Church

The National Monuments Service's description

On a N-facing slope of rising ground in upland area with extensive views to N, and higher ground to S. There is a large deep quarry immediately to N of the graveyard (TS055-067002-) and a moated site (TS055-068----) 100m to the S. In the Civil Survey (1654-6) one of the glebeland acres is described as being situated to the N of the church of Lismalin (Simington 1931, vol.1, 123). Long (1896, 255) mentions that the church of Lismolin was attached to Hore Abbey. According to Butler (2006, 282) the church was in continuous use since the Reformation and was substantially remodelled or rebuilt in 1716. A rectangular church (ext. dims. 17.45m N-S; 7.65m E-W; wall T 0.75m) with a three-storey 19th-century bell-tower (ext. dims. N-S 5.05m; E-W 4.3m; wall T 1m) built onto the W end. It is located in the centre of a large rectangular graveyard which is enclosed by a high limestone wall. The E gable is composed of limestone rubble, roughly coursed with a base-batter at the NW angle. There is a later, broken-out window, in the centre of the gable. Most of the central section of the N wall has been reduced to wall-footing level and the W end appears to be 18th or 19th in date. The S wall is better preserved, though there are no features visible in either wall. A doorway (Wth 1.15m) in the centre of the W wall gives access from the church into the bell-tower. The main pointed, cut limestone doorway of the tower (Wth 1m) is visible in the centre of the S wall of tower. A 19th-century wall memorial is inserted into the external face of the S wall off centre to the W. A large medieval waterspout has been re-erected as a memorial in the SE quadrant of the graveyard. The majority of the headstones are located S of the church, there are none to the N and few to the W. The graveyard appears to have cleaned up by a recent graveyard restoration scheme. In the OS Letters the church is mistakenly described as a 19th-century church with nothing surviving of the original church (O'Flanagan 1930, vol.1, 152).

Compiled by: Jean Farrelly

Date of upload: 26 August 2011

References

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.

Butler, D.J. 2006 South Tipperary 1570-1841: religion, land and rivalry. Dublin. Four Courts Press.

Long, R. H. Rev. 1896 The old Cistercian abbeys in the Diocese of Cashel and Emly. Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaelogical Society 2, 250-56.