monuments galway

This national monument is named after Saints Fursa, Conall, Bearchan and Breandan of Birr. It stands near the village of Cowrugh, 1km west of Eochaill, and is a small 15th century building. Outside there is an enclosure called - Leaba an Cheathrair - on which there are four great flagstones, marking the graves of the saints, while to the south of the church is a holy well.

A few fields west are graves marked by plain pillar stones: also in the vicinity is the ruinous Clochan an Phuca,...

The Browne Doorway has stood in Eyre Square for three-quarters of a century. It was removed from an old mansion in Lower Abbeygate Street and bears the arms of the Brown and Lynch families dated 1627. It is now the entrance to the John Fitzgerald Memorial Park, Eyre Square....

Alcock & Brown Memorial; Close to the ruins of the Marconi Radio Station is the spot where Alcock and Brown landed in Derrygimlagh Bog, at the end of the historic first non-stop trains-Atlantic flight in June 1919. A cairn has been erected nearby and on higher ground about 2.5Km away, a 4m limestone monument in the shape of an aeroplane has been erected to mark the historic achievement....

The strong iron cannons, which have stood in Eyre Square for as long as anybody can remember, were presented to the Connaught Rangers, at the end of the Crimean War. The Rangers who subsequently became known throughout the world for their mutiny in India during 1920 in support of the Irish War of Independence, were involved in the Alma Valley battles in 1854. During the course of the campaign they captured and destroyed the town of Burlymk. To mark this and other military achievements they were...

Padraig Pearse's Cottage; In the townland of Tuar Loch, Rosmuc is the cottage of Padraig Pearse, one of the executed leaders of the 1916 Rising. He came on holidays here and also to learn the Irish language. Here he wrote most of his works, including the O'Donovan Rossa graveside oration (1915). The cottage is now a national monument, open to the public during the summer....

The Lynch Memorial is situated near the Church of St Nicholas in the form of a black marble stone over a built-up Gothic doorway. It commemorates the - stern and unbending justice - of James Lynch Fitzstephen, Mayor of Galway in 1493, who found his own son Walter guilty of murdering a Spanish visitor and condemned him to death. When no one could be found to carry out the sentence, so the popular but dubious legend goes, the Mayor hanged his own son before retiring into seclusion....

A Triumphal Arch was erected here in 1782 to commemorate the local volunteers. The structure is still in good condition although the house is now gone....

This statue by stands in the John Fitzgerald Kennedy Memorial Park, Eyre Square. It commemorates Padraic O'Conaire (1882 - 1928), a pioneer in the Irish Literary Revival in this century.

O'Conaire and Patrick Pearse are regarded as being the two most important Irish language short story-writers during the first decades of the 20th century....

A reminder of another war, culminating in the Fight for Independence can be seen at eyre Square. In a circular island stands a statue by Donal Murphy of Liam Mellows, the patriot who led one of the few military engagements outside Dublin during the Easter Rising of 1916. The Liam Mellows Hurling Club, founded in 1934, is named in his honour....

Despite its somewhat prosaic surroundings and the modern iron grating to fend off grazing sheep, this unique and beautifully decorated monolith is one of the great treasures of Celtic La Tene art in Europe. The style of the carving, in its Irish context, is assignable to the last three centuries BC.

The Turoe Stone is a domed granite boulder a little over 3 feet high, artificially shaped and decorated by a technique known as picking, which sets the design out in relief against the...