What is recorded here

St Johns Abbey was an Augustinian priory founded in the late 12th century, yet by 1540 its church had degraded into a barn while canons still kept stables, a dovecote and a watermill beside it. That drop from prayer to livestock is not decline but adaptability: the site kept giving shelter, food and work long after formal worship thinned. The buried ditch, cooking-pot sherds and graveyard mark a place where ordinary life continued around sacred origins rather than freezing them into display.

According to Bradley et al. (1986 vol. 4, 367-8), the Augustinian Priory of St John the Baptist was founded in the late 12th-century (Gwynn and Hadcock 1970, 189), but there are few references to it prior to the 14th -century. The church is described in an extent of 1540 as being used as a barn, while the precinct also included a hall, a tower, stables, a dovecote, a watermill and an orchard (White 1943, 154-5). The priory was probably on, or near, the site of the present parochial house, and was known in the 19th-century as St John's Abbey. Digging in the area in the 1950's revealed sections of stone walls which may have belonged to the priory. In 1990, archaeological testing (O’Carroll F. Excavation Licence No. 90E0022) identified a ditch (Wth 3.3-3.7m; D 1.2m; est. traceable L c. 25m N-S) from which two sherds of medieval Leinster Cooking Ware were recovered. The ditch was interpreted as possibly forming a boundary for the priory. A font (KD019-030058-) was also recorded at the site. In 1995, archaeological testing led in 2000 to archaeological monitoring and excavation at a previously unrecorded graveyard (KD019-030042-) associated with the priory. Compiled by: Gearóid Conroy Date of upload: 10 June 2011

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