Muiredach's High Cross

‘Celtic’ or more correctly ‘high’ crosses are one of the most evocative symbols of the early medieval period in Ireland. Created in the form of a Latin cross, intersected by a ring, their distinctive silhouette has become synonymous with Irish, and to a lesser degree Scottish, identity since the revival of the form in funerary and monumental sculpture from the mid-nineteenth century. Roughly 250 of these monuments, intact and fragmented, survive across Ireland. Of these, Muiredach’s cross at Monasterboice in Co. Louth is one of the most substantial and best-preserved examples. As such, it is also one of the best-known, and while still in its original location, in a quiet rural graveyard, copies of it are held in in numerous international museum collections.