Water mill

The mill of the Augustinian Abbey (TS070-040004-) is likely to have been at a location SE of the abbey, where a watermill is depicted on Redmond Grace's map of 1708 and Miles Swiney's map of 1763 (O'Keeffe 2003, map 5 and map 9). The upstanding mill immediately S of the abbey occupies the locaton of the former S range of the abbey so it is unlikely that there was a mill there prior to the 18th century. The mill building, which is primarily of late 18th/19th-century date, was entirely renovated in the 1980s and converted into a theatre. There is a large limestone plaque incorporated into the masonry which reads: Aby Mills Built by Patrick O Connel in the year 1791. This plaque was reused as a threshold stone at some stage as is suggested by a spudstone hole at one of its corners. Though the general location of the medieval/17th-century mill is known from cartographic evidence there is no surviving physical evidence above ground. The shape of the river was modified when a mill race was constructed for the late 18th/19th-century flour mill immediately S of the abbey, thus the earlier mill cannot be precisely located. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of revised upload: 19 May 2015