Saint Iberius' Church, Wexford

The parish church of St Iberius is at the N end of the Norse town and on the E side of North Main St. It is named after St. Ibar or Iobhar of Begerin (WX038-004001-), who is one of the most mythologized saints in Ireland (Ó Riain 2011, 381-2). The location is reputedly the site of an early church but there is no evidence of this, although it was a medieval parish. According to a Visitation by Thomas Ram, the Protestant bishop of Ferns, in 1615 the church was impropriate to St. Selskar’s, David Browne was the priest, and the church and chancel were in repair (Hore 1900-11, vol. 6, 267). The present building was built in 1760-6. (Hore 1900-11, vol.5, 80 81, 385-6)

Archaeological monitoring (20E0734) of groundworks outside the W doorway uncovered a culvert, from which human bone was recovered, and also a fragment of a N-W wall that extended E (Wth 0.6m plus) beneath the W wall of the present church and may be from the medieval church, but the only artefacts recovered were seventeenth to eighteenth century ceramics. (McLoughlin 2021, 14-15)