Tallaght Monastery

[2] In addition, life at the monastery was chronicled in a text now referred to as the Tallaght Memoir, probably completed by AD 840.

[6]Activities at the monastery included mass, prayer, and beneficial labor such as gardening and working at trades that supported the needs of the community.

[2] The site of the monastery was given to Máel Ruain "in honour of God and St. Michael" by Cellach (d. 18 July, 771) of Ui Donnchada, grandson of a Leinster king, Donogh (d. 726).

The monastery withstood an attack by Vikings in AD 811 and survived as a discrete entity to the time of the Anglo-Norman invasion of 1169.

[9] Subsequent to the turmoil of that period, Pope Alexander III issued a bull dated 20 April 1179, by which Tallaght, along with its subsidiary chapels of Killohan and St. Bride’s, was united to the Archdiocese of Dublin.

Gradually, the town of Tallaght grew up around the monastery, and the English-appointed archbishop of Dublin, built (or possibly restored) a palace there.

In 1324 Alexander de Bicknor built or restored an archiepiscopal manor at Tallaght, which was fortified later to protect the English in Dublin from the attacks of the O'Byrnes.