The ruins of Clonmacnois form by far the most interesting architectural
remains on the Shannon. Their situation is unique--on a sandy knoll
overlooking the winding river, as it flows in great reaches among marshy
meadows of apparently illimitable extent. Thousands of acres of them on
both banks of the Shannon are spread before one's gaze when standing at
the base of any of the ruined shrines of this ancient seat of piety and
learning. The ecclesiastics of ancient Ireland seem to have been gifted
with an extraordinary amount of appreciation for the beautiful and unique
in nature. The wilder and the more beautiful a place was, the more it
seems to have attracted them. Cashel's solitary Rock, Glendaloch's gloomy
vale, and this barren sandhill overlooking the most peculiar scenery in
all the island, were the places in which they reared their most cherished
fanes and most beautiful buildings. The situation of Clonmacnois cannot be
said to be beautiful, but it is strange and weird to the last degree--more
strange and weird, perhaps, than any other place in Ireland.
The best and most agreeable way to reach Clonmacnois is from Athlone. It
is twelve English miles from Athlone by road, and ten by river. By river
is not only the cheapest way but the most interesting. Sails can be used
on this part of the Shannon almost as well as on Loch Ree, for the banks
are so low that every breeze that blows can be fully utilised; and the
river is so crooked, that no matter from what quarter the wind comes it
can sometimes fill the sail. The Shannon here is no tiny stream like the
Liffey, but a wide river, never less than from 150 to 200 yards in
breadth, and generally deep enough to float a small ocean steamer. The
current is, however, not rapid.
The first thing that strikes the stranger who sees Clonmacnois for the
first time is the extraordinary view from it over the largest extent of
callow meadows to be seen in any part of Ireland. It must not be thought
that these meadows are mere bogs, for some of the finest hay is raised on
them. The grass that grows on them must be of a fairly good quality, for
they let at from L5 to L6 per Irish acre, the purchaser having to save the
hay, and run all the risk attending the making it in land so liable to be
flooded. Not infrequently, the taker of meadow on the vast flats that
border the Shannon between Loch Ree and Loch Derg, will awaken some fine
morning and find all his small cocks of hay afloat, sailing placidly
southward, and more likely to find their way to Killaloe than to his
haggard. The second thing that will strike the observant stranger in
Clonmacnois is the small size of the churches. That it was one of the most
important ecclesiastical establishments in ancient Ireland there cannot be
any doubt, for it is more frequently mentioned in ancient Irish history
and annals than any other place of its kind in the country. Yet the
largest church in it, the ruins of which exist, would not, by any stretch
of imagination, accommodate more than three or four hundred worshippers.
There are the ruins of but three churches existing in Clonmacnois; the
largest of them is called Cathedral, the two smaller ones can hardly be
called churches. They must have been oratories, and would not combined
contain over two hundred persons. When Clonmacnois was in its most
prosperous condition--that was in the early part of the ninth century, or
about the time when the Danish invasions were heaviest and most
harassing--Ireland must have been a very populous country. There are so
many proofs of this in ancient Gaelic annals and literature that it may
be regarded as a fact. How, then, did it happen that the churches in
Clonmacnois were so small? This is a question that cannot be answered
fully. It may be that what now remains of its churches is of comparatively
recent origin, and may not have been erected until the decadence of the
population had commenced at the time of the Danish invasions, which
decadence became more and more pronounced down to the latter part of the
sixteenth century. Or it may have been that there were large wooden
Churches in Clonmacnois in ancient times, not a vestige or trace of which
would be found after fire had done its work on them.
[Illustration: ROUND TOWER, CLONMACNOIS.]
The two round towers are by far the most interesting and beautiful
buildings in Clonmacnois. The larger one wants apparently twenty or thirty
feet of the top; whether it was struck by lightning, or knocked off by
cannon, no one seems to know. The smaller tower is as perfect as it was
when its builder pronounced it finished a thousand years ago. No more
beautiful piece of architecture in the way of a tower ever was erected. It
seems to be absolute perfection. The most skilled modern artisan in stone
could not find an imperfection in it. It is built entirely of cut
stones. The roof or dome is made of lozenge-shaped stones, fitted so
closely and finished so well that time and weather seem to have passed
over it in vain, for it is, as far as can be seen from the ground at its
base, as perfect as it ever was. Of all round towers in Ireland, it is the
most beautiful and perfect. The larger tower seems to have been built of
stones similar to those of the smaller one, but as it wants its top its
beauty is almost entirely spoiled. What remains of it seems about as
perfect in its architecture as human hands could make it. The smaller
tower appears to afford positive proof of Petrie's theory as to the
post-Christian origin of the Irish round towers, for it and the little
church or oratory at its base, and out of which it rises, were evidently
built at the same time, for the walls of both are actually in some places
one. Like some few of the existing round towers (the one near Navan, for
instance), the smaller one at Clonmacnois has no opening in the roof by
which the sound of bells could be emitted, showing clearly that it could
never have been erected solely for a belfry; for no matter how big a bell
might be, its sound would not have been heard a hundred yards away, if
rung under the windowless stone roof of this most perfect and beautiful of
Irish round towers. That round towers were sometimes used as belfries
seems very probable; but that their principal use, and the prime object
for which they were erected, were to protect the clergy and the treasures
of the churches from the marauding Northmen is the theory regarding them
that is now most generally accepted.
