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Bremore

Passage Grave

Fieldnotes

So to Bremore passage grave cemetery once again. The endangered Bremore passage grave cemetery. Five recorded passage graves (by Herity), a recorded fulacht fia, a recorded unclassified barrow and an unrecorded shell midden, all within a small corner of a small headland in the northernmost part of the county Dublin coastline.

We parked on the lane and headed into the cropless field towards the south-eastern mound. If this ever was a passage grave, it's been totally ruined beyond recognition. The mound, along with the next one a little to the north and the one to the extreme west of the group, are only recognisable as anything prehistoric because the farmer has desisted from ploughing them into oblivion. These three have a couple of boulders each that may be parts of kerbstones, but all three barely rise a half metre above the surrounding terrain. They are all elongated, their longer axis pointing back towards the main mound.

The main mound is a large, circular cairn that seems to have been robbed out, as opposed to the 'collapse' mentioned in the Monuments Database entry. It reminds me of the chunk taken out of Dowth. I had hoped to be able to explore the chamber/passage area a bit more given the time of year, but last year's brambles are too tightly woven and still quite vicious. Pity.

The tomb is less than 5 metres from the shoreline. We traversed our way down below the main mound and found a rather impressive shell midden. This looks to have been a feasting area, but the sea has eroded into the material and is in danger of washing it away altogether.

The last of the five so-called tombs is barely recognisable under all the vegetation, even though growth has been slow with our late Spring this year.
ryaner Posted by ryaner
8th April 2013ce
Edited 10th July 2020ce

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