Cooly Graveyard

Graveyard arranged on rectangular plan c. 1700 with collection of inscribed eighteenth and nineteenth century stone gravemarkers (earliest dated 1702), together with uninscribed late-post medieval stone gravemarkers. Site bounded by random rubble stone walls with flat stone coping. Entered from west through square plan random rubble stone piers, with rendered pyramidal coping and strap-iron double gates. Random rubble steps forming stile over wall to south of gateway. Graveyard contains remains of two early churches and a single chambered mortuary or skull house with a corbelled stone roof. Tall wheeled cross, Cooly Cross, sited outside of entrance to graveyard.

An early ecclesiastical site with a modern enclosing wall. Although a site primarily of archaeological interest with the remains of two churches, a mortuary house and a high cross, the variety of gravemarkers from uninscribed markers to eighteenth and nineteenth century inscribed headstones and table tombs are an important social record of the region and give a good sense of the changing burial customs. The early ecclesiastical site here consists of a modern subrectangular graveyard inside of which are a number of earlier features. To the west outside the entrance to the graveyard (DG021-008001-) is a tall, plain, ringed high-cross (DG021-008005-). Inside the graveyard are the remains of two churches (DG021-008002/003-) and a mortuary house or tomb shrine (DG021-008004-). One of the churches served as a medieval parish church, the other was built in 1622 and remained in use until its destruction in 1688. This site has been a focus of worship for a considerable period, since and is an important element of the built heritage and archaeology of the local area.

1700 with collection of inscribed eighteenth and nineteenth century stone gravemarkers (earliest dated 1702), together with uninscribed late-post medieval stone gravemarkers.