IN IRELAND IN THE 1800’S it seems that there were still many of these ‘Round Towers’ scattered over the Island, but no one seemed to know the origin or purpose of these structures which showed so much skill and architecture knowledge and skill. In the 1800’s knowledge of the far east was almost unknown except there was no accounting for the contrast of ‘The Ireland that was’ and ‘The Ireland that is’, which has sunk almost to the level of Barbarianism. Our Author as a young man was very curious as to why this land covered with these structures showing such knowledge could have sunk so far, why was this knowledge stopped so suddenly and for ever?
Our Author then began the study of the writings of every traveller and he noticed that one such as Bishop Pococke coming back to Ireland had recorded the amazing conformity between the Ancient Irish and the Ancient Egyptian and of course our young Author was very curious.
As a boy young O’Brien had seen the ruins of some, and the complete as yet, of some of these famous ‘Round Towers’. He had read that some were in eastern lands and that they had something to do with public worship, and he wondered: ‘Were these particular forms of belief carried from the east to the west in a type of kindred religious belief. As a young Student he seemed to have been confident that an earlier origin would explain the mysteries of the ‘Round Towers of Ireland