Heritage audit for Mount Temple
A HERITAGE audit is taking place in Mount Temple and Baylin parishes and the local community are invited to get involved.
The Heritage Council has granted €2,500 in funding for the project which is focusing on the local schools and anyone who wants to get involved. It is spearheaded by the Mount Temple Holy Trinity Graveyard Committee.
The project is aimed at identifying and recording the cultural heritage of the area, with a focus on archaeological monuments, field names, the tradition of music and personal stories from the area.
It follows the graveyard group's production of a Conservation and Management Plan for the early medieval graveyard in Mount Temple last year, thanks to €2,200 in funding, also from the Heritage Council. The local community has played a key role in the past few years in enhancing and conserving the graveyard which was previously hidden with dense vegetation. It is owned by the Church of Ireland.
Local councillor and committee chairman Frankie Keena (Fianna Fáil) said the graveyard was “in a dilapidated state, overgrown with weeds and scrubbery” when work commenced four years ago.
Oliver Hynes, who is a committee member, said that while people looked after the graves of their relatives, others were not maintained. “There was no-one to look after a lot of graves,” he said.
Cllr Keena added: “It is a listed site and goes back to the 14th or 15th century. There are two churches on the site. One is an early Christian church and there is a small piece of a wall left.”
The roof of the other Church of Ireland church was demolished in the 1940s or 1950s and the footprint of the church remains.
Mr Hynes said: “There is a medieval grave slab, where exactly it came from we are not exactly sure.”
The graveyard, which has been closed for burials for decades, is now receiving visits both from locals and people living overseas who have connections to the area.
“The audit will feed back to the graveyard project,” said Mr Hynes.
The audit will involve a series of workshops in Mount Temple, Baylin and Moydrum. Children attending the local primary schools in Mount Temple and Baylin will be invited to fill out questionnaires relating to heritage in the area and the information supplied by them will be compared with information gathered locally during a previous survey in the 1930s. This information, which dates back more than 80 years, is available. It is anticipated that the audit will be finished in November.
“It is being done the same way it was done in the 1930s. We can compare the stories of today to the stories of the 1930s,” said Mr Keena.
Archaeologist Dr Eoin Sullivan is working with the community on the project. He said: “It's a wonderful opportunity for the people of the area to engage with their heritage. The people of Mount Temple and Baylin all have a personalised local knowledge of the area and we hope they will share this knowledge and help us bring it to the forefront, in this, the European Year of Cultural Heritage.”
He added: “We are looking at traditional cures, traditional crafts, place names and field names. The names will be indications of people who lived in the area and potential archaeological monuments. We are trying to catch as much local knowledge of the area that's not recorded.”
All of the information gathered will be collated and archived. There are also plans down the line to apply for funding for heritage information signs and to create a heritage tourist trail.
“This area has a rich heritage,” said Dr Sullivan. “When somebody visits the area they should be able to see all the work that has gone on.”
Anyone interested in contributing to the audit should contact any of the committee members.
“We plan to hold public meetings shortly and encourage local people to take part,” said Cllr Keena.
During Heritage Week, a heritage workshop will be held in Mount Temple (Thursday, August 23) and which will be open to the public.
“We are going to show people how to do a heritage audit for those in other areas who would like to do similar projects,” said Dr Sullivan.