What is recorded here

Inishcaltra is a small Clare island where a twelfth-century cross-slab still lies beside the Saint’s graveyard. The slab measures 1.55m long, 0.5m wide and 0.08m thick, with a Latin cross in relief on a trapezoidal base. Its unusual feature is the panel at the east end, carrying two lines of Irish text set upside down to the cross. Part of the top right corner is broken, but in 1916 the surviving words could still be read as OR DO CATHGAL. The name Cathal may have belonged to the person remembered there, perhaps a local man honoured on the island. Whether he was a priest, a donor or a traveller is no longer certain. What remains clear is that someone shaped stone, cut a cross and set a name where the tide and wind could not easily erase it.

This graveslab lies immediately S of a composite grave in the ‘Saint’s graveyard’ (CL029-009030-) on Inis Cealtra, 5.5m from the N wall of the graveyard and 3.3m from the E wall of Teampul na bhFear nGonta (CL029-009015-). Noted by Macalister (1916-17, 155, no. 45) as of ‘twelfth-century type’ the slab (L 1.55m; Wth 0.5m; T 0.08m) has a Latin cross in relief on a trapezoidal base with concave sides. At the E end of the slab, above the cross and of a piece with it, is a panel which extends the full width of the slab. This panel contains two lines of text in Irish, upside down in relation to the cross. The top right corner is now broken off and the start of the text is missing. It was complete, although still difficult to decipher, in 1916 when in read: ‘OR DO CATHGAL’. The slab is exceptional in having the head of its cross (and the text) at the E end. (Okasha and Forsyth 2001, 67-9) Compiled by: Mary Tunney Date of upload: 7 October 2015

Date likely to the early medieval period (5th–9th centuries), associated with Christian monastic activity on the island. The cross-slab may mark a burial of a notable individual, reflecting the site's role as a holy or saintly cemetery.

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