Cloghprior Church (in ruins) — Priorpark

Cloghprior Church ruins stands on a rise of ground in undulating countryside, in the N quadrant of Cloghprior graveyard (TN009-052002-). Prior Park House stands 515m to SW, Cloghprior Castle (TN009-047----) stands 645m to NW, Carney Castle (TN010-052001-) 1.7km to NE, Woodpark House stands 320m to SE. Cloghprior (Cloch an Phrióra) medieval parish church ruins stands in the townland of Priorpark (Páirc an Phrióra) previously known as Ballybeg, in the parish of Cloghprior, diocese of Killaloe, barony of Lower Ormond. The Royal Visitation of 1615 described the building as 'church and chancell downe' (Murphy and Ormond 1914, 220). Church ruins and Cloghprior Castle depicted on 1654-57 Down Survey map of Cloghprior parish (NLI MS 721). The Civil Survey of 1654-56 recorded the following details about Cloghprior parish; 'The s[ai]d Parish lying and being in the Barrony of Lower Ormond being an intire Rectory impropriate belonging to the Priory of Tyone [TN021-042----] in the Barrony of Upper Ormond. The Tythes greate and smale of the sd Parish was worth in 1640 the sume of £30. The sd Tythes is an intire Impropriation belonging to the Priory of Tyone afforesd. and held by John Grace of Ballylensy in the County of Kilkeny by Pattent (as wee are informed) in whome the presentation of a Curatt was. In this Parish is noe Gleabland' (Simington 1934, 340-1). In 1640 the lands of Cloghprior and Ballybegg were in the ownership of John Grace of Ballylinch, Co. Kilkenny and Philip Kennedy of Castletown, both listed as Irish papists (ibid. 341). The terrier of the 1654-57 Down Survey map of Cloghprior Parish recorded that 'In Cloghprior & Ballibegg is a Thatcht House a Castle & Church in repaire' (NLI MS 721). Medieval parish church ruins described by John O’Donovan in 1840 as follows; ‘The old Church of Cloghprior is a small building about three centuries old. It measures on the inside forty two feet ten inches [13m] in length and twenty feet nine inches [6.3m] in breadth and its side walls are two feet seven inches [0.8m] in thickness and about ten feet [3m] in height. The east gable contains a pointed window divided into two parts on the outside by a stone mullion. This outer part of it is three feet five inches [1m] in height and one foot six inches [0.45m] in width and placed at the height of five feet three inches [1.6m] from the present level of the ground. The doorway was on the south wall at the distance of eleven feet [3.35m] from the west gable, but it is now reduced to a formless breach in the wall. At the distance of nine feet [2.75m] from the south east corner on the outside there is a small window constructed of cut lime stone and measuring on the outside two feet four inches [0.7m] in height and four and a half inches [0.11m] in width. This little church is covered with strong dense ivy which conceals any other features it may contain; its two gables are in good preservation' (O’Flanagan 1930, 24-5). Cloghprior Church described by Gleeson (1951, 100) as follows; ‘This parish was formed from the gift of lands by Theobald Walter Butler about A.D. 1200 to the Prior and community of Tyone (Tigh Eoin) for which see Cal. O. Deeds Vol. 1. The lands in the grant can be identified from those shown in the Civil Survey of 1653 as in the possession of the Graces of Ballylinch, Co. Kilkenny, which family succeeded to them at the Dissolution of the monasteries. The Church is described in O.S. Letters as ‘not more than three centuries old’ i.e. circa 1540. It is in a collapsed condition. The E. gable has a pointed window with two lights and a stone mullion. The S. door is gone. The whole is infested with ivy and growths. There are many tombs and interments of the 18th century’. Present remains consist of a single cell rectangular church (ext. dims. 7.9m N-S; 14.9m E-W; wall T 0.7m) constructed with uncoursed limestone rubble of cyclopean appearance with a protruding plinth at the base of the wall. The church walls have undergone recent restoration with reset quoin stones at the SW angle and rebuilding of the external face of the S wall. Nineteenth-century headstones have been inserted into the external face of the N wall and E gable. A rebuilt doorway with no cut stone visible is at W end of the S wall. There are traces of wicker centring on the underside of the rebuilt doorway arch. The E gable has a partially blocked-up twin-light ogee-headed window with hood-moulding. In the W gable there is a round-headed single-light window at first floor level which may indicate the presence of a two storey priests residence or a gallery. There is a round-arched bell-cote on top of the W gable. A single-light flat-headed window with chamfered jambs is visible at the E end of the S wall. The E end of the church has been converted into a burial area for the Cambie family with a seventeenth-century graveslab (TN009-052003-) inserted into the base of the window embrasure of the S wall at the E end. No window openings visible in N wall of church. The church stands inside an irregular-shaped graveyard (TN009-052002-) defined by a wall constructed with large limestone boulders of cyclopean appearance at N only, elsewhere the wall has been rebuilt. The above description is derived from 'The Archaeological Inventory of County Tipperary. Vol. 1 - North Tipperary' compiled by Jean Farrelly and Caimin O'Brien (Dublin: Stationery Office, 2002). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.# Revised by: Caimin O'Brien Date of revised upload: 8 July 2022