Thurles Information

Thurles residents were informed, back in December 2012, that a new Public Area Surveillance System (a 10 unit Pan, Tilt and Zoom camera CCTV system) would cost in the region of one hundred thousand Euro, with 70% of this cost being funded by Pobal.

Pobal, formerly known as Area Development Management, was first established in 1992 by the Irish Government together with the European Commission, to manage an EU Grant for local development. Same EU grant aid was designed to support local communities and agencies, in achieving social inclusion, reconciliation and equality.

A further 15% of this one hundred thousand Euro costing was to be provided by the former Thurles Town Council, while the final 15% was to be aided by Thurles Chamber of Commerce. [Latter TCC aid actually never materialised.]

In November 2015 residents of Thurles were informed that the existing Local Authority (Thurles Town Council) was required to assume responsibility for the management and operation of this CCTV system, in compliance with Data Protection legislation, [See pdf link page 3 – Crime Prevention – Installation of CCTV Cameras].

Two years on following its installation, we understand from Town Councillors that this one hundred thousand Euro CCTV system had not properly functioned since early 2017, and while just some of the cameras continue to operate, the actual equipment used to record surveillance footage had ceased to function.

The one question now being asked, by Thurles residents, requires a simple Yes or No answer; “Was any video footage recovered from the camera presently tacked on to the Thurles castle, latter situated on Barry’s Bridge, thus offering possible evidence as to who wilfully decapitated the statue of Archbishop Dr. Patrick Leahy?”

As the video footage hereunder shows, the damage is not confined only to the statues head, but also to the edge of the precisely sculptured short cape, latter known as a ‘mozzetta’, which today is still worn by some ecclesiastics, e.g. His Holiness the Pope and Cardinals.

But what was the legacy granted to the small rural town of Thurles, by Archbishop Dr. Patrick Leahy (1806–1875)?

It has to be of course the priceless tabernacle in our town’s Cathedral of the Assumption. Today it remains one the most beautiful and precious of art objects, to be found openly displayed anywhere here in Ireland.

Archbishop Dr. Patrick Leahy had learned through personal contacts in the city of Rome, (Urbs Aeterna (Latin) The Eternal City), Italy, that a Tabernacle was being disposed of from the high alter of the mother church of the Society of Jesus (The Jesuits) called ‘Gesú’, located in Via degli Astalli. The Gesù had been the home of the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, until the suppression of that order in 1773.

Leading Italian sculptors, painters, architects and poets of the High Renaissance period, including Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, (more commonly known by his first name Michelangelo), Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, (architect of the Farnese family, latter who could trace their origins back to around AD 984) and Giacomo della Porta would have received Communion from this same tabernacle, in the then Gesù church.

This tabernacle, a work of the sixteenth century, was purchased for £50.00 and transported to Thurles for a similar financial sum, having been somewhat refitted in the workshop of Signor Filippo Leonardi of Rome.

The Tabernacle doorway is adorned with a Corinthian portico which rests on two beautiful pillars of ‘verde antico’ (antique green) marble, two feet ten inches (86.36cm) in high; each pillar with bases and capitals made of bronze.

The front door access is made of bronze with a silver host featured in the centre, bearing the letters I.H.S. (ΙΗΣ), (a monogram denoting the first three letters of the Greek name for Jesus), set over three arrows, signifying three nails standing on converging points; same an emblem of the Jesuit community. See Picture left.

Two small bronze statues formerly belonging to this tabernacle, representing St. Peter and St. Paul, occupy niched recesses to be found either side of the front portico.

Initially the tabernacle had rested against the Gesù church wall, so it became necessary to now decorate the back end, since same, positioned out from the wall, could now be viewed from all sides by visiting faithful.

A locking rear door was introduced, made of cream oriental alabaster or onyx marble in which a large cross of blue ‘lapis lazuli’ is inlaid, supposedly by Dr. Leahy own hand. Dr. Leahy after all was the son of a civil engineer and Cork County Surveyor. (Lapis lazuli is a deep blue metamorphic rock used as a semi-precious stone that has been prized since antiquity for its intense colour).

Unable to acquire two blocks of ‘verde antico’ to match the existing front pillars, he was forced to settled for two pillars manufactured from Galway green marble, which to the uneducated eye, appears to match almost perfectly. A frame of pale reddish marble, called ‘Porta Santa’ or ‘Holy Door’ surrounds the onyx back door slab. Latter marble is named after the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican, which was carved from this stone.

Now began the difficult task of building the main alter and lectern to match this most beautiful and priceless of tabernacles, while matching both in a similar design vein as the now existing installed tabernacle.

Some of the marbles used here and on the floor area were presented by Pope Pius IX at the request of Dr. Leahy; same mined, to a large extent, by Christian slaves sent to work in marble quarries by Roman Emperors. Here in Thurles cathedral today we can view at close range these rare and priceless semi-precious stones like the green porphyry and multicoloured agate (mined in Greece), sienna (mined in Italy), green malachite (mined in England), reddish brown rosso, brown giallo antico, black nero antico (Latter all mined in Italy), blue lapis (latter a symbol of royalty, honor, power, spirit, vision and a universal symbol of wisdom and truth), the black, red, beige, white, and grey africano (mined in Turkey), etc.

Other marble was now acquired in Dublin and England and all this marble was cut and inlaid by an Irish workforce under the guidance of Dublin man John Chapman, operating here in Thurles.

It is truly necessary for visitors to examine this tabernacle in closer detail to appreciate fully the sheer perfection and priceless beauty of what is just one small part of the legacy of Dr. Leahy, bestowed on rural Thurles.

One Final Question: The missing head removed from Dr. Leahy’s statue, possibly weighs about 30 – 50 lbs; this being the case has anyone searched around in the immediate vicinity of this statue in the event that the vandals / offender may have thrown it away nearby?