Romanesque features indicating a date around the mid-
dle of the twelfth century.
Cemeteries, Holy Wells and Bullauns
Burial was an important function of ecclesiastical
sites from an early date, but it is important to under-
stand that for many lay people the use of noneccle-
siastical ancestral burial grounds continued for some
centuries after the introduction of Christianity. The
earliest cemeteries attached to churches may have
been used only for priests and monks and lay people
directly associated with the church or ecclesiastical
settlement.
An enigmatic feature of many ecclesiastical sites is
a bullaun stone. Usually either sandstone or granite,
these large or small boulders have a ground-out hollow
or hollows in them. There is great uncertainty as to
how or why these hollows or basins were formed.
Theories vary between practical uses such as grinding
grain or metal ore with smaller stones or pestles to
ritual or devotional use of turning stones within the
hollows. There are a large number of bullauns at cer-
tain sites such as Glendalough.
Holy wells are certain natural springs usually asso-
ciated with a saint and resorted to for their supposed
curative powers for particular or general ailments.
They are often close to but seldom within ecclesiastical
sites and many have been enhanced with kerbs, steps,
and well houses in stonework and even concrete over
the years. They often play or played an important part
in the local Pattern (patron) Day or pilgrimage. There
are strong indications in some cases that their sanctity
goes back to pre-Christian times.
Sometimes the former existence of an early medi-
eval ecclesiastical site can be deduced from clues such
as a place name with “kill” in it, usually indicating a
church or church property; a large oval enclosure; a
holy well or other traditional association with a saint;
a bullaun stone; and so forth. The combination of a
number of these clues tends to increase the certainty
of the identification.
CONLETH MANNING
References and Further Reading
Hamlin, Ann. “The Study of Early Irish Churches.” In Ireland
and Europe: The Early Church, edited by Próinséas Ní
Chatháin and Michael Richter. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1984.
Manning, Conleth. “Clonmacnoise Cathedral.” In Clonmacnoise
Studies Volume 1: Seminar Papers 1994, edited by Heather
A. King. Dublin: Dúchas The Heritage Service, 1998.
. “References to Church Buildings in the Annals.” In
Seanchas: Studies in Early and Medieval Irish Archaeology,
History and Literature in Honour of Francis J. Byrne, edited
by Alfred P. Smyth. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000.
Ó Carragáin, Tomás. “A Landscape Converted: Archaeology
and Early Church Organisation on Iveragh and Dingle,
Ireland.” In The Cross Goes North, edited by Martin Carver.
Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2002.
Stalley, Roger. “Sex, Symbol and Myth: Some Observations on
the Irish Round Towers.” In From Ireland Coming: Irish Art
from the Early Christian to the Late Gothic Period and its
European Context, edited by Colum Hourihane. Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 2001.
Swan, Leo. “Enclosed Ecclesiastical Sites and their Relevance to
Settlement Patterns of the First Millennium A.D.” InLandscape
Archaeology in Ireland, edited by Terence Reeves-Smyth and
Fred Hammond. Oxford: BAT British Series 116, 1983.
See alsoArchitecture; Ciaran; Columcille; Early
Christian Art; Ecclesiastical Settlements; High
Crosses; Inscriptions; Parish Churches, CathedralsEDUCATION
Between the fifth and the sixteenth centuries, the two
main institutions of Irish education were the monastic
schools, founded by Christian missionaries in the early
fifth century, and the bardic schools, originating in
ancient Celtic times. It has been argued that the bardic
schools predate the arrival of Christians in Ireland,
existed parallel to or were integrated with the monastic
system and, after the decline of monastic schools in the
tenth and eleventh centuries, continued to thrive up
until the seventeenth century. Between the fifth and the
ninth centuries, however, the Christian monastic schools
modeled on a classical Latin curriculum were the pre-
dominate educational form. What we know of education
in medieval Ireland comes from manuscripts produced
in Christian monasteries, accounts of the lives of the
Irish saints, glosses, the Brehon Laws, and translations
of Latin texts produced in monasteries. Most of these
accounts describe a rigorous and dynamic monastic life
that created learned scholars who influenced Irish and
European culture, religion, and scholarship.The Ancient Filid
When Christian missionaries arrived in Ireland, they
encountered an already thriving educational system
under the tutelage of the ancient learned class, the filid
(scholars). Among their many social roles, the filid
were educators and taught natural and moral philoso-
phy. Three tracts of the Brehon Laws, the Senchus Már,
theCrith Gablach(the branched purchase), and the
Uraicecht Becc(the small primer), provide a sharper
picture of the schools created by the filid. The school
itself involved a regular course of training with seven
ascending grades: Fo c hluc,Mac fuirmid,Dos,Cana,Cli,
Anruth, and Ollamh. The whole course lasted twelve
years, and each year was assigned a specific curriculum.
Tocomplete the course, the student progressed throughECCLESIASTICAL SITES