then exported to Ireland to be hunted by the owners of large estates.

This new book has crept onto our shelves (it was a present from Finola) Brown Hares in the Derbyshire Dales, published by Vertebrate Publishing: it is beautifully illustrated with photographs by the author, Christine Gregory

The Irish Hare is a protected species under EU Directive 92/43 Annex V (see page 104), but, curiously it can be hunted and coursed at certain times of the year. On June 23 2016 (on the same day as the UK Brexit referendum) a private member’s bill was brought before Dáil Éireann by Maureen O’Sullivan to ban hare coursing in order to protect this ‘protected’ species. It was heavily defeated – most TDs voted in favour of hare coursing, including your own local TDs (bear that in mind when an election comes around again). Out of 164 TDs attending the debate only 20 voted in favour of a ban. The general argument by the coursing supporters was that coursing is “a regulated sustainable rural industry”. So economics apparently outweigh animal welfare. The whole debate is available online here.

Dean Wolstenholme – Greyhounds coursing a hare – c1800

In February 2013 I wrote another post which mentioned hares in Ireland: Hare Heaven.  This was more optimistic in tone, and was an opportunity to describe the wonderful Sherkin Island Marine Station, run by the indefatigable Matt Murphy. Doubtless hares will feature in future Roaringwater Journal posts and – perhaps – in future Dáil debates. I will hope for a better outcome next time around.

Two Hares

Two Hares ambling together in Ballybane West: grazing, ‘sharing the watch’…

The Irish Hare – Lepus timidus Hibernicus – sometimes confused with the Mountain Hare – Lepus timidus Scoticus – which is smaller, Scottish, and has a lighter, winter coat, is not an unusual sight for the careful watcher in West Cork. Sightings of groups of two or more are frequent enough, in fact, to cause us to question the old folklore that says that Hares are always solitary: I once saw eight Hares running in a cluster across the field next to Danny’s house. But the story goes that the female Hare escaped from the Ark and was drowned, so God gave the male Hare the power to bear children: country people recounted that the Hare is androgynous – even as recently as the twentieth century – and lives in complete isolation, without the need for a mate.

Hares walked our Earth a million years before humans did – and have changed very little in that time: a true archetype. This could explain why the Hare is such a central figure in so many mythologies: trickster, moongazer, mischief-maker… In one pan–African story, the Moon sends Hare, her divine messenger, down to earth to give mankind the gift of immortality. “Tell them,” she says, “that just as the Moon dies and rises again, so shall you.” But Hare, in the role of trickster buffoon, manages to get the message wrong, bestowing mortality instead and bringing death to the human world. The Moon is so angry, she beats Hare with a stick, splitting his lip – as it remains today.

I watch the pair: they are aware of me – but I’m no threat. Two West Cork fields lie between them and me… small fields, perhaps, but they know very well that they could vanish before I even made the gate.

When I first saw the movement I thought it was partridge: I made it out to be two female heads in the long grass. Then I realised – ears laid low, then up and turning. They are all to do with the head: those so defining ears; the nose; the liquid, fathomless eyes – never closed, even in sleep. All the senses, and always at the ready… And – if they had to take off – that confounding sense of dizziness that sends them in impossible zigzags – even doubling back – to confuse their far less intelligent pursuers. They will also leap – up to twelve feet in one bound – to avoid laying a scent.

But – if you can – look further into those eyes: the depth, the perfect attuning, the knowledge… These are not animals for the jug – these are creatures we are privileged to share the Earth’s gifts with: these are the Old Gods.