Tomb - effigial (present location)

The National Monuments Service's description

Five partial funerary monuments were recovered from the River Nore during the archaeological excavations (01E0036) carried out in 2001 as part of the River Nore Drainage Scheme (Brady 2004, unpublished). These were found associated with the late medieval bridge (KK019-026070-), immediately N of the current John’s Bridge. Brady (ibid. 22) suggests that these monuments were deliberately defaced and dumped in the river by iconoclasts during the Reformation in the 1540s. The closest church is St Mary’s parish church (KK019-026115-) c. 100m to the W, with St John’s Priory (KK019-026068-) a little further, being c. 200m to the NE. Doyle and O’Meara (2004, 16-19) contend that the these monuments may have been seen as a convenient supply of stone, and were deliberately reused as part of the rubble needed to form a protective apron for the piers of the late medieval bridge.
An effigial tomb (overall dims. L 1m; Wth 0.59m; T 0.16m), described by Brady (ibid. 46) as an, ‘Incised effigial slab of limestone in two large pieces and one chip, showing an ecclesiastic with his hands in the orant position. The figure is tonsured, and is shown wearing an amice and chasuble. His hands are placed together across his stomach with the palms facing outwards. His head rests on a pillow with chevron decoration, and he is framed within a cusped ogee frame. The design is well and competently executed, and the surface is very well preserved. The slab is however fragmentary and the monk’s legs and feet are missing. It may have been fractured by the pile driving of Timber 2 during the 1760s. Date: fourteenth century’.
It is possible that another fragment (KK019-026432-), recovered from the vicinity by Doyle and O’Meara (2004, 13, 16), with incised decoration consisting of a partial shoe and folds of a garment, may belong to this effigial tomb.
This slab is currently on display in the Medieval Mile Museum, formerly St Mary’s parish church (KK019-026115-), Kilkenny.

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 17 January 2023

References

Doyle, I.W. and O'Meara, B. 2004 Medieval grave slabs recovered from the River Nore, St John’s Bridge, Kilkenny City. Old Kilkenny Review 56, 6-20.