Qualla: Aghaboe Abbey https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:12 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Aghaboe Abbey https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey Aghaboe Abbey: Introduction https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey/ Photo credit Sarah777, CC BY-SA 2.0. The name means "little field of the cow" - Achadh-bou in old Irish, Campulus Bovis when Adomnan wrote about it in Latin in the seventh century. St. Canice founded his monastery here in the 500s, in the small kingdom of Osraige, and for a while the field of the cow held one of Ireland's most consequential intellectual exports. From this Laois pasture, a monk named Feargal walked across Europe and became the bishop who built Salzburg's cathedral. The cow-field made history. Then the world moved on, and the abbey burned twice, and what is left is a single ruin in a damp green field, with a beautifully carved three-light window in the east wall.

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Image: Sarah777 | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/gc6t-aghaboe-abbey-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Aghaboe Abbey: Canice and the Cow-Field https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey/ Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. In the sixth century, Cainnech of Aghaboe - known in English as St. Canice - chose this spot in the Slieve Bloom foothills for his monastery. The kingdom of Osraige stretched from Slieveardagh to the Barrow, and Aghaboe became its principal religious house, eclipsing the older mo...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/gc6t-aghaboe-abbey-canice-and-the-cow-field.mp3 0:06 2 full Aghaboe Abbey: The Monk Who Built Salzburg https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey/ Photo credit Karin Rager, CC BY-SA 3.0. Sometime in the eighth century, a monk named Feargal - also called Virgilius in Latin - left Aghaboe for the continent. He was a geometer and an astronomer, and he reportedly held the dangerous opinion that the earth was a sphere with people on the other side, a position that bri...

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Image: Karin Rager | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/gc6t-aghaboe-abbey-the-monk-who-built-salzburg.mp3 0:06 3 full Aghaboe Abbey: Burned Twice https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey/ Photo credit A.-K. D., CC0. In 1234, the original monastery burned. Aghaboe was a possession of the Mac Giollaphadraigs - the lords of Upper Ossory, anglicized to Fitzpatrick - and the fire occurred during a Mac Giollaphadraig attack on a Norman fortification built right next to the abbey. The flames were p...

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Image: A.-K. D. | CC0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/gc6t-aghaboe-abbey-burned-twice.mp3 0:06 4 full Aghaboe Abbey: A Place That Refuses to Disappear https://qualla.com/aghaboe-abbey/ Photo credit Andreas F. Borchert, CC BY-SA 4.0. The civil parish of Aghaboe and the Roman Catholic parish of Aghaboe both still carry the abbey's name, though they cover quite different areas of the surrounding Laois countryside. The local community conserved the priory church, and the east window's three lights still catch th...

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Image: Andreas F. Borchert | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/aghaboe-abbey-wp/gc6t-aghaboe-abbey-a-place-that-refuses-to-disappear.mp3 0:06 5 full