The Four Altars

I was born in the shadow of the Four Altars, which stands proudly on a hill overlooking the present or ‘new’ road from Ballaghaderreen to Monasteraden. This monument is located in the townland of Creggane, which in the past was called Creggane-na-gcrann because of all the trees in the area.

During the Penal times priests risked their lives saying Mass in people’s houses, on the hills and behind fences. The Four Altars offered protection to the priest from the wind and rain while saying Mass. For example when the wind came from the north, the priest would say Mass at the alter facing south. From the beginning of the 18th Century places were named after the local Mass hill or Mass rock.

The priest who read Mass at Ateen-taggart in Bockagh also read Mass here when circumstances permitted and usually resided with the Costello family in Creggane. It is believed that Mass was said at least once in the 19th century, about 1820 when Father Farrell lived in the district.

The penal laws were not rigorously enforced as regards worship in many parts of the country, especially the west, after 1700. The rigour of the laws depended to a large extent on the landlord. Orlaur Abbey, for example, survived right through the penal laws. There is no evidence that Mass was said at the ‘Four Altars’ in more recent times. We know that about the year 1897, Father O’Connor, a curate in Ballaghaderreen, gathered the neighbours together to recite the rosary one October evening. I remember an elderly neighbour of mine proudly showing me a photograph of the occasion.

It is said that Myles Costello who lived in Creggane (Creggane-na-gCrann) erected the building sometime between 1720 and 1750. He was a descendant of the Costello’s of Castlemore. This family is now extinct. It was built as a monument to the faith and sufferings of the Irish.

Castlemore was the ancient seat of the family who were originally Norman settlers in Meath, called de Angulos or Nangles but later adopted the name Mac Costello or Costello. After getting the O’Gara lands they set up their headquarters at Castlemore about 1300 and prospered until ousted by Sir Theobald Dillon in 1587. In 1595 Castlemore castle was destroyed by Hugh O’Donnell.

The Costello’s of Tallaghanmore or Edmondstown were another family. The last member of this family was Captain Costello who built the residence of the present bishop of Achonry. This latter family became Protestants somewhere about, the beginning of the 19th Century. It was said that Sir Robert Peel, who was British Home Secretary from 1812 to1818, the man who established the Royal Irish constabulary (the Peelers), regularly visited this family of Tallaghanmore for the shooting season.

On 10th November 1967 the Roscommon Herald published a letter from a Rev. P. Kilgarriff who resided in Sidmouth, Devon. The writer provided additional information about Rev. Thomas Costello whose family built the Four Altars. The letter mentions that a biographical account of his life is contained in a ‘History of the Catholic Religion in the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Somerset, Wilts and Gloucester’ by the very Rev George Oliver a noted historian and friend and contemporary of Rev. T. Costello.

This account states that in the spring of 1821 Father Costello took up a post in Plymouth where he ministered for thirteen years. On the 25th April 1834, he was transferred to Cannington and on 29th January 1837, he moved to Calverleigh Court where he remained until the establishment of St. John's near Tiverton on 19th May 1839.

He died on 21st March 1846 at the age of 77 years and is buried beside the St John’s Church in Tiverton.

Two Ancient Trackways - Creggane

Beneath the boglands of Ireland we can find evidence of our ancestors’ past going back thousands of years.

An ancient wooden trackway, built to carry people walking in single file, was discovered close to the Lung River in the Callow Bog, North County Roscommon in the early 1960s and has been dated to 1165 BC. A wood and stone trackway from the same locality has been dated to 1100 BC.

The wooden trackway was originally several hundred yards in length but large sections had been cut away during turf cutting over the years. It consisted of two parallel wooden planks measuring approximately nine inches in width and eight feet in length. The ends of one pair of planks were placed over the ends of the next pair and they were joined together by two long pegs driven through holes cut in the timbers. In some parts a short piece of roughly cut timber had been placed underneath to provide additional support.

The second wood and stone trackway was discovered directly across the Lung River and measured three feet in width. It consisted of a foundation of brushwood over which was placed a layer of roughly cut planks laid edge to edge like railway sleepers but without any spaces in between. Two layers of stone or flags were placed on top. The structure was held in position by a series of pegs. A slightly different method of construction was used at the north end of the trackway where long poles were laid lengthways to support up to three layers of stone. This ancient roadway was traced continuously over a distance of a quarter of a mile. Today, it lies largely undisturbed beneath a blanket of soft bogland, hidden from the world.

The two trackways at Creggane and Callow, although very different in construction, formed a single roadway that may have linked the higher grounds towards Banada with that in Creggane to the north. It has been suggested that there may have been some form of crossing near where the two trackways met the Lung River.

Peatland once covered some 16% of the land surface of Ireland. Prior to modern drainage much of central Ireland consisted of soggy marshland interspersed with areas of dry land. This presented enormous problems for the ancient traveller whose existence involved moving about the land. The early inhabitants of Ireland lived on the uplands where they looked after their herds and cultivated the land, which would have been surrounded by large areas of wetland.

Looking out on the surrounding marshlands, these early people would have seen a vast area of reeds, sedges, mosses and stagnant pools glistening in the sunlight against the greens and browns of the marsh vegetation. Willow and Alder trees abounded and around the low-lying perimeters of the bogs there were hazel and birch. Ash trees were also to be seen while on the higher ground there were clusters of oak.

