[3] Situated 63 km from Dublin on the R445 road, Monasterevin has been relieved of much through-traffic by the opening in 2004 of a section of the M7 motorway bypassing the town on the N7 Dublin-to-Limerick route.

Monasterevin railway station is on InterCity rail lines for trains from Dublin to the southwest (Cork, Limerick and Tralee) and west (Galway and Mayo).

The main geographical features of the countryside are the River Barrow, its tributaries, the extensive bogland and the limestone outcrop of Moore Abbey Hill.

The land between is mainly limestone and proved an ideal path for the River Barrow, fed by its tributaries the Black and the Figile.

During the Barrow drainage, hundreds of stone axe heads were found on the river-bed at each of the three major crossing points that occur within the town.

Saint Abban of New Ross, a contemporary of Saint Patrick, established a monastic settlement by the banks of the River Barrow at Rosglas and gave it into the charge of his protégé Evin (Éimhín; the name is a diminutive of the adjective eimh "swift, active", Latinized Eminus).

[citation needed] He secured special status for the Monasterevin area placing it outside the common law, making it a sanctuary.

Once again the importance of Monasterevin as a crossing point on the Barrow asserted itself and the town came under the opposing influences of the O’Mores of Laois, the Hiberno Norman Earls of Kildare and the English Pale.

Abbots of Monasterevin held a seat in the Irish Parliament while assisting outlaws and rebels against the crown of England.

By 1427 Rosglas had fallen on hard times and in 1541 the Abbey was handed over to Henry VIII of England as part of his reformation.

King James I granted the Abbey and demesne of Rosglas at Monasterevin to Sir Adam Loftus in 1613.

Their son Edward became the Fourth Earl who sold the Mellifont estates and transferred the family seat to Monasterevin.

Its rise as the "Venice of Ireland" was encouraged by the many improvement works undertaken by the family and the influx of a mixed Protestant and Catholic merchant class.

The Battle of Monasterevin took place in the Main Street opposite St. John's church, which had been fortified by local yeomanry and militiamen.

Edward Prendergast was arrested and condemned to death for ministering to the insurgents in their camp in Iron Hill near Nurney.

Captain Padraig O’Bierne and a group of Derryoughter boatmen stole into the town under cover of darkness and removed the body to his home place of Harristown.

The area was largely unaffected by the widespread mass evictions of the era, the Droghedas being generally regarded as good landlords.

Monasterevin is noted for its unusually high number of bridges in such a small semi-rural area, earning it the name of Venice of Ireland.

[13][14] The route consisted of several loops of a circuit that passed-through Kilcullen, Kildare, Monasterevin, Stradbally, Athy, Castledermot, and Carlow.

During the Great War many young men from the town and surrounding areas joined the Leinster Regiment and Connaught Rangers.

During the War of Independence, the rail lines around Monasterevin and Kildangan were the chief targets of IRA action.

[16][11] From 1987 to 2015, a Gerard Manley Hopkins Literary Festival[17] was held annually in the town, which the poet described as "one of the props and struts of my existence" whilst he was teaching in Dublin.