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About a kilometre east of Belcoo, on the Belcoo to Enniskillen (or, expanding out a bit, the Sligo to Belfast) road, close to the northern shore of Lough Macnean Lower, on a damp and dreary late May day, we looked north across the rushy fields and wondered how to traverse obstacles of ditch and fence and fast traffic.

Ah maps, don’t you just love them? Where would we be without them? Take the next left here – there’s a track that skirts around at the back of the fields. We might get to it from there. Templenaffrin (Teampail nAifreann – the mass church) has, unsurprisingly, a medieval church and graveyard. And surprise, surprise it’s tended to, which we discovered after we’ve headed up the track and crossed the meadow.

But nice and all as it is (inklings here of another christianisation as the church is built on a mound), it’s not why we’re here today. Separating the field with the church from the field with the bullaun is a small wood with some very large deciduous trees. A fence runs through it and there is some dense undergrowth. However, heading south, the wood runs out and the fence is easily traversed. Heading back north-west and through the wood I got the sense that we’re not the only visitors this stone gets. The place reeked of hippiness, a not unwelcome vibe. We disturbed a grazing deer as we emerged from the wood.

The ground around the stone, and especially to its east, is marshy. We’re in limestone territory and were it not for the nearby swallow hole this would probably be impassable. My companion, not hugely experienced in the megalithic, suggested as we stood and listened to the water disappear underground that maybe this was why the carvers chose this stone. I wouldn’t disagree.

The stone is a sandstone erratic about 1.2 metres tall. The three very visible basins are satisfying. I did the old wash my hands in the water trick to ward off warts. I prefer this idea to the alternative locally named ’baptismal font’. Arriving back and checking the reports it seems I missed a fourth basin, 31cm in diameter and 3cm deep (no wonder). You can see this in one of the shots I took.

Third time lucky? No such thing. Third time I knew exactly where the tomb is because of the excellence of the mapping at the NISMR which I hadn’t got the last two times I was here. Start at the forest track on the Ulster Way where it crosses the Swanlinbar to Enniskillen road. There’s a place to park that doesn’t block any farm gates and it’s over a stile and along a field track.

Benaughlin is prominent to the west as you start to rise out of a small valley bottom. It’s not at all strenuous and after about 1,200 metres you take a left turn, off the Way. Another 300 metres in a south-westerly direction, the dot on the OS map could mean that the tomb is well in to the left off the track. It isn’t. The central chamber of a sprawling, ‘star-shaped’ cairn is 20 metres in amongst the scrub. In fact, some of the cairn almost reaches the track itself.

It was excavated by Wakeham in 1882. It was he who first described a ’starfish-shaped’ cairn or a star-shaped cairn. This is now thought to have come about by, according to Estyn Evans, ‘the accidental result of pillage.’ Whatever about all that it’s evident that someone cares enough to come here and cut back some of the under/overgrowth and stop it completely inundating the gallery and chambers.

We mooched around for a bit – it’s not the easiest on the eye nor on the ankles. There’s a large amount of cairn rubble in both the small northern chamber and the larger southern one. Herbage of various sorts obscures the small arm at the south-east of the gallery. Vibes-wise I would say for the completists only, or maybe for those who still want to bear witness to the burial rites of the ancestors.

I’ve called this a kerbed cairn but there ain’t no cairn here anymore. There are, however, 67 boulders in a circle of 35 metres diameter. Alas, late May is probably not the best time to visit them. I’ve seen other photos of the site and they show some quite massive stones, only 10 of which are still in situ.

So it seems, according to historical reports, that this was probably a passage grave, or possibly a bronze age multiple-cist cairn, the central material of which went into the creation of the roads and other infrastructure in the locality. Which is a shame really, because this would be one hell of a fantastic site. As it is it’s not bad either, just neglected and overgrown and frustratingly unloved and uncared for. So what’s new?

I approached from the north, from the quaintly named Wattlebridge Road, just beside the bridge. The turrets of Crom Castle were visible in the distance to the north-west. It was a bit of a climb through marshy grass until I reached the circle. There is no access to the site from here but some of the stones are visible in the hedge. I skirted over two fences and around to the southern arc and gained access from here.

