Graveslab, Portlecka, Co. Clare

Co. Clare |

Tombs & Memorials

Graveslab, Portlecka, Co. Clare

In the middle of the nave floor of Ruan church in County Clare, set directly into the gravel, lies a medieval graveslab that most visitors would likely step around without a second thought.

It is not mounted on a wall or protected behind glass; it simply sits there, slightly uneven, broken clean across its middle, the two halves now separated by a gap of about three centimetres. The slab tapers from roughly 44 centimetres wide at the top to 40 centimetres at the base, and runs to a maximum length of 1.33 metres, the whole thing oriented east to west with the head end pointing west, following the standard Christian burial alignment.

What the slab carries is worth looking at closely. A ringed cross, the kind of design where a circle connects the arms, has been incised into the stone using a double-lined technique, meaning each arm and the ring itself were cut as two parallel lines rather than a single groove. The ring fills the entire upper portion of the slab, edge to edge, giving the composition an almost compressed, monumental quality despite the modest scale. Below it, the cross ends in a base with upturned steps, a decorative feature found on a number of early Irish grave markers, positioned about 35 centimetres from the bottom of the slab. The base of the stone itself is rough and broken. Immediately to the south, a second slab lies adjacent, this one considerably more worn, with only faint traces of what appears to be a similar cross still legible on its surface. The two slabs together suggest this corner of the nave was once a place of particular significance, though whatever names or status once attached to the people buried here have long since been effaced by time and weathering.

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Pete F
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