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Killarney ( ; , meaning 'church of ') is a town in County Kerry, southwestern Ireland. The town is on the northeastern shore of Lough Leane, part of Killarney National Park, and is home to St Mary's Cathedral, Ross Castle, Muckross House Muckross Abbey, the Lakes of Killarney, MacGillycuddy's Reeks, Purple Mountain, Mangerton Mountain, Paps Mountain, the Gap of Dunloe and Torc Waterfall. Its natural heritage, history and location on the Ring of Kerry make Killarney a popular tourist destination.
The town's population was 14,412 as of the 2022 census, making it the second largest in the county. Killarney won the Best Kept Town award in 2007, in a cross-border competition jointly organised by the Department of the Environment and the Northern Ireland Amenity Council. In 2011, it was named Ireland's tidiest town and the cleanest town in the country by Irish Business Against Litter.
Innisfallen (from Irish: Inis Faithlinn, meaning "Faithlinn's island") is an island in Lough Leane, one of the three Lakes of Killarney. It is home to the ruins of Innisfallen Abbey which was founded in 640 by St. Finian, and was occupied until the monks were dispossessed in 1594, by Elizabeth I. According to tradition, the Irish High King Brian Boru received his education at Innisfallen.
Aghadoe, the local townland which overlooks present day Killarney, may have begun as a pagan religious site.Long, Tom. "Tracing Our Faith." Fossa & Aghadoe: Our Heritage and History. ed. Jim Larner. Fossa Historical Society. 2007. . p 1. The site has also been associated with the 5th century missionary St. Abban, but 7th century ogham stones mark the first clear evidence of Aghadoe being used as an important site.Long, 1. According to legend, St. Finian founded a monastery at Aghadoe in the 6th or 7th century. The first written record of a monastery dates from 939 AD in the Annals of Innisfallen where the Aghadoe monastery is referred to as the "Old Abbey."
Following the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169, the Normans built Parkavonear Castle, also at Aghadoe. The castle was perhaps intended as an early warning outpost due to its views of the entire Killarney valley and lakes region.
Ross Castle was built on the lake shore in the late 15th century by local ruling clan the O'Donoghues Mor (Ross). Ownership of the castle changed hands during the Desmond Rebellions of the 1580s to the Mac Carty Mor.
Muckross Abbey was founded in 1448 as a Franciscan friary for the Observantine Franciscans by Donal McCarthy Mor. The abbey was burned down by forces under Edmund Ludlow in 1654, and today remains a ruin.
Killarney was heavily involved in the Irish War of Independence. The town, and indeed the entire county, had strong republican ties, and skirmishes with the British forces happened on a regular basis. The Great Southern Hotel was for a while taken over by the British, both as an office and barracks, and to protect the neighbouring railway station. One notable event during the war was the Headford Ambush when the IRA attacked a railway train a few kilometres from town.
However, divisions among former colleagues were quick to develop following the truce and treaty, and Killarney, like many other areas, suffered in the rash of increasing atrocities during the Civil War. A day after the Ballyseedy massacre, five Republican prisoners were killed in Killarney by Free State forces.
Killarney was granted town commissioners under the Towns Improvement (Ireland) Act 1854, which was converted to an urban district under the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898, and a town council under the Local Government Act 2001. The Local Government Reform Act 2014 dissolved the town council with the creation of Killarney Municipal District under the authority of Kerry County Council. Killarney Town Hall was erected in Kenmare Place in around 1930.
Killarney benefited greatly from the coming of the railway in July 1853. British trade directory publisher Isaac Slater noted that there were three hotels in the town in 1846Slater, Isaac. Slater's Directory. 1846. but by 1854, one year after the coming of the railway, James Fraser named seven hotels and described their locations:
the Railway Hotel opposite the Railway Station; the Kenmare Arms and Hibernia which are on the main street and immediately opposite the church... the Victoria which is about a mile 1.5 km to the west of the town on the shores of the Lower Lake; the Lake View which is about the same distance to the east of the town and also on the shore of the Lower Lake; the Muckross about two and a half miles 4 km away and near the Muckross Lake and the Torc which occupies an elevated site about a mile and a half 2.5 km from the town on the hill which rises immediately over the Lake Hotel.Fraser, James. Guide to Killarney. 1854In 1858, Irish born Victorian journalist, Samuel Carter Hall named O'Sullivan's Hotel and the Innisfallen rather than the Hibernia and Torc, but Isaac Slater also named the Hibernia in 1846. At the time he was writing, tours of the Ring of Kerry were already an industry and Killarney was considered the starting point of the circuitous route. He was fascinated by the horses' endurance on the two-day trip, and leaves clear advice for other travellers;
It is a common and wise custom of those who make this tour, and are not pressed for time, to hire the carriage at the hotel in Killarney and continue with it 'all the way round.' It is absolutely marvellous what these mountain bred horses can get through "thinking nothing" of thirty miles 50 km for days together or even fifty miles 80 km in a single day.Hall, Carter. A Week in Killarney. 1858As part of the trip, he noted that there were hotels in Glenbeigh and Waterville along with a "comfortable inn", which is now the Butler Arms Hotel.
