CASHEL, an inland city and parliamentary borough in
the county of Tipperary, Ireland, with a population in 1851
of 4798. The town is rather handsome, with a wide and
well built main street, but has been far from prosperous,
probably for want of the requisite means of communication
with other parts of the country. The chief object of interest
is the "Rock of Cashel," which may be seen from a distance
of many miles, and which commands a beautiful prospect
over the city and the county of Tipperary. This rocky
elevation, covered with the most beautiful grass, rises ab-
ruptly out of the plain, and stands close to the town. On
its summit is the finest assemblage of ruins in Ireland. They
consist of the ancient cathedral, the largest and most re-
markable ecclesiastical remains in the country; Cormack's
chapel, considered to be the oldest stone building in Ire-
land; and a round tower which differs in the material of
which it is composed from all that surrounds it—the other
ruins and the rock itself being of limestone, whilst the
round tower is built of freestone. The chief buildings in
the city are the new cathedral, a spacious modern church;
the palace attached to the see, now converted into a deanery
house; the Roman Catholic chapel; the market-house;
court-house, &c. Cashel, formerly an archiepiscopal see,
was reduced to a bishopric by the Church Temporalities
act in 1833; and the bishop now resides at Waterford. It
returns one member to parliament, and was formerly a cor-
porate town, but the corporation was extinguished by the
Municipal Reform act. Constituency in 1853, 126. The
Great Western railway passes within 6 miles of the town,
which is distant 108 miles S.W. from Dublin. (ii. 8—11)