Church (in Ruins)

In pasture within a graveyard (LF023-057002-). In 1406 Charles Maccarmuyc was assigned the 'rectories’ of Taghshinny and Taghsheenod (LF023-097----) (Cal. papal letters 1904, vol. 6, 86) and in 1427 Carbricus Y [F]ergail a priest in the diocese of Ardagh held the 'perpetual vicarage’ (ibid. vol. 7, 571). In 1542 the rectory was leased to Walter Tirrell of Dublin (Nicholls 1994, vol. 1, 38). The church is depicted on an early 17th-century map of Moydow barony (BL, Cotton MS Augustus I.ii.28) and it is recorded on the terrier of the Down Survey (1655-6) map of Taghsheenod parish as the 'Ruined Church on the Gleabe Land' (NLI, MS 719). This late-medieval, ivy-covered parish church (ext. dims. c. 18.2m E-W; c. 8.3m N-S; wall T 0.9m) is constructed of rubble limestone with alternating long and short undressed quoins. The doorway is at the W end of the N wall. Only its lower chamfered jambstones, punch dressed with drafted margins, survive in situ. A limestone two-light ogee-headed window with decorated spandrels is visible in the E gable and there is a narrow single-light window in the S end of the W wall. Bar-holes for an iron grill are visible in the jambs of the latter window. The remains of a single-light window at first-floor level in the centre of the W gable and beam-holes on its internal face suggest the former presence of a two-storey priest's residence, or less likely a gallery, at the W end of the church. Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien Date of upload: 5 June 2013