Rathmolyon is a village in the southern portion of County Meath

County Meath

County Meath is a county in Ireland. It is part of the Mid-East Region and is also located in the province of Leinster. It is named after the ancient Kingdom of Mide . Meath County Council is the local authority for the county...

, Ireland

Republic of Ireland

Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...

, situated 8 km south of Trim

Trim, County Meath

Trim is the traditional county town of County Meath in Ireland, although the county town is now Navan. The town was recorded in the 2006 census to have a population of 6,870....

. It is situated at the junction of the R156

R156 road

The R156 road is a regional road in Ireland, linking the N3 national primary road near Clonee in County Meath to the N4 in County Westmeath. The road is single carriageway throughout. Many parts of the route have dangerous bends.-Route:...

 regional road

Regional road

A regional road in Ireland is a class of road not forming a major route , but nevertheless forming a link in the national route network. There are over 11,600 kilometres of regional roads. Regional roads are numbered with three digit route numbers, prefixed by "R" A regional road in Ireland is a...

 and the R159 regional road connecting Trim to Enfield

Enfield, County Meath

Enfield or Innfield is a town in south County Meath, Ireland, situated between Kilcock and Kinnegad and very close to the border with County Kildare...

. Rathmolyon serves as a service center for the surrounding rural area.

(The name of the village is frequently mispronounced as "rathmoylan"; the correct pronunciation is "rath-mo-ly-on", with the emphasis on the second-last syllable, the "ly".)

Local history

The village developed at the junction of two regional roads. Most of the significant older buildings in the village date from the Georgian and Victorian periods. During the late 19th century, the area played an important role in the development of the Two by Twos and Cooneyite movement, the only religion known to have had its origin in Ireland.

Although small, Rathmolyon includes some impressive buildings, which include a Catholic church, a Protestant church, two public houses, Cherryvalley House, Rathmoylon Villa and Rathmoylon House.

Local attractions

The “Rathmolyon Esker” east of Rathmolyon has been proposed as a Natural Heritage Area.

The village (up until recently) contained a house that used to be an Royal Irish Constabulary

Royal Irish Constabulary

The armed Royal Irish Constabulary was Ireland's major police force for most of the nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. A separate civic police force, the unarmed Dublin Metropolitan Police controlled the capital, and the cities of Derry and Belfast, originally with their own police...

 Station. This has since been demolished and replaced with a modern house of a similar appearance. Local rumours in this village is that Ian Paisley

Ian Paisley

Ian Richard Kyle Paisley, Baron Bannside, PC is a politician and church minister in Northern Ireland. As the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party , he and Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness were elected First Minister and deputy First Minister respectively on 8 May 2007.In addition to co-founding...

's Grandfather was Constable there and that Paisley himself was born in the barracks.

See also

• List of towns and villages in Ireland.