What is recorded here

Fertagh abbey gave Johnstown its carved doorway in 1799, moving a pointed limestone arch decorated with vine leaves and grape-eating birds from a church three and a half kilometres away. The date is cut into the slab above the entrance, marking the moment a sacred threshold was broken open and rebuilt elsewhere. Crocket pinnacles still frame the vine work like guards at a forgotten gate, suggesting that even displacement could carry beauty into a new room.

From the church of the Augustinian abbey of Fertagh (KK008-047001-) located c. 3.5km to the NNE. The W doorway (KK008-153----) was removed in 1799 and reconstructed in the C of I church in Johnstown (Carrigan 1905, vol. 2, 294). The date '1799' is incised in a horizontal slab immediately above the carved doorway and beneath the horizontal hood-moulding. The W pointed doorway (H 1.9m; Wth 0.97m) has a moulded limestone surround, with vine leaves springing forth from the outer edge of the moulding, and birds eating grapes on the vine. There are crocket pinnacles rising from either side of the doorway, framing the vine leaf carvings. The carvings are similar to those on a doorway in the Augustian Priory of St. Mary's on Devenish Island, Co. Fermanagh which Leask (1960, Reprint 1985, vol. 3, 77) dates stylistically to the third quarter of the 15th century (Foley and McHugh 2014, 885-7). There is a fragment of a similarly carved doorway at Ballygriffin church (TS060-049001-), Co. Tipperary. The E window (KK008-153001-) in the C of I church is also from Fertagh. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of upload: 25 July 2018

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