Cross-slab

The National Monuments Service's description

On raised ground at the base of a hill which rises to the S-SE, in rolling pasture overlooking a broad plain from NW-N. The high cross is on a hillock where there are a number of 18th and 19th century headstones. The land drops away steeply immediately S of this hillock to a small valley with St. Nicholas’s holy well (KK030-008007-) c. 10m to the S in this valley. The land rises again immediately S of this, on which rise there are the remains of a church (KK030-008003-). All these monuments are enclosed within the graveyard (KK030-008010-). According to Carrigan (1905, vol. 4, 311-2) a monastery here was founded by St. Gobán Fionn early in the 7th century whose feast day is celebrated on the 6th of December. In the Annals of the Four Masters the obit of an abbot, Domhnall son of Niall is given in 1004 (Edwards 1990, 41). Of the monastic site only a high cross (KK030-008004-), two cross-slabs (KK030-008005-; KK030-008011-), a stone cross (KK030-008013-), the remains of a church (KK030-008003-) and two bullaun stones (KK030-008006-; KK030-008008-) are currently visible at the location.
The cross-slab is currently located 3.8m NNW of the high cross, where it has been fixed, on its side, with metal straps to a low wall. A roughly rectangular slab (dims. 1.56m x 0.56m; T at top 0.145m; T at base 0.09m) with a rounded top. The decoration, on the smooth flat surface, is described by Carrigan (1905, vol. 4, 314) as, ‘an irregularly shaped panel in two incised lines embracing a Latin cross, which terminates in a triangular-shaped base enclosing a triquetra. It has two incised Irish inscriptions, one of which, under the left arm of the cross, commences towards the base, continues upwards parallel to the shaft, and is a follows: ÓR AR ANMAINN AEDAIN that is: A prayer for the soil of Aedhán. The other inscription runs across the top of the slab, over the cross, and is: OR AR ANMIN AEDAEN that is: A prayer for the soul of Aedhán’.

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 2 August 2017

References

Carrigan, Rev. W. 1905 (Reprint 1981) The history and antiquities of the diocese of Ossory, 4 vols. Kilkenny. Roberts Books and Wellbrook Press.

Edwards, N. 1990 Some crosses of County Kilkenny. In W. Nolan and K. Whelan (eds) Kilkenny: history and society. Dublin. Geography Publications.