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Children's burial ground in Gowlane (magunihy By.)

Children's burial ground

What is recorded here

Páirc na Cille in County Kerry remains a children's burial ground where unbaptized infants lay beneath low uninscribed stones. The rectangular raised area sits inside an old ecclesiastical enclosure, marked by an ogham stone in one corner. Local memory preserves the brutality and tenderness of that exclusion, turning a forgotten field into a chamber for grief rather than doctrine.
In a possible ecclesiastical enclosure (KE048-113001-), c. 10m inside the bank of the enclosure at S. A roughly rectangular raised area (14m N-S; 13m E-W; H 0.35m) containing low uninscribed stone grave-markers (H 0.2m) set intermittently throughout the area. In the 1940s it was recorded that unbaptized children were buried here and that the field was called 'Páirc na Cille' (Schools Manuscript, Co. Kerry), the name by which it is still known. There is an ogham stone (KE048-113003-) in the NW corner of the children's burial ground. (Dennehy 2001, 20-23) Compiled by: Elizabeth Byrne, Ursula Egan and Sheila Ronan, Archaeological Survey Unit, University College, Cork. Date of upload: 31 January 2011
A possible medieval children's burial ground within an ecclesiastical enclosure; significance relates to early Christian burial practices and monastic or lay communities in the region.

The monument record does not grant public access. Check the route and ask the landowner before entering private land.

What survives
Recorded monument

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