placenamesTarbert
Tairbeart
Buildings across the district record educational consolidation, successive church alterations and a former dairy enterprise.
The name
A reliable full-name meaning has not been established here. The recorded Irish and English forms are given without an unsupported translation.
Recorded forms
- Tairbeart · Irish · main form
- Tarbert · English · main form
Place & story
A comprehensive school for the region
Tarbert Comprehensive School opened in September 1973 after the merger of Saint Ita’s in Tarbert, Mr Dore’s school in Glin and Glin Vocational School. Its first intake comprised 280 students, with eighteen teachers. The coastal site west of Tarbert served several North Kerry and West Limerick parishes. Later extensions provided technical rooms, science laboratories, computer facilities and a stage. [2]
The changing shape of Saint Brendan’s
Saint Brendan’s Church in Tieraclea Lower developed through several building campaigns. The architectural inventory dates its main structure to around 1800, with a northern extension in 1814. Around 1830 the tower gained another stage, battlements and corner pinnacles. A southern transept followed in the nineteenth century. Pointed windows with timber tracery and contrasting stonework help distinguish these additions to the church. [3]
A creamery survives as a boundary
A former creamery in Tieraclea Lower preserves evidence of Tarbert’s working buildings. Dating from about 1860, its surviving rubble-stone walls incorporate a segmental carriage arch and dressed-stone window surrounds. The architectural survey recorded an iron window grille and remnants of a sash window. By the 2005 survey the roof had gone, and the structure was being used as a boundary wall. [4]
Geographic information
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Tarbert. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- A Living History · Tarbert Comprehensive School
- Saint Brendan’s Church, Kilnaughtin, NIAH21300305 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Former creamery, Tieraclea Lower, NIAH21300307 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2010-02-11. How this page was prepared.