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ROSENALLIS

CO. LAOIS · IE

Rosenallis
Ros Fhionnghlaise, Co. Laois

The Ireland's Ancient East
STOP 07 / 07

Ros Fhionnghlaise · Co. Laois

The oldest Quaker village in Ireland, where the River Barrow rises and the Slieve Blooms begin.

Rosenallis is not a stop so much as a starting point. The Slieve Blooms press in from the west, the central plain rolls away to the east, and the village sits on the seam between them on the R422, about six kilometres northwest of Mountmellick. The name is Ros Fhionnghlaise, the wood of the clear stream. The stream is still here. So, more or less, are the Quakers who gave the village its shape.

William Edmundson brought the Society of Friends to Ireland and settled here in 1659. The village grew around them, and it kept their stamp: plain, quiet, practical. During the Famine the population of Rosenallis actually rose while the rest of the country emptied, because the Quakers fed and sheltered the people around them. The graveyard outside the village is the oldest Quaker burial ground in Ireland, and walking it is the main heritage reason to come.

The other reason is up the hill. Glenbarrow, five minutes by car, is where the River Barrow rises out of the bog before it becomes the great navigable river of the southeast. There are marked loops to the Clamphole Falls and the trailhead for the Slieve Bloom Way, the long waymarked circuit of the whole range. You can do an hour or you can do three days.

What is here in the village is modest and honest: two churches, a primary school, a community centre, a GAA and a soccer club, and one pub. The filling station and the shop are gone. Say that plainly. You come to Rosenallis for the graveyard, the well and the hills, not for a high street.

Population

~420 (2006 census; surrounding ED 469 in 2011)

Pubs

1and counting

Walk score

Gateway to the Slieve Bloom Way and Glenbarrow

Founded

Quaker settlement, 1659 (William Edmundson)

Coords

52.8957° N, 7.5319° W

01 / 07

At a glance.

Three things every local will eventually mention. Read these and you've already understood more than most day-trippers do.

01 The Quaker graveyard

The oldest Quaker burial ground in Ireland.

In use since the 1720s, locally called the Friends Sleeping Place. William Edmundson, who brought the Quakers to Ireland and lived here fifty-eight years, is buried just outside the village. So is Anne Jellicoe, the Mountmellick woman who founded Alexandra College in Dublin.

Stories & lore → 02 Glenbarrow

Where the River Barrow rises.

Five minutes uphill from the village. The Barrow, the longest river in Ireland after the Shannon, starts in the bog above here. Marked looped walks lead to the Clamphole Falls, a tiered waterfall on the young river. The car park is the trailhead for the Slieve Bloom Way.

Walks & outings → 03 St Brigid

Church, churchyard and a holy well in the village.

The parish is dedicated to St Brigid of Kildare. There is a Church of Ireland St Brigid's, an older St Brigid's churchyard up the road, and a holy well bearing her name in the centre of the village. Three Brigids in one small place.

Stories & lore →

02 / 07

The pubs.

None of these are themed Irish pubs, because they don't need to be. A few that earn the trip:

The Village Tap

Old-style bar, recently reopened

Village pub, Main Street

The village's one pub, formerly Poole's Tavern. It had closed during the pandemic and sat shut for years until Wayne Walsh and Mark Dunne bought the building in 2024 and reopened it before Christmas 2025 with Ruth Farrell managing. They did the work themselves with local tradespeople, salvaging stone from demolished buildings for the interior. Old-style room, cards and conversation, a beer garden with a St Brigid mural by local artist Tara Poole. Phone signal is poor but there is WiFi. The reopening was, by local account, the best thing to happen in the village in years.

03 / 07

Stories & lore.

The reason to come back. The things every local will eventually tell you about, usually after the second pint.

The man who brought the Quakers to Ireland

William Edmundson

Born in England in 1627, Edmundson served in Cromwell's army, came to Ireland in 1654, and found Quakerism along the way. He settled at Rosenallis in 1659 and held the first Quaker meetings in the country here. He lived in the village for fifty-eight years and died in 1712, aged eighty-four. He is buried in the Friends graveyard just outside the village, in the burial ground he helped make into something that has lasted three centuries.

The oldest Quaker burial ground in Ireland

The Friends Sleeping Place

A walled graveyard with a gateway dating to around 1800, recorded as a protected structure, the headstones running from roughly 1725 to the present day. Quaker stones are deliberately plain, all the same size, no ornament - the point was that no one is more important in death than anyone else. Anne Jellicoe, born in Mountmellick in 1823 and founder of Alexandra College Dublin, a pioneer of women's education in Ireland, died in 1880 and is buried here too. Read the headstones. The flatness of them tells you something about the people.

