ryaner

Travelling around megalithic Ireland a couple or three questions of the imagined tomb-wreckers have frequently arisen: If you’re going to destroy one of these ancient sites, why not obliterate and eradicate it totally? Why leave the scant remnants, the vague outline, of what once was? Is it because mid-destruction you got visited by some phantom in your bed that made you desist? In the end, it’s possible that you got from here what you came for and sated you said fuckit, leave what’s left and who cares? It’s always puzzling – the disrespect shown is sometimes total, and those sites are lost forever, but it’s at places like here in Ravensdale where enough remains to intrigue and tantalise.

I’ll quote in full the description from the Louth Inventory (copyright Dublin: Stationery Office, 1991): “This court-tomb has suffered considerable damage by blasting, and drill holes for dynamite are visible in a number of shattered stones. It consists of a roughly trapezoidal cairn orientated NNE-SSW, incorporating at its N end the inner end of a broad court and the scant remains of a gallery. The N limit of the court is defined by a facade stone at the W, indicating overall court dimensions of about 5.5m deep by 7m wide. Eight stones mark the inner end of the court, four at the W and three at the E. Two of these form the entrance jambs to the gallery which had at least two chambers. The N chamber 3m long and about 1.5m wide, is delimited by two side stones at the W and one at the E. This is separated from the rest of the gallery by a pair of jambs. Beyond these the continuation of the gallery is represented by a single orthostat at the E side and there is no back stone. A field fence curves around the N and W sides of the monument.”

Blasting? Dynamite? So post 1866 then, and more likely well into the 20th century. We’ve heard of this before, in Carrowkeel, but there’s doubts about that. There it was said to be part of the excavation, far-fetched maybe; here it seems that it was simple destruction and the re-use of the stones and antiquarian niceties be-damned. And yet, as mentioned above, they left us what’s here, unprotected as it is. Bizarre.

The small charms of the court with its almost symmetrical arms; the entrance jambs; behind those their chamber segmenting twins, all speak of a classic multi-chambered gallery, unmistakably an ancient burial place. Almost total wreckage of court tombs is quite common in North Louth and the Cooley peninsula it seems. Contrast that with the near complete tombs Ballymacdermot, Clontygora and Annaghmare in neighbouring county Armagh. I’ve been around these parts a lot in the last few years but had always been put off by that Inventory note but I have to say I’m glad to have finally bit the bullet. It’s not that bad of a site compared to others around, just that you wish they hadn’t trashed the place so badly.