by the Academy in 1839. During this period Petrie was himself the editor of two popular antiquarian magazines, the Dublin Penny Journal and, later, the Irish Penny Journal. Another major contribution of Petrie's to Irish culture was the collection of Irish traditional airs and melodies which he published in 1855 as The Petrie Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland. The first commercial recording of Petrie's collection was The Petrie Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland (the 1855 Edition of 147 Airs & the 1882 Edition of 40 Airs) [2007, 8-cd set, Trigon TRD 1526, 187 tracks] arranged and performed by Irish pianist J.J. Sheridan. William Stokes's contemporary biography includes detailed accounts of Petrie's working methods in his collecting of traditional music: "The song having been given, O'Curry wrote the Irish words, when Petrie's work began. The singer recommenced, stopping at a signal from him at every two or three bars of the melody to permit the writing of the notes, and often repeating the passage until it was correctly taken down ..." As an artist, his favourite medium was watercolour which, due to the prejudices of the age, was considered inferior to oil painting. Nonetheless, he can be considered one of the finest Irish Romantic painters of his era. Some of his best work is in the collections of the National Gallery of Ireland, such as his watercolour painting Gougane Barra Lake with the Hermitage of St Finbarr, Co. Cork (1831). He was awarded the Royal Irish Academy's prestigious Cunningham Medal three times: firstly in 1831 for his essay on the round towers, secondly in 1834 for the essay (now lost) on Irish military architecture, and thirdly in 1839 for his essay on the antiquities of Tara Hill. Worksincomplete, only larger works listedMusic , uncompleted fragment published posthumously Illustrations Antiquarian works Also as , unpublished, won a gold medal from the Royal Irish Academy, see References Sources Cooper, David. The Petrie Collection of the Ancient Music of Ireland. Cork University Press, 2002 Crooke, Elizabeth. Politics, Archaeology and the Creation of a National Museum of Ireland: An Expression of National Life''. Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 2001. External links Dublin University Magazine 1839 , a painting engraved by J Rogers for Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1833 with a poetical illustration by Letitia Elizabeth Landon. 1790 births 1866 deaths 19th-century Irish painters Irish male painters George Petrie Irish art historians