Cross

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated in the SW corner of the ‘Saint’s graveyard’ (CL029-009030-) on Inis Cealtra. A cross-base (L 0.81m; Wth 1.27m; H 0.27m) trapezoidal in shape and split through the socket into two pieces. Only the top few centimetres are shaped which according to Okasha and Forsyth (2001, 48) suggests that it was intended to be embedded in the ground. The upper surface is dressed with a groove forming a moulding around the perimeter and the SW corner has been chamfered. A worn inscription, in Irish, in one horizontal line is set along the W (longest) side and reads: ‘+ILAD IDECHENBOIR’ (+Tomb of the ten persons). The cross-base stands NE of the centre of an almost square area (ext. L 2.4m N-S; Wth 2.3m) defined by a low kerb of thin upright stones. Some packing stones and other stones protruding from the ground may be all that remains of what Macalister (1916-17, 147) described as ‘what seems to be a low carn, covered with earth, and grass-grown’. The identity of the people buried here is not known. Iniscealtra is a national monument in state care, no. 5. (Macalister 1916-17, 146-7; Okasha and Forsyth 2001, 47-50)

Compiled by: Mary Tunney

Date of upload: 29 September 2015

References

Macalister, R.A.S 1916-17 The history and antiquities of Inis Cealtra. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, 33C, 93-174.

Macalister, R.A.S. 1906 The inscriptions of Iniscaltra, Lough Derg, County Galway. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries 36, 303-10.

Okasha, E. and Forsyth, K. 2001 Early Christian inscriptions of Munster: a corpus of the inscribed stones. Cork University Press.