FRANCIS ABBEY (ST.)

Samuel Lewis

1837

FRANCIS ABBEY (ST.), an extra-parochial district, in the centre of the city of Limerick; containing 1483 inhabitants. This district comprises the site, garden, and precincts of the ancient Franciscan monastery, founded in the reign of Henry III. by Fion de Burgo, and in which he was interred in 1287. The abbey continued to flourish till the dissolution, when it was granted to Alderman Sexton, and now forms part of the estate of the Earl of Limerick. It is situated in the Island, or Englishtown, and wholly surrounded by the parish of St. Mary, to which it nominally belongs, and in the R. C. divisions forms part of that parish. There are no vestiges of the ancient buildings, nor can their exact site be ascertained.

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