Clogher

Clogher, a market village of Co. Tyrone, Ireland, in the south parliamentary division, on the Clogher Valley light railway. Pop. (1901) 225. It gives name to dioceses of the Church of Ireland and the Roman Catholic Church, but the seat of the Roman Catholic bishop is at Monaghan, with the cathedral. The Protestant cathedral, dedicated to St Macartin, dates from the 18th and early 19th century, but St Macartin (c. 500) was a disciple of St Patrick, and it is said that St Patrick himself founded a bishopric here. The name is derived from the Irish cloch, a pillar stone, such as were worshipped and regarded as oracles in many parts of pagan Ireland; the stone was preserved as late as the 15th century in the cathedral, and identity is even now claimed for a stone which lies near the church.