Sadly, as I said above, there’s precious little to see – however, the place still retains some power and dignity. Once upon a time there were supposed to be views all around and all with water. Now with all the growth, including some large ash trees, that’s mainly restricted to the south. There are some stones visible on the ground in the less overgrown western and southern arcs. I could have stayed a lot longer than I did, rooted around a bit more, but my companion for the day was waiting below at the bridge and we had more sites on our agenda.

I knew this was going to be bad but had hoped that maybe the lintels over the entrance and segmenting jambs might be visible. Alas no. The site is in a disgraceful condition and there is not even a glimpse of what are the substantial remains of a fine dual court tomb. I understand the amount of work that running a farm entails and the time it takes to keep things viable and though I’m reluctant to, I can’t help but say it – the owners of the site should be ashamed of themselves. In the unlikely event that they come across this I’ll make them an offer – I will volunteer to clean up the site, cut back the plants and ensure that I don’t interfere with the tomb structure.

I decided that we’d try Megaman’s approach to Creggandevesky – it seemingly avoids all the mud and treachery of the Lough Mallon way. Also, there is the remains of a supposed wedge tomb on the way down the lane. In the end this way is barred, ‘the very end of the road’ as Megaman suggests is actually someone’s driveway. We asked a friendly local and he recommended us not taking that route anyway, the Jersey bull in the field nearby being an even hardier deterrent. And then there was the weather – horizontal rain stinging our faces on the way back up to the car, I said to Paulie – yer man must think we’re a right pair of gobshites.

Our first foray had pretty much softened our cough as we pulled into the the side of the road beside the waterworks. There’s nothing like a drenching to take all the excitement out of a day out. I did get to the aforementioned wedge tomb, but the last time we were here at this spot I had to leg it back to Dublin because of a Covid emergency. And I wasn’t feeling too optimistic now. But hey, people here know what happens when you have that hunger and then I spotted the kissing gate between the first and second field and knew I was on the right track.

(A little aside here: In Creggandevesky townland there is a sign for Cregganconroe court tomb at the T-junction. There are no other signs of any description around that I could see. Coincidentally, in Cregganconroe, at the T-junction, there’s a fancy sign for Creggandevesky court tomb, and nothing for the local tomb that I could find. I couldn’t help feeling that the local burghers of both townlands don’t want the likes of you or I traipsing around the locality and would much prefer if you would fuck off 2 miles up the road to the other site. Nifty plan and seems to go against the reports of the Creggandevesky landowners pride in their monument, so I could be wrong, but experiences at Cregganconroe later in the day told me I’m not.)

In the pelting rain we set off on the southern route around the lake. It would be a nice trek in mild conditions, maybe a little soggy here and there, but there was precious little pleasure to be had getting lashed on. The tomb sits atop a small esker, part of which on the lake-side has been quarried for gravel. Much of the land in the vicinity has been altered, reclaimed, improved, and so here. As with a lot of the tombs in the north that are in state care, this one is fenced in and the fence is way too tight onto the monument. It seems that the compulsory purchase orders of these sites never take into account their visual contexts.

Despite the fence, Creggandevesky court tomb is really rather beautiful, the excavation and reconstruction/restoration leaving us with a near perfect example of its kind. Its construction reminded me of Annaghmare in South Armagh with its mixture of orthostats and dry-stone walling. However, the stones in the court here are much bulkier, the facade stones of the court the largest of the tomb, giving the whole construction a wedge shape as it tapers downwards along the gallery towards the rear.

Except for the wind and rain – all I could do was duck under the fantastic entrance lintel and crouch down beside the northern sidestones of the first chamber – I was really enjoying myself. With a bit of half-decent weather this would be a nice spot to pass a few hours, Lough Mallon offering a serene backdrop.

