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The claddagh friendship ring in Irish legend

The origins of today’s Irish friendship rings can be placed back to a ring produced by the goldsmith Richard Joyce who lived in the town of Claddagh overlooking Galway Bay around the year 1700. There are several legends how Joyce came upon the idea.

One legend has him being captured by Algerian pirates and learning how to make these rings from a Moslem goldsmith. Finally pressure from the King of England secures his release. His employer offers him his daughter in marriage but Joyce declines and returns to Ireland bringing the secret of making these rings with him.

Another legend traces the origins of this ring to a Spanish connection and we know that similar kinds of rings were really made in Spain.

Although such legends are entertaining, we have to recognize that friendship rings date back to at least fifteen hundred years before Joyce began his business. A form of jewelry known as the faith ring was popular in Roman times and this popularity continued into the medieval period. The twin hands design on these rings served to symbolize faith.

Although we cannot be sure from where Joyce got his ideas, he certainly played an important part in raising the profile of friendship rings. Today the more ancient friendship ring wearing tradition is only remembered by the historians and the term claddagh friendship ring has brought this little town in Western Ireland international fame.

After Joyce ceased making claddagh rings in the early eighteenth century interest waned, but it was revived mid-century by other jewelers in the county of Galway. From the mid-nineteenth century the rings manufacture was mechanized. The giving of claddagh friendship rings to Queen Victoria, and later to her son King Edward and his wife Queen Alexandra, aroused additional interest in the wearing of this distinctive item of Irish jewelry.

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