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THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL.
| Number 3. | SATURDAY, JULY 18, 1840. | Volume I. |
THE ROCK OF CASHEL, AS SEEN FROM THE SOUTH.
To such of our readers as have not had the good fortune tosee the ancient metropolis of Munster, our prefixed illustrationwill, it is hoped, give some general idea of the situationand grandeur of a group of ruins, which on various accountsclaim to rank as the most interesting in the British islands.Ancient buildings of greater extent and higher architecturalsplendour may indeed be found elsewhere; but in no otherspot in the empire can there be seen congregated together somany structures of such different characters and uses, and ofsuch separate and remote ages; their imposing effect beingstrikingly heightened by the singularity and grandeur of theirsituation, and the absence from about them of any objectsthat might destroy the associations they are so well calculatedto excite. To give an adequate idea, however, of this magnificentarchitectural assemblage, would require not one, but aseries of views, from its various surrounding sides. These weshall probably furnish in the course of our future numbers;and in the mean time we may state, that the buildings ofwhich it is composed are the following:—
1st, An Ecclesiastical Round Tower, in perfect preservation.
2d, Cormac’s Chapel, a small stone-roofed church, withtwo side-towers, in the Norman style of the eleventh andtwelfth centuries—also in good preservation.
3d, A Cathedral, with nave, choir, and transepts, in thepointed style of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, now inruins, but which was originally only second in extent and themagnificence of its architecture to the cathedrals in our ownmetropolis.
4th, A strong Castle, which served as the palace of theArchbishops of Cashel.
5th, The Vicar’s Hall, and the mansions of the inferior ecclesiasticalofficers of the Cathedral, which are also in ruins.
If, then, the reader will picture to himself such a group ofbuildings, standing in solitary grandeur on a lofty, isolated,and on some sides precipitous rock, in the midst of the greenluxuriant plains of “the Golden Vale,” he may be able to formsome idea of the various aspects of sublimity and picturesquenesswhich it is so well calculated to assume, and of the excitinginterest it must necessarily create even in minds of thelowest degree of intellectuality. Viewed from any point, it is,indeed, such a scene as, once beheld, would impress itself on thememory for ever.
It would appear from our ancient histories that the Rockof Cashel was the site of the regal fortress of the Kings ofMunster, from ages anterior to the preaching of the gospelin Ireland; and it is stated in the ancient lives of our patronSaint, that the monarch Ængus, the son of Nathfraoich, washere converted, with his family, and the nobles of Munster, bySt Patrick in the fifth century. It would appear also from thesame authorities, that at this period there was a Pagan templewithin the fortress, which the Irish apostle destroyed; andthough it is nowhere