placenamesMoneenalassa
Móinín an Leasa
The named bridge records successive road crossings, while Moneenalassa also appears in the organisation of nineteenth-century poor relief.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Móinín an Leasa · Irish · main form
- Moneenalassa · English · main form
Place & story
A bridge on the old maps
Moneenalassa Bridge crosses a tributary of the River Nore at the Laois–Tipperary boundary. Fred Hamond's industrial heritage survey identifies a bridge here on the Ordnance Survey maps of 1839 and 1890. The 1906–07 edition supplies the name Moneenalassa Bridge. The survey places the crossing between Curraghmore and Newtown or Skirk, recording its position through the neighbouring townlands. [2]
The concrete replacement
The earlier structure was replaced, probably in the middle of the twentieth century. Hamond's 2007 inspection recorded a reinforced-concrete slab supported on concrete abutments, with concrete parapets. The road crosses the watercourse at a pronounced angle: its measured span was 2.43 metres straight across and 4.55 metres along the skew. No visible remains of the previous bridge were identified. [2]
The poor-law district
Moneenalassa was also the name of an electoral division included in Donaghmore Poor Law Union, formally established on 7 June 1850. The workhouse museum's account draws on the guardians' minute books to show that people were admitted by July 1851, before the building was officially declared ready in September 1853. This was a service for the wider union, rather than a workhouse located at Moneenalassa. [3]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Laois
- Barony
- Clandonagh
- Civil parish
- Skirk
- Coordinates
- 52.92041, -7.67025
- Logainm ID
- 107036 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Moneenalassa. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Bridges of County Laois: An Industrial Heritage Review, Part2, Site Gazetteer Volume2, LAIAR-021-014, PDFpage136 · Fred Hamond for Laois County Council,2009
- The Workhouses of Laois · Donaghmore Workhouse and Agricultural Museum
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2026-06-08. How this page was prepared.