Insights
In the quiet grounds of an old church in Birr, County Offaly, lies the tomb of a man who spent decades turning his telescope toward the Moon and drawing what…
Among the most evocative forms in any historic cemetery, the obelisk reaches skyward with a quiet insistence that names should not be forgotten. The Egyptian…
The midlands of Ireland hold a quiet, waterlogged secret. Across counties Offaly, Roscommon, Galway and Mayo, small burial grounds sit low in the landscape,…
Grace O'Malley, known in Irish as Gráinne Mhaol or Granuaile, was a 16th-century chieftain of the O'Malley clan who commanded fleets along the west coast of…
St Michan’s Church, on Church Street in Dublin, is best known for its atmospheric crypts and naturally preserved mummies. Yet the church and its surrounding…
Mellifont Abbey in County Louth is one of Ireland’s most important medieval monastic sites. Founded in 1142 by monks associated with Clairvaux, it became the…
Across Irish graveyards, an oak leaf may appear as a carved border, a cluster of acorns, a wreath, or a branch worked into the upper part of a headstone. These…
In a quiet corner of County Tipperary, a small grave and its associated story preserve one of Ireland’s most evocative pieces of rural folklore. It is linked…
Station Island rises from the waters of Lough Derg in County Donegal, a place where landscape and devotion have been closely joined for centuries. Known…
The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries saw a surge of interest across Ireland in carved stone monuments that had lain weathered and overlooked in…