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"Once on a particular day, lifting the latch of twisted wire that held closed the great iron gate, we opened it and passed
in under the shadowy arch of the Gate Lodge of Friar's Bush. In a wall of the archway to the left, a door stood open, giving
a pleasant glimpse of a dusky room, dark furniture, dim pictures, flowers, and the yellow gleam of shining brass.
Before us, beyond the archway's shade and between rows of headstones, stretched a sun-bright, moss-grown aisle, and at
its farther end, surrounded by giant elder trees, stood the Friar's Thorn. Out from under the ivy-wreathed porch and down
through the tree-shaded alley we passed, in and out - up and down and to and fro, between the leaning headstones, each telling
its simple story - the story that is the epitomy of all human stories............
'All that live must die, passing through life to eternity'
And on many of the gravestones in Friar's Bush are graven the names of men who were not unknown to fame in the Belfast
of the strenuous and sometimes dangerous times in which they walked its familiar ways, and guided, many of them, its various
destinies."
(Extract from Cathal O'Byrne's book 'As I Roved Out')
Fellow traveller, we will endeavour to follow the beautifully descriptive passage above in our journey through Friar's
Bush Gravesite - one of the oldest gravesites in Ireland with roots firmly fixed in the 14/15th centuries...Documentary and
physical evidence abounds to support the concept of an active friary or chapel in existence in that era which can be summarised
as follows:
* Map of Belfast c1570 in which reference is made to'Freerstown' or more properly, Friarstown - an area of three single-storied
dwellings situated above Moses Hill at Strathmillis.
* An Inquisition of James 1 of England wherin the area is spoken of as Ballynabraher - roughly translated as 'town of
the friary road'.
* Reference to Capella de Kilpatrick - Church of Patrick.
* A stone block containing a well worn hole on one side - known locally as the 'hole stone' or 'friars stone' embedded
within the oldest part of the site and considered by many to represent the holy water font used within the ancient friary.
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