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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Ecclesiastical enclosure

Killeany, County Clare, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Ecclesiastical enclosure, Killeany, County Clare, with a pin at the register's coordinates
Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915), covering this location. Courtesy of the National Library of Scotland. The pin is ours, placed from the register's coordinates.

The record

Townland
Killeany
County
Clare
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Not indicated
Latest-edition OS map
Indicated (1916)
Coordinates
53.05118, -9.24712
SMR number
CL005-108002-

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

4 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1753 map "Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae" (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

Historical maps covering this location

  • 1753 · Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1869 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

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This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗

The National Monuments Service's description

On a low rocky spur projecting W from higher ridge to NE and skirted to W by a small, fast-flowing stream, within a field system (CL005-108001-). There is improved pasture to N and S. A church (CL005-108003-) and graveyard (CL005-108004-) are indicated and named ‘Killeany Church (in ruins) Graveyard’ on the 1842 and 1916 eds. of the OS 6-inch maps and the stream running along its W side is named ‘Owentoberlea’. The site is reputed to have been founded by St. Enda ‘the evangelizer of Aran’ (Westropp 1900, 108).

An ecclesiastical enclosure (c. 120m E-W; 90m N-S), only traceable from E to SW and at NW, defined by an internally and externally faced wall (Wth c. 1.4m; max. int. H 0.9m; max. ext. H 1m) from E to SE and a bank from SE to SW. There is an entrance gap (Wth 1.7m) at SSW flanked by two large transverse slabs. The stream skirting the site to the W may have delimited it from SW to NW and a modern wall running on the line of a low cliff appears to run on the line of it at N.

A ruined medieval church (CL005-108003-) is in the SE sector. The church is surrounded by a rectangular graveyard (CL005-108004-) that sits over the site of (and removed all trace of) the enclosure from E to SE. A penitential station (CL005-108005-) and cursing stones (CL005-108008-) sit on the approximate line of the enclosure within the E sector of the graveyard. A house of indeterminate date (CL005-108006-) and a kiln (CL005-108007-) are located in the N sector of the enclosure.

Compiled by: Mary Tunney and Ros Ó Maoldúin

Date of upload: 15 March 2023

References

Westropp, T.J. 1900-02 The churches of Co. Clare and the origin of the ecclesiastical divisions in that county. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, Series 3, vol. 6, 100-180.

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Sites and Monuments Record data: National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Record text is reproduced unchanged. National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
All Ecclesiastical enclosure in Clare All County Clare records All Ireland Heritage registers Historical markers (US)National Register of Historic Places (US)
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