Modern employers include Liebherr Group, which has had a presence in Killarney since 1958, with a combined manufacturing/research and development facility in the town manufacturing container cranes. In honour of its founder, a street in Killarney was named Hans Liebherr Road. Other businesses include Tricel (also known as Killarney Plastics) which was founded in 1973.
In the public sector, both the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media and Department of Justice have offices in Killarney.
In 2023, in a scheme intended to reduce litter volumes during the tourist season, Killarney became the first town in Ireland to ban single-use coffee cups.
Killarney has three football clubs—all of which compete in the Kerry District League.
Killarney Athletic A.F.C. was founded in 1965, and played its first competitive game in the Desmond League as a youth team. It entered a junior team at the start of 1966. In the early 1970s, the club became a founding club of the Kerry District League (KDL). Originally the club played in the centre of Killarney, but have since moved to a modern facility (with two pitches) in the Woodlawn area of the town.
Killarney Celtic was founded in 1976. The club purchased their own ground in 1993 and have invested in their facilities since then. There is a grass pitch and a FIFA 1-star full-size synthetic all-weather pitch (both floodlit to match standard), a 50 x 80 meter grass training pitch and a 70 x 35 metre synthetic training pitch which is also fully floodlit.
Cedar Galaxy was formed in 2011 and play in the Kerry District League Division 2B. The team were promoted to Division 2A for the 2013/2014 campaign.
Killarney has three Gaelic football clubs: Dr Crokes, Killarney Legion and Spa GAA. The rural hinterland also has a number of football teams, including Kilcummin GAA, Fossa GAA, Firies GAA, Glenflesk GAA and Gneeveguilla GAA. All these teams compete in the Kerry County league and the East Kerry Senior Football Championship (O'Donoghue Cup) and league.
Dr. Crokes is the most successful of these teams, winning the All-Ireland Senior Club Football Championship in 1992 and the Munster Senior Club Football Championship in 1991, 1990 and 2007. The club has also won the County Championship on 7 separate occasions, including in 2010. Dr. Crokes is the only club in Killarney with a hurling team; it won the Kerry Intermediate Hurling Championship in 1999 and 2001.
Muckross Rowing Club is the largest of the clubs, having developed into a full-time 'sliding' club with 32 National Championships (since 1996) at various levels from Junior to Senior. A number of members of the club have also been selected to row for Ireland and have competed at the Home International Regatta, Coupe de la Jeunesse, World Rowing Championships and Olympic Games. Paul Griffin, Sean Casey and Cathal Moynihan members of Muckross Rowing Club, are Olympic and Irish World Championship rowers.
The Ring of Kerry Cycle, a charity cycle around the Ring (175 km) takes place every first Saturday in July. There is also a club in Killarney called Killarney Cycling Club.
St. Paul's Killarney Basketball Club, founded in 1985, has entered both youth and senior teams in tournaments organised by Basketball Ireland. Killarney is also the home of Irish floorball.
At the beginning of the 20th century, many songs which romanticized Ireland made direct mention of Killarney. Examples included "My Father Was Born In Killarney - Don’t Run Down The Irish" (1910), "Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral" (1914) and "For Killarney and you" (1910).
"There's Only the One Killarney" is a song that was written by Irish songwriter Dick Farrelly and recorded by Irish tenor Patrich O'Hagan. Killarney also appears in "How Can You Buy Killarney," written by Kennedy, Steels, Grant and Morrison, and recorded by Joseph Locke, among others. Killarney is also mentioned in "Christmas in Killarney" (written by Redmond, Cavanaugh and Weldon) and "Did Your Mother Come From Ireland?" (written by Kennedy and Carr), both most notably recorded by Bing Crosby. "Some Say the Devil Is Dead" by Derek Warfield contains the line "Some say the devil is dead and buried in Killarney/ More say he rose again and joined the British Army."
Van Morrison references the town in the opening lines of his 1974 song "Fair Play" off of his album Veedon Fleece: " Fair play to you / Killarney's lakes are so blue / And the architecture I'm taking in with my mind / So fine."
Colin O'Sullivan's 2013 novel, Killarney Blues, is set in the town and was awarded the "Prix Mystère de la critique" in 2018.
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