Church

The National Monuments Service's description

On the NW side of an irregularly shaped graveyard (GA123-021001-) in relatively flat but rough scrubland, c. 90m to the SE of the Beagh River. On inspection in August 1982 this otherwise well-preserved rectangular medieval church, aligned E-W, was densely overgrown. Two building phases were evident. The W gable and the N and S side-walls of the original building (L >11m; Wth 5.5m) survived along with a broken single-light window and the original doorway, both in the S wall. The latter was constructed of finely dressed jambs chamfered externally and internally but the original head had been replaced by a flat lintel. The masonry of this building phase consisted of well-coursed limestone blocks and finely dressed alternating quoins, all of which suggested a 15th/16th century date. The original E gable was subsequently demolished when the church was extended 6.35m to the E. The stonework of the extension was distinguishable by its smaller size. The single-light window with a triangular head in the E gable and the crude ogee-headed example in the extended portion of the S wall suggested a late 16th/early 17th century for the second phase of construction. At the W end of the church, immediately to the W of the doorway, the foundations of a later internal dividing wall were visible. This and the two external buttresses on the S wall probably also dated from the later period. In the early 1990s the church was cleaned up and re-pointed as part of a FÁS scheme; the repair of the gap in the N wall and the addition of a new buttress to support the W gable were also part of works carried out. (O’Flanagan 1927, Vol. 2, 495-8; Topgr. Files, NMI).

Compiled by: Galway Archaeological Survey, UCG

Date of upload: 24 January 2020

References

Topographical Files, National Museum of Ireland. Dublin.

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1927 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the county of Galway collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1839. Typescript in 3 vols. Bray.