Information Clonmel Ireland
This museum features Tipperary related snapshots, comprising plenty of material on transport, as well as the county of Tipperary’s more famous names and faces through history, and newspapers from the nineteenth century. You’ll learn that Laurence Sterne, author of the iconoclastic novel Tristram Shandy, was born in Clonmel in 1713. Clonmel was also home to immigrant Charles (or Carlo) Bianconi from Lombardy, whose coaches – called “bians” – were the first public transport network Ireland had ever seen. Bianconi was twice mayor of Clonmel, and his coach service was headquartered in the town. While his details are found at the County Museum, more modern transport of the motorised variety features at a transport museum on Richmond Hill. Some ten miles from Clonmel is Fethard Museum, and more transport themed exhibits can be found here. However, the exhibits – which run into the thousands in an old railway station – are very varied and include prams from Victorian times and a horse drawn fire engine. Fethard also has some impressive medieval town walls. Another “alumnus” of Clonmel was the tenor Frank Patterson. Back at the County Museum in Clonmel, some of his biographical details can be found, but he is also the subject of a statue at the top of Emmet Street beside the library. The Main Guard at the eastern end of O’Connell Street in Clonmel was first built around 1675 as a courthouse by the Duke of Ormonde. In the course of its history, it also served as a mall of sorts, its arches converted to accommodate market stalls and shops. It has since been restored, and its neoclassical architecture can be appreciated fully during tourist season, when it is open to the public. There you will see exhibits on its history. Clonmel (transliterated as Honey Meadow from the Irish) is mainly situated on the north bank of the River Suir.
Attractions Clonmel Ireland
Cahir Castle - Cahir
Located at Castle Street, Cahir, is one of Ireland's largest and best preserved castles. It is situated on a rocky island in the river Suir. The Castle's attractions include an excellent audio-visual show called 'Partly Hidden and Partly Revealed' in English, French, German and Italian, informing visitors about all the main sites of the area.
Carrick On Suir Heritage Centre - Carrick-On-Suir
This former Protestant church, now restored as a heritage centre, was once part of the Pre-Reformation burial ground and church site of Carrick Mor. Its interesting gravestones include a memorial to Thomas Butler, an illegitimate son of Thomas, tenth Earl of Ormonde. Dorothea Herbert, daughter of the eighteenth century rector and author of 'Retrospections' is also buried here.
Cashel Folk Village - Cashel
Located at Dominick Street, Cashel, it has a delightful series of informal reconstructions of various traditional thatched village shops, a forge and other business. It is housed within the town of Cashel, near by the famed Rock of Cashel.
Mitchelstown Cave - Cahir
Located at Burncourt, Cahir, is considered one of the most spectacular caves in Europe. The caves have three massive caverns, in which the visitor is surrounded by indescribable drip stone formations, stalactites, stalagmites and huge calcite columns.
Ormond Castle - Carrick
Located at Castle Park, Carrick on Suir, is one of the finest examples of an Elizabethan manor house in Ireland. It was built by Thomas, the tenth Earl of Ormond in the 1560s. Closely integrated into the manor house are two fifteenth century towers. It is the country's only major unfortified dwelling from that turbulent period. The state rooms contain some of the finest decorative plasterwork in the country, including plasterwork portraits. Access to the castle is by guided tour only, with a maximum number of twenty people at one time.
