placenamesJohnstown
Baile Eoin
A nineteenth-century country house and archaeological evidence beside the village church belong to different stages of this Kildare parish’s history.
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
- Baile Eoin · Irish · main form
- Johnstown · English · main form
Place & story
A house built in memory of an earl
Thomas Henry Wyatt designed Palmerstown House for the Mayo Trust after the sixth Earl of Mayo’s assassination in 1872. The Irish Architectural Archive records Henry Sharpe as builder and James Hogan and Sons undertaking plasterwork. Its design used the Queen Anne style. After a fire in 1923, Richard Orpen prepared rebuilding plans in 1925. Those plans and the contemporary compensation claim form a separate chapter from the original memorial building. [2]
Medieval activity beside the church
Seventeen test trenches in Palmerstown townland in 2018 identified three archaeological areas near Johnstown’s medieval church. Finds included thirteenth- and fourteenth-century pottery, an iron spur and later tin-glazed ware. David Bayley’s report interprets the features as a probable medieval field system with some settlement. The evidence suggests farming and occupation beside the church, without identifying a particular household or the spur’s owner. [3]
The Flatesbury Monument
A limestone slab in the church’s north wall is known as the Flatesbury Monument. It bears an eight-pointed cross above a stepped base and two heraldic shields carved in relief. The archaeological record gives a possible commemorative identification, rather than an unambiguous named inscription. The surviving carving is firmer evidence than an exact attribution to one marriage. [4]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Civil parish
- County
- Kildare
- Barony
- Naas North
- Coordinates
- 53.23988, -6.61745
- Mapped area
- 5.14 km²
- Logainm ID
- 1181 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Johnstown. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Palmerstown House Naas, work53392: Wyatt and Orpen · Irish Architectural Archive, Dictionary of Irish Architects
- Palmerstown Johnstown3, Excavations2018:296,18E0044 · David Bayley, IAC Ltd.
- Flatesbury Monument, KD019-014003- · Gearóid Conroy, Archaeological Survey of Ireland, National Monuments Service;10 June2011
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2021-10-29. How this page was prepared.