Church (in Ruins) — Church Hill

In pasture, on the W-facing slope of a bog-island; in the N half of an ecclesiastical enclosure (SL032-195003-). Fragmentary remains of a rectangular church (int. 19m E-W; 6.7m N-S) which, apart from its W gable with short returns of the N and S walls, has been reduced to sod-covered foundations. The surviving walling (T 1m) is built of roughly coursed limestone in a lime mortar. One window, with a flat-headed light, survives in the short return of the S wall. The SE corner stood in 1992 (SMR (1989) file) but had fallen by 2000. It contained an aumbry (Wth 0.4m; H 0.7m) and a plain round-headed piscina (H c. 0.95m), both built of limestone. There is a limestone arch-stone lying on the ground near the E end of the church. These features are all 15th/16th century in date. However, built into the E side of the window in the S wall is a single block (SL032-195005-) with Romanesque motifs including beading and cross-hatching (pers. comm. M. A. Timoney). This stone was probably a voussoir from the arch of a doorway of an earlier church. A bullaun stone (SL032-195004-) lies c. 8m to the SW of the church. There is a souterrain (SL032-194----) in the adjoining field also to the SW. A 19th-century farm building, a short distance to the NW, was built using stones derived from the church. The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Sligo' compiled by Ursula Egan, Elizabeth Byrne, Mary Sleeman with Sheila Ronan and Connie Murphy (Dublin Stationery Office, 2005). Date of upload: 18 January 2008