| Furness Church | |
|---|---|
| Forenaghts Church | |
Séipéal Fhornochta | |
  Furness Church | |
| 53°13′24″N6°36′05″W / 53.223363°N 6.601476°W | |
| Location | Forenaghts Great, County Kildare, Ireland |
| Country | Ireland |
| Denomination | Church of Ireland |
| Previous denomination | Pre-Reformation Catholic |
| History | |
| Founded | 13th century |
| Architecture | |
| Style | Gothic |
| Administration | |
| Diocese | Kildare and Leighlin |
| Official name | Furness Church |
| Reference no. | 394 |
Furness Church is a 13th-century Norman church located in County Kildare, Ireland.
Furness Church is located outside Furness House; 2 km (1.3 mi) southeast of Johnstown, County Kildare.
The church is in the grounds of Furness House, owned by Patrick Guinness. The church is Early Christian (c. AD 500) and it was extended by the Normans in 1210. On the Norman conquest of Ireland after 1169, lands in Kildare were assigned to Adam de Hereford who in turn bequeathed them to the Abbey of St Thomas the Martyr, Dublin. This monastery extended the church in 1210, allowing a roof for the congregation. The name derives from the Irish fornocht, meaning "bare hill." In the 1530s the monastery was dissolved by the Crown and its land at Furness was bought by the Ashe family, merchants in Naas.
The church has doors and windows edged with tufa, a form of limestone favoured by Cistercians in Europe from 1150. The exception is a leper window, usually blocked up now in older churches. [1]
At some point the church burned down and was abandoned. Despite being Protestant, the Nevill family owning the land allowed local Catholics to continue to bury their dead around the church alongside their ancestors. One gravestone from the early 18th century reads IHS, signifying a Catholic burial. Burials stopped in the 1840s when the then owners built a wall around the estate as a famine relief measure. [2] [3] [4]
A standing stone is located 300m NNE of the church. [5]
An abbess is the female superior of a community of nuns in an abbey.
Gisborough Priory is a ruined Augustinian priory in Guisborough in the current borough of Redcar and Cleveland, North Yorkshire, England. It was founded in 1119 as the Priory of St Mary by the Norman feudal magnate Robert de Brus, also an ancestor of the Scottish king, Robert the Bruce. It became one of the richest monastic foundations in England with grants from the crown and bequests from de Brus, other nobles and gentry and local people of more modest means. Much of the Romanesque Norman priory was destroyed in a fire in 1289. It was rebuilt in the Gothic style on a grander scale over the following century. Its remains are regarded as among the finest surviving examples of early Gothic architecture in England.
The Lordship of Ireland, sometimes referred to retrospectively as Anglo-Norman Ireland, was the part of Ireland ruled by the King of England and controlled by loyal Anglo-Norman lords between 1177 and 1542. The lordship was created following the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169–1171. It was a papal fief, granted to the Plantagenet kings of England by the Holy See, via Laudabiliter. As the Lord of Ireland was also the King of England, he was represented locally by a governor, variously known as the Justiciar, Lieutenant, Lord Lieutenant or Lord Deputy.
County Carlow is a county located in the Southern Region of Ireland, within the province of Leinster. Carlow is the second smallest and the third least populous of Ireland's 32 traditional counties. Carlow County Council is the governing local authority.
Bohermeen is a Roman Catholic parish in the Irish Diocese of Meath. Its English name is a corruption of an ancient Irish language name, An Bóthar Mín, which meant the smooth road. Originally one of the five famed ancient roadways that led from the mediaeval capital of Ireland, Tara, approximately 10 miles away cut through the area. The quality of the roadway, in an era of dirt-roads, earned for it the nickname of the smooth road, An Bóthar Mín.
Kildare is a town in County Kildare, Ireland. As of 2022, its population was 10,302, making it the 7th largest town in County Kildare. It is home to Kildare Cathedral, historically the site of an important abbey said to have been founded by Saint Brigid of Kildare in the 5th century. The Curragh lies east of the town.
Dunbrody Abbey is a former Cistercian monastery in County Wexford, Ireland. The cross-shaped church was built in the 13th century, and the tower was added in the 15th century. With a length of 59m the church was one of the longest in Ireland. The visitor centre is run by the current Marquess of Donegall and has one of only two full sized hedge mazes in Ireland.
