Church (in ruins) — Killimor AND Boleybeg

Within a graveyard (GA107-109001-) c. 700m to the WNW of Killimor village. Described in the OS Letters (O’Flanagan 1927, Vol. 2, 74-5) as ‘the largest parish church of the period … in Ireland, being 75 feet [c. 22.8m] long and 18 [c. 5.4m] broad’. What survives of this partially reconstructed medieval church is the E gable with the adjoining returns of the N and S side-walls, and the free-standing W gable in which a difference in masonry is suggestive of two phases of construction. Surviving architectural features include a two-light cusped tracery window and quatrefoil in the E gable, the remains of a two-light mullioned window in the N side-wall and an opposing robbed-out window in the S side-wall. An internal division at the W end of N wall is indicative of a chancel (L 6.8m; Wth 5.1m). A small rectangular window in the W gable suggests the former presence of a loft at this end of the church. According to the OS Letters (ibid.), there was a chapel, called 'Seipéal Ui Mhaoilcheir, off the S side of the church. It was built by a family of that name whose burial place was there. It was completely destroyed some years prior to 1838 and no visible surface trace it survives. There is a holy well (GA107-111----) c. 45m to the NE and a cross (GA107-112----) c. 75m to the E. Compiled by: Galway Archaeological Survey, UCG Date of upload: 2 March 2020