What is recorded here

Half a cross, half a name, half a life. Petrie knelt beside it in 1872 and read OR THANACH before the slab vanished for thirty years. It reappeared under OPW hands in the 1950s, still carrying its ring, its wedges, its diagonal cantons. Thanach may have been a woman, a child, a monk or a stranger. The stone does not say. It only survives the swallowing and returns with half an arm broken.

Clonmacnoise grave-slab inventory (1992) number: CLN00136 Dimensions: H 0.18, W 0.29, T 0.065 Outline ring cross inside a one line rectilinear frame. There is a linear cross with wedge-shaped terminals in the centre of the cross. The cantons have diagonals crossing them. Inscription: Petrie saw half the slab and recorded the inscription 'OR THANACH (?)' Evidence of discovery: Found in 1872 by Petrie, lost by 1909 and refound by the OPW 1954-58. Condition: Part of left cross arm and centre survive. National Monuments Service, Photo number: 81-297, 484. The Clonmacnoise inventory was compiled by the Office of Public Works. A copy of the record for this slab is available for inspection in the relevant Archaeological Survey of Ireland (SMR) file. Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien. Date of upload: 23 May 2011

Date likely to the early medieval period (7th–10th century AD), associated with Christian monastic activity in Clonmacnoise. The ringed cross symbolizes early Irish Christianity, often used as a funerary or commemorative marker.

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