Tullynakill Church, Tullynakill Road, Tullynakill, Killinchy, Co Down, BT23 6QP

Tullynakill Church is a substantial but roofless ruin of a small gabled church of probable late medieval origin, situated in a hollow to the north-east of Tullynakill Road, approximately two miles north of Killinchy village in County Down. The church was renovated around 1639 and abandoned in the early 1800s. It now stands in state care, surrounded by a graveyard containing headstones dating from the 17th century onwards.

The ruin is a gabled rectangular structure measuring approximately 14 metres by 7.5 metres, with walls approximately 0.8 metres thick. It is built of large split stone Silurian grit masonry, a mixture of roughly coursed and snecked work, with what appears to be Castle Espie limestone used as dressings. Both gables and much of the walls have survived.

The south facade features a left-of-centre entrance with a semicircular head, moulded archivolt and keystone rising from moulded imposts, crowned by a moulded cornice. The spandrels display the date 1639 in worn lettering, with two digits to each side. The impost on the west side of the entrance appears to have been replaced recently. The base of the entrance is now below ground level. To the left of the entrance is a two-light window, the only one to have retained all of its dressings. It is chamfered externally with semicircular heads beneath a moulded cornice, though sections of the dressings appear to have been recently restored. Evidence of another window opening exists to the right of the entrance. The west gable is blank, though there is evidence of a former doorway. The east gable features a central pointed arch window with chamfered reveal and label moulding. The rear facade contains the remains of a window to the left of centre. Some sections of former window dressings have been placed inside the church.

The church appears to have replaced Nendrum as a parish church after the latter was abandoned around 1450. However, the building itself may be considerably older; its Gaelic name is significant in this regard, and its absence from the Papal taxation records of 1306 may stem from its inclusion in the returns for Nendrum itself. In 1639 the church underwent renovation, with the old doorway on the west gable blocked and a new one opened to the south, and windows remodelled. The church remained in use until 1826, when a new church was built a short distance to the south at a cost of £700. In 1868 the parishes of Tullynakill and Kilmood were united, and in 1923 both were combined with that of Killinchy. Declining congregations led to the deconsecration and demolition of the replacement church in 1970, so that the original medieval structure has outlived its 19th-century successor. The graveyard contains the grave of John McWilliams, killed at the Battle of Ballynahinch.