Cross, Cinn Aird Thoir, Co. Kerry

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Crosses & Monuments

Cross, Cinn Aird Thoir, Co. Kerry

In a graveyard at Cinn Aird Thoir in County Kerry, a single slab of old red sandstone does double duty.

Carved with what appears to be a rudimentary cross, it serves simultaneously as a cross slab and as the gravemarker for a burial recorded as Grave No. 403. The qualification matters: this is a possible cross, not a confirmed one. The carving is basic enough that the distinction is genuinely uncertain, which gives the stone a quiet ambiguity that more elaborate monuments rarely possess.

The slab came to light during a graveyard survey conducted in 2011 by Ann Frykler and Robert Hanbidge of Headland Archaeology Ltd. Old red sandstone is a sedimentary rock found widely across Munster and was a common material for early grave markers and cross slabs in Kerry, valued as much for its local availability as for its workability. The simplicity of the carving here is not unusual in that context. Rudimentary cross slabs, where a cross form is incised or shaped with minimal elaboration, appear throughout Irish early medieval and later burial grounds, sometimes as markers of genuine antiquity and sometimes as much more recent improvisations. Which category this stone belongs to remains an open question.

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