Cross-slab, Ballingarry, Co. Galway

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Crosses & Monuments

Cross-slab, Ballingarry, Co. Galway

At Ballingarry in County Galway, a small limestone slab lies flat on the ground, easy to overlook and easier still to misread.

It measures just 66 centimetres long and roughly 26 centimetres wide, not much larger than a roof tile, yet its upper surface carries a Greek cross carved in an unusual way: rather than cutting the cross itself into the stone, the carver worked the negative space, gouging out four curved recesses around a central point so that the cross emerges as the material left behind. The recesses are deeply pocked, suggesting the work was done by repeated pecking with a pointed tool rather than by clean incision.

The slab was documented by Higgins in 1987, who noted that the carver had also flattened irregular patches across the face of the stone, and that there is evidence of trimming along the sides, though the back was left rough. It now lies recumbent, meaning it has fallen or been placed face-up on the ground at some point. Cross-slabs of this kind, simple dressed stones bearing an incised or relief cross, are among the most modest survivals of early Christian practice in Ireland, often associated with burial grounds, wells, or places of localised devotion. This one sits just five metres to the west of a holy well, a natural spring that acquired religious significance and was likely a focus of continued local observance over many centuries. Beside it stands an 18th-century cross, suggesting the spot accumulated layers of use across a long stretch of time, each generation adding its own marker to a place that already carried meaning.

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Pete F
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