Clonmacnois is not so rich in ancient crosses as some other places like
it. There are only two to be seen there at present. They are not nearly so
well carved and ornamented as many that still remain in other Irish
cemeteries. There is not, so far as can be seen by the passer-by, a single
inscription in the Irish language visible, though some scores of such
inscriptions exist in it, every one of which has been faithfully copied
and translated by Doctor Petrie in his great work, "Christian Inscriptions
in the Irish Language." The inscribed stones are, very properly, stowed
away in a vault under lock and key where they are safe from the mischief
of so many who would delight in marring and effacing any thing they could
not understand. There are plenty of inscriptions in English to be seen in
Clonmacnois, for it is still used as a place of interment. This takes away
a great deal of its antique charm and general interest. It seems a sort of
profanation to erect a modern tomb with an English inscription on it at
the very base of a hoary round tower that was a wonder of art and beauty
when London was little else than a large village, and when England itself
was hardly civilised, and as politically powerless as Saint Domingo or
Corea.
Clonmacnois has suffered as much from vandalism as any other place of its
kind in Ireland. It was taken and spoiled by the Danes when at the height
of its splendour in the ninth century. But it was not the Danes that
committed the worst depredations in this wonderfully unique and ancient
place. They were committed by men who used gunpowder, for it was evidently
by it that most of the old buildings of Clonmacnois were destroyed. It is
generally believed that it was by one of Cromwell's captains who was
stationed with some troops at Athlone when the Royalist cause had been
lost that most of the destruction at Clonmacnois was accomplished. The
blowing up of the magnificent castle erected here by Hugo de Lacy in the
twelfth century, is attributed to Cromwell's troopers, as is also the
demolition of some thirty or forty feet of the larger of the two round
towers, known as O'Ruarc's tower.
There are the remains of only three churches extant in Clonmacnois; but
we know from authentic annals and history that there were nearly a dozen
churches in it at one time. What became of them, or where they stood,
cannot now be known. Many of them were, probably, wooden churches, and,
when once destroyed, left no trace. The ruins of the ancient nunnery are
distant nearly quarter of a mile from the churchyard, on the grounds of a
gentleman named Charlton. It is only about thirty years ago since an
attempt was made to clear away the rubbish in which they were buried, and
to try if any of the sculptured stones could be recovered. The excavations
were made under the supervision of the Protestant Bishop of Limerick.
Sculptured stone-work of the highest order of art was dug up from many
feet under the surface where the destroyers had buried it. Visitors to
Clonmacnois will not have any difficulty in seeing the ruins of the
nunnery, for Mr Charlton willingly permits visitors to see them. It is not
only curious, but hopeful and pleasant, to find people of the same
religious belief altering so much for the better as time rolls by. Whilom
Protestant men and a whilom Protestant Government did all they could in
the seventeenth century to turn Clonmacnois into a heap of ruins, almost
as void and as shapeless as those of Babylon; but Protestant men and a
Protestant Government in the nineteenth century have done everything in
their power to save it from further decay, and to dig up its sculptured
stones from the dust in which ancient Protestant fanaticism and bigotry
had buried them.
Clonmacnois was founded by St Kieran, who died in the year 549. There are
records of the erection of most of its ancient buildings to be found in
Irish annals and history. According to the _Chronicon Scottorum_, a work
of high authority, the Cathedral was built in the year 909. The Cathedral
that existed when Turgesius the Dane obtained sway for some years over the
greater part of Ireland, and when his wife used to issue her orders from
that building, was probably of wood, for no trace of it appears extant.
Doctor Petrie says that the larger round tower was erected in the tenth
century, and the smaller one in the eleventh or early part of the twelfth.
There is good authority to prove that the nunnery was erected and endowed
by the too well-remembered Dearvorgil, wife of O'Ruairc, whose _liaison_
with Dermot Mac Murrough, King of Leinster, is popularly believed to have
brought about the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland.
One of the great curiosities of Clonmacnois is the powder-blown-up castle
built by Hugo de Lacy in the latter part of the twelfth century, the
remains of which stand on a hill about two hundred yards from the
cemetery. It is generally known as the Prior's house, but it was evidently
built as a place of defence. It was one of the strongest castles ever
erected in Ireland. Although comparatively small, building and enclosure
not covering more than half an acre, it was a place of immense strength,
and before the invention of gunpowder could have defied a host. It is
encompassed by a fosse in some places forty feet in depth, that descends
sheer from the walls. The walls are of immense thickness and strength,
from six to eight feet thick in many places, and so firmly are the stones
embedded in grouting that to detach one of them from the powder-riven
walls, or from the vast masses of blown-up masonry that lie scattered
around, a hammer and chisel would be required. Huge heaps of the ruined
walls, some of them tons in weight, have been tumbled into the deep fosse
that surrounds the castle, but they are still almost as solid as rocks. If
ever the art of building solid walls was brought to perfection, it was by
those who reared this now ruined pile. To know the strength of gunpowder
and the solidity of ancient masonry, one should see this ruined castle of
Clonmacnois.
With all the beauties and diversity of scenery of the Shannon, on the
banks of which stands all that remains of Clonmacnois, and with all the
places of historic interest laved by its waters, it is a disgrace to
Ireland at large that there is not a single passenger steam-boat on it
above Limerick. It is nearly a hundred and fifty miles from
Carrick-on-Shannon to Killaloe, and in all that vast distance of spreading
lake and winding river there is not a passenger steam-boat to be seen!
There may be said to be no obstacle to navigation in all that distance for
boats drawing from five to six feet of water, and there are only four or
five locks to pass through. No other river of equal length affords more
variety of scenery than the Shannon. Sometimes the voyager passes by
wooded banks, anon through apparently illimitable meadows, and then
through great lakes like veritable inland seas,--island-studded or
mountain-girded,--change of scene occurring in almost every mile. Let it
be hoped that a line of passenger steamers will soon again be seen on the
waters of this great and beautiful river,--this "ancient stream," as its
Gaelic name is said to mean,--that has on its banks so many relics of the
past-the grass-grown rath, the hoary round tower, the crumbling castle,
and above all, the ruined fanes of Clonmacnois.