Saggart Hill/Knockananiller/Crockaunadreenagh/Knockandinny sits at the western end of the chain of south county Dublin Hills, the northern edge of the Wicklow mountains. Have a glance at the bottom of Sheet 50 of the Discovery Series OS map and you’ll see that this chain is quite the megalithic playground, peppered as it is with a fair smattering of red monument dots. It also happens to be on the edge of the city and consequently is a favourite spot for non-megalithic adventurers, both benign and malign.
It’s almost exactly 14 years since I last visited here and I was looking forward to seeing the slight remains of the passage tomb and the neighbouring cairn. From back then I remembered a large, overgrown Knockananiller cairn, with the Crockaunadreenagh passage tomb remains over the usual countryside fence. What I encountered today made my heart sink. The forest walks on the hill are increasingly popular and there are mountain-bike trails running through them. More and more people use the hill as an amenity and as a drinking place. As a consequence, there is now a concentration camp-like electric fence separating the cairn on the public land from the ruined passage grave, not 15 metres away on private land in the neighbouring townland. The message here is plain and simple – fuck right off.
It’s not often that one feels like giving up on a place – to do so would be to give up on humanity and the little bit of love that we get from the passion we have for these places, but the absolute, complete wreck that is Crockaunadreenagh and the disdain shown for its neighbouring cairn by the outdoor drinkers and the mountain bikers, almost makes one want to. If you’re going to be that mean-spirited to erect the aforesaid fence, however you may feel about the lumpen attitude of the general populace, well keep it; in fact shove it so far up your…
I remember a short debate a few years back with Fourwinds about the derivation of Crock in Crockaunadreenagh and I think Julian mentions it somewhere in one of the books, and Fourwinds saying it’s an alternative to cnoc, or knock, meaning hill and that that’s where he reckoned the phrase crock o’ shit comes from – as more and more of south Dublin gets opened up and landowners get more and more paranoid, it’s in danger of becoming just that. Apologies but I can’t say anything better.
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Posted by ryaner
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