The Saturday Market at St Nicholas’ Collegiate Church is a Galway tradition that goes back some 800 years. It was a fruit and vegetable market which expanded greatly at this time of the year when the farmers brought in large numbers of turkeys and geese for sale.
From very early morning, a procession of donkeys would set out, nose to tail, for the market. There, the donkeys were unharnessed and tethered to a wheel, the shafts were let down and the goods to be sold were displayed on the sloping cart. Vendors came from many more prosperous areas and their wares were a source of envy to those who lived in the congested strip along the coast. Eggs in big wicker baskets with hinged lids, ducks, hens and chickens, wooden kegs of buttermilk, home-churned butter laid in rolls on cabbage leaves, cabbages, onions, sometimes geese, hand-knitted socks — all sold briskly to people of the town. At Christmas time, this market would be much bigger than normal and there might be two or three extra market days where the emphasis would be on selling turkeys or geese. On these days, the activity would extend into adjoining streets.
There was a special lively atmosphere about the Christmas market, a beehive of activity with cackling geese, turkeys going “gobble, gobble, gobble”, Christmas trees and holly, hustle and bustle, thousands of people, producers and bargain hunters, town meeting country. Above all, there was haggling and bargaining. At one stage, the corporation brought in a scale for weighing the turkeys but it was largely ignored as people preferred to haggle. The horses, donkeys and carts, with their quotas of turkeys and geese, took their places in orderly fashion, each cart backed up against the footpath leaving ample room for the traffic to pass. Prices for the birds usually started high, but often got cheaper as the day wore on. You must remember these birds were all alive, so the customer had to kill it and pluck it as well as cooking it.
The biggest market was the one about a week before Christmas Day. People would stock up on potatoes, carrots and cauliflower for the occasion. Few of the ‘stallholders’ could afford to buy anything but the bare essentials. When they had sold everything, the money was instantly spent on food supplies for the following weeks, tea, sugar, flour, salt, maybe a few sweets for the children who had been left at home. Then, most of them had a cup of tea in a cottage near the market and the long trek home began. Some might have a pint in a local pub. There was one man from Barna who usually hitched his donkey to a pole outside Joe Reidy’s pub while he had a few drinks. When he emerged, he sat up on the cart and set off for home, but invariably fell asleep. Happily, the donkey knew the way home and always delivered him safely.
It was a wonderful tradition, Galway at its most Christmassy and not a Christmas light or decoration to be seen. Shopkeepers in the town also said it was the best business day of the year.
Things began to change with the advent of motorised transport and gradually cars and vans began to mix with the donkeys and carts. New stalls began to arrive and new smells too as people began to cook sausages, doughnuts, crepes and Chinese vegetable stews there. Today, it is a cosmopolitan market with all kinds of exotic foods available in addition to the traditional vegetables and potatoes.
We have two images for you today, the first was taken c1890 at the church railings. The second shows the beginnings of change as some stallholders now have cars or vans, and the traffic is making its way slowly through the throng.
As it is Christmas, we thought to finish with an evocative poem entitled 'Christmas Time' written by the late Jimmy Parslow Snr.
I remember Christmas when I was a young lad
I remember the good and the bad times we had.
Washed and scrubbed from toe to crown
Our good clothes on, we could go down town.
Down to Glynns to look at the toys
Dolls for girls and trains for boys.
Write to Santa, we would be told
Warned we would get nothing if we were bold.
We’d write for a bike or a Meccano set
That we knew in our heart we would not get
But we were young and we did not know
Dad had no work and funds were low.
But we were happy with our lot,
We thanked God and Santa for what we got.
Kids today do not realise
They don’t even mind their brand new toys.
But one thing that rich and poor do share
It is Christmas morn, Christ is here.
Give praise to God, our saviour's here
Give glory to God in the highest and peace to all people on earth.
