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A very steep climb. 650 metres according to Carleton Jones’ gazzeteer (Temples of Stone: Exploring the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland, 2007), and straight up. The tomb is just the other side of the peak, at the end of the track.

Inside the chamber it’s diffcult not to engage with the salmon-pink flush of the stones, freckled with bits of quartz and this and that, pitted and alternatively smooth as you gaze along their features. Then the passageway pulls your attention out across the vast plain underneath. It points much too far north, at least on my compass, for a solar orientation but it’s tempting to imagine, having read Bawn’s bit of folklore below, some ancient crumble of bone staring out over his former domain.
A gorgeous place.

One of Somerville’s five stone circles of West Cork (JCHAS 35, 1930; 79), Maulatanvally can suffer when placed in comparison with its more intact brethren. Lacking the more monumental construction and solar event alignments of Drombeg and Bohonagh, the beauty and seclusion of Reenascreena and the mystery of the lost world at Carrigagrenane SW, it could almost be the odd child of large local sites.

Situated on a platform, with the ground falling swiftly to the south and west, the circle is pushed fairly tightly against the eastern field boundary. The gap and deeply rutted track from the next field are right beside it and just on the rise to the north is a chicken factory. After the drop to the west the ground rises steeply again, over the Dunmanway-Rosscarbery road, to reach a hill summit that gives the townland its name. Beyond this lies the omnipresent Carrigfadda.

The rise of ground to the west pulls an axial azimuth of 256.5 back to a declination of -5.4 (Ruggles, Astronomy in Prehistoric Britain and Ireland, 1999; 217), offering no obvious solar or lunar event to a modern observer. What might be significant however is its direct line to the peak on the northern section of Carrigfadda, the imposing centre of the source forks of the Argideen river, a flow whose silver is mirrored in the quartz components of many of these monuments.

According to O’Nuallain (PRIA 84C, 1984; 21) there would have been originally 11 stones in the perimeter of a circle with a common local diameter of about 9.5 metres. Seven stones remain, with four in an arc at the western side and three in a group to the east. The entire northern side is missing, including what should have been the northern portal. Placed slightly off centre is the squarish, box-like quartz block, smaller than that at Lettergorman SW and Carrigagrenane NE but still dazzlingly white.

The western section contains the axial stone, long but low at just over knee height, its two flankers and the continuing stone to the north. The top of the axial is rather weathered and it has a curious seam running across the middle of its inner face. The eastern side still has the radially set southern portal, now leaning somewhat to the north, with a rather sharp looking stump and a round topped circle stone to the south. Despite the wrecked guttery look to the remains this circle hasn’t deteriorated since at least as far back as 1930 and possibly much further (see plan below).

A slightly unusual aspect to the ring is the position of the axial stone with regard to the remaining stones. It would seem to be positioned to be perpindicular to a line running between the stump to the south of the portal and that stone, rather than facing a line to the north of it, between it and the presumed northern portal. This stump can’t be a portal here because it is set with its long axis along the perimeter and it is well off the centre line of the circle as deduced from the remaining stones.

The whole eastern section seems to be flattened and pushed slightly too far north to make a true circle. If a secondary alignment was intended it would be closer to an equinox event than the mid-portals-axial line, but this has never been surveyed.

This site is located in the second field to the east of the road from Dunmanway to Rosscarbery, just down from the rim of the hill after Kippagh bridge. There is a little lay-by as the second indentation in the ditch after the chicken factory. Look over the brambles here.

Just before the summer I went to a talk given by Professor O’Brien on the prehistory of the Dunmanway area. While the first half of his presentation was a steady trot around the expected topic, he spent the rest of the time speaking about his excavation at Clashanimud, a townland that he ventured to translate as ‘the trench of the timber’. It’s possible that some folk memory remained into historic times of this massive wooden construction.

I’ve included the newpaper report from August in the miscellaneous section below, as a reasonable summary of his findings. On visiting the site myself in early June I found access to be easy, with a parking spot just up the hill from the entrance at the eastern side.

The remains of this probable five stone circle (O’Nuallain PRIA 84C, 1984; 44) are situated at the eastern end of a marshy field which slopes down gently north to a noisy and intensely overgrown stream. The ground rises towards Carrigfadda to the southwest but a view to the horizon in this direction is obscured by a line of trees near the southern field boundary.

Two hip-height stones; the axial and its northern flanker are all that is left to immediate sight. O’Nuallain noticed a quartz boulder 1.7m and a stone 90cm at their maximum placed against the fence a few yards to the east. I could only find the quartz stone, and then only by its brilliance speckling through the earth and growth now covering it. I dusted it off somewhat for the photograph and then covered it up again.

The axial stone leans outwards considerably to the west but looks as if it originally presented a level, flat top, pitted in the centre. The flanker leans inwards to the south giving it a rather bulbous look, tapering to the bottom. Its shading and shape are very striking to the eye.

O’Nuallain grants the possibility that the two stones at the fence originally formed part of the monument and it certainly would not be unusual for the coincidence of a sizeable quartz block with a stone circle in this area. Its dimensions are apparently in excess of the wonderful conglomerate in Lettergorman and I would have loved to have seen more than the foot-size patch I scratched open.

The site can be approached with courage or recklessness through the marsh, brambles, water traps, sheer drops and wire fences from the road to the east but may be better attempted from the Carrigfadda side.