Spaces of movement and meditation: Franciscan choirs in Ireland

From the time of their arrival in Ireland in 1224 and until the dissolution of monasteries in the 1540s, mendicant orders enjoyed sustained success in the cities and boroughs of the country, and in its more rural and remote regions. The Franciscan order was the most prolific of mendicant orders in Ireland, both in the first few decades of their arrival and during their Observant revival in the fifteenth century. The surviving remains of their friaries offer architectural historians, art historians and archaeologists a unique opportunity to observe the material realisation of Franciscan ideals and their attitudes to the use of space, as well as tackling questions about architecture, decoration and the spatial division of these friaries. This chapter discusses the position of a choir in Irish Franciscan churches, focusing on how the choir was related to the general division and organisation of ecclesiastical space, and how the choir expressed Franciscan ideals, both materially and symbolically.