A Typical Celtic Monastery

Originally the monastic settlement would have consisted of a small group of wattle and daub huts surrounded by a defensive earth wall.
It would have included a small mud hut and timber church with a preaching cross.
There would also have been a store house, guard house, cemetry and cultivated fields around.

The Wall

The monastery would have been surrounded by a wall with a ditch dug outside the wall. This served a variety of purposes:

it was used as a boundary
it kept out wild animals and unwelcome visitors, such as raiders.

Attached to the wall would have been a square 'house' where the guard's man stayed.
It would have been his job to see people going in and out of the enclosure
and to close the gated at night to stop wild animals and invaders coming in.

The Church

Inside the enclosure there would have been a church with a large stone near it. Almost every place where the early Christians settled
had a stone which they marked with a cross. This would be a preaching stone. One of the monks would have stood here to tell the people about God.

Cells

The simple wattle (wood) and daub (mud and clay) huts which the monks lived in were known as cells.
Each monk would have had his own cell. The monks prayed for many hours each day, alone in their cell.

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