Cross-inscribed stone, An Baile Riabhach, Co. Kerry

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Crosses & Monuments

Cross-inscribed stone, An Baile Riabhach, Co. Kerry

Worked into the inner wall-face of a small oratory on the lower eastern slopes of Lateevemore, a series of boulders carry early Christian cross-carvings that most visitors to the Dingle Peninsula never know to look for.

Three of the stones are inscribed with simple equal-armed crosses, one bearing four such crosses, another two, and a third just one. A fourth stone is slightly more elaborate, carrying an equal-armed cross with expanded terminals, the arms flaring outward at their ends in a form associated with early medieval ecclesiastical carving throughout Ireland and western Britain.

The site is known variously as Templemanaghan, Teampall Mhanacháin, or Teampall Geal, and it sits within an associated burial ground on the lower eastern slopes of Lateevemore, overlooking Dingle Harbour and the Milltown valley. The oratory itself belongs to a tradition of small stone churches built by early Christian communities in the west of Ireland, often in remote or elevated positions. The cross-slabs here are embedded in the fabric of the building rather than standing free, which is not unusual for sites of this type; carved stones were frequently reused as structural material as communities rebuilt or repaired their oratories across the centuries. The site was documented in J. Cuppage's 1986 archaeological survey of the Corca Dhuibhne region, which remains one of the foundational reference works for understanding the density of early medieval remains across the Dingle Peninsula.

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