Tipperary, Ireland, which rises dramatically above the surrounding plain, and houses a cluster of important ecclesiastical buildings of the medieval period. St Patrick consecrated Cashel as a bishopric and it later bcame the see of the infamous Bishop Cormac who was killed at the battle of Ballaghmoon in 908 while attempting to make himself the king of Ireland. The earliest and finest church on the rock is known as Cormac’s Chapel and was built by Bishop Cormac MacCarthy in 1134, its style is heavily influenced by the German Romanesque with square flanking towers, but the blind arcading is a feature commonly employed on Norman churches in France and England. The cathedral dates to the 13th century and later, and stands near to the attractive perpendicular Gothic choral building. Beside the cathedral is a round tower of contemporary date. Other monuments of interest include a large sarcophagus carved in devolved Scandinavian styles and a Christian standing cross which depicts the Crucifixion on one face and St Patrick on the other.
The Macmillan dictionary of archaeology, Ruth D. Whitehouse, 1983Copied