Emly
Imleach Iubhair, Co. Tipperary

One of the oldest Christian sites in Ireland. Fourteen kilometres of road and fifteen centuries of history.

The name alone is a document. Imleach Iubhair - border of the lake of yews. Before the Christians arrived this was Medón Mairtine, capital of the Mairtine people, an Érainn tribe who have since disappeared from history. After them, the Eóganachta dynasty chose the site for their chief church. They did not choose badly.

St Ailbe founded his monastery here, probably in the early 6th century - the Irish annals record his death at 528. The tradition that he preached in Ireland before Patrick is just that, a tradition: no document supports it, and scholars are careful to say so. What is beyond dispute is that his church at Emly was the premier ecclesiastical site in Munster for centuries. The diocese was formally established at the Synod of Ráth Breasail in 1118. In 1568 the Church of Ireland united it with Cashel; the Catholic Church followed in 1718. The diocese is gone. The village is still here.

Emly today is a quiet place - a main street, a few dozen houses, a GAA ground named for the saint, and the old monastic site underpinning a modern Catholic church. The holy well is in the graveyard corner. The ancient cross leans in the same ground. You can walk the whole site in twenty minutes, and most people who stop to do so are surprised it doesn't have more road signs pointing at it.