Da fupp?
Andrew Sheridan writes:
Not what you would expect to find in a graveyard in Castlerickard, Co. Meath. Built in c.1815.
Did he play the GAA at all?
Pics: Andrew Sheridan
Update:
Via Noel Byrne:
Resting inside the elaborate tomb is Godwin Swift. A noted freemason, he was also the uncle and benefactor to the renowned writer and dean, Jonathan Swift. Godwin lived from 1628 to 1695, and it was he who first set Jonathan on the road to literary greatness*. Alongside Godwin lies the remains of Sophia Jane Swift who died in 1851 in Versailles….
Child eating reptiles dude.
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There’s a pyramid grave in Naas too.
Where abouts?I think its moe of a crypt
sizlack’s dead?
I think Fluffy meant one of the Stooges.
iggiy’s dead?
That’s right, I did the Iggy
That is up the road from where I was raised! My family was involved in working on the FAS scheme years ago that restored it. Underneath there is two or three lead coffins and at the time the bodies were uncovered. Next door to it was a ‘fairy fort’ which the locals always maintained was a burial site for those from the famine. Years ago children who died were unbaptised were not buried in it as it was consecrated ground, so they were buried outside of the grave yard. The same goes for people who committed suicide.
There is also a house across the way and the rumour has it that a maid who worked at the time in the 19th Century fell in love with the son of the master of the house. On the night before their wedding she apparently found it he was her brother and committed suicide in the Boyne.
Who was in the coffins? What’s the family’s surname?
Oooooh, check you eh !
Fair play Fluffy :)
I have no idea myself, we always thought they were related to Jonathan Swifte!
There are suicide graveyards poorly marked about the area near graveyards. The markings look like just square stone columns in hedges but they are upside down stone crosses. Rome eh?
Typical FAS.Decorate the place with HDR
there are 5 or 6 pryamid graves like this around the country. If u draw lines between them on a map, they create a square and compass! (i wish). this grave is very important because it suggests that speculative freemasonry was in ireland a lot earlier than thought.
godwin swift died in the 1600s but the grave is 1815?
There’s a massive one in Arklow, built by another freemason. I’m making a documentary on it at the minute.
There’s a few like this around the country, but as far as I know the Arklow one is the only where people are buried *inside* as opposed to under.
http://www.countywicklowheritage.org/page/howard_mausoleum_kilbride_co_wicklow
tommyf, you should contact the masons hall in molesworth st and talk to the historian there. Id be very interested to see your documentary
My cousin died in the 70s and the headstone on his grave is a one foot high three-sided pyramid.