Graveyard

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on a S facing slope of rising ground in an upland area with a nearby motte (TN025-037----) to the W. Listed in the ecclesiastical taxation of the Diocese of Killaloe in 1302 (Cal. doc. Ire., 301). The Royal Visitation of 1615 described the building as 'a good church, a good chancell' (Murphy 1914, 219). All that survives of the church (TN025-038001-) is a small portion of the S wall in the centre of a large D-shaped graveyard (approx. dims. 70m N-S x 75m E-W) enclosed by a post-1700 stone wall with entrance gate and stone stile in centre of S wall. The graveyard wall incorporates fragments of the medieval church that have been reused in the building of this wall in the post-1700 period. The graveyard contains post-1700 memorials and is still in use to this day. A sheela-na-gig (TN025-038002) discovered by local men in 1932 in the NE corner of the church is now housed in the National Museum (Raftery 1969, 92-3). A graveslab possible of medieval date was described by Gleeson (1951, 98) as following; 'close to the east end of the south wall is a tombstone (broken) of the Uí Briain family partly in black letter. It is inscribed "Hic jacet Donatus Dermitius als Bryn de Gortmore'. The location of this graveslab within the graveyard could not be identified.

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly and Caimin O'Brien

Revised by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of revised upload: 21 February 2020

References

Raftery, J. 1969 A sheela-na-gig from Burgesbeg, Co. Tipperary. North Munster Antiquarian Journal 12, 92-3.

Cal. doc. Ire. - Calendar of documents relating to Ireland 1171-1307, ed. H.S. Sweetman (5 vols., London, 1875-86).

Gleeson, D.F. 1951-2 Churches in the deanery of Ormond. North Munster Antiquarian Journal 6, 96-107, 130-35.

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1930 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the county of Tipperary collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1840. Bray.