Cahersiveen
| Cahersiveen Irish: Cathair Saidhbhín | |
| County Kerry | |
|---|---|
 Main Street | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | V469795 |
| Location: | 51°56’53"N, 10°13’26"W |
| Data | |
| Population: | 1,297 (2022) |
| Local Government | |
Cahersiveen, sometimes Cahirciveen, is a town in in County Kerry. As at 2022 it had a population of 1,297
The name is from the Irish Cathair Saidhbhín, meaning 'Little Sadhbh's stone ringfort'/[1]
The village sits is on the slopes of Bentee, a hill that climbs to 1,234 feet, and on the lower course of the River Ferta. It is the principal settlement of the Iveragh Peninsula, and is found by the coast looking out to Valentia Island. The town is thirty miles west of Killarney.
Cahersiveen was served from 1893 to 1960 by the Cahersiveen railway station on the Great Southern and Western Railway.[2]
History
Cahersiveen was where the first shots of the Fenian Rising were fired in 1867.
On 12 March 1923 during the Irish Civil War, in Cahersiveen five local men were murdered; taken in the early hours of the morning from Bahaghs Workhouse where they were held prisoner, shot in the legs then blown up with a landmine.[3]
Mentions in literature
Patrick O'Brian's novel Post Captain gives Cahersiveen as the location of the character Stephen Maturin's childhood home in Ireland.
- At present two Highlanders were talking slowly to an Irishman in Gaelic ... as he lay there on his stomach to ease his flayed back. 'I follow them best when I do not attend at all,' observed Stephen, 'it is the child in long clothes that understands, myself in Cahirciveen."[4]
Cahirciveen is the central city in Brian Moore's futuristic novel Catholics
Places of interest
The Roman Catholic church in the town is the only one in Ireland named after a layperson, Daniel O'Connell.
The decommissioned Royal Irish Constabulary barracks, dating to the 1870s and now a heritage centre, was built in the distinctive "Schloss" style favoured by its architect, Enoch Trevor Owen. Because of this, it is often claimed to have been mistakenly built from the plans for a British barracks in India – a common myth heard in many Irish garrison towns.[5]
The stone forts of Cahergall and Leacanabuaile stand close to each other a short distance from the town.
The ruins of Ballycarbery Castle are near to Cahergall and Leacanabuaile.
The town falls within the Kerry International Dark-Sky Reserve, the first Gold Tier Reserve in the northern hemisphere and one of only four Gold Tier Dark-Sky Reserves on earth.
Gallery
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("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Cahersiveen) |
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Gate to Holy Well on New Street -
Corner of Main Street and O'Connell Street -
O'Connell Street -
West Main Street
References
- ↑ {logainm|22092|Cathair Saidhbhín / Cahersiveen}}
- ↑ "Cahersiveen station". Railscot - Irish Railways. http://www.railscot.co.uk/Ireland/Irish_railways.pdf.
- ↑ Prisoners of conscience: when silence spoke loud Irish Independent 7 Jan 2009 https://www.independent.ie/regionals/kerry/lifestyle/prisoners-of-conscience-when-silence-spoke-loud/27379496.html
- ↑ O'Brian, Patrick (1996). Post Captain. London: HarperCollins. ISBN 0006499163. OCLC 43221921.
- ↑ "The Old Barracks". https://www.askaboutireland.ie/reading-room/culturenet/landscape-heritage/kerry/the-old-barracks/.