TWO MEDIEVAL CARVINGS which were taken from an island in the Shannon Estuary in Co Clare around 150 years ago are to be brought back to the island next month.
The carvings, which date from the 12th and 15th centuries, were taken from Scattery Island in the early 1800s – and were only positively located earlier this year.
It has emerged that the captain of a passenger ship removed the artefacts from the island and used them as garden ornaments in his home in Kilkee – where they remained until 1865, when they were moved a few kilometres south to Kilfeeragh, to St Senan’s Well.
There they remained until the 1960s, when they were discovered by local man Padraig de Barra and moved for safekeeping.
However, it was only this year when the exact location of the carvings became known – and the Scattery Island Heritage and Tourism Group is now to bring them back to the former monastic settlement from which they were originally taken.
Scattery Island has been uninhabited since 1979, but will be the site of a Gathering event in two weeks.
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