Stone sculpture (present location) in Castleboy (skreen By., Tara Par.)

Located in the Church of Ireland church on Tara Hill (ME031-033071-) is a large sandstone side-panel (L 2.3m; H 0.64m) from the tomb of Sir Thomas Cusack of Cushinstown dated 1571 (Hickey 1971, 78-80) that was at Trevet church (ME0038-017----) originally. From Trevet it was moved to a position outside the Roman Catholic Church of Skreen (ME032-040002-) c. 1955 and from there it was moved to its present position c. 2000. It depicts Sir Thomas and his second wife, Dame Maud (nee Darcy), praying with their five sons and eight daughters. Hickey describes it as: Stone No. 2: This stone measures 2.35 x 0.75 metres and until recently was lying across the stone No. 3 in the ruins of Trevet church. It was moved about twenty-five years ago to the front of Skryne Parish church (ME032-040----) where it now stands. (It was moved to Tara c. 2000.) It is a portrait stone of Sir Thomas with his second wife and their thirteen children. The Cusack crest - a mermaid, is carved on the top right hand corner, and though the stone is in many ways quite typical of the period, in some respects it is unique. Sir Thomas kneels at a prayer-table with four sons kneeling behind him; opposite were kneels Dame Maud with six of her daughters, also kneeling. There were eight daughters in this family according to all the pedigrees; and the armorial bearings of eight daughters are shown on stone No. 3. It follows then that the two little girls who are standing must be the two younger daughters. These little girls carry the attributes of their father's office - a judge's mace and the Lord Chancellor's purse. The long wavy hair falling over their shoulders confirms the fact that they are members of the family and not retainers, who would have their heads covered and would not have been shown under a family crest. The girl on the left, in addition to the mace carries aloft a scroll. This may have borne some writing alluding to Sir Thomas' office as Master of the Rolls. The third standing child is a boy carrying in his left hand a bowl and in his right hand a pipe through which he is blowing bubbles towards the youngest kneeling child who seems to bend slightly as if the bubbles bounce towards him. (The tombs of two 16th century lawyers, Thomas Weston and Sir Thomas Hesketh, in Westminster Abbey are embellished with cherubs blowing bubbles from gilt cups: there are also two tombs by Nicholas Stone, in Charterhouse Chapel in London, similarly decorated.) Bubble blowing is generally taken as representing the transitoriness of human life and in this case seems to apply to the two little boys. Three of Sir Thomas's sons by Dame Maud survived to maturity and are known by their names but the third stone, as we shall show, supports the supposition that two died in childhood. The group as depicted on this stone shows the family as they may have appeared in 1558 or early 1559. Thomas Cusack married Maud Darcy in 1537 or 1538 after the death of her second husband and the decree of nullity of his first marriage given at Ardbraccan in 1537. Twenty years of marriage would have allowed them to have a family of the ages shown. Sir Thomas was Lord Chancellor of Ireland from 1550-1555. The fashions portrayed however are not those of the courts of Edward IV and Queen Mary but rather early Elizabethan. Dame Maud and her daughters wear bodices with puff sleeves and skirts supported by farthingales; Sir Thomas and his four eldest sons wear the padded trunk hose and full short capes worn from the beginning of Elizabeth's reign onwards. However, the portrait representation must be earlier than May of 1559 when Sir Thomas drew up a memorandum, now filed with the transcript of his will in the Public Record Office in Dublin, in which he names his third wife and entails property on only three sons by Dame Maud. Date of upload: 9 January, 2015