Church

The National Monuments Service's description

The medieval church of Creevagh na Temple (Cruagh) or An Chraobhach (Creevagh) stands in the parish of Cruagh (Creevagh), in the diocese of Dublin, in the barony of Newcastle and Uppercross. The 1654-6 Down Survey map of Newcastle Barony shows Creevagh Church standing on the N side of a stream annotated 'A branch of ye River of Daghen [Dogher]' [Dodder] (Hib. Reg.). Today the church stands in an upland area between two streams, one to the N and one to the S. The church is shown standing on the bank of the 'Dogher water' [Dodder] on the Down Survey parish map (NLI Ms 714). An inquisition dated 1620 (Inquis. Off. Rot. Can. Hib. Asservatum Rep., vol. i, No. 42), found that John Talbott, late of Radowne [Rathdown] in Co. Wicklow, gent., was seised in fee, amongst other lands, "of the town and lands of Tebrodan [Tibradden] al[ias] Killmainhambegg 60 acres, and town of Newetowne al[ias] Crevaghneclogh [Creevagh na Clogh] et Crevaghnetample [Creevagh na Temple], 100 acres".
The church was a rectory which belonged to the monastic estate of Kilmainham Priory (DU018-020286-) and became a parish church in the English lands ruled by the Harrold family known as 'Harrold's Country'. Between 1179 and 1275 it was listed as 'Ecclesia de Creuach' in the Crede Mihi (Gilbert 1897, 136). In 1540-1 the tithes of the rectory of 'Crowagh' in 'Harrolds countrey' were held by John Wyrall of Dublin for 20s., who was listed as a shoemaker, these tithes formerly belonged to the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem in Ireland at Kilmainham (White 1943, 88). In 1593, Queen Elizabeth granted a 21 year lease to John Lye; 'of the rectory of Crevaghe [Cruagh] in Harroldes country, co. Dublin (recites a lease No. 1591, for 21 years from the end of a lease, 8 July, xxx. Hen. VIII., from the prior of Kilmainham, to John Wyrall, of Dublin, shoemaker, for 51 years) (Nicholls 1994, 218). In 1615, the Royal Visitation of Dublin recorded that in the Deanery of Tany, there was the church of Creagh which was served by the curate Thomas Drakeshaw and the church building was described as ‘church repaired with no books’ (Ronan 1941, 31). According to Ronan (1941, 31); ‘The original name of the place was Craobhach, afterwards corrupted into Cruagh. "Dalua of Craoibech" was of St. Patrick's household (Vita Tripartita), and is also called “Molua, a pilgrim of the Bretons" and commemorated on January 7 as "Dalua Tigi Bretan" (Martyrol. Tallaght; Martyrol. Donegal). Craoibech and Tigh Bretan (Tibradden) hills are near each other. A cairn [DU025-023001-] stands on Tighbretan, and the celebrated cromlech [DU025-002----], called Mount Venus, stands at Craoibech which in an inquisition of 1620 was called "Creevaghnetemple" and "Crevaghneclog", alias Newtown. A cross-in-circle inscribed stone and large square basin with hole were found here’. Archbishop Bulkeley's Visitation of Dublin in 1630 recorded no details about the condition of the church building in Cruagh, stating in the footnotes that it had been extinct since 1615 (Ronan 1941, 74).
Situated in a graveyard (DU025-003005-) on a steep grass-covered knoll, off the Pine Forest Road. The partial remains of a church located in Cruagh graveyard on a steeply raised area, which has a retaining wall in the E. Only the E and W gable of the church survives (int. dims L 10.15m E-W). The E section of wall (L 6.7m N-S, wall T 0.95, H 1.3m) is built of roughly coursed granite boulders with an original window (Wth 0.7m). There is a buttress against the SE corner. The W section of wall is ivy covered (L 6m). To the N of these remains is a roughly square granite font (DU025-003002-). To the W is a post-medieval circular cemetery watchtower (DU025-003003-). In the 19th century an inscribed pillar stone or standing stone (DU025-003004-) showing concentric circles, was discovered here but it has since disappeared (O'Reilly 1901, 184-155; Crawford 1913, 167; Ó hÉailidhe 1957, 86). Church ruins described by Ní Mharcaigh (1997, 265) as; 'situated on a raised circular mound in a walled burial ground, consist of a length of the east wall 0.66m high and less than 8m long. A further angle of walling survives c. 10m west of the east wall. The foundations have been greatly disturbed by burials. In the graveyard is a granite font'.

See attached Down Survey Map of the Parish of Crevagh (Cruagh) showing Creevagh Church, Courtesy of the National Library of Ireland.

See attached Down Survey Map of the Barony of Newcastle showing Creevagh Church (Hib. Reg.)

NLI Ms 714 National Library of Ireland, The parish maps of the Down Survey for the county of Dublin, attested by William Petty in 1657, copied by Daniel O'Brien, 1786-1787.

Compiled by: Geraldine Stout and Padraig Clancy

Revised by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of revised upload: 21 February 2023

References

Ronan, M.V. 1941 Royal Visitation of Dublin, 1615. In Archivium Hibernicum 8, 1-55.

Ronan, M.V. 1941 Archbishop Bulkeley's Visitation of Dublin, 1630. Archivium Hibernicum 8, 56-98.

Ní Mharcaigh, M. 1997 The medieval parish churches of south-west County Dublin. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 97C, 245-96.

Nicholls, K.W. (ed.) 1994 The Irish fiants of the Tudor sovereigns during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Philip & Mary, and Elizabeth I, 4 vols. Dublin. Éamonn de Búrca for Edmund Burke Publisher.

Ó hÉailidhe, 1957 The Rathdown slabs. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 87, 75-88.

O'Reilly, P.J. 1901 The Christian sepulchral leacs and free-standing crosses of the Dublin half barony of Rathdown. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 31, 134-161, 248-9.

Gilbert, J.T. 1897 Crede Mihi: the most ancient register book of the archbishops of Dublin before the Reformation. Dublin.

Crawford, H.S. 1913 A descriptive list of early cross-slabs and pillars. (cont.) Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 43, 151-69, 261-5, 326-34.

Turner, K. 1983 If you seek monuments: a guide to the antiquities of the barony of Rathdown. Rathmichael Historical Society.

White, N.B. 1943 Extents of Irish monastic possessions, 1540-1541. Dublin. Irish Manuscripts Commission.

Hibernia Regnum: A set of 214 barony maps of Ireland dating to the period AD 1655-59. The original parish maps have been lost but the Hibernia Regnum maps are preserved in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris (Goblet 1932, v-x). Photographic facsimiles of these maps were published by the Ordnance Survey, Southampton in 1908.