What is recorded here

A small stone with the name MAELMARTAIN carved beside a ringed cross now rests in an Athenry depot after leaving a church on Inchbofin island. It is not a grand monument, but a narrow slab barely half a metre tall, yet it carries a personal name across centuries. The stone may have marked a grave, a boundary or a prayer, and its movement from island to depot turns it into a traveler rather than a fixed monument.

This cross-slab (H 0.51m; max. Wth 0.36m; T 0.07m) bears a single-line ringed cross with a pointed base and straight ended terminals with spirals. An inscription running down the sinister and up the dexter side reads: MAELMARTAIN. It was found during ground-clearance works in the vicinity of the church (WM015-001----) on Inchbofin island on Lough Ree, Co. Westmeath (Commissioners of Public Works 1913, Appendix E, Slab A) and is currently kept in the OPW depot in Athenry. See WM015-001008- for its original location. (Crawford 1913, 329, 1. (b); Macalister 1949, 79 no. 874) Compiled by: Olive Alcock Date of upload: 2 March 2023 Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland 1913 Eighty-first annual report of the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland with appendices for the year ending 31st March 1913. London. HMSO. Crawford, H.S. 1913 A descriptive list of early cross-slabs and pillars. (cont.) Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 43, 151-69, 261-5, 326-34. Macalister, R.A.S. 1949 Corpus Inscriptionum Insularum Celticarum, 2 vols. Dublin. Irish Manuscripts Commission.

This cross-slab is likely of early medieval origin, possibly Christian, given the ringed cross and inscription. The inscription "MA" may represent an initial or abbreviation, though its exact meaning or dedication remains uncertain.

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