Gallarus Oratory

The Gallarus Oratory (Irish: Séipéilín Ghallarais) is an oratory on the Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Ireland. It has been presented variously as an early-Christian stone church by antiquary Charles Smith, in 1756; a 12th-century Romanesque church by archaeologist Peter Harbison in 1970; a shelter for pilgrims by the same in 1994. The local tradition prevalent at the time of Charles Smith attributed it to one Griffith More, being a funerary chapel built by him or his family at their burial place.

The oratory overlooks the harbour at Ard na Caithne (formerly also called Smerwick) on the Dingle Peninsula. Saints road (Cosán na Naomh), an old pilgrimage road less than 300 metres away, leads to the summit of Mount Brandon, which can be seen in the background of the oratory.

There exist several interpretations as to the origin and meaning of the placename Gallarus. Archaeologist Peter Harbison ventures the meaning to be something like 'the house or shelter for foreigner(s)' (Gall Aras), the said foreigners being possibly "these pilgrims that have come from outside the Peninsula."

However, according to lexicologist Pádraig Ó Siochfhradha (aka An Seabhac), the name does not refer to a foreign settlement but to a rocky headland (Gall-iorrus).

As the oratory is the only intact specimen of its type, it has attracted considerable attention, starting from antiquarians in the mid-18th century. The first account we have of the oratory is Charles Smith's description of 1756 in The Antient and Present State of the County of Kerry (Dublin), p. 191.

The oratory is built of large cut stones from the Dingle Beds of the Upper Silurian Old Red Sandstone. Charles Smith, who discovered the edifice in 1756, described the stone as "a brown free-stone, brought from the cliffs of the sea shore, which cuts readily and is very durable."

The stones are cut on every side and end so as to fit perfectly together and slope slightly down to help rain run off the structure. They exhibit smoothly finished outside facings that follow the slant of the wall.

The edifice is usually thought to be of dry-stone walling – built without mortar as a structural medium, but there is evidence that even if mortar "was never visible in the wall facings it was used as a structural medium for the interior of the wall at least." A thin layer of lime mortar is used to bond the stones together and to fill in small hollows in the inner faces.