The National Science and Ecclesiology Museum at Maynooth is a

science museum A science museum is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in mu ...

and museum of ecclesiology, located on the joint campus of St Patrick's College, Maynooth and

Maynooth University The National University of Ireland, Maynooth (NUIM; ga, Ollscoil na hÉireann Mhá Nuad), commonly known as Maynooth University (MU), is a constituent university of the National University of Ireland in Maynooth, County Kildare, Ireland. It ...

(the southern campus of the university),

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. It is an institution of the college, having begun as an ecclesiological museum. The museum holds various artefacts from the history of science in Ireland (the largest such collection open to the public in Ireland), a large collection of scientific equipment used by Nicholas Callan, and one of two death masks of Irish political leader

Daniel O'Connell Daniel O'Connell (I) ( ga, Dónall Ó Conaill; 6 August 1775 – 15 May 1847), hailed in his time as The Liberator, was the acknowledged political leader of Ireland's Roman Catholic majority in the first half of the 19th century. His mobilizat ...

. The museum was founded in 1934 as the Museum of Ecclesiology but has become more focused on science, partially due to Maynooth's association with Callan.

History

The museum was founded in 1934 as the Museum of Ecclesiology in what was then simply St. Patrick's College, with Dr. William Moran, Professor of Dogmatic Theology, as its first curator. After Moran resigned in 1942, the Very Rev. Dr. Patrick J McLaughlin (then Professor of Experimental Physics and later Vice-President of the College) was appointed as curator. Moran oversaw the transferral of much of Callan's apparatus, which are now on display, into the museum, a process that was completed by his successor, Rev. Dr. Michael Casey.

Collection

The museum has two main collections: a collection of scientific instruments associated with Nicholas Callan and a collection of ecclesiastical artifacts. The Callan collection is significant because it includes the first induction coil, invented by Callan in 1836. There are a number of his other

induction coil An induction coil or "spark coil" (archaically known as an inductorium or Ruhmkorff coil after Heinrich Rühmkorff) is a type of electrical transformer used to produce high-voltage pulses from a low-voltage direct current (DC) supply. p.98 To ...

s, including his giant induction coil (pictured) which he created in 1845, which produced 600,000 volts. There are two coils in this invention, the primary coil and the secondary coil. Over twenty miles of wires in the induction coil were hand-insulated with bees wax. Callan used

seminarians A seminary, school of theology, theological seminary, or divinity school is an educational institution for educating students (sometimes called ''seminarians'') in scripture, theology, generally to prepare them for ordination to serve as clergy, ...

holding hands touching the coil to measure the strength of the current. The current passed through the seminarians and Callan judged its strength by the height the seminarians jumped. He worked with a local blacksmith to create the large

electromagnet An electromagnet is a type of magnet in which the magnetic field is produced by an electric current. Electromagnets usually consist of wire wound into a coil. A current through the wire creates a magnetic field which is concentrated in the ...

(pictured) in 1836. The collection contains a number of documents and books, including a royal patent for galvanization. There is also a large holding of nineteenth century batteries in the museum. Other items of note in the collection include a Norremberg

polariscope A polarimeter is a scientific instrument used to measure the angle of rotation caused by passing polarized light through an optically active substance.Marie Antoinette Marie Antoinette Josèphe Jeanne (; ; née Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was the last queen of France before the French Revolution. She was born an archduchess of Austria, and was the penultimate child a ...

. They include an old Ecce Homo (12C) and a leaf of an ivory diptych (14C, Northern France). In addition there are a number of altar stones. Also of historical note is a statue of Jesus that was defaced by Cromwellian soldiers during the Siege of Drogheda in 1649. Navigation instruments are also to be found in the museum, namely several octants and

sextant A sextant is a doubly reflecting navigation instrument that measures the angular distance between two visible objects. The primary use of a sextant is to measure the angle between an astronomical object and the horizon for the purposes of celes ...

s which were the life blood of navigation on the seas. These instruments are used to fix the position of a ship on the ocean. The octant was a hand-held instrument, with mirrors, used to look at the line of the horizon, take the measurements from the marked scale, and use sea charts to calculate your position. The year 1731 saw the Hadley octant improved in design to become the forerunner of the modern sextant. The octant inscribed with the name 'Yeates' in the collection appears to refer to a George Yeates, active from 1826-1858.

Access

The museum opens several days a week out of academic term, and by appointment from October to May.

History

Collection

Access

References

Further reading