ABBEYS AND RELIGIOUS HOUSES
the Augustinian canons regular, priests living accord-
ing to the Rule of St. Augustine, and, in the case of
abbeys only, the Cistercian monks, followers of the
Rule of St. Benedict. Monasteries of both groups sur-
vive in significant numbers in areas formerly under
Gaelic-Irish and Anglo-Norman control. Priories of
Augustinian canons regular occur more frequently in
urban settings than the monastic houses of other
orders, in part because of their willingness to engage
in pastoral work, their modest space requirements, and
their presence in Ireland at the time of colonization.
There were also other orders present in Ireland at
this time, but they have left behind little above-ground
archaeology. Premonstratensian canons, for example,
had about a dozen houses in Ireland, but little remains
of any of them. The sole house of Cluniac monks,
founded by Tairrdelbach Ua Conchobair at Athlone
circa 1150, is lost. Carthusian monks from England
had one house, Kinalehin, founded circa 1252; dis-
solved ninety years later and then re-colonized shortly
afterwards by Franciscan friars, the archaeological
remains are mainly Franciscan, though elements of the
Carthusian priory and fabric are still evident. There
were also about seventy convents of nuns, mainly
Augustinian canonesses. Of the few that survive, the
nunnery of St. Catherine near Shanagolden stands out:
Its church projects from the middle of the east side of
the cloister, a very idiosyncratic arrangement.
Benedictine Houses
Benedictine monks were also present in Ireland, includ-
ing some at Christ Church cathedral in the late 1000s,
but they had surprisingly few houses there compared
with contemporary England, where they enjoyed the
patronage of the Normans. Malachy’s energetic promo-
tion of the Cistercians and Augustinians as the land-
scape of reformed monasticism in Ireland was taking
shape was evidently to their cost. A couple of Benedic-
tine houses, Cashel and Rosscarbery, were subject to
Schottenklöster(Irish Benedictine monasteries in cen-
tral Europe) but we know virtually nothing about their
archaeology or architecture. Ireland’s most substantial
medieval Benedictine survival is at Fore, a late-twelfth-
century foundation of the Anglo-Norman de Lacy fam-
ily; the fabric of this claustrally planned monastery was
altered considerably during the Middle Ages, but parts
of the original church of circa 1200 remain.Cistercian Houses
The Cistercian order, founded in 1098 in Burgundy,
was a pan-European institution in the twelfth century,
and its arrival in Ireland in 1142 is one of the key
moments in the country’s history. Fifteen Cistercian
abbeys were founded in the thirty years before the
Anglo-Norman invasion, and twice as many again
were founded (by both Anglo-Norman and native Irish
patrons) in the subsequent century. The last medieval
foundation was at Hore, near Cashel, in 1272.
Cistercian architecture in Europe has a distinctively
austere personality: The churches are generally simple
cruciform buildings with flat-ended, rather than apsidal,
presbyteries and transeptal chapels, and their interior
and exterior wall surfaces tend to be unadorned. The
Irish examples conform to this general pattern even
though the two earliest foundations, Mellifont (founded
1142) and Baltinglass (founded 1148) have churches
of slightly unusual plans.
Mellifont’s construction was overseen by a monk
of Clairvaux, Robert. Little of its original architecture
remains. The principal surviving features at Mellifont
are the late Romanesque lavabo, an elaborate structure
for the collection and provision of water to monks
about to enter the refectory, and the slightly later chapter
house. Mellifont’s community was originally com-
posed of Irish and French brethren, but racial and
cultural conflict between them persuaded the French
to leave shortly after the foundation. Similar conflicts
emerged and were sometimes resolved after armed
conflict when the Anglo-Normans sought control of
Ireland’s Cistercian monasteries.Augustinian Houses
Unlike the Cistercian Order, which entered Ireland in
the company of monks from overseas, the Augustinian
canons regular of pre-Anglo-Norman Ireland were
simply indigenous religious who, in response to the
twelfth-century Church reform, adopted the Rule ofMoyne Abbey, Co. Mayo. © Department of the Environment,
Heritage and Local Government, Dublin.