placenamesOughterard
Uachtar Aird
The Kildare site preserves a round tower and church, family burials and archaeological evidence whose limits are as important as its findings.
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
- Uachtar Aird · Irish · main form
- Oughterard · English · main form
Place & story
A parish name with different church boundaries
Lewis described Oughterard as a civil parish on the Dublin–Naas road, while explaining that church administration treated it as part of Kill. Its tithes went to Kill’s vicar. His 1837 account also records a church rebuilding in 1609 and a crypt beneath the western end used for the Ponsonby family of Bishopscourt. These details belong to a dated description of the site and its burial arrangements. [2]
The limestone tower and church remains
The surviving limestone round tower stands just under ten metres high. Its doorway is raised about two and a half metres above the ground, and three floor levels remain identifiable. The Office of Public Works records a rounded window facing south and a narrow window in the church nave. A fragmentary bellcote survives above the church’s western gable. [3]
The Guinness family tombs
The church contains the tombs of Arthur Guinness and his wife Elizabeth Reed. Other members of the family buried there include his sister Olivia and brother Richard. The association is therefore a specific burial connection with the surviving church, rather than evidence that every episode of the family’s commercial history took place in this parish. [3]
Testing on the southern slope
Clare Mullins tested a development plot on the southern slope of the ecclesiastical hill on 9 August 2000. Three trenches revealed no archaeological features. The ground was heavily disturbed, with bedrock close to the surface and an old quarry pit in one corner. Her report situates the plot within an area identified as a reduced medieval settlement; the negative trench results apply to the tested ground, not to the whole settlement. [4]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Civil parish
- County
- Kildare
- Barony
- Salt South
- Coordinates
- 53.26776, -6.55755
- Mapped area
- 11.67 km²
- Logainm ID
- 1216 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Oughterard. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Oughterard, South Salt: A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837) · Samuel Lewis
- Oughterard Ecclesiastical Site · Office of Public Works
- 2000:0510 Oughterard, Kildare: archaeological testing · Clare Mullins, Excavations.ie
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2026-07-01. How this page was prepared.