Kilnamanagh Church (in Ruins)

On flat poorly drained pasture in undulating countryside with good extensive views in all directions. There is a tower house (TS051-011----) c. 800m to W. This is a poorly preserved church with only the W gable (L 7m N-S; Wall T 1.1m), constructed of coursed conglomerate rubble, surviving. A modern silage pit and other farm buildings have been built immediately E of the gable. There is a flat-headed slit ope in the centre of the gable, the only architectural feature visible. According to Seymour (1917, 38) the 'west gable and foundations remained, the latter measuring 60 x 21ft [18.3m x 6.4m]. The interior and exterior of the gable are faced with long unquarried gritstones laid horizontally, while the core of the wall is built of rubble masonry'. Described by Curry in the OS letters (O'Flanagan 1930, vol. 1, 96-7) as consisting of 'the foundations and west gable of a church called by the natives Cill na Manach i.e. the church of the Monks, from which the barony took its name. It was sixty feet [18.3m] in length and twenty one feet [6.4m] in breadth. The gable of this building, now the only part remaining, is four feet [1.2m] in thickness and built of long grit stones gathered on the mountain, not quarried and cemented with lime and sand mortar of good quality. It had two windows, one placed within two feet of the present level of the ground, the other eight feet, but both are now entirely disfigured. There is no graveyard attached to this church which argues its antiquity'. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of upload: 26 August 2011