181 



cient cathedral, and of excellent workmanship, were found under- 

 neath it.* 



Some writers-f- have imagined that masonry was introduced either 

 by wandering Greeks, about the close of the seventh century, or by 

 the freemasons, brought to Ireland by some of our bishops who had 

 travelled to Greece and Palestine, and had there acquired a taste 

 for the degraded Grecian style prevalent in the lower Roman empire 

 during the seventh and eighth centuries ; and that hence arose the 

 style of the early buildings, such as Cormac's Chapel at Cashel. 

 But in the details of this curious building nothing Grecian appears ; 

 the short thick columns, the heavy capitals, the semicircular arch, 

 and the chevron mouldings, all belong to the Saxon or Norman 

 schools, which have been shewn to be in all essentials the same,;}; 

 deriving from the Roman style, and not partaking of the over- 

 ornamented fretted manner apparent in the buildings of the Eui- 

 press Helena, and those of the eastern empire, from the time of 

 Constantine. 



In the great number of churches and monastic establishments 

 founded by St. Declan, St. Fechan, St. Patrick, St. Columba, and 

 other early Christian teachers, it can scarcely be doubted but that 

 some were built of more durable materials than wattle or timber ; and 

 accordingly we find mention in Ware of St. Kienan's lime and 

 stone church, built in the fifth century ;§ the Irish were tlierefore 

 in advance of the English, who did not adopt the use of lime and 

 stone until A. D. 675, according to Bede and William of Malms- 



• Memoir of a Map of Ireland, by Dr. Beaufort, p. 141. 

 f Dr. Ledwich. — And in the Anthologia Hibernicae, II. p. 193. 



■\. Britten's Architectural Antiquities, v. —Turner's Architectural Tour of Normandy, II. p. 

 176. Article on Civil Architecture. Rees's Cyclopedia. 

 § Ware's Antiquities, p. 134. — William of Malmsbury, Rep. Gest. Ang. lib. i. c. 2. 



