MEATHMAN'S DIARY: A burial ritual unique to Navan

In recent months, a couple of true Navanites were laid to rest in old Athlumney cemetery in the heart of the town. You probably can’t claim to be a proper Navan soul unless you have burial rights in the little old graveyard in the shadow of Athlumney Castle, on the bank of the Boyne off Convent Road.

Podge Newman and Robbie McCormack, both sons of Parnell Park, made their final resting place in old Athlumney in recent times. Robbie’s funeral was during lockdown, and Podge’s was restricted as well, so not many would have witnessed the unique ceremony that takes place in the graveyard before burial.

For the coffin does not go directly for burial when it arrives in the old graveyard. There is a ritual to be observed first, which I have never heard of anywhere else. In the cemetery close to the old ruined church, is a stone slab.

The undertakers direct that the coffin be placed on this stone slab embossed with a skull and crossbones, known as the ‘Cheevers-Goff stone’ after a 15th century knight, and a particular prayer has to be said, before the coffin is then brought to the grave for burial.

The prayer is the De Profundis, a Latin prayer for the faithful departed. Apparently, Pope Clement XII was the first who, “in order to move the piety of Christians to pray for the souls in Purgatory, granted, by a Brief of Aug. 4, 1736, Coelestes Ecclesiae thesaurus: The indulgence of 100 days to all the faithful, every time that at the sound of the bell, at the first hour after the evening Ave Maria, they say devoutly on their knees the psalm De profundis, with a Requiem aeternam at the end of it; ii. A plenary indulgence to those who perform this pious exercise for a year at the hour appointed, once in the year, on any one day, after Confession and Communion. Those who do not know by heart the De Profundis, may gain these Indulgences by saying in the way already mentioned for the De profundis, one Pater noster and one Ave Maria, with the Requiem aeternam.”

Nobody knows where this Navan tradition comes from. Historian Beryl Moore thought it is in memory of the first cleric, often the patron saint of the parish walking round the piece of land given by the local chieftain for a church and graveyard, and blessing it, walking in the footsteps of the saint.

Why are coffins placed on certain tombstones for a prayer? It is suggested that there was a person buried in that grave who had died without confession and so was according to old ideas unable to be interred with full Christian rites. The De Profundis or Pater Noster said over him every time a coffin comes into the cemetery would be thought as helping the poor fellow. Hopefully, Cheevers-Goff, whoever he was, has made it to the pearly gates by now.

(First published Meath Chronicle print edition, 22nd August 2020)