This was a first. In a howling gale and horizontal rain we headed up the farm track in the car, went into the farmyard and did a u-turn and faced outwards at the side of the house. The tomb is in the field at the back of this house. So on with the coat and over to the door, ring the doorbell and ask is it ok to have a look at the old tomb of the lady who answered the door. No it’s not, says she. Shit, said I to myself and not out loud. Ok, so re-strategise. Do you own the field?, I ask. Yes, says she. Do you mind me asking why you won’t let us? (after all it’s just over the fence there – to myself), I ask. Contamination, says she. Ah, I see, Covid? I ask. No, there’s cattle in the field, says she. Oh, ok, says I, completely deflated. (In my mind – lady, have you any idea of the thousands of cattle and sheep that I’ve met in my sojourns into the Irish countryside in search of amazing megaliths like the one in your backyard?) But no, the weather had already demoralised us and this just topped a sense of impending shittiness. A most unfriendly experience.

A cairn? A barrow? Something even grander? Who knows? The good news is that it seems the owners of the site care about what they have on their land and have recently cleaned up the site. This is the text of the note on archaeology.ie taken from the Inventory of Co. Wicklow: Situated on a gentle W-facing slope. A cairn (diam. 13m; H 2m) with small boulders around the perimeter, some of which may be kerbstones. Sounds about right but I would add that some of the stones may also be field clearance, or structural stones from some kind of ruined chamber or cist – some of them are quite blocky and shaped, some are embedded, some not, and some are contiguous and some are not. The view across to Slievethoul draws the eye.

Two fields away from the road, the lowest of a co-called complex of megalithic sites in this aptly named townland. The last time I was here 15 years ago there was way less gorse. Even at that I hadn’t been too impressed, not really knowing what I was looking at, so I was quite surprised to see the amount of the tomb that remains, despite its almost complete colonisation by the gorse.

The tomb is aligned roughly NE/SW with the entrance at the south-west overlooking a narrow neck of the Poulaphuca reservoir. This watery view wouldn’t have been there when the tomb was built, of course, but is very pleasant all the same. I ventured in under the tangle of gorse to the now hidden chamber, the walls of which are still quite extant. Most of the stones here are large and bulky, double walling visible of there western side. The remains of the wrecked portico and facade are inundated, some of the structure still embedded in the turf and some lying flung around.

This place could really do with a relatively simple clean-up as Bogman says below, but I’m not holding my breath – seems that no-one cares enough.

Not much to say about this except to post the note from archaeology.ie. I couldn’t see anything here remotely close to 46 metres in diameter. Maybe I was in the wrong place, but I was in the exact location given on the Historic Environment Viewer and there’s nothing else similar nearby.

Class: Barrow – unclassified
Townland: ATHGOE,HIGHDOWNHILL
Scheduled for inclusion in the next revision of the RMP: Yes

Description: Located on the N face of Athgoe Hill in an area indicated as a copse on the 1837 OS 6-inch map. A sub-circular area (diam. c. 46m) defined by a fosse (Wth 2.8m; D 0.9m) and an outer flat-topped bank in the NW and W (Wth 4m at base; 1.2m at top; H 0.6m) and by bushes in the E and SE. The interior of the site is planted with trees (Stout 1998, 151-2).
Compiled by Geraldine Stout

References:
1. Stout, G. 1998 The archaeology of Ballymount Great, County Dublin. In C. Manning (ed.), Dublin and beyond the Pale, 145-54. Bray. Wordwell.

How many times have I been here and failed to identify this stone? Too many, but sure what the heck? It’s a tranquil setting with a satisfyingly ancient feel about the place. That said, it’s important to say that this stone is not recognised by the SMR at archaeology.ie as ancient. It doesn’t mention it at all. However, on the tourist board outside the graveyard that records the monuments in the locality and gives a map of the area, it’s called a pagan stone and says that it maybe marks an old, pre-christian burial site. And sure what more would you need?

It’s very firmly embedded in the ground at the rear of an old chest tomb, a granite slab about 1.3 or 1.4 metres tall, aligned almost north-south on its longer axis, tapering to a point and reasonably convincing. And yet the nagging doubt is there. Does it even pre-date the adjacent tomb. The granite doesn’t look worn enough for a stone that has been erect for thousands of years. I guess the only way to be really sure is to excavate it, a prospect not too likely for the foreseeable.

