Church

The National Monuments Service's description

The townland name – Grange – suggests that it was once an out-farm for a religious institution and some of the land at least had belonged to the Cistercian abbey of Boyle (RO006-068005-)in the seventeenth century (Simington 1949, 58), but it may have been church land before that. It is situated at the outer edge of a shelf with rock outcrop on a N-facing slope. The church is a rectangular structure (int. dims 14.3m ENE-WSW; 6.1m WNW-SSE) whose walls (T 0.8m) barely survive (H c. 1m), apart from the featureless S wall (H 4m). It is situated at the W angle of a subrectangular graveyard (RO028-217004-) (dims c. 40m NW-SE; c. 31m NE-SW) defined by masonry walls (H 1-1.4m) but with a curved edge N-E which is on the perimeter of a subcircular grass-covered ecclesiastical enclosure (RO028-217001-) (int. dims 76m E-W; 70m N-S). This is defined by an earthen bank (Wth 5m; H 0.1-0.2m) ENE-E, a scarp down to the interior (H 0.5m) SE-S and a grass-covered stone spread (Wth 3m; H 0.3-0.5m) with some outer facing stones S-NW. The perimeter is damaged by quarries E-SE and NW-N. Field system (RO028-217005-) is attached to the SW. Archaeological testing (04E0304) c. 150m to the S (Read 2007e) and also (04E1019) c. 200m to the SW (Carey 2007) failed to produce any related material.

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 24 August 2010

References

Read, C. 2007e Grange. No archaeological significance. In I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 2004: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 378, No. 1460. Dublin. Wordwell

Simington, R.C. (ed.) 1949 Books of survey and distribution. County of Roscommon. Dublin. Stationery Office.

Carey, A. 2007 Grange: no archaeological significance. In I. Bennett (ed.), Excavations 2004: summary accounts of archaeological excavations in Ireland, 378,
No. 1461. Dublin. Wordwell