Exciting results from LiDAR survey of monastic site in Mayo Abbey

A NEW survey of the original early Christian monastic site at Mayo Abbey has thrown up some exciting new discoveries that have the potential to shed new light on the village's proud heritage, its central role in the Celtic-Anglo Saxon Christian world in the 7th and 8th centuries and its evolution and development across the following millennium.

Mayo Parish Heritage Committee has just received the results of an aerial LiDAR survey of the monastic site and associated settlement, undertaken by Dr. Paul Naessens of Western Aerial Survey last August.

Large amounts of earthworks are showing up on the scans, study of which are at a very early stage. The data will require a lot of further analysis and additional, more intensive surveys will have to be carried out in particular areas of interest.

LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) is a remote sensing technique for creating a high resolution, high accuracy topographic model of a landscape. LiDAR facilitates the identification and mapping of extant archaeological earthworks, even when slight or under tree-cover. Modern drone technology has revolutionised the adaptability and affordability of this method of surveying.

The Mayo Abbey LiDAR survey, funded by the Heritage Council under the Community Heritage Grant Scheme 2023, highlighted some hugely exciting new discoveries that have the potential to shed new light on its proud heritage.

A monastery was founded in Maigh Eó (The Plain of the Yew Trees) c. 670AD for a group of Saxon monks by St. Colman, Bishop of Lindisfarne. The monastery became known as Mayo of the Saxons.

For more than a thousand years it remained the most important centre in the region, becoming in turn a diocese, a Norman town, and giving its name to County Mayo, the third largest county in Ireland.

This survey and other recent research projects will give new impetuous to future research projects and will also inform the development of a community-driven heritage plan for the monastic site and its environs in the coming years.

Mayo Parish Heritage Committee gratefully acknowledges the support of the Heritage Council and extends thanks to Dr. Paul Naessens for carrying out the survey and Kevin Jordan of KevEm Media for filming the survey and the two information evenings held in the village during the summer. They have also thanked the landowners for facilitating the survey and the speakers and many people from Mayo Abbey parish and through County Mayo that attended the information evenings.