Begun from the initial collection of the Royal Irish Academy, Ireland’s National Museum of Archaeology is an astounding attempt to chronicle the people and civilizations that have landed on the shores of this small island since the Bronze Ages. Housed within a sprawling compound standing proud in academic regality, the museum boasts one of the finest collections of gold artifacts in Western Europe. Arabesque railings and pillars of ebony mimic the haunting funeral halls of old in the Prehistoric Ireland exhibit. The Treasury is a mark of remembrance for when Ireland was flooded by the light of knowledge and academia at a time when the rest of Europe was in the throes of the Dark Ages. Panels of oak overlaid in gold filigree and worked through with iron mark the Cross of Cong as way beyond its time in the level of precision and refinery present in its workmanship. Silverware and chalices as part of the Derrynaflan Hoard highlight the opulence and wealth enjoyed by the aristocracy of Ireland and the carefree mirth they partook in. Be warned however that you should remember to keep your lunch secure within you as you step into the Kingship and Sacrifice exhibition. Two petrified bodies cloaked in silt, hardened to form a casing form the centerpiece of the gallery which explores the cultural practices and lifestyles of our ancestors from centuries past. A trip to the National Museum is a dive into the complicated past of an island in the Atlantic, fingers outstretched to brush against the lives of our ancestors who walked upon this soil all those years ago.