Celbridge is a town and townland on the River Liffey in County Kildare, Ireland. It is 23 km (14 mi) west of Dublin. Both a local centre and a commuter town within the Greater Dublin Area, it is located at the intersection of the R403 and R405 regional roads. As of the 2022 census, Celbridge was the third largest town in County Kildare by population, with 20,601 residents.
Castleknock is an affluent suburb located 8 km (5 mi) west of the centre of Dublin city, Ireland. It is centred on the village of the same name in Fingal.
Stillorgan, formerly a village in its own right, is now a suburban area of Dublin in Ireland. Stillorgan is located in Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown, and contains many housing estates, shops and other facilities, with the old village centre still present. Stillorgan is at least partly contiguous with Kilmacud and neighbours other southside districts such as Mount Merrion, Sandyford, Leopardstown, Dundrum, Blackrock, Goatstown and Foxrock.
County Kildare in the province of Leinster, Ireland, was first defined as a diocese in 1111, shired in 1297 and assumed its present borders in 1836. Its location in the Liffey basin on the main routes from Dublin to the south and west meant it was a valuable possession and important theatre of events throughout Irish history.
Oughterard is an ecclesiastical hilltop site, graveyard, townland, and formerly a parish, borough and royal manor in County Kildare, nowadays part of the community of Ardclough, close to the Dublin border. It is the burial place of Arthur Guinness.
Kilteel is the name of a village, townland and civil parish located in the barony of South Salt, County Kildare, Ireland. The townland of Kilteel Upper contains the remains of a church with a decorated Romanesque chancel arch, the ruins of a 13th-century preceptory of the Knights Hospitaller and a well-preserved 15th-century tower house. The historic settlement is located on the southwest corner of the English Pale and served an important function as a border fortress during the medieval period.
Castlemartin is the name of a historic house and estate, and the townland in which they sit, on the banks of the River Liffey in Kilcullen, County Kildare, Ireland. Formerly a key estate of the Eustace family, it was for many years the home of media magnate Tony O'Reilly, and his wife, Chryss Goulandris, but was bought in 2015 by John Malone, an Irish American. The estate includes major stud farm and cattle breeding operations, a restored medieval church and an icehouse.
St. Mary's Church, Castlemartin, located in the broad Kilcullen area of County Kildare, Ireland, is the first medieval church in Ireland to have been restored to full working order. The small stone Roman Catholic church, with accompanying burial ground, lies within Castlemartin Estate, which belonged for many years to media magnate Tony O'Reilly; O'Reilly paid for the restoration in 1979–1980, after which the church was reconsecrated in August 1981 by Archbishop Dermot Ryan. There has been a church on this site for over 800 years.
St Canice's Cathedral, also known as Kilkenny Cathedral, is a cathedral of the Church of Ireland in Kilkenny city, Ireland. It is in the ecclesiastical province of Dublin. Previously the cathedral of the Diocese of Ossory, it is now one of six cathedrals in the United Dioceses of Cashel and Ossory.
Kildare Cathedral, or St Brigid's Cathedral in Kildare, is one of two Church of Ireland cathedrals in the United Dioceses of Meath and Kildare. It is in the ecclesiastical province of Dublin. Originally a Catholic cathedral, it was built in the 13th century on the site of an important Celtic Christian abbey, which is said to have been founded by Saint Brigid in the 5th century. The site was taken over by the Protestant Church of Ireland following the Reformation. There is an Irish round tower in the cathedral grounds.
Clare Abbey, also known as Clareabbey, is a ruined Augustinian monastery located near the Town of Ennis, along the banks of the Fergus River, and about a mile north of Clarecastle in County Clare, Ireland. The Abbey, founded in 1189, was the largest and most important of the Augustinian monasteries in County Clare.
The Liberty of Thomas Court and Donore was one of several manors, or liberties, that existed in County Dublin, Ireland since the arrival of the Anglo-Normans in the 12th century. They were adjacent to Dublin city, and later entirely surrounded by it, but still preserving their own separate jurisdiction.
There are numerous Bermingham monuments in Ireland, particularly in counties Kildare, Offaly, Galway, and Dublin. Most are now in a poor state but Athenry Castle in Galway has been restored, using building techniques similar to those employed when it was originally built.