Cross - High cross

The National Monuments Service's description

The cross stands in a graveyard (KD029-011004-) to the N of a 19th-century church. Of granite, this tall, slightly tapering, ringed cross (H 3.4m; Wth across arms 1.4m; shaft H 2.15; Wth 0.42-0.49m; T 0.33-0.35m) stands on deeply buried rectangular base. The upper shaft and the E side of the S arm are damaged. The W face has a large central boss surrounded by a low rounded moulding and the ring on both faces is banded by a double half-roll moulding. It is probably pre-1200 in date. A secondary inscription in Roman capitals on the W face reads (anticlockwise); AMEN/ NO(r) THE 9 ERECTED IN 16/89/BY/ AM WALL/ IHS (King, H. 1999 Excavations at the North Cross, Ballymore Eustace, Co. Kildare. Unpublished report, National Monuments Service, Dublin), and commemorates its re-erection in 1689. The cross was leaning badly, and in 1999 it was taken down and re-erected securely, the work being informed and facilitated by a small scale archaeological excavation around the base (Licence No. 99E0143; King, op. cit.). The deeply buried base consists of a large granite boulder, worked to create a stepped pyramidal shape on its upper surface. It is crudely cut, and the steps are of uneven height. The lower part of the stone is unworked, and the eastern side is steeply concave. The base was sitting on the undisturbed natural and was propped on the east by a number of stones overlain in places by mortar. The cross shaft was found to have no tenon and sat loosely in the base’s mortice to a depth of c. 0.3m. The mortice was, however, over double that depth but bellied inwards at c. 0.3-0.35m below the upper surface, resulting in a narrowing which did not permit the shaft to be seated securely in position. The gap between the shaft and the mortice had allowed an old iron key, probably for the church door, to slip down into the bottom of the mortice, which was filled up with soil, dead leaves and water. Excavation was confined to the area immediately around the base so that no stratified burials would be disturbed, although a number of cuts for burials were recorded. The lack of significant stratigraphy or any great depth of burial suggested that this area of the graveyard had not been extensively used. The finding of two sherds of medieval pottery, slag, a bronze binding strip and a small quantity of animal bone suggested some medieval occupation activity in the area before its use as a burial-ground. (Manning 1998, 112; King 2004)

Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy

Date of upload: 30 August 2013

References

Manning, C. 1998a Miscellanea: The inscription on the North Cross at Ballymore Eustace, Co. Kildare, Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries 128, 112

Harbison, P. 1992 The high crosses of Ireland: an iconographical and photographic survey, 3 vols. Dublin. Royal Irish Academy. Bonn. Dr. Rudolf Habelt GMBH.

King, H. 2004 Excavation at the north cross, Ballymore Eustace, Co. Kidare. In C. Hourihane (ed.) Irish art historical studies in honour of Peter Harbison. Dublin. Four Courts Press, 165-74.