Skellig Michael
A monastery on a pillar of rock eleven kilometres into the Atlantic. Beehive huts, six hundred steps, the monks who lived there from the sixth century, the puffins and the lighthouse keepers, and what filming Star Wars there did to it.
Part of Saint Michael
16 moments in this segment.
- - Aug1987. Skellig Michael, County Kerry, Ireland 03. Skellig Michael photographed in August 1987, before modern visitor restrictions.
- - High cross on grave at Skellig Michael. Early medieval cross slab in the monks' graveyard on Skellig Michael, photographed 2014.
- - Beehive huts in the monastic site on Skellig Michael. Drystone beehive huts on Skellig Michael, modern photograph of a monastic settlement on a bare Atlantic pinnacle.
- - Skellig Michael From the Air. Smithsonian Channel aerial sequence over the sea crags seven miles off the Irish coast that once housed a community of reclusive monks.
- - 600 steps ascending to top of Skellig Michael - June 2018 13. The stone stairway climbing to the monastery on Skellig Michael, photographed 2018.
- - Approaching Great Skellig. Skellig Michael seen from the sea, 2018; the isolation that defined this Atlantic Michael hermitage.
- - Beehive dwellings at the monastery on Skellig Michael 01. Beehive cells of the early medieval monastery on Skellig Michael, Co. Kerry, photographed 2018; the island was dedicated to the archangel and occupied from roughly the 7th century.
- - Hermitage: A Film About Skellig Michael. Leonard Sheil's film on the ascetic monastic settlement that occupied the Kerry sea crag between roughly the 6th and 8th centuries.
- - Conservation Work on the Skellig Islands. Office of Public Works film documenting the conservation programme on the Skellig monastic remains.
- - Sceilg Mhichil: Conservation on Skellig Michael. Ireland's National Monuments Service documents ongoing conservation and maintenance work on the UNESCO-listed monastic island.
- - Seabird Research on Skellig Michael. Ireland's Office of Public Works documents University College Cork's puffin census on the restricted-access monastic island in July 2020.
- - Smarthistory: At the Edge of the World, Skellig Michael. Art historians Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank and Steven Zucker discuss the monastery's stone construction, most of which dates to the 8th-11th centuries.
- - The Edge of Europe: The Story of Skellig Michael. Documentary on the early Christian monks who lived and worshipped on the Skellig islands off County Kerry, presented by poet Paddy Bushe.
- - Visiting Skellig Michael: The Official Safety Guide. Ireland's Office of Public Works sets out the conditions and hazards of landing on and climbing the monastic island, which limits visitor numbers.
- - The Skellig Michael Visitor Experience Film. Footage of the orientation film shown at the Skellig Michael Visitor Experience in September 2025, covering the monastery's history and access.
- - An Archaeologist on Visiting Skellig Michael. Archaeologist Neil Jackman on the site's condition, landing conditions and what recent survey work has shown about the monastic settlement.