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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Watchtower

Cruagh, County Dublin, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Watchtower, Cruagh, County Dublin, 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
Cruagh
County
Dublin
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
Indicated
Latest-edition OS map
Tower
Coordinates
53.25753, -6.30174
SMR number
DU025-003003-

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 1790 map "Composite: Ireland." (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

Historical maps covering this location

  • 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1799 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1811 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

Get directions ↗

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

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated in a graveyard (DU025-003005-) on a steep grass-covered knoll, off the Pine Forest Road. A cemetery watchtower built to prevent the robbery of freshly dug graves which consists of a two storey high cylindrical tower (ext. diam. 3.2m), with a parapet level marked by an offset. It is built of roughly coursed granite masonry. There is a lintelled doorway now blocked in the N. The interior is lit by narrow, square-headed opes. Within the graveyard are the remains of Cruagh church (DU023-003001-) and a roughly square-shaped granite font (DU025-003002-). In the 19th century a Rathdown type graveslab (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).

Compiled by: Geraldine Stout and Padraig Clancy

Revised upload on: 7 July 2018

References

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.

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

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.

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
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