Jerpoint Abbey Kilkenny
Jerpoint Abbey near Thomastown in County Kilkenny is the finest Cistercian abbey ruin in Ireland and one of the most impressive medieval ecclesiastical sites in the country, a Cistercian monastery of the twelfth century whose combination of the substantial surviving architecture, the remarkable medieval sculptured cloister arcade and the quality of the carved stonework throughout creates a heritage visit of exceptional quality in the beautiful valley of the River Nore. The Office of Public Works manages the abbey and the quality of the interpretation provided enhances what is already an architecturally outstanding site.
The cloister arcade of Jerpoint Abbey is the most celebrated feature of the site, a series of medieval carved figures on the cloister piers that provide the finest and most extensive example of medieval figurative sculpture in any Irish monastic ruin. The carved figures include saints, knights, bishops and a remarkable series of hybrid creatures combining human and animal characteristics in the tradition of medieval manuscript marginalia translated into stone, and the variety and quality of the carving provides a window into the artistic imagination of the medieval Cistercian community that inhabited this abbey.
The abbey church, with its Romanesque crossing tower and the remains of the transepts and chancel, preserves substantial elements of the twelfth-century building campaign in a quality of preservation that allows the architecture of this important early Cistercian building to be appreciated clearly. The combination of the architecture and the sculpture makes Jerpoint one of the essential heritage visits in Kilkenny.