Abbeymahon Abbey (), also known as The Cistercian Abbey of St Mary de Fonte Vivo, and as the Abbey of Sancto Mauro is a ruined medieval Cistercian

abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The con ...

situated near

Timoleague Timoleague () is a village in the eastern division of Carbery East in County Cork, Ireland. It is located along Ireland's southern coast between Kinsale and Clonakilty, on the estuary of the Argideen River. Nearby is the village of Courtmacs ...

County Cork County Cork ( ga, Contae Chorcaí) is the largest and the southernmost county of Ireland, named after the city of Cork, the state's second-largest city. It is in the province of Munster and the Southern Region. Its largest market towns a ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. Due to a "dearth of documentary evidence", little is known about Abbeymahon Abbey, though it was a flourishing and wealthy abbey up until its suppression in the 16th century.

History

Abbeymahon Abbey was built in the 1270s to replace an abbey that was founded in 1172 by Diarmait Mac Cormac Mac Carthaig, king of Desmond, in the neighbouring townland of Aghavanister. This original settlement was populated by a group of Cistercian monks from

Baltinglass Baltinglass, historically known as Baltinglas (), is a town in south-west County Wicklow, Ireland. It is located on the River Slaney near the border with County Carlow and County Kildare, on the N81 road. Etymology The town's Irish name, ''Be ...

. Close to a century later, the monks of Aghavanister decided to move to a new site; it is possible that the time had come to renew the abbey buildings and the monks took the opportunity to find a more spacious site. The monks had moved to Abbeymahon by 1278, when Diarmait MacCarthaig, son of Domnall Cairbrech, was buried in the ‘new monastery’. The new site is on the estuary of the Argideen River, just over a mile east south-east of

, on the road to

Courtmacsherry Courtmacsherry (), often referred to by locals as Courtmac, is a seaside village in County Cork, on the southwest coast of Ireland. It is about 30 miles southwest of Cork, and 15–20 minutes drive east from the town of Clonakilty. The village co ...

. This abbey was later known as the Abbey of Sancto Mauro, though it is unlikely to have been connected

St Maurus Maurus (french: Maur; it, Mauro) was the first disciple of Benedict of Nursia (512–584). He is mentioned in Gregory the Great's biography of the latter as the first oblate, offered to the monastery by his noble Roman parents as a young bo ...

, and this is likely a corruption of the original name for the abbey, the meaning of which has been lost. It was also given the Cistercian name De Fonte Vivo. Though it was thought in the 19th century that the abbey of Sancto Mauro / De Fonte Vivo was not the same as the ruins present in Abbeymahon, this is not the case. The

abbot Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various Western religious traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not the head of a monastery. The ...

s of Abbeymahon were rebuked several times in the thirteenth century for not attending the General Chapter when summoned. It is not surprising that the abbots refused to attend considering that the journey was extremely lengthy and expensive. In the

taxation A tax is a compulsory financial charge or some other type of levy imposed on a taxpayer (an individual or legal entity) by a governmental organization in order to fund government spending and various public expenditures (regional, local, o ...

of 1302-1306 the income of the

was valued at £4, which would hardly have covered the cost of the journey. The annual income of the abbey during the 15th and 16th centuries was still a meager amount, estimated at just £18, with a potential income of £34 during peace time. At the time of the Dissolution it was found that the abbey church was functioning as the parish church and that all other buildings were being used by the local farmer. It is likely that the abbey was protected by James de Barry, the 4th Viscount Buttevant, as it was not dissolved until some point between 1570 and 1587. In a Henrician survey of the abbeys taken as part of the dissolution of the monasteries, Abbeymahon was listed as the most valuable monastery in the diocese of Ross. In 1568 the property was leased to the Viscount Buttevant and in 1584 the lease was transferred to Nicholas Walsh, Justice of Munster. The site was granted "forever" to Nicholas Walsh in 1587, with some additional place names appearing on this grant.

Architecture

Little remains of the abbey, which was a small structure to begin with. Only parts of the

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which sp ...

, and

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building wi ...

arches remain today. The site of the monastery is unusual among Cistercian foundations in that it is not located by a steam or fresh-water river as is typical, instead being located on the shore of a salt-water estuary. A lack of architectural features such as doors or windows among the remains makes it difficult to ascertain by physical means any physical changes the abbey may have undergone.

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History

Architecture

References

Notes

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See also