Most of the small hamlet of Valleymount survived the 1940 inundation that drowned the village of Ballynahown (memories of which can be found here poulaphuca.com/ ) not a kilometre north-east of it, thirst for water and hunger for power necessitating the damming of the Liffey at Poulaphuca falls. A story is told of the Valleymount man who stayed put until the last moment, clinging on hopelessly against the literal and relentless rising tide of modernity, only to have to give in eventually as the water lapped across his doorstep.

What remains of Valleymount is now a narrow, northwards pointing peninsula, the drowned Kings river valley to its west and the largest expanse of the Poulaphuca reservoir, created by the dam on the Liffey, to its east. On the southern shore of the reservoir was discovered/identified in 2010 this small wedge tomb. It was rescue excavated by Chris Corlett not long after, the urgency brought about by the tomb’s proximity to the shoreline and the threat of consistent erosion from the rise and fall of the lake levels.

You can access the area from central Dublin by taking the 65 bus that occasionally terminates on the Ballyknockan road. Directly north of the bus stop about 200 metres across the field is the tomb.

The wedge tomb is not much to look at but the setting is beautiful. The water gently laps a few metres away and the abandoned pleasure boat nearby adds a Ballardian sense of weirdness to the altered environment. The view north across the lake to Carrig with it’s complex of monuments is probably best appreciated on an intermittently cloudy day like today, the changeable sky offering varying light and perspective. Plants are encroaching on the tomb and, without the plan on archaeology.ie, it’s difficult to interpret, with many unsocketed stones confusing the whole array. We spent quite a while here, wistfully lost in thought and our own meanderings, together but all the while separate, maybe mesmerised by the ghosts of the sunken Ballynahown, and those of the small tomb builders.

A quick visit to Paddock wedge tomb in south county Louth. It’s a relatively isolated example and oddly inaccessible, though the M1 passes by only 400 metres to the east.

A quick leap over the farm gate and up through the (Paddock) paddock and it’s obvious that someone has cleaned up the site (see Bogman’s pics). I had seen elsewhere that there had been improvements. The clatter of herbage hadn’t been as bad when I last visited 15 years ago, but invasive elder trees were already taking hold back then.

The tomb is incorporated in a field fence (or is it that the fence is incorporated into the tomb?). The western entrance is blocked and it’s difficult to identify the monument stones from the walling here. The northern side is the most pleasing, though this is possibly because the outer walling has been removed from here, exposing the gallery stones. Outer walling is visible on the south side, though there is much material between it and the gallery stones.

We didn’t stay long, an appointment in Ardee pulling us away. North of the farm gate, behind the houses, is this: irishmegaliths.org.uk/zTinure.htm a place that will have to wait for another day.

I saw some shots elsewhere that showed that the trees have been felled from around the tomb and I had to investigate. I’ve approached from the farm track to the north-east of the tomb on the occasions I’ve previously visited. Looking back at the shots from those visits on here it seems that it’s been eight years since I was last here. That’s a bit of a shock, considering that it’s such a well-preserved and fine example of a wedge tomb as to be found anywhere else. I guess the off-putting restriction of the views and adventures in other parts have meant that I’ve ignored the place.

This time we approached from the south, across what used to be a golf course and is now The GAP (Glencullen Adventure Park), a hybrid mountain-bike, trekkers adventure fun-park. You can park here Wednesday to Sunday for €2. Access to the tomb is easy, a 15 minute stroll, partially uphill, but not at all strenuous. The old tree-line is still visible directly south of the monument – these trees are of the same vintage as those recently felled so more hope there, except that the GAP seem to use this area for some forested mountain-bike tracks. Also, I don’t suppose that it will be anytime soon when Coillte will take the views from ancient sites into consideration when they plant and re-plant trees. Looking at the photos in the excavation report from 1945, the forestry is a relatively recent addition. And now that they’re gone I wonder will Coillte allow at least the eastern and south-eastern views to remain. I didn’t see any new planting so we can hope.

