Monastic Ruins at Annaghdown, Co. Galway

About twelve miles north of Galway City, on the eastern shore of Lough Corrib, lies a group of ecclesiastical ruins that bear silent testimony to the by-gone glories of Annaghdown, or, as it was originally and more correctly called, Enaghdún – the Bog of the Fort.

The fame of Enaghdún in Christian times is due chiefly to St Brendan the Navigator, Patron of the parish, who founded a monastery and convent here in the sixth century, less than a hundred years after the death of St Patrick. A study of this lonely spot by the lake is a meditation on the growth of the Christian faith from its earliest days in our parish. We invite you to follow us on our journey through the ecclesiastical ruins at this hallowed spot. We can safely say that the mouldering pile of ruins at Enaghdún – with its traditions of St Brendan and St Briga, of Bishop’s palace and De Burgo castle – is the most interesting in a barony thickly strewn with monuments of Ireland’s former greatness. As we now approach this spot of monastic memories, the imagination bodies forth the forms of by-gone generations; the abbeys and cloisters resound with sweet-toned psalms; the voices of saints and scholars are heard in the schools; the cloisters are once again peopled with cowled and sandalled figures walking in silent meditation; the busy fingers of the scribes ply the quill of knowledge But alas! It is only a day-dream. The place is peopled only by the dead; the reality is an unbroken silence, except for the cry of the lonely curlew.