What is recorded here

Two-thirds of a limestone chest tomb from St Mary's, Callan, lies cracked in a Kilkenny depot, its missing end lost to time. The surviving panel carries a ringed cross, a severed ear on a sword, dice cast beside a robe and thirty silver coins, all cut in false relief around a central scourging pillar. These are not decorations but a ledger of suffering, perhaps read by the dead as clearly as living eyes see them. What the tomb recorded has broken away, leaving only the wound it measured.

Originally from the medieval parish church (KK026-010012-) of St Mary's, Callan. Currently in the OPW store, Kilkenny (Kilkenny depot stone carving number: KD043). Approximately two-thirds of an incomplete limestone side panel (L 1.04m; H 0.6m; T 0.175m) of a chest tomb, the dexter end is missing. A plain margin (H 0.045-0.05m) runs along the top and base of the panel. It is decorated in false relief with symbols of the crucifixion on either side of a now central scourging pillar entwined with two ropes. On the dexter side there is a large cross which is ringed with a crown of thorns and which rests on a skull. At the base dexter side of which there are three nails and immediately above there is a pincers, most of which is broken off. On the sinister side of the cross there is a lantern and below this Peter’s sword with the ear of Malchus, the servant of the high priest, shown on the blade. On the sinister side of the scourging pillar there is a bunch of twigs and a pillar which rises from lower margin and continues to the top. To the sinister of the pillar there is a cock on a pot with scourges on either side, below which there is a seamless robe with three dice on one side and a draw-string purse on the other. Below the robe are two rows of coins making up 30 pieces of silver. There is a bad, almost vertical, crack running on the dexter side of the scourging pillar, with another crack running from this across the arms of the cross. According to Phelan (1996, 174) the slab was moved from Callan to the OPW Kilkenny Depot c. 1993. In style it is similar to the Comerford chest tomb (KK026-010037-) in St. Mary’s church, Callan, dated 1604 and attributed to the O’Kerin workshop. This intact tomb panel is divided into four sections, each separated by a pillar which is very similar to that on the panel in the depot and also shows a similar treatment in the carvings of some of the symbols of the crucifixion. See attached photograph: KK019-026406-_01 (photograph by Chris Corlett) Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of upload: 30 January 2023

Medieval chest tomb, 13th to 16th century. Originally part of St Mary's parish church, Callan, it is significant as a fragment of ecclesiastical funerary architecture from a period of evolving tomb design in Ireland.

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