A small stone plaque, high on the wall outside Emly Graveyard in Tipperary, states in Latin, ‘The place you enter is holy ground. 1641 R. Jones, Preceptor’.
What makes it holy? The general impression is of a typical Irish burial ground, scattered over and around a slight raised centre
If you walk through it a few times clues emerge. You will come across a sign for the Marsh Walk which explains how Emly was, until two centuries ago, surrounded by a large lake and there was a ferry to take the people over the water to the church.
Inside the graveyard you will eventually find a sign for St Ailbe’s Cross and further on, another for his Well. On your way out you may discover a life-sized statue of Ailbe himself.
The once important Cathedral City of Emly is now a village which shows little of past glory. Local scholars claim it was mentioned in Ptolemy’s 2nd century map of the world under the name of Imlagh as one of the three principal towns of Ireland.
Its name in Irish, ‘The border of the Lake of Yews’, refers to the pre-Christian reverence for certain trees and a religious past. Under Ailbe it became one of the earliest centres of Christian learning in Ireland and until the early Middle Ages was the centre of the principal diocese in Munster. It is now joined with its neighbour to form the Archdiocese of Cashel and Emly.
Its Christian past goes back to the man whom one of the early annals calls, ‘Humble Ailbe, the Patrick of Munster’. His Cross and Well have survived in the graveyard site although everything else that once stood there – the monks cells and a later cathedral -- have completely disappeared.
Ailbe himself is an interesting but puzzling figure. I first came across him in Clane, Co Kildare near where I live. He is widely recognised as one of the pioneers who spread Christianity in Ireland before Patricks arrived, or perhaps at the same time but independently in Munster while Patrick was active in Ulster and Connaught. However one of the important annals states he died in 527 which would place him after Patrick’s time. Were there two St Ailbes? It is another of those tricky questions that faces Irish historians: it is not that historical sources are lacking but there too many of them.
Emly remained a Cathedral City until the 16th century. After the Reformation the Protestant cathedral functioned with a Chapter until 1877 when the cathedral was dismantled and its materials sold for construction purposes. Today not a trace of it previous history remains except the easy-to-miss Well and Cross.
Among his accomplishments, Ailbe is said to have composed a Rule for Monks in which he advised them to provide, ‘A clean house for guests and a big fire, washing and bathing for them, and a couch without sorrow.’ Unfortunately, today there is no sign of that either.
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