The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

County Cavan: Latest Posts

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Lanliss (Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art) — Images (click to view fullsize)

<b>Lanliss</b>Posted by ryaner ryaner Posted by ryaner
5th April 2023ce

Burren (E) (Wedge Tomb) — Images

<b>Burren (E)</b>Posted by ryaner ryaner Posted by ryaner
3rd April 2023ce

Burren (Central) (Portal Tomb) — Images

<b>Burren (Central)</b>Posted by ryaner ryaner Posted by ryaner
3rd April 2023ce

Aghnacally (Wedge Tomb) — Fieldnotes

After two relative disappointments earlier in the day this was the real deal. Aghnacally (achadh na calliagh? – field of the cailleach) is on the north-western slopes of Slieve Rushen (404m) and I’d always assumed that the megalithic tomb marked on the OS map was the Aughrim tomb, uprooted and taken off to the Slieve Russel hotel. Browsing the Historic Environment Viewer at archaeology.ie disabused me of that assumption – Aughrim is actually to the south-east of the mountain, five kilometres away.

There are a couple of ways to approach this isolated site: the difficult one that we took in Tircahan townland at H196245; the other at Drumbrughas at H207270. Either way brings you deep into the borderlands of north Cavan. I hadn’t got too many hopes for the site as the satellite photo shows heavy pine forest and an overgrown clearing. Thankfully we were in my mate Thomas’s 4X4 because after two kilometres up an ever decreasing road, then lane, then track, then forest track, I was ready to turn back. He wasn’t having any of that so on we went, up another two kilometres, through forest junctions, along overgrown tracks, deeper and deeper – this would be a pleasant day’s hike, the track beside the tomb leading up onto the top of the mountain.

All of the plantation trees in the vicinity of the tomb are felled, but the small, unplanted enclosure where it lies is overgrown. This is no bad thing with the vegetation deepening the mystery and enfolding the tomb in a magical atmosphere. However, there are vague trails here – we’re not the only visitors seeking out ancient knowledge. And then there it is, hidden among some stray pines and lots of summer grasses, what on first sight looks like a tumbledown wreck, but on further investigation reveals itself to be a fine wedge tomb.

Open at its south-west end, closed by a backstone at the north-east, with a much intact, covered chamber in between, this, at times infuriatingly overgrown, monument is, to use a well-worn cliché, a hidden gem. The split roofstone covers most of the gallery, just the westernmost sidestone of the northern wall jutting out beyond to the front of the tomb. Hunkering down, the cozy interior of the gallery looked inviting in a maybe-once-upon-a-time sort of way, but not now, thanks all the same. Sunshine intermittently broke through and lit the floor of the fern and clover-floored sepulchre.

There’s classic outer walling and some cairn here too but it’s all pretty much buried in the detritus and mulch. This is not an easy site to peruse – you’re in danger of falling down through some hidden void and spraining an ankle – but it’s well worth the hassle, the rugged structure revealing itself slowly, surviving down through the ages. It’s the type of place you don’t want to leave, a place where maybe, once in a blue moon, you might meet a stranger in search of an answer to an unspoken question.
ryaner Posted by ryaner
25th September 2021ce

Cranaghan (Slieve Russel Hotel, present location) (Wedge Tomb) — Images

<b>Cranaghan (Slieve Russel Hotel, present location)</b>Posted by ryaner ryaner Posted by ryaner
25th September 2021ce

Cranaghan (Slieve Russel Hotel, present location) (Wedge Tomb) — Fieldnotes

Visiting this is a slightly awkward pleasure: thoughts of the absolute arrogance of digging it up and transferring it to your hotel and golf club and using it as a massively ignored decorative afterthought so you can continue to quarry out the side of the mountain on which it rested, weighed up against the desire to see it, check on it, maybe mourn it a bit.

It’s the monument that most points up the angst that sometimes accompanies me on my pursuit of these monuments. That pursuit has been made multiple times easier by the mapping system at both the Historic Environment Map Viewer in the north and the similar system at archaeology.ie in the south. The wealth and depth of information available at these websites almost makes anything I do here redundant. Almost… because as we all know, these monuments need looking after, a task the authorities are not always too keen to pursue. Who said it here? “Progress was fine, but it went on too long.”

So in our need for economic progress we’re sometimes quite prepared to demolish what we once were. Precious funerary monuments from 3,500 years ago are deemed expendable and the safety blanket of ‘preservation by record’ is used to register their destruction. What happens the stones after? It seems that they’re then put in storage, the report is written up and we move on. Or as has happened here, permission is given to reconstruct away from the original site. On reflection, even the very notion of a visit here being an acceptable alternative to seeing it in its original place is contemptible. To do so is to almost acquiesce in a process that one finds hugely problematic. Almost…

So what’s it like anyway? Well it seems that it was in a fairly ruined condition before the excavations in 1992, and no matter what what was done, actually replicating what was found would be impossible. Three cists were found in the cairn, none of which are noticeable now. The structural stones of the chamber/gallery are quite tall, almost head height and there’s a lintel-like roofstone midway along. I get the feeling that the stones weren’t socketed as deep as they would have been in the original. Ivy is being allowed to grow over the stones making examination more difficult.

Overall the impression I get is that the excavators were quite diligent, but, once the initial task was completed, that was that. Mr. Quinn could continue his quarrying, his hotel has a garden ornament and life went on. But the story didn’t fully end there. For an alternative history, see the link in the folklore below.
ryaner Posted by ryaner
25th September 2021ce

Doon (Court Tomb) — Fieldnotes

Doon is one of those sites that would have you asking “why bother?” Practically destroyed beyond all recognition and shamelessly overgrown to the point where you wonder if there’s anything there that remotely resembles a recognisable megalith.

Here’s the Cavan Inventory entry: “Court tomb – Situated in rolling countryside just N of Ballyconnell. This is a dual court tomb set in a long cairn. It is somewhat overgrown by trees and bushes. Two galleries, set back to back, are both 9m long, and each is divided by jambs into three chambers. They are likely to have shared a backstone but this is lacking. Eleven stones remain along the combined N sides of the galleries and seven along the south sides. There is a single courtstone just beyond the southern entrance jamb of the SW gallery and another about 2.5m from the south side of the NE gallery.” And that’s it. Which is quite substantial in comparison to some sites I’ve seen, but seemingly not substantial enough to have found its way into the Survey of the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland, which is neither here nor there really, but I’d like to see a plan of what’s there and maybe come back in winter when the vegetation is less rampant.
ryaner Posted by ryaner
25th September 2021ce

Garvagh (Standing Stone / Menhir) — Images

<b>Garvagh</b>Posted by ryaner<b>Garvagh</b>Posted by ryaner<b>Garvagh</b>Posted by ryaner ryaner Posted by ryaner
18th August 2021ce
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