Abbeylara History
There are few places in the County of Longford which possess such interest for students of ecclesiastical history as the neighborhood of Granard, in which was erected the great Abby of Lerha which became Abbeylara. Abbeylara or Mainistir Leathratha, means the abbey of the half rath, or little rath. It is told by the ancient annalists that one of the first places in Leinster which St. Patrick visited after visiting Tara, was the neighborhood of Granard, which at that time was one of the chief seats of the pagan worship which then prevailed in Ireland; for here was said to be the “hill of the sun,” or, in other words, the “Hill” from which worship was offered to the sun, moon, and stars. We may suppose then that St. Patrick, having heard of the fame of the place, made his way there to the people the history of the birth and death of our Lord Jesus Christ.
In 1205, Richard Tuite, an Anglo-Norman settler on conquered Irish land, founded an abbey in Lerha, for monks of the Cistercian order in honour of the Blessed Virgin. He brought several monks from Dublin and placed them in it, so that the abbey might not lack for priests until it would become a stable erection. Richard’s huge motte castle lies only two and a half miles away at Granard. About a hundred yards to the west of the abbey is a stream, the monastery’s water supply, which probably determined the choice of this particular site. Although anglophile in origin, long before the dissolution of 1539-40 the abbey had lost its English affiliations and fallen under control of the O’Farrells, the dominant local family. All that remains of the abbey is the central tower and adjacent walls. The church had a regular crossing from the start and the creasing of the steeply pitched roofs which covered the nave, chancel and transepts is still to be seen. The picturesque ruins of the crossing tower are the principal remnant of the medieval abbey.
Lough Kinale Shrine, a historical artifact, was discovered on the bed of Lough Kinale in 1986 and is currently being restored by the National Museum. Abbeylara also has two important springs or wells; The Well of the King of Sunday is in the townland of Ballyboy and The Well of the Holy Woman, located near the ruins of the Cistercian abbey.
