The First Church

The First Church

St. Augustine’s, fondly known as ‘the Wee Church on the Walls’, sits on the Grand Parade of Derry’s Walls on the site of St. Columba’s first monastery in Ireland.

Columba (Colmcille, meaning Dove of the Church) was born of Royal parentage at Gartan, Co. Donegal in 522AD.

After study at Glasnevin, in 546 his cousin Aed, King of Cenel Conaill gave him the oak clad Hill of Derry on which to build his first church. Reluctant to cut down any of his beloved oaks, Columba chose a clearing in the middle of the oakgrove, resulting in the church running north south rather than the usual east west. This unique footprint remains to this day.

In 563 Columba travelled down the River Foyle into exile on Iona from where he spread Christianity to pagan Britain and Europe. His Derry monastery continued to flourish and became the leading monastery in Ireland.

Columba died on 9th June 597, a day still honoured and celebrated in our city.

 

The Monastic site was raided, destroyed and rebuilt many times over the centuries, By 1200 the Irish Celtic Church had lost its uniqueness through the introduction of structures more in keeping with European Christianity. By the early 1400s, all Columba’s abbeys throughout Ireland came under the rule of the Augustinian Order signalling the end of the ancient Celtic Christian Church. 

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