Kilbake/Kilbakee church in Dromore Woods

[Paddy Casey]

Deep in the undergrowth of Dromore Woods almost adjacent to the Ardroon river I came across the ruins of the Kilbakee church (position N52.92816 W-8.95010). This church (name spelled Kilvakee) is mentioned on the Clare Library website at http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclar ... parish.htm and there are some pictures of the ruins there. It can also be seen on the 1842 Ordnance Survey map on the Library site and is already described there as a ruin.

I'm curious to know more about this church (e.g. when was it built and by whom, when was it abandoned, who was the saint to whom it was dedicated) but cannot find anything about it online (I'm a long way from libraries that might contain this kind of information).

I'm not absolutely sure that the above name is correct. On the 1842 OS map it looks like Kilbake but could also be Kiltake or Kilfake. In Frost's book it appears to be spelled Kilwakee. In the parish of Kilkeedy, a little farther north, there is ruined church called Kill Taice, today called Kiltacky.

Does anyone in this forum know anything about the church at Kilbake/Kilbakee/Kilwakee/Kilvakee in Dromore Woods?

Paddy

[Sduddy]

Paddy, Kilbakey Church is very close to Kiltoola Church, where you outran the bull. Thomas Coffey gives some information in his book, The Parish of Inchicronan (Crusheen), p.70. He thinks, because it is so close to Kiltoola, the two churches may have had some association in the past. He does not give a saint for it.

[Paddy Casey]

Thanks for this reference to Thomas Coffey, The Parish of Inchicronan (Crusheen), p.70. It hadn't occurred to me that the church might have been on the other side of the river until the river changed course (whacks side of own head several times).

When I was there I was sorely tempted to clear the undergrowth around the ruins with my machete to get a better idea of its outlines but then it occurred to me that I would probably need archaeological site planning approval, an agricultural tools licence, a noise abatement review, Health & Safety clearance (Paragraph IV, section A, subsection 64b, Machete, use and care of), and a pre-dig Heritage survey so I just took a GPS reading of the site location and went home ignorant.

Everyone calls this a church but on what evidence, I wonder ? The fact that it is described as such in historical documents does not guarantee, with all respect to the scribes, that is was one. Man drawing up inventory of a warlord's properties in the year 922 notes down old building. Second man says "What's that ?". First man says "I think it was a church". Second man notes "Church ?" on inventory. Monks copying mould-degraded inventory in 1298 for posterity miss the "?", note "Church" and bingo !, a large cow byre or banqueting hall changes into a church.

Another possibility: a monks' residence or some other accomodation associated with Kiltola ?

Probably we'll never know.

Paddy

[smcarberry]

My online version of the James Frost book has the spelling as Kilvakee. Westropp in his article on Clare churches (p. 142) also used that spelling but apparently found nothing on its history in standard reference books of the time (compare the Kilvakee entry to the Ruan parish church entry above it; see screenshot below). The link to the online version of the Westropp article is:
http://books.google.com/books?id=Func1k ... ee&f=false

Tourism sites use the spelling Killakee or Kilakee, both based on this extremely brief reference:
"...This is also the sites of Cahermacrea Castle, Kilakee Church, two ring forts and a lime kiln..."
http://www.heritageireland.ie/en/.../DromoreWood/

This book may be the source of additional information:
Forgotten Stones: Ancient Church Sites of the Burren and Environs
by Averil Swinfren
Lilliput Press, 1992
"This is a lovingly detailed record of eighty-two churches secreted in the hundred-odd square miles of the Burren, west of Galway. The physical remains and state of preservation of each church are carefully described, along with other elements of archaeological and historical interest."

Good luck with that,
Sharon Carberry

Westropp p.jpg (40.26 KiB) Viewed 7881 times

[Paddy Casey]

Following Sharon Carberry's lead above I contacted the Local Studies Centre at the Clare Library and they kindly passed me the following information from Averil Swinfren's book "Forgotten Stones: Ancient Church Sites of the Burren and Environs" (Lilliput Press, 1992). The section on the Kilvakee (sic.) church reads as follows:

KILVAKEE, DROMORE WOOD
The site of this old church in Dromore Wood is not easy to locate. According to the revised Ordnance Survey map of 1898-9 (sheet 124), it should be alongside a riverlet connecting one lake to another. Hours spent scrambling along the water's edge, skidding across wet boulders, failed to discover the site. It was while I was plodding dejectedly back to the woodland avenue that at last the remains came into view. Over the years the water has changed course, leaving a dry gully between church and stream, so that the ruin now lies west of the gully, which itself is west of this riverlet. Though now covered in wreaths of greenery, the old church remains as it was described by T.J. Westropp nearly a century ago: 'Rudely built foundations remaining in Dromore.' Its origins are not known. Only one other reference to it has been found. In 1893 James Frost mentions its existence as a ruined church, of which 'nothing can be ascertained'. There is no record of a burial place at the site. Locally, it is said to have been a penal church and its secluded situation makes that easy to believe. It most likely fell into disuse after 1793 when the penal code was relaxed and the laws restricting religious practice were repealed.

The term "penal church", as I understand it (I am not a historian), would refer to a church that was erected in penal times (broadly 1695 to around the early 19th century).

In view of the difficulty that not only I but, it seems, Averil Swinfren had in locating this church in the jungle* that is Dromore Woods it would have been an ideal place to worship out of sight of the anti-papists.

Paddy

* Thanks goodness there are still a few jungles left in Western Europe. But it won't be long before Google Street View gets into the thickets of Dromore Wood so check that church out before its moss-covered remains are on the Internet for the armchair explorer to view in "Been there, done that" mode.