The views aside, the thing that Ballyedmonduff has going for it is that so much of it remains. When Ó Ríordáin and de Valéra arrived to conduct their excavation, it seems that much of it was contained within its covering cairn, minus the chamber roofstones. They did find some interference and they did remove all of the soil and cairn material, but what you see is very much the skeleton of an almost perfect wedge tomb, aligned just about west/-east, with the entrance at the west. It had been speculated by some that Howth would be visible from here and as we headed up we could indeed see the peninsula but then on arrival you realise that the north-east shoulder of what is Two Rock mountain blocks that view. The tomb has two chambers and one ante-chamber, almost a complete and continuous set of double-walling, almost complete revetment between the walling and the chambers and much of the orthostats of those chambers. One of its stones has cupmarks.

The tomb lies there on a slight slope, pancaked almost and breathing freely and much more fascinating than when crowded. A few miles almost directly north-east Killiney Head hugs the shore. Swing around 90 degrees and there are the Sugar Loaves, revealed at last. Over the rear of the tomb almost due east is Newtown Hill with its barrows and standing stone. At the hill’s foot to the south is Johnny Foxes famous pub in Glencullen village. This ever popular tourist draw brings thousands on a weekly basis. Hopefully Ballyedmonduff wedge tomb stays protected from the hordes. The glorious quartz obelisk of Glencullen standing stone remains mostly ignored. There are works continuing in the vicinity so Ballyedmonduff will be worth checking on every once in a while.

These two stones are located about 150 metres slightly east of south of the cairn in the same townland that I had visited earlier. No connection is made between them and the cairn in the Eogan notes on the SMR at archaeology.ie. These notes are taken from a paper that I haven’t been able to access, so he may have mentioned a connection that I would say is fairly obvious.

The southern side of the cairn is truncated and a wall has been built that delineates the two different fields that I suspect are owned by separate people. The cairn is somewhat preserved in the northern field. On the southern side it has been flattened to the surrounding ground level, ergo, these are two of the stones that were pulled from the cairn during this destruction.

Anyhow, the broad flat face of the leaning stone is covered in what seem to be natural solution pits (they reminded me of the capstone at Rathkenny). A couple of these have rings carved around them and some of the pits may well have been enhanced. There are other markings on the stone, but in overcast light and without water, these were hard to make out. The stone leans at a 45 degree angle on another possible orthostat/kerbstone and as a result the carvings are now badly eroding.

Having read Eogan’s notes (see below) before setting out I was excited and intrigued at what I might encounter. After a long explanation about what we were after at the house at the bottom of the hill, we set out for the not too strenuous walk. There’s an old railway cutting that needs to be surmounted and from the satellite pictures I was unsure of how to achieve this. Thankfully there is a gated gap that leads to the field in which the cairn lies.

Early March is possibly the only time that you will get to see anything here. The cairn is a tangled mess of brambles, thorn trees, barbed wire and shrubbery. I couldn’t see the opposing uprights that Eogan mentions. I did see some cairn rubble and what looked like two kerbstones, one in situ and one fallen outwards. From my prior research I wasn’t really expecting much and I wasn’t that disappointed, though there were the usual pangs of regret at the sad neglect.

Nearly 15 years since I last visited here. The residents of the house to the right at the bottom of the lane that leads to the stone are as friendly as I remember. That last time I had met the farmer and his son in the field and they were more than happy, proud even, to let me have a look at the stone.

This is well worth checking out if you’re in the vicinity at Loughcrew about 4 kms to the south-west. The stone most probably came from a destroyed passage tomb in the locality. It would probably be worthwhile examining and surveying the ditches and hedgerows nearby and I would if I lived locally.

I’ve mainly added this because of the townland name. The SMR/Archaeological inventory entry is: Small sub-rectangular mound (diam. 9m N-S, 9m E-W, H 1m) in centre of wood. Trees have since been cleared and spoil added to original mound making it oval (dims. 50m NW-SE, 40m NE-SW, H 2m). The Meath inventory was published in 1987. It’s a long, barrow type mound but that classification is in doubt given the SMR entry.

