Kilbixy / Cill Bigsighe

The entry for St. Bigsech of Kilbixy in the Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae [https://omniumsanctorumhiberniae.com/2013/06/28/saint-bigsech-of-kilbixy-june-28/] [accessed 26 July 2025] nores: "The Rev. Mr. Cogan visited this place on the 4th of August, 1863. Then he found one of the old fonts, belonging to a former church, and stuck in the wall of a donkey-stable, at one of the private entrances to the churchyard. He gives an interesting account of this ancient place. At the same date, the name of this saint occurs in the Martyrology of Donegal, with the designation of Bigsech, Virgin, of Cill-Bigsighe, in Meath." We are not able to confirm whether the object in Cogan's description above is the same as the font described in Roe (1968: 123) as the surviving fragment of a medieval baptismal font: "It was eight-sided with four wide and four narrow panels, the lower panels chamfered to a greater depth than the vertical height of the upper ones"; Roe further notes that the basin well is circular without a drain, and that its "appearance suggests a post-Reformation date for its making".
A 3-D model of this object by the Archaeological Survey of Ireland may be seen in Sketchfab [https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/kilbixy-church-font-wm011-040004-044623ca47e148f98cb5c5734def7e8c] [accessed 26 July 2025]; its caption reads: "Post-reformation octagonal-shaped limestone baptismal font, partially broken, lying on the surface of Kilbixy graveyard (WM011-040005-) between the C. of I. church and the Malone family mausoleum to the east-south-east of the church. The octagonal-shaped font with sixteen chamfered faces probably stood inside the medieval church (WM011-040002-) that was replaced by the present C. of. I. church in the late 18th or early 19th century [...] For more information on this font, visit: https://maps.archaeology.ie/HistoricEnvironment/?SMRS=WM011-040004-."