Kenmare Ch. (in ruins) — Kenmare Old

St Finan's medieval parish church ruins stands in the townland of Kenmare (Ceann Mara/head of the sea/great river) Old, parish of Kenmare, diocese of Ardfert, barony of Glanarought (Gleann Ó Ruachta). The name Kenmare was transferred to the seventeenth-century town on the northern shore (known in Irish as an Neidín). The 1302-06 Ecclesiastical Taxation of the Deanery of Hacudoe in the Diocese of Ardfert listed the church of 'Keynmara' [Kenmare] where it was valued at 13s. 4d. with the tithe valued at 16d. per annum (Cal. doc. Ire., Vol. 5, 298). On the 1841 ed. OSi 6-inch map the ruins of Kenmare Church are depicted standing in the N quadrant of a rectangular-shaped burial ground with St. Finan's Well to the NE on the S side of the sea with the Sheen River to the E. The medieval roughly rectangular-shaped 'Glebe' of the church is depicted lying immediately to S of church and W of the River Sheen where it enters to sea on the 1841 ed. OSi 6-inch map. This glebe-land is depicted at this location on the 17th century Down Survey map of Glanarought barony (Hibernia Regnum). The shape of the Glebe on the Down Survey map roughly corresponds to the shape of the glebe depicted on the 1841 ed. Osi 6-inch map. Today the helicopter pad and car-parking facilities of the Sheen Falls hotel stands partially on the site of this glebe land. In 1605 the 'moiety of the rectory of Kenmara', with all its 'tithes and other commodities' were demised to 'Thomas Springe' (Cal. pat. rolls Ire., Jas I, 71). In 1613, King James I granted Jenkin Conway lands, which included. the 'abbey of Inishfallen, containing the advowson and right of patronage of of the church of Killelly [Killalee/Cill Oilbhe/KE066-008---] and Keownemarrie [Kenmare], with all the tithes' (ibid., 268). In 1615 the Royal Visitation of the Diocese of Ardfert recorded that the 'parsonadges of Killelly [Killalee Church KE066-008---] and Keanmarra [Kenmare]' belonged to the 'Abbey of Inishfallen' (KE066-072001-) and were kept by 'Mr. Jenkyn Conway', Henry Reade was listed as the curate of Kenmare (Murphy 1915, 191). Church ruins in the NE corner of the graveyard (KE093-035002-). The ruin of a church comprising a nave (int. dims. 10.55m E-W; 7.15m N-S) and a chancel (int. dims. 7.05m E-W; 4.7m N-S). Apart from the E wall of the chancel (H c. 4.5m to the gable), part of the N wall of the chancel (max. H 3m) and the SE corner of the nave (H 3.5m), the walls are fragmentary and poorly preserved. The walls are generally heavily mantled with ivy. There is a narrow pointed light (ext. H 1.3m; ext. Wth 0.15m) in the E wall of the chancel; the embrasure splays and has a round-headed masonry arch to the interior. A window with a narrow lintelled light (ext. H 0.5m; ext. Wth 0.12m) occurs at the S end of the E wall of the nave; the N jamb has been rebuilt, partially blocking the light. In the S wall of the nave, 0.9m from the SE corner is the splayed E ingoing of a window. The interior of the church has been used for burials. In 1841 it was noted that a 'difference in style and age is clearly discernible between the nave and choir, the latter being built of large stones cemented with lime and fine sand mortar, and the former of stones of comparatively small size cemented with lime and gravel or coarse sand mortar' (OSL, 183); this distinction is now difficult to ascertain due to the condition of the surviving walls. The church is associated with St Finan and is reputed to have been attached to St Finian's Abbey in Innisfallen (KE066-072001-) (McCarthy 1993, 14). There is a holy well (KE093-035003-) c. 70m ENE of the church. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Kerry. Volume I: South-West Kerry' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 2009). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. In 1841 the Ordnance Survey recorded the following details about St. Finan's Church; 'The old church of Kenmare is situated on the south side of the Kenmare river about one mile to the south-east of the little town of Kenmare. It consisted of a nave and choir, the nave measuring on the inside forty feet [12.2m] in length and twenty-four feet [7.3m] in breadth, and the choir twenty feet six inches [6.24m] by thirteen feet three inches [4m] and the walls of the nave are three feet [0.9m] thick and those of the choir two feet ten inches [0.86m]. A difference of style and age is clearly discernible between the nave and choir, the latter being built of large stones cemented with lime and fine sand mortar and the former of stone of comparatively small size, cemented with lime and gravel or coarse sand mortar. The walls of the choir are ten feet [3m] high in good preservation, but those of the nave nearly destroyed. The west gable is entirely destroyed, and there remains of the south wall but eight feet [2.4m] and of the north but ten feet [3m] to the height of three feet [0.9m]. The east window is semi-circular headed on the inside where it is formed of chiselled sandstone and measures five feet four inches [1.6m] in height and in width two feet three and a half inches [0.7m] at the top and two feet six inches [0.76m] at the bottom; but it was modernised and made curvilineally pointed on the outside, where its cill is five feet six inches [1.67m] from the present level of the ground. It measures on this side four feet three inches [1.3m] in height and in width five inches [0.12m] at the top and six and a half inches [0.16m] at the bottom. At the distance of five feet four inches [1.6m] from the east gable there is on the south wall of the choir a small quadrangular window rudely formed of hammered stones and measuring on the inside three feet four inches [1m] in height and two feet ten inches [0.86m] in width, and on the outside two feet two inches [0.66m] by six and a half inches [0.16m]' (O'Donovan 1983, 232-3). Saint Finan's Church and graveyard was described in 1898 as follows; 'The graveyard here is a large overcrowded place, with the holy well on the shore itself with the sea ebbing in and out of it, so that it can only be approached at low tide. The little east window of the ruined church has been made into a shrine, and is much used as a place for prayer. On the sill is a great variety of objects, a Small figure of the Virgin in delf is placed in the centre, and around that image are fragments of human bones, broken rosaries, and old scapulars, coins, beads, trinkets, buckles, buttons, crucifixes, and a great number of small personal trifles, all' worn and battered and of no intrinsic value. The various reasons for their being placed here are only known to the donors, if even to them, and the Custom is doubtless a survival of some old-world idea' (Bigger 1898, 323). According to Lewis (1837, 704), the 'ruins of the old church [KE093-035001-] still remains; also those of a small chapel, supposed to have been built by Sir Wm. Petty on the establishment of the English Colony'. The precise location of this 17th-century chapel within the graveyard has not been identified. In 2009 a graveyard survey carried out by Bernard O’Mahony of Aegis Archaeology Ltd. recorded the following details about Kenmare Old Graveyard (KE093-035002-); ‘Kenmare Old graveyard is located in the townland of Kenmare Old, parish of Kenmare, barony of Glanarought, in south Co. Kerry, approximately 1km to the southeast of the town of Kenmare on south bank of The Sound in Kenmare Bay. The Sound is visible immediately to the north of the graveyard and the peak of Mucksna Mountain is 2km to the south. The graveyard is sub-rectangular in shape and slopes to the edge of The Sound to the north. The graveyard slopes steeply to the north and east from the entrance at the southwest corner. The development of Kenmare Old through time is visible in the layout of the graveyard. The graveyard can be divided into an earliest phase – the eastern third of the graveyard – associa