Cross-inscribed pillar, Inishmurray, Co. Sligo
Co. Sligo |
Crosses & Monuments
On the island of Inishmurray, off the Sligo coast, a carved stone slab sits atop a leacht within an enclosure, and the precision of what was cut into its face still commands attention.
A leacht is a low, flat-topped cairn or altar-like structure used as a focus for prayer and ritual during pilgrimage circuits, and this one, known as Treenode More, holds a slab whose entire visible surface is given over to a single dense composition of crosses worked in careful relief.
The slab, just under a metre tall and roughly half a metre wide, carries a large central cross measuring 0.769 metres by 0.366 metres, surrounded by four smaller crosslets arranged in a tight symmetrical cluster. The lower two crosslets grow from the horizontal bar at the base of the main cross; the upper two spring from points midway along its horizontal arms, creating a compact, interlocking arrangement rather than a scattering of separate motifs. All five crosses are shafted and finished with flat serifs, some of them very slightly cusped, giving the upper arms a delicate terminal flourish. At the centre where the arms of the main cross meet, a false relief dimpled boss, a raised circular feature produced by cutting away the surrounding surface rather than adding material, draws the eye to the compositional heart of the whole design. The work was recorded and described by archaeologists Jerry O'Sullivan and Tomás Ó Carragáin during a survey of Inishmurray's monuments carried out between 1997 and 1999, with the results published in their 2008 volume on the island's monks and pilgrims.
Inishmurray itself is an uninhabited island, and reaching the slab requires crossing to it by boat from the Sligo mainland. The pillar stands within its enclosure as a National Monument in state ownership, and the carved face, worn but legible, rewards a close look at the way the four crosslets relate to the geometry of the main cross, each one positioned not at random but derived directly from the structure of the larger form around it.