St Jarlath of Tuam
Tuam's coat of arms carries a broken wheel because of a story about its founder. Jarlath, an old man, was told by his student Brendan of Clonfert to leave his school at Cluainfois and drive a new chariot until its shafts broke, for there he would rise again; the wheel broke at Tuam. No medieval life of Iarlaithe mac Loga survives, and what we know comes from genealogies, martyrologies, the Irish lives of Brendan and John Colgan's compilation of 1645.
Checked against the source on 2026-09-19.
Andreas F. Borchert, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Temple Jarlath, St. Jarlath's College, Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the 3D model; tap a pin for its page and directions.
Two Jarlaths
The genealogies know two saints of the name: Jarlath son of Lugh, of the Conmhaicne who held most of what became the parish of Tuam, and Jarlath son of Trian, a bishop of Armagh from the Dál Fiatach of east Ulster. Tuam's Jarlath studied under St Benignus, Patrick's disciple, at Kilbennen, founded Cluainfois, now Cloonfush, near the town, and made Tuam his seat; his school is said to have drawn scholars from all Ireland, Brendan among them.
Feast, shrine and festival
His feast is 6 June, the day his relics were translated to a church built for them beside the cathedral; the remains lay in a silver shrine that gave the thirteenth-century church its name, Teampul na Scrín, the church of the shrine, united to the prebend of Kilmainemore in 1415. St Jarlath's College, St Jarlath's Park and parishes in Oakland, Yarragon and Jos carry his name. Energise Tuam held the first St Jarlath's Festival on Saturday 7 June 2008 with a pageant from the cathedral through the streets. The model on this page pins Temple Jarlath, the cathedrals and the college.
Questions people ask
Why is a broken wheel the symbol of Tuam?
When is St Jarlath's feast day?
Written from Wikipedia, "Iarlaithe mac Loga" (CC BY-SA 4.0), read on 2026-09-19, and from the OpenStreetMap places on the model. Nothing has been added from memory; follow the source for its footnotes.