Wexford Selskar Priory Tower and Selskar Church Nave 2012 10 03

Selskar Abbey () is a ruined Augustinian abbey in

Wexford Wexford () is the county town of County Wexford, Ireland. Wexford lies on the south side of Wexford Harbour, the estuary of the River Slaney near the southeastern corner of the island of Ireland. The town is linked to Dublin by the M11/N11 N ...

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 ...

. Founded in the twelfth-century, the abbey's full name was the Priory of St Peter and St Paul. The name is derived from

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

''selr-skar'', "

seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to impr ...

skerry A skerry is a small rocky island, or islet, usually too small for human habitation. It may simply be a rocky reef. A skerry can also be called a low sea stack. A skerry may have vegetative life such as moss and small, hardy grasses. They a ...

History

It is claimed that originally a

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

temple dedicated to

Odin Odin (; from non, Óðinn, ) is a widely revered Æsir, god in Germanic paganism. Norse mythology, the source of most surviving information about him, associates him with wisdom, healing, death, royalty, the gallows, knowledge, war, battle, v ...

stood on the site.

First church on site

There was an earlier church on the site: it was here in 1169 that

Diarmait Mac Murchada Diarmait Mac Murchada (Modern Irish: Diarmaid Mac Murchadha), anglicised as Dermot MacMurrough, Dermod MacMurrough, or Dermot MacMorrogh (c. 1110 – c. 1 May 1171), was a King of Leinster in Ireland. In 1167, he was deposed by the High King ...

signed the first

Anglo-Irish Anglo-Irish people () denotes an ethnic, social and religious grouping who are mostly the descendants and successors of the English Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. They mostly belong to the Anglican Church of Ireland, which was the establis ...

peace treaty A peace treaty is an agreement between two or more hostile parties, usually countries or governments, which formally ends a state of war between the parties. It is different from an armistice An armistice is a formal agreement of warring ...

.''Illustrated Dublin Journal'' The leading

Norman Norman or Normans may refer to: Ethnic and cultural identity * The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries ** People or things connected with the Norm ...

commander

Raymond FitzGerald Raymond (or Redmond) Fitz William Fitz Gerald (died 1185–1198), nicknamed ''Le Gros'' ("the Large"), was a Cambro-Norman commander during the Norman invasion of Ireland. Raymond was among the first of a small band of Norman knights who lan ...

, (nicknamed ''Le Gros'') and his wife Basila de Clare, sister of

Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (of the first creation), Lord of Leinster, Justiciar of Ireland (113020 April 1176), also known as Richard FitzGilbert, was an Anglo-Norman nobleman notable for his leading role in the Anglo-Norman invasion ...

(nicknamed ''Strongbow''), are said to have been married at Selskar in 1174. There is a long-standing tradition that King Henry II spent

Lent Lent ( la, Quadragesima, 'Fortieth') is a solemn religious observance in the liturgical calendar commemorating the 40 days Jesus spent fasting in the desert and enduring temptation by Satan, according to the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke ...

of 1172 at Selskar Abbey, where he did

penance Penance is any act or a set of actions done out of Repentance (theology), repentance for Christian views on sin, sins committed, as well as an alternate name for the Catholic Church, Catholic, Lutheran, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox s ...

for the

murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification (jurisprudence), justification or valid excuse (legal), excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person wit ...

Thomas Becket Thomas Becket (), also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket (21 December 1119 or 1120 – 29 December 1170), was an English nobleman who served as Lord Chancellor from 1155 to 1162, and then ...

. It is unclear if there is any truth in the story, although Henry was in Ireland at the time, and Becket's murder, some fifteen months earlier, was still a subject of great controversy. Henry might well have felt that Selskar was the right place to make an appropriate gesture of penance.

Second foundation

The surviving ruins are of the abbey which was founded about 1190 by Alexander de la Roche, ancestor of the Roche family who hold the title

Baron Fermoy Baron Fermoy is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. The title was created by Queen Victoria by letters patent of 10 September 1856 for Edmond Roche. Previous letters patent had been issued on 14 May 1855 which purported to create this barony fo ...

. The abbey was built with

Dundry Dundry is a village and civil parish, situated on Dundry Hill in the northern part of the Mendip Hills, between Bristol and the Chew Valley Lake, in the English county of Somerset. The parish includes the hamlets of Maiden Head and East Dun ...

stone and dressed

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

. In the early 1400s Ardcolm Church, Castlebridge, was appropriated to Selskar by the Bishop of Ferns,

Patrick Barrett Patrick Barrett (died 10 November 1415) was an Irishman who held religious and secular high offices in Ireland. Biography Patrick Barrett was an Augustinian Canon at Kells Priory in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Ossory, County Kilkenny. He s ...

. We have a glimpse of everyday life in the abbey through a letter which

John Topcliffe John Topcliffe (died 1513) was an English-born judge who spent much of his career in Ireland, where he held office as Chief Justice of each of the three courts of common law in turn.Ball, F. Elrington ''The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921'' John Murra ...

, the

Lord Chief Justice of Ireland The Court of King's Bench (or Court of Queen's Bench during the reign of a Queen) was one of the senior courts of common law in Ireland. It was a mirror of the Court of King's Bench in England. The Lord Chief Justice was the most senior judge i ...

, addressed to

Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...

in about 1512. He complained that the monks who "time out of mind" had chosen their own

Prior Prior (or prioress) is an ecclesiastical title for a superior in some religious orders. The word is derived from the Latin for "earlier" or "first". Its earlier generic usage referred to any monastic superior. In abbeys, a prior would be l ...

, had elected a "good blessed religious man" as Prior, but that 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 fem ...

had turned him out. It is unclear why the Chief Justice, who was an Englishman without any obvious ties to Wexford, nor to the Augustinian Order was so concerned about the affair, nor why he thought the King would be interested. The King's reply, if any, is not recorded. Selskar Abbey, Wexford, Ireland

Suppression and later history

The Abbey was suppressed in 1542 and the property was given to John Parker, the

Master of the Rolls in Ireland The Master of the Rolls in Ireland was a senior judicial office in the Irish Chancery under English and British rule, and was equivalent to the Master of the Rolls in the English Chancery. Originally called the Keeper of the Rolls, he was respons ...

. It later passed to the Stafford family. The Abbey was reportedly sacked by

Oliver Cromwell Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English politician and military officer who is widely regarded as one of the most important statesmen in English history. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1651 Wars of the Three Ki ...

's troops in 1649.

Today

Selskar Abbey is now part of the Westgate Heritage Tower; it reopened to the public in July 2012.''Wexford People'' 11 July 2012 However it can only be visited as part of a guided tour, run by volunteers from Wexford Lions Club (Monday to Saturday, at 11am leaving from the heritage centre at Westgate(Y35 X2DK) - in July & August

References

{{reflist

External links

Selskar Abbey History
Buildings and structures in County Wexford Ruins in the Republic of Ireland Tourist attractions in County Wexford Augustinian monasteries in the Republic of Ireland