St. Katherine's Abbey, Monisternagalliaghduff

The 13th century Augustinian nunnery of St. Catherine de O'Conyl or ‘Manisternagalliaghduff’, known locally as Old Abbey, stands in the parish of Robertstown, in the medieval barony of Connelloe [O’Conyll] (Gwynn and Hadcock 1970, 323). The village of Shanagolden lies 2.4km to the W, Shanid Castle (LI019-081001-) lies 4.1km to the SW. Knockpatrick and its church (LI010-058001-) stands 4km to the NW.

Monasternagalliaghduff was mistakenly identified with a nunnery (LI032-043002-) in Lough Gur (Fitzgerald and McGregor 1826, 315, 363, 577). The monastery of the Black Nuns was dedicated to St. Catherine for the Canonesses of St. Augustine (Ware 1705, 103; Croker 1833, 103; Dowd 1896, 79). It was founded in the 13th century on lands belonging to John FitzThomas of Connelloe (O'Konyl) who was killed at Callan in 1261. The abbey buildings stand on the S side of the walled garden of the ruins of Oldabbey House in a hollow overlooking a stream to S, with good views of open countryside to E, and views of undulating countryside to S and W. Earthworks of a possible medieval settlement (LI019-026001-) lie in fields to N and W. Fish-pond (LI019-026006-) 20m to WSW, dovecote (LI019-026004-) and gateway (LI019-026003-) of possible monastic precinct wall 100m and 155m to SW respectively. An Inquisition into the lands of the Manor of Shanid which belonged to Thomas FitzMaurice who died in 1298 recorded that ‘wherefrom are subtracted 8s. paid yearly to the Bishop of Limerick for land which his (Thomas') grandfather granted to the nuns of Okonyl, and 26s. 8d. paid to the same Bishop to acquit land of demesne which Sir Thomas held of him there" (Wardell 1904, 43; Cal. doc. Ire. vol. 4, 259). In 1302-06 the papal taxation of the goods of the religious houses in the diocese of Limerick valued 'St. Catherine in O'Conyl' at 40s. 4d. (Cal. doc. Ire. vol. 5, 271). In 1432 Awly Olongsygh [Lynch] was appointed parish priest of the abbey by Pope Martin V who was informed on behalf of James, Earl of Desmond, patron of St. Catherine's, that the prioress and nuns, or several of them, leading a dissolute life, had wasted in lubricity and converted to unlawful uses the goods of the monastery, whose church was parochial, the priest being appointed or removed by the prioress and nuns; that the only remaining nun had married a layman by whom she had offspring so that she had been removed from the monastery by Cornelius, Bishop of Limerick (1400—25), with the consent of the dean and chapter' (Gwynn and Hadcock 1970, 323-4; Cal. papal letters 1427-47, 400-1). On the 26th September, 1567, Sir Warham St. Leger obtained a lease for twenty-one years of the Abbeys of Adare and Nenagh [Co. Tipperary], together with the site of the monastery of nuns of St. Katherine, called Monaster ne Kayllaghe, County Limerick, with appurtenances, rent £22 17s. 8d. (No. 1143) (Nicholls 1994, 141). Annotated 'M:Negella', the monastery is depicted along with Knockpatrick Church on Jobson’s Map of Munster dated 1589 (TCD MS1209/36). In 1633 the Earl of Cork purchased from sir Charles Coote ‘Monasternegillagh, with two plowlands and the tithes of one of them, and the rectories or parsonages of Robertstown, Donmoylan, Granshawe, and the Island of Aghnes, in the County of Limerick, which Sir Charles this day offers to sell me the inheritance, which is in lease to one John Green at £82. His mts. [sic] rent is about £1 6s. 8d.; it was conveyed by Sir John Jephson and his lady for £800 ster., and Sir Charles' price thereof to me is one thousand pounds, which I paid him" (Wardell 1904, 48-9). About the year 1770 John Greene left Old Abbey, and moved to Letteville, in the County Tipperary. George Hodges, who died in 1788, was succeeded by his cousin, George Morgan, of Foynes Island, ancestor of the present holder (Wardell 1904, 50).

The abbey ruins were surveyed and described by Westropp (Wardell 1904, 53-62) in 1875 as following; ‘The remains consist of a large cloister court surrounded by other buildings : a long narrow church projects from the centre of the eastern face ; it is flanked by two small apartments opening into the cloister, that to the south of the church being evidently a sacristy. The refectory (with a long, low, projecting building, extending southward to the stream, and probably a kitchen) lies along the south wall of the court. To the west is a massive structure with buttresses, and at least three vaulted rooms underneath. It is older than the adjacent walls of the cloister, which embody its buttresses. The church and cloister walls are of one piece, and, though the refectory gables are only bonded at the top, the windows are of the same age as the church, early thirteenth century. Some rebuilding and considerable alteration and mutilation of portions of the church took place late in the fifteenth century. To this period belong its north doorway and east window. The sacristy, commonly called " the Black Hag's Cell,', is also an after-thought, and not bonded into the church; the south window is of late and bad design. The sacristy closes an older doorway in the western wall. The kitchen, though rude and plain, is also late, abutting against the refectory in awkward contiguity with an early window. A small structure, possibly a garderobe, projects near its south-eastern angle. The orchard and garden of Old Abbey House probably correspond to ancient enclosures. The old fish-pond remains in the latter. Another walled field, nearly surrounded by two little streams, seems of conventual origin; and, to the south of it, old earthworks and an ancient gateway with the curious circular pigeon-house mark the limit of the ancient precinct.

Abbey Church

The Church, like some of the other parts of the building, is "off the square." It is 82 feet [25m] long to the south, 83 feet [25m] to the north, and is 18 feet 6 inches [5.6m] wide to the east, and 17 feet 11 inches [5.4m] to the west. Buttresses project from each face of the angles at the east end; they seem of the fifteenth century, and embody older cut stones. The present east window is inserted in the arch of a larger and older window, and has the remains of two ambries under the sill. It has a slight external hood-moulding, and had two simple chamfered shafts, plainly interlacing overhead, without heading pieces or cusps. The shafts and tracery have disappeared; but the framework is intact, and shows slot holes for metal frames, both in the sides and sills. The stonework shows late dressing with toothed and pick chisels; the splay (and that of the second window in the south wall) were turned over planks. The holes for a long bar remain inside the window-shafts to either side of the splay. The south wall, going from the east, retains the following features: A window with a round splay, the light (which is partly built up) has a pointed head, and is recessed and chamfered, being of the same type as the window opposite to it in the north wall, and, in fact, save for its shortness, identical with the remaining window-light of the refectory and that removed from it, and now in the garden-house. This type is very common in the monasteries and churches built by the Normans or under English masons from 1180 to about 1230, and is found with round heads, but in other respects identical design, through the eleventh and early twelfth century. Below its sill are a small piscina with a quatrefoil basin, neatly moulded side shafts with capitals and bases, and an unusually flat trefoil arch, suggesting by its crooked and cramped appearance that the original head was replaced in later times. This was probably done when the upper part of the church walls was rebuilt, the recesses deprived of their arches, and in one case of their capitals, and the side windows lowered to their present stumpy proportions, perhaps in the late fifteenth century. Next we find a tall round-headed recess, probably once containing a picture. It has moulded capitals, bases, and sill,