Sheela-na-gig

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on the summit of a hill is a stone-walled garden whose NW angle has a distinct batter and projects forward from the line of the garden.This section of masonry (3.80m E-W, 3.90m N-S, H 2.80m) is built with roughly coursed limestone blocks and appears to be part of a castle, probably a tower house (LA008-013001-) (JKAS 1909, Vol. VI, 68) which is said to have been destroyed in 1650. Sheela-na-Gig thought to have come from here (Guest 1936, 117) location not now known. In the Ordnance Survey Letters of Tipperary, John O’Donovan wrote ‘that there was another figure of a similar hideous character on the old Castle of Shane (LA008-013001-) in the Queen’s County – a building erected by the O’Mores of Leix about the beginning of the reign of Queen Elizabeth’ (O’Flanagan 1930, vol. 1, part 2, 121). However in the Ordnance Survey Letters of County Laois, O’Donovan wrote that he ‘had no time to go to Shane Hill when I was in the Parish, to ascertain whether any of the castle remains or not. I have been informed, however, by a creditworthy man, that no part of it exists’ (O’Flanagan 1933, 64).

The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Laois' (Dublin Stationery Office, 1995) compiled by P. David Sweetman, Olive Alcock and Bernie Moran. In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of upload/revision: 23 May 2012

References

Guest, E.M. 1936 Irish sheela na gigs in 1935. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 66, 107-29.

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1933 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the Queen's County, collected during progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1838. Typescript in 2 vols. Bray.