Grave Yd, Everardsgrange, Co. Tipperary
Co. Tipperary |
Burial Grounds
A graveyard that contains the ghost of an older one is an unusual thing, but that is precisely what survives at Everardsgrange in County Tipperary.
Set on a gentle rise of undulating pasture, the rectangular enclosure that most visitors would take for the whole site, measuring roughly 42 metres north to south and 25 metres east to west, turns out to conceal an earlier curvilinear boundary running just inside it. That inner curve, defined by a low earthen bank, sweeps from south to west to north and joins the outer rectangle at both ends, suggesting that a rounded early ecclesiastical enclosure, of the kind associated with pre-Norman Irish Christianity, was later rationalised into the more regular shape that stands today.
The site is anchored at its northern edge by a ruined church, whose north wall actually forms part of the graveyard boundary, with the earthen bank folding inward to meet the building's east and west gables. Entry is through a stone stile set towards the western end of the south side. The curving inner bank is modest in scale, roughly 3.2 metres wide at its base and less than a metre above the exterior ground level, but it is legible enough to read in the landscape once you know what to look for. The headstones within are of eighteenth and nineteenth century date, and alongside the carved stones are a number of plain boulders serving as grave-markers, a quiet reminder that formal inscription was not always available to those buried here. Some 640 metres to the south-west, Cramps Castle is visible on the horizon, placing the graveyard within a landscape that was clearly inhabited and organised over many centuries.