A church, a churchyard and a well

St Brigid in the village

Long before the Quakers, the parish was dedicated to St Brigid of Kildare. The story has her founding a church here in the early Christian period. Today there is the Church of Ireland St Brigid's, an older St Brigid's churchyard a little up the road, and a holy well bearing her name in the centre of the village. The well is the kind of small, undramatic sacred site that Ireland is full of and that most visitors drive past without noticing.

A river that runs the length of Leinster

Where the Barrow begins

The River Barrow, the second-longest river in Ireland, rises in the bog at Glenbarrow above Rosenallis. From this damp, peaty start it runs more than a hundred and ninety kilometres south through Portarlington, Carlow, Bagenalstown and Graiguenamanagh before reaching the sea at Waterford Harbour. Standing at Glenbarrow, watching it as a brown mountain stream tumbling over the Clamphole Falls, is a strange thing once you know what it becomes.

04 / 07

Things to do outside.

Wear waterproofs. Bring a sandwich. Tell someone where you're going if it's the mountain.

Glenbarrow waterfall walk The headline walk. From the Glenbarrow car park, five minutes uphill from the village, a looped trail follows the infant River Barrow up to the Clamphole Falls, a tiered waterfall, then back through old forest. River, rock and woodland. The most popular outing by far.

4-5 km loopdistance

1.5-2 hourstime

Glenbarrow to Clamphole Falls (direct) If you only want the waterfall and not the full loop, walk straight up to the Clamphole Falls and back. Boots in winter - the path is peaty and wet after rain.

3 km returndistance

1 hourtime

Cathole Falls on the Owenass Less visited than Glenbarrow. A second waterfall in the Barrow valley on the Owenass River, reached by mountain tracks above the village. Quieter, rougher underfoot, fewer people. For walkers who want the hills to themselves.

About 5 km returndistance

1.5-2 hourstime

Slieve Bloom Way sections The waymarked circuit of the whole Slieve Bloom range passes through Glenbarrow. Yellow arrows. Almost nobody does the full thing in one go - take a marked section as a day walk and turn back, or arrange a pickup the far side. The Ridge of Capard above the village has one of the great central-Ireland viewpoints, the Stoney Man, looking out over the plain.

80+ km full circuitdistance

3 days end-to-end, or day walkstime

05 / 07

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar-May

The Slieve Blooms green up, the falls run hard with snowmelt and rain, and St Brigid's feast at the start of February has just passed. Long enough light for a Glenbarrow loop after lunch.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun-Aug

Best for the long walks and the high viewpoints. Glenbarrow is busiest on summer weekends but still quiet by most standards. The Village Tap beer garden earns its keep.

◉ Go

Autumn

Sep-Oct

The forest at Glenbarrow turns and the falls fill again with the autumn rain. Probably the prettiest season for the river walk.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov-Feb

Short days and wet, peaty paths. The falls are at their most dramatic but the trails are mud. Boots, daylight, and check the weather off the mountains before you set out.

◐ Mind yourself

06 / 07

What to skip.

Honestly? Don't bother.

If a local was sitting beside you, this is the bit where they'd lean in.

Expecting a high street

Rosenallis once had a filling station, a shop, a pub and two churches. The garage and the shop are long gone. What is left is one pub, the churches, a school and a community centre. Come for the graveyard, the well and the hills - not for browsing.

Driving past the Quaker graveyard

It is just outside the village and easy to miss. People come for Glenbarrow and never stop at the oldest Quaker burial ground in Ireland a few minutes away. Stop. It takes twenty minutes and it is the more interesting half of the visit.

Underestimating the Slieve Bloom Way

It is over eighty kilometres around the full range and the waymarking is genuine hill walking, not a riverside stroll. Do a section as a day walk. Do not set off from Glenbarrow thinking you will loop the lot before dark.

Getting there.

By car

Rosenallis is on the R422 about six kilometres northwest of Mountmellick, between Mountmellick and Clonaslee. From Portlaoise take the R422 north, roughly 30 minutes. Glenbarrow car park is signposted a few minutes uphill from the village.

By bus

No mainline bus serves the village directly. Local Link runs rural services connecting Rosenallis with Portlaoise and into neighbouring Co. Offaly - check current timetables, frequency is limited. Otherwise it is a taxi from Portlaoise.

By train

Nearest station is Portlaoise on the Dublin-Cork line, about 30-40 minutes south by road. Hire a car or take a taxi from there - this is walking and driving country, not rail country.