Ordnance Survey Letters by John O'Donovan and Eugene Curry, 1839

Parish of Clooney [Corcomroe] (a)

The Parish of Clooney in the Barony of Corcomroe and Co. of Clare is bounded on the north by the Parish of Kilfenora, on the east and south east by the Parishes of Rath and Disert, on the south by the Parish of Kilfarboy in the Barony of Ibricken, and on the west and north west by the Parishes of Killmannaheen and Killshanny. See Engraved Map of Down Survey.

The name of this place is not of ecclesiastical origin though the local name, Cluain, is very frequently found in connexion with ecclesiastics and ecclesiastical establishments throughout Ireland, and so numerous are those ecclesiastical Cloons that it is difficult to identify any of them unless the Patron Saint is remembered, or the ancient name of the district is retained. There is a place in the Irish Calendar called Cluain-da-acra, which will be found under the 21st Sept., and I am inclined to think that it is the present Cloony. Let me have whatever is said of that place in the Calendar.

Of the old Church of Cloony twenty five feet of the side walls remain, attached to the east gable, which also remains in full preservation. It was nineteen feet nine inches wide, the walls three feet two inches thick. There is a semicircular-headed window in the south side near the east gable, measuring four feet ten inches in height and three feet wide inside, three feet one inch high and five and a half inches wide on the outside. This window does not appear to me to be of any great antiquity and the side in which it is inserted does not appear to be as old as the other side and the gable. There is a semicircular-headed window in the east gable, measuring seven feet six inches in height, by three feet ten inches in breadth on the inside, three feet eleven inches in height, five inches in breadth at the top, and six inches in breadth at bottom on the outside, built up of finely cut stone, through and through.

The whole of this gable and that part of the north wall which remains are of considerable antiquity, probably of the ninth or tenth Century, exhibiting at the angles the style of architecture called the long and the short, and which . . . . the celebrated English architectural antiquary, says does not occur but in edifices of the Saxon times. There is a large burying ground attached and a holy well a little to the south west called Tobar Lonain or Saint Lonan’s Well, at which Stations are still performed and the cure of diseases of the eyes and limbs sought, but on no particular day. It would appear from the well bearing the name of Lonan that this Church was called after Lonan, the Bishop of Killeasbuig-Lonan, in the Parish of Killmacreahy, already mentioned, but of whom we have not been able to procure any satisfactory account.

There is a small burying ground in the Townland of Killeenagh, proper Cill-Eidhneach.

There is a small burying ground for children and strangers in the Townland of Mooghna and called Cill-Mhuchna, and a holy well near it called Tobar Mooghna, which is still frequented by persons afflicted with soreness of the eyes.

The side of an old Castle stands on a very conspicuous little hill not far to the east of Ennistimon, in the Townland of Gleann, and called Glan Castle. It appears to have been riddled by cannon or lightning. This Castle is said in the List of Castles preserved in MS. T.C.D., Class E.2, 14, to have been possessed by Sir Donell O’ Brien of Glan. There is a place mentioned in Hardiman’s Irish Deeds No. 14 called the Three Quarters of Gleann Meic-Conchubar-na-Coille, i.e., the Glen of the Son of Conor of the Wood, and which very probably is the Glan above mentioned.

The Townlands of Cuilleanach: Cathair-Sheirkin, Muidhe-na-n-Enoch, Tir-Leithin, Baile-Ui-Coilinna and Cluain itself.

                                                                             I am, Sir,
                                                                                          Your obedient servant,
                                                                                                      Eugene Curry.

The extract from the Annals of the Four Masters, the year 1573, which Mr. Petrie says was sent out here has not reached us yet. I fear they have neglected to re-direct some of those matters from the Post Offices behind us, though we left them directions to do so.