Historical information

St Nichols' National School, Limerick, Ireland, is near the Adare Church, built on the grounds of good land beside a river where three groups of monks made their home during the Middle Ages. The Church was formerly the Black Friar's Abbey. The monastery was founded by John, Earl of Kildare, in 1315. The name of the old parish church was St Niholas where the school derived its name. On 2 June 1808 the local vestry meeting of the Church decided to abandon the old parish church of St Nicholas, the ruins of which are on the Estate, and the old Black Abbey was restores.
The remains of the monasteries of all three orders of monks are in relatively good order still (considering their age) and two of them have been restores for worship.
The first is the Trinitarian Abbey, otherwise known as the White Abbey, which is in the centre of the village of Adare. This was once the mother-house of a small influential order which had as its main object the ransoming and redeeming of Christian captives from the Moslems.
The second is the ruin of the Franciscan Abbey in the demesne, beside the gold course.
The third is the Augustinian Priory or the Black Friars' Abbey founded in 1315 by John, Earl of Kildare.

Reference: Adare Church by The Right Reverend R. Wyse Jackson LITT.D., LL.D., D.D., Bishop of Limerick 1961-1970.

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