What is recorded here

In a rocky glen above Ennistymon, a Madigan stonecutter may have shaped a cross for a forgotten grave before leaving it half-finished. The limestone still stands in its ancient groove, proud and incomplete, while the field around it has kept its shape through centuries of rain and labour.

In an area of exposed limestone pavement within an extensive multiperiod field system (CL005-104001-). A partially carved post-medieval limestone cross (L 1.2m; Wth 0.62m; T 0.11m) set upright in a gryke. Rynne (1972, 61) interviewed the landowner who informed him that the cross had been erected ‘by one of the Madigans of Ennistymon, allegedly the great-grandfather of the present-day stone-cutters of the name still working in that town’. The cross bears a similar morphology to local styles of early 19th-century gravestones and probably represents a partially carved gravestone c. 1825-50 (ibid.). There is a wedge tomb c. 63m to the SW (CL005-135----). On inspection in 1998 the cross was not seen. It was photographed however in 2010 and is pictured on the Clare Library Archaeological Monuments collection. (https://clarelibrary.fotoware.cloud/fotoweb/archives/5008-Archaeological-Monuments-of-Clare-Collection, AMC_0578) Compiled by: Mary Tunney and Eve Campbell Date of upload: 14 October 2025

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