Research carried cut by Dr. Barry Raftery of University College, Dublin, over the five-year period 1985 - 1989, in the Fount Dillon complex of bog land, Co. Longford, has done much to increase our knowledge of this hitherto neglected aspect of our history. (Trackways Through Time by Barry Raftery - Headline Publishing). During this time some 57 tracks were excavated, some extensively, and more to a limited degree.

Some archaeologists have suggested that these ancient roadways were not structures designed to cross the bog but to get into the bog, perhaps, for ritual purposes. A seventh century sword, which may have been such a votive offering, was found close to where the two Creggane Trackways meet the river.

The life of these ancient roadways would have been short in view of the extremely wet conditions in the continually growing bog. The trackways would quickly sink into the soft peat and become covered in vegetation. Projecting pegs would have marked the route through the bog after the walking surface had become obscured.

The tool marks on the timbers recovered from these old roadways were perfectly preserved giving precise information on the size and shape of the axes used. Individual axes were recognisable because of the blemishes or imperfections on the blade, which left a distinctive ‘signature’ in the wood. Indeed, it is possible to point to the individual work of a craftsman in a particular track.

We owe much to our waterlogged boglands. To quote the words of John Lubbock, writing in 1865:
‘Few things can be more interesting than the spectacle of an ancient long-forgotten people, thus rising, as it were, from the waters of oblivion’.

St. Attracta (5th Century)

St. Attracta was born in the 5th Century and was the daughter of a noble family. She founded a convent and hospice for travellers, where the seven roads met at Killaraght near Lough Gara, that still existed as late as 1539. She also founded churches and convents in Galway and Sligo.

St. Attracta was a contemporary of St. Patrick from whom she received the veil. A native of the County Sligo, she resolved to devote herself to God but was opposed by her parents. She fled to South Connacht and made her first foundation at Drumconnell, near Boyle, County Roscommon. Thomas Knox, historian, writing on information from the life of Saint Patrick, states that she was a daughter of Cathbad of Gregraide of Lough Techet (Lough Gara) and lived in parts of the fifth and sixth centuries. She is said to have had exceptional powers of curing the sick. Her convents were famous for hospitality and offering charity to the poor.

St. Attracta’s Holy Well is located at Clogher, a short distance from the village of Monasteraden. There is a crucifixion plaque, dating from the 1660s, in the wall on the north side of the well. The plaque shows a crucifixion scene carved in relief. Symbols of the crucifixion are displayed either side of the cross and include: a ladder, whip, hammer and pincers. This cross is thought to be the work of a local artist and there is a slab on the right of the cross, which bears the date 1668 and the letters IG. Healing powers have been attributed to the waters of this well.

Colgan gives an account of the Cross of St. Attracta, which was famous during the Middle Ages, and of which the O’Mochain family were hereditary keepers. The existence of this relic in the early years of the fifteenth century is evidenced by an entry in the “Calendar of Papal Letters” (V1, 451) from which we learn that in 1413 the cross and cup of St. Attracta (Crux ac Cuach Aracht) were then venerated in the church of Killaraght, in the Diocese of Achonry.

On 28 July, 1864, Pius IX authorised the Office and Mass of St. Attracta, which had lapsed into disuse, to be again celebrated in the Irish Church. The feast of St. Attracta, on 11 August, is given special honour in the Diocese of Achonry, of which she is the patroness.

Lough Gara and its Crannogs

There is something mysterious and magical about Lough Gara and its ancient crannogs. This remote and beautiful lake on the border between Sligo and Roscommon seems to invite and at the same time repel the casual visitor. Although I left this place some forty years ago I still yearn for its tranquil waters and find myself returning there regularly.

When Lough Gara was drained in the early fifties several crannogs or lake dwellings, some dating from as early as 3500 BC, were revealed around the shoreline. Our Stone Age ancestors once inhabited this area leaving behind their stone axes, arrowheads and such like remnants. Archaeologists have found evidence of occupancy in the Late Bronze Age (1200 – 800 BC), Early Medieval Period (600 AD) and as recently as the 17th Century. Some of these earlier artificial islands pre-date Stonehenge and the Egyptian Pyramids and provide testimony to a bygone age. Today, they form the centrepiece of a local landscape rich in archaeology and history.

The word crannog comes from the Irish words, crann, meaning tree, and og, young trees or, more accurately, small woods. The word first appeared in literary sources at the beginning of the 13th Century. Estimates of the actual number of crannogs on Lough Gara range from 145 to 369, which is more than anywhere else in Co. Sligo. One of the most famous and well documented crannogs on this lake is Rathinaun, which was found to have been occupied and abandoned on no less than three separate occasions.

Archaeologists have viewed crannogs as defensive enclaves, high status residences and places for fishing and metalwork production. It has also been argued that Bronze Age crannogs were built in order to provide a place from which objects could be deposited in the lake as votive offrings. This lake and surrounding rivers are rich in such finds.

The waters of Lough Gara still hold many secrets although our understanding of the life of these early lake dwellers is growing all the time. It is regrettable that there is still not a re-constructed crannog for visitors to view or an interpretive centre to bring the rich heritage of this area to life.

Lough Gara, with its numerous abandoned crannogs is, perhaps, one of Ireland’s best kept secrets.