What is recorded here

Balleeghan Friary Graveyard holds the forgotten dead beside ivy-strangled granite on the Lough Swilly shore, a place where O'Donnell built for Franciscan Third Order Regular monks in the later 15th century before James Fullerton claimed it in 1603. Testing found no buried features, yet the absence does not erase the shape of lives that once walked this small strip of Donegal earth. The stones still stand like a sentence broken mid-word, waiting for someone to remember what the silence removed.

Balleeghan Friary: Founded by O'Donnell for the Franciscan Third Order Regular probably in the later 15th century. The site was subsequently granted to James Fullerton in 1603(Gwynn and Hadcock 1970, 268). The ivy-covered ruins stand close to the E shore of Lough Swilly and are built of granite blocks and slate pinnings with sandstone and greenstone dressings. The above description was derived from the 'Archaeological Survey of County Donegal. A description of the field antiquities of the County from the Mesolithic Period to the 17th century.' Compiled by: Brian Lacey with Eamon Cody, Claire Cotter, Judy Cuppage, Noel Dunne, Vincent Hurley, Celie O'Rahilly, Paul Walsh and Seán Ó Nualláin (Lifford: Donegal County Council, 1983). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated. Date of upload: 22 September 2008 No archaeological features Excavation Licence No. 03E0672 NGR 1248/8353 Archaeological testing carried out by Billy Quinn in the vicinity of the friary and graveyard identified no archaeological features.

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