‘The commemorative function of monuments was paramount. However, the expression of loss and regret for the dead was inextricably entwined with and, to an extent, secondary to attempts to continue the memory of their owners’ personal and social identities……..
 ….the endlessly manipulable nature of funeral monuments could become invaluable. By choosing an identity from the most socially acceptable elements of one’s past, present and future, and rendering this in stone, a medium which by its very nature could convey added veracity, solidity and permanency, reality could be created and controlled by the patron. Moreover, once reality is constructed in this manner, monuments allow for no doubt or argument. Their owners may be denounced or discredited, but monuments will continue to proclaim their own brand of truth. This is why contemporaries occasionally found it necessary to destroy monuments. The propaganda element inherent in them could not be countered in any other way.’
 Clodagh Tait, Death, Burial and Commemoration in Ireland, 1550-1650, p.105.

​“When the coffin is supplied, the pieces of wood which remain over are cut into small crosses measuring two feet eight inches in height by eleven inches wide across the arms. These crosses are painted in various colours - green, blue, red and yellow. They have pointed shafts and one, which is meant to be planted in the soil at the head of the grave, is laid on the coffin, while the others are carried by the chief mourners behind. At the cross-roads nearest the cemetery there is always a tree, either hawthorn or ash, at the foot of which the procession pauses, and the cross-bearers lift their crosses to its branches, where they fix them and leave them. In some places the tree has fallen from age or other causes, but its root remains, or at all events the memory of the place where it grew ; and so the practice is continued, and the crosses are thrust in a heap, lying upon one another, till a mound often eight or ten feet high may be seen.”
“Ancient Funeral Custom in Kilmore Parish”:  The Past: The Organ of the Uí Cinsealaigh Historical Society, No. 2 (Dec., 1921), pp. 146-148: Uí Cinsealaigh Historical Society

​“Visitors to Kilmore are always struck by the unusual sight of a heap of wooden crosses under a thorn tree on the roadside near Brandy Cross. The crosses are placed there by the mourners attending passing funerals, and I have often been asked for an explanation of the origin and meaning of the custom”
 
“Ancient Funeral Custom in Kilmore Parish”:  The Past: The Organ of the Uí Cinsealaigh Historical Society, No. 2 (Dec., 1921), pp. 146-148: Uí Cinsealaigh Historical Society