First published in Irish in 1961, and in English in 1967, this work covers the subject of traditional wakes in Ireland. As well as eating, drinking, smoking a pipe and taking snuff, many other forms of entertainment were common in Irish wakes, to pass the long hours of the night or two nights of the wake. These included storytelling, singing, dancing, music, card-playing, riddling and rhyming, and feats of agility and strength, both inside the wake-house and in an adjoining field, before the funeral started the next day. The book also shows that Ireland, far from being different from other countries, was part of the general European (and world) pattern in holding prolonged and merry wakes.
- ISBN10 0853421455
- ISBN13 9780853421450
- Publish Date March 1967 (first published 1 March 1967)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 8 September 1994
- Publish Country IE
- Imprint The Mercier Press
- Format Paperback
- Pages 190
- Language English