PARISH CHURCHES, CATHEDRALSthepriest performed the ceremonies at the altar. The
upkeep of the nave was the responsibility of the parish,
while that of the chancel fell to the priest. The chancel
was usually a separately roofed, lower and smaller sec-
tion of the building and was entered and visible from
the nave through a chancel arch. Usually set immedi-
ately west of the chancel arch was a wooden rood
screen, which takes its name from a large wooden cru-
cifix (rood) suspended above it. The screen, which had
doors in the center giving access to the chancel, nor-
mally had a narrow loft above it, accessed by a stairs
within the screen or in the thickness of the wall on one
side. Not a single medieval wooden rood screen sur-
vives from Ireland but evidence for their former exist-
ence can be seen in many churches in the form of
corbels or beam-holes in the walls and windows or stairs
that served them. The rood screen would have further
emphasized the division between nave and chancel and
in plain rectangular churches would have been the main
demarcation between these two areas of the church.
Irish medieval parish churches are mostly in ruin
and are generally considerably smaller than contempo-
rary examples in England. Some of the largest exam-
ples from the thirteenth century were built in towns
and good examples can be seen at New Ross, County
Wexford and Gowran, County Kilkenny. At New Ross
only the chancel and transepts survive from an ambi-
tious early thirteenth-century church. At Gowran most
of the nave survives with its aisles, all built around 1270.
Parish churches were frequently altered and added
to and it is rare to find an example that is of one period
only. Some incorporate remains of older churches from
the tenth to twelfth centuries, such as Tullaherin,
County Kilkenny and Fore, County Westmeath. The
sequence of alterations and rebuildings can in some
cases be very complicated as at St. Audoen’s in Dublin
or the larger church at Liathmore, County Tipperary.
The fifteenth century saw a great boom in building
in Ireland and many churches were built anew or older
ones altered. Many of the small ruined medieval
churches in graveyards around the country date from
this period. Often they have opposing doorways, with
pointed two-centered heads, in the north and south
walls of the nave. The most popular form of window
in late medieval times was that with an ogee head and
these are found also in the contemporary tower houses.
Some of the finest churches of this period were those
built in towns or in the more settled lands of the Pale.
Larger examples have fine traceried windows such as
those seen at St. Nicholas’s in Galway or Dunsany,
County Meath.
A feature of churches of this period is the provision
of accommodation for the ministering priest in the
west end of the church or in an attached tower. In many
cases the area of the nave to the west of the doorways
was walled off from the rest of the church and provided
with a first floor for extra accommodation. A tower at
the west end or attached to one side or incorporating
the chancel probably served as a castellated presbytery.
A common feature of the period was the addition of
crenellated parapets on churches, rendering them suit-
able for defense on a small scale. Churches were
attacked and damaged in raids and warfare and the
provision of defenses was a serious consideration. Also
churches were used to store property and valuables,
making them a lucrative target for raiders and thieves.
Chantry chapels were sometimes formed within or
added to parish churches, especially those in towns.
These and collegiate churches were sometimes
endowed under the terms of a will, when money or
property was bequeathed for this purpose and to sup-
port the priest or priests to say mass there for the souls
of the deceased. Some chantry chapels were controlled
by guilds, such as the guild of St Anne at St Audoen’s
in Dublin.
Many parish churches, especially the rural ones,
became ruined during the wars of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries or as a result of the Reformation,
which made them the property of the established Prot-
estant church while the vast majority of the population
remained Catholic. Also, as a consequence of the dis-
solution of the monasteries, many parishes became
impropriate to lay people, whose main concern was
not the cure of souls.CathedralsThough bishops were important figures in the early
medieval Irish church, churches associated with them
were not referred to as cathedrals until the reforms of the
twelfth century divided the entire country into dioceses.
Most of the buildings then designated as cathedrals
would have been older principal churches on ecclesias-
tical sites. Some of these survive as ruins such as those
at Clonmacnoise and Glendalough, while others were
incorporated into buildings still in use by the Church of
Ireland such as Clonfert, County Galway and Kilfenora,
County Clare. Other churches had short-lived claims to
cathedral status such as those at Ardmore, County Water-
ford and Scattery Island, County Clare. The newly
appointed bishops in the twelfth century succeeded in
acquiring for their dioceses some of the old termon lands
of early medieval monastic/ecclesiastical sites and,
where these were successfully held and well managed,
they became episcopal manors, which helped to support
the bishop and other diocesan dignitaries. If extensive,
these see lands could help in supplying funds for build-
ing projects, such as a new cathedral or additions to
anoldone.