Two of Ireland’s great cultural treasures are from Durrow: the Book dated 916 AD, now at Trinity College Dublin, and the High Cross still on or near its original site. Yet it is probably true that the majority of the people of Ireland have never seen either.
To get to the cross you have to go through a side-gate off a busy road and walk up a solemn 300 metre tree-lined avenue. The first time I went there I could not view the cross as it was securely locked up in the disused COI church on the site.
When I returned recently, as part of my new interest in Irish High Crosses, I found that the cross is now visible but only from a distance. A glass door has been installed in the church. Through it you can peer up the aisle towards the cross.
Why is it so famous? Obviously I could not see why from where I was viewing it and if there were any information boards they also were locked up inside. I had to go home to find out.
Usually the centrepiece of a cross is a crucifixion scene but in Durrow it not just any crucifixion scene. It is one of the Monasterboice group of scriptural crosses, unique because the scene is based on the account of the death of Jesus in St John’s Gospel. Only John’s gospel states that a soldier piercing the side of Jesus with a lance. This is what is depicted on the crosses.
Crucifixion scenes dominate the west face of the cross while those on the east range from the Old Testament’s David with his harp to the New Testament’s Risen Christ. The variety and detail show a familiarity with scripture that is not surprising in a monastery which produced the illuminated scripture Book of Durrow, older than the Book of Kells.
Despite its limited view of the cross, Durrow is worth visiting. The silence of the long leafy avenue provides a fitting approach and you are unlikely to be disturbed by other visitors.
After you get your glimpse of the cross, search behind the church and you may come across the carefully tended holy well of Columcille with a plaque dated 550. That is the year Columcille (later of Iona) founded the monastery. Durrow’s name, ‘Oak Plain’, echoes that of his foundations, Derry, meaning ‘Oak Grove’.
What is it about Ireland that we hide away national treasures like this?
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