Love, betrayal, revenge. With gunpowder, costume, music and fire, Athenry, Co Galway, intends to stir up such passion at its medieval festival later this week.
The specific historical event was the sacking of the walled town in 1504 by Gearoid Mor Mac Gearailt, the eighth earl of Kildare, and the fate that befell him, his son, Gearoid Og, and grandson, Silken Thomas. Gearoid Mor was a medieval mover and shaker, whose personal domain extended across Dublin, Kildare, Laois and Offaly.
His influence was bolstered by powerful family connections, not least the arranged marriage of his daughter, Eustacia, to Ulick de Burgo, Earl of Clanricard in Connacht. Eustacia had other ideas, however.
She loved one Malachy O'Kennedy, and ran off with him, thus prompting the defeat of de Burgo's army by Gearoid Mor at the battle of Knockdoe.
The open-air pageant next Sunday will include a full cast from the town, using the ancient walls, battlements and castle as a backdrop. The evening's spectacle will culminate in a theatre of fire.
Other highlights of this year's festival will include street performances, medieval music, a craft "fayre" and the "magical mix of singing, drumming, chanting and horseplay" presented by the Armagh Rhymers.
The Athenry medieval festival is now in its sixth year, and it starts with an open-air performance in the town square by The Conquerors on Thursday night. The programme includes some pre-festival events, including seven-a-side hurling teams from five parishes slugging it out at the Christy Kelly Memorial Tournament, workshops for children in puppetry, animation and gymnastics, and a poetry reading and music tomorrow night with Pat O'Brien and the Athenry-based medieval group, Cairde.
Over in Headford, 65 students from Presentation College and their teacher released a compact disc yesterday which is being sold to raise funds for the premature baby unit in University College Hospital, Galway. Known as the Pachelbel Patchwork group, they are said to have "stunned" audiences with their five-minute musical performance, devised by the college music teacher, Ms Mairead Berrill.
Six music styles are represented: classical, folk, jazz, pop, rock, Irish and "Irish rock". They recently took the All-Ireland award at this year's ASTI celebration of music in schools and secured £1,000 in sponsorship from the teachers' union to record the piece. The CD will be on sale in outlets in Headford, and in Flanagan's pharmacies in Galway and Ballinasloe.