Hospital Church is a medieval

fortified church A fortified church is a church that is built to serve a defensive role in times of war. Such churches were specially designed to incorporate military features, such as thick walls, battlements, and embrasures. Others, such as the Ávila Cathedr ...

of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic military order. It was headqu ...

and a

National Monument A national monument is a monument constructed in order to commemorate something of importance to national heritage, such as a country's founding, independence, war, or the life and death of a historical figure. The term may also refer to a spec ...

Hospital A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized Medical Science, health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically ...

County Limerick "Remember Limerick" , image_map = Island_of_Ireland_location_map_Limerick.svg , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Ireland , subdivision_type1 = Province , subdivision_name1 = Munster , subdivision_ ...

, Ireland. The church is located on Main Street,

, to the west of the R513.

History

The church was founded before 1215 by

Geoffrey de Marisco Geoffrey, Geoffroy, Geoff, etc., may refer to: People * Geoffrey (name), including a list of people with the name * Geoffroy (surname), including a list of people with the name * Geoffrey of Monmouth (c. 1095–c. 1155), clergyman and one of the ...

(d. 1245) as a

commandery In the Middle Ages, a commandery (rarely commandry) was the smallest administrative division of the European landed properties of a military order. It was also the name of the house where the knights of the commandery lived.Anthony Luttrell and Gr ...

of the Knights Hospitaller who had owned land in the area since 1200. Conor O'Brien (Unknown-1203) buried here, was a Gaelic nobel and Knight Hospitalier who took part in the 3rd Crusade. He was knighted by King Richard I Coeur-deLeon, King of England, during the course of the 3rd Crusade. The Irish monks at the Abbey of St. Peter in Ratisbon, Germany recorded his oversea journey. The church was dissolved in 1540 during the Dissolution of the Monasteries and then leased, along with its contents, to

William Aspley William Aspley (died 1640) was a London publisher of the Elizabethan, Jacobean, and Caroline eras. He was a member of the publishing syndicates that issued the First Folio and Second Folio collections of Shakespeare's plays, in 1623 and 1632. ...

and then to the Browne family.

Church

This is a fortified church built for defence with high walls, prominent base batter and narrow arched windows. A tower sits at the west end with a partial

barrel vault A barrel vault, also known as a tunnel vault, wagon vault or wagonhead vault, is an architectural element formed by the extrusion of a single curve (or pair of curves, in the case of a pointed barrel vault) along a given distance. The curves are ...

on the second floor. In the west wall is a medieval carving of the

crucifixion of Jesus The crucifixion and death of Jesus occurred in 1st-century Judea, most likely in AD 30 or AD 33. It is described in the four canonical gospels, referred to in the New Testament epistles, attested to by other ancient sources, and consider ...

. On the interior of the east wall are two 13th/14th tombs with effigies: *a double tomb depicting a knight and his wife

References

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