Clonmacnoise was a religious center, to the left of the River Shannon, in County Offaly. It has several churches, two towers, three high crosses and over seven hundred early Christian grave slabs. It was a fundamentally important site in early Christian Europe.

St. Ciaran founded the abbey at Clonmacnoise in the sixth century. Abbeys are religious communities with monasteries, homes for monks. The local people worked as craftsmen and traded with people from far away. The settlement was a center for learning and politics.

The first churches were made out of timber. Sadly, they have not survived. In 900CE stone started to be used for the buildings. Parts of a structure called Temple Ciaran and a larger building called The Cathedral, have survived. Parts of the churches are results of later rebuilding.

Amazingly, even more churches were added in the centuries that followed. Temple Finghin was built in the 1100’s.

The highest of the beautifully carved, stone high crosses is The Cross of the Scriptures, which is thirteen feet tall. The early Christian grave slabs have prayers inscribed on them.