Cathedral

The National Monuments Service's description

Located at the S end of a N-S drumlin ridge. Around 1454 Andrew MacBradaigh, bishop of Tír Briúin 1445-55, settled on the church of St. Feidhlimidh at Kilmore as the cathedral for the diocese that would come to take its name from the new location. The existing parish church, which may be on an early site, was not enlarged or enhanced as a result of its new status, except that the Romanesque doorway from Trinity Island (CV020-077001-) was added onto its S wall where it remained until it was placed at the entrance to the vestry (CV025-071002-) of the nearby present Church of Ireland Cathedral of Kilmore c. 1860. St. Feidhlimidh’s church may have been chosen rather than any church associated with St. Maodhóg who had been the principal saint of Tír Briúin because Feilim was particularly venerated by the O’Reilly clan (Ó Riain 2011, 312-3), and is now the recognised patron of the diocese in both the Roman Catholic and Church of Ireland traditions. (Kelly 2017, 128-31)
Thomas Mogine was the first Protestant bishop of Kilmore and he was succeeded by William Bedell in 1629. Moigne seems to have built a house at Kilmore while refurbishing the Cathedral church in the 1620s when he reported that ‘The Cathedral church is newly built and repaired…A fair stone house built at Kilmore by the now bishop, which together with the building of other outhouses and of seats in the chancel and body of the church of Kilmore had cost £600’ (ibid. 251). The surviving structure probably dates to the thirteenth century and there are references to the church of Kilmore in 1242 and 1382, and possibly in 885 (AFM) (Davies 1948, 99). The cathedral was described as having a roof of wood and sods in 1646 (ibid. 118). It comprises a rectangular building (ext. dims c. 26m E-W; c. 8m N-S) built of roughly coursed limestone, with a batter at base of the E gable and dressed quoinstones at the SE angle as the only visible evidence of its medieval fabric. The cathedral appears to have been restored, together with the Bishop's Palace (CV025-073----) which adjoins its W wall, in the period following the Williamite wars. It was abandoned for worship when the new cathedral was built c. 120m to the S. It now serves as a hall and the present wooden gothic windows may have been inserted at the time of its change of use. The two storey structure at its W end probably incorporates part of the bishop’s palace (CV025-073----), and it is known that the cathedral communicated directly with the palace (King 1892, 10).

The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Cavan' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1995). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.

See the attached view from S

Date of upload: 22 December 2008
Amended: 8 February 2021

References

King, Sir Charles S. 1892 Henry’s Upper Lough Erne in 1739. Dublin, William McGee

Kelly, L. 2017 The Diocese of Kilmore c. 1100-1800. Dublin, Columba Press

Ó Riain, P. 2011 A dictionary of Irish Saints. Dublin. Four Courts Press.

Davies, O. 1948 The churches of county Cavan. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 78, 73-118.

AFM - Annals of the kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters from the earliest period to the year 1616, ed. and trans. John O'Donovan (7 vols., Dublin, 1851; reprint New York, 1966)