ck
himself founded a bishopric here. The name is derived from the Irish
_cloch_, a pillar stone, such as were worshipped and regarded as oracles
in many parts of pagan Ireland; the stone was preserved as late as the
15th century in the cathedral, and identity is even now claimed for a
stone which lies near the church.

CLOISTER (Lat. _claustrum_; Fr. _cloitre_; Ital. _chiostro_; Span.
_claustro_; Ger. _Kloster_). The word "cloister," though now restricted
to the four-sided enclosure, surrounded with covered ambulatories,
usually attached to coventual and cathedral churches, and sometimes to
colleges, or by a still further limitation to the ambulatories
themselves, originally signified the entire monastery. In this sense it
is of frequent occurrence in earlier English literature (e.g.
Shakespeare, _Meas. for Meas._ i. 3, "This day my sister should the
_cloister_ enter"), and is still employed in poetry. The Latin
_claustrum_, as its derivation implies, primarily denoted no more than
the enclosing wall of a religious house, and then came to be used for
the whole building enclosed within the wall. To this sense the German
"Kloster" is still limited, the covered walks, or cloister in the modern
sense, being called "Klostergang," or "Kreuzgang." In French the word
_cloitre_ retains the double sense.

In the special sense now most common, the word "cloister" denotes the
quadrilateral area in a monastery or college of canons, round which the
principal buildings are ranged, and which is usually provided with a
covered way or ambulatory running all round, and affording a means of
communication between the various centres of the ecclesiastical life,
without exposure to the weather. According to the Benedictine
arrangement, which from its suitability to the requirements of monastic
life was generally adopted in the West, one side of the cloister was
formed by the church, the refectory occupying the side opposite to it,
that the worshippers might have the least annoyance from the noise or
smell of the repasts. On the eastern side the chapter-house was placed,
with other apartments belonging to the common life of the brethren
adjacent to it, and, as a common rule, the dormitory occupied the whole
of the upper story. On the opposite or western side were generally the
cellarer's lodgings, with the cellars and store-houses, in which the
provisions necessary for the sustenance of the confraternity were
housed. In Cistercian mona