Castles, Cloisters & Churches 2025 – Galway Archaeological Field School

Location: University Rd, Galway, Ireland

Season: June 2, 2025 to July 11, 2025

Session Dates: Session 1 (2 June to 13 June), Session 4 (30 June - 11 July)

Deadline Type: Rolling

Website: https://gafs.ie/

Program Type:
Field School

RPA Certified:
No

Affiliation:
University of Galway

Project Director:
Dr. Rory Sherlock

Project Description:

The Galway Archaeological Field School provides students with hands-on experience of the archaeology and architecture of medieval Ireland. We specialize in this field and seek to immerse our students in the wealth of medieval castles, churches and monasteries which lie scattered across the Irish landscape. We offer three courses: a two-week non-excavation course focussed on the study of medieval architecture and two four-week excavation courses (though the excavation courses will not run in 2025). We are primarily an educational institution and so we design our courses and select our survey and excavation sites with one important thing in mind – the provision of first-class training opportunities for our students.

The field school is based in Co Galway and draws on a wealth of archaeological remains which are found across the landscape of this historic region. Our two-week Castles, Cloisters & Churches course involves daily travel to visit many of the famous castles, churches and monasteries of medieval Ireland. We start the course with a few introductory lectures to introduce students to several key themes, and then we spend the remainder of the course on the road – we explore ruined Franciscan friaries, Augustinian priories, Cistercian abbeys, and early medieval monastic sites, we visit a range of medieval castles to investigate their architecture, we compare and contrast medieval towns which flourished with others which failed to grow, and we arrange a ‘Skills Day’ where we give our students hands-on experience of how to survey medieval buildings.

The ethos of the field school is firmly founded on high quality, small-group tuition and we aim to give every student close attention so that they may fully understand the skills they learn and thereby enjoy their course to the fullest degree possible. Our course fees include tuition, accommodation (on a self-catering basis), access fees to historic sites and local transportation, so that additional expenses for our students are limited to transport to and from Galway and food for the duration of their stay.

Program Details 2025

Session 1: 2 June – 13 June (2 weeks – 3 Semester Credits / 6 ECTS credits)
Castles, Cloisters and Churches: The Architecture of Medieval Ireland

Session 4: 30 June – 11 July (2 weeks – 3 Semester Credits / 6 ECTS credits)
Castles, Cloisters and Churches: The Architecture of Medieval Ireland

Period(s) of Occupation: Medieval

Project Size: 1-24 participants

Minimum Length of Stay for Volunteers: Two weeks

Minimum Age: 18

Experience Required: None

Room and Board Arrangements:
Our course fees include tuition, local transportation and self-catering accommodation. Students are accommodated in superb modern, comfortable accommodation with good kitchen facilities, but must purchase and prepare their own food. All students will be accommodated in Gort na Coiribe, a high-quality student accommodation complex in Galway City where every student will have their own bedroom and every apartment has free Wifi, TV and a regular cleaning service! Cost: €1200 per week

Academic Credit:
Two-week courses come with 3 semester credits (6 ECTS) offered by the University of Galway. Tuition is small-group teaching directed by Dr Rory Sherlock. This includes on-site supervision and instruction, field trips and lectures.