Mia, eight, was helping her granny clear out the attic on Headfort Street on Saturday when she found what may be the most important piece of paper in the history of Kells. It's a yellowed slip, folded four times, that reads: "Book, one (1), illuminated. Lent to Dublin for safekeeping. To be returned when things calm down."
"Things have calmed down," Mia told reporters, of whom there was one. "It's been nearly four hundred years. I have to give my library books back in three weeks."
Mia took the slip to school on Monday, where her teacher made it the class project and the class drew a timeline in crayon. It stretched from the 1650s, when the Book left town to be kept safe from Cromwell's army, to the present day. It went around the classroom twice, out the door and down the corridor, and stopped at the hall because the caretaker said that was enough.
A Trinity College Dublin spokesperson responded within the hour, which locals say is a record. "We are aware of a document," the statement read. "We'd ask the young lady whether she's sure it isn't a photocopy, whether she has proof of address from the seventeenth century, and whether she'd like to book a timed-entry slot to discuss it further."
Mia's mother confirmed that Mia does not, in fact, have proof of address from the seventeenth century. "She has a library card and a Brownies badge," she said. "That's more paperwork than Trinity had when they took it."
Local historians are now checking the slip. One said it's "almost certainly not legally binding, but morally? It's a lot more binding than a gift shop."
Mia has since written to Trinity herself, in pencil, on lined paper:
"Dear Trinity, I found your slip. You can keep the bookmark. Please bring the book back, it is 69 km, my dad says you can do it in an hour if the M3 is good. From Mia (8), Kells. P.S. The fine is a lot by now but we will let you off."
Trinity has not yet replied, but sources say a gift shop tea towel featuring Mia's letter is already "in development."
Mia and the slip are invented. The 69 km is real, and so is the Book.