Rathkenny is a relatively isolated North Meath townland, just west of the hills that include the Slieve Beagh barrow cemetery. It’s off the beaten track, about 10 miles north-west of the Brú na Bóinne complex. I visited here maybe 12 years ago but never posted any pictures, for some unknown reason.

A public road ends where a farm track begins, leading to the big old house where we asked permission to visit the tomb. Duly granted we headed off into the pasture field where the remains lie. The ring barrow that you meet as you head over from the gate was a pleasant surprise. It’s quite low but is very noticeable and there are many large stones in its fosse that may have come from the tomb.

All that remains are a large, chunky capstone leaning on an upright stone, presumably a portal stone from this destroyed portal tomb. The top of the capstone is heavily marked with solution pits and cupmarks, some of which are said to have been artificially enhanced. There are many linear scorings on the capstone too, all of which seem ancient. I speculated that the tomb had been destroyed by the time the bronze-age barrow builders constructed the tomb to its west and had used the stone to sharpen their swords, but maybe I’ve been watching too much Game of Thrones lately. The tomb was in this condition when Borlase visited it in the late nineteenth century. He noticed, and gives a drawing of, some circular markings on both the underside of the capstone and the northern face of the upright. I only remembered these after I got back home (The circles on the underside of the capstone are actually visible in one of the shots I’ve posted here). Oh well.

Some friendly horses sauntered over to visit us as we were there. The ground rises to the east to the wooded hills of Simpson’s mountain, which in turn hides the higher ground, further east, of Slieve Beagh with the aforementioned barrow cemetery. Further east again is the decorated stone of Mullagharoy, a standing stone with passage tomb art.

Realtoge ringfort sits to the west of the summit of Realtoge hill. It is most probably a mediaeval habitation site, but on a gorgeous spring day we decided to visit it. It’s a protected national monument, with its own Fógra sign and, unlike most of the tens of thousands of other ringforts recorded, has its own name on the OS map.

We pulled in opposite the farmhouse whose garden abuts the eastern edge of the fort and before long were joined by the owner Martin Finegan. The site itself is extremely difficult to photograph, overgrown with gorse and brambles, but the real gem, and a delightful surprise, is the find from the eastern ditch that Martin showed us.

This is a perfectly preserved neolithic stone axe-head, thought to have come from either the Tievebulliagh axe factory in Antrim or from Rathlin Island, further north. Encountering and getting to hold such a piece of prehistory doesn’t happen often and meeting with a person such as Martin, someone as aware as he is of the treasure that it is, was a delight that shall remain in my memory for a long time.

Martin related how his father had found it lying in the ditch on the eastern side of the fort and had subsequently had a visit from the archaeologist Rúaidhrí de Valera, developer of the Survey of the Megalithic Tombs of Ireland project and the author, with others, of its first four volumes. Martin also related, with arched eyebrow, the folklore of the ringfort being protected by a large, mythical black dog.

A leaning 1.4 metre tall standing stone at the west end of a ridge above the hamlet of Mullaghey. The weathering on this stone reminded me of the stones at Callanish, though I’ve never been. A little gem and not far from the road.

11 and a half years since I last stopped by here. It’s another of the slab-like stones peppered around the foothills of Loughcrew. About 1.5 metres tall and aligned NW-SE.

Another of the many Ballinvally standing stones, a slab aligned WNW-ESE. It’s visible from the Kells to Oldcastle road and sits atop a small rise. There’s another stone about 200 metres to the north-west in the neighbouring townland of Boolies.

A last, fleeting visit before the third grim lockdown. I’d been here many times before but never made it to the circle, not confident enough to venture across the fields and over the fences. I’d read Ken Williams’s notes before but had forgotten the directions. We approached from the south, across marshy ground and traversing a small stream and a fence.

To be honest the place left me feeling a bit cold. It’s not the stones fault, just the air of general disregard and neglect and the mud and the grey December lightless atmosphere, all combining to a rushed and cursory visit. The place is puzzling anyway – was it a ‘true’ circle? The stones seem too large to be the remains of a kerb, and if you were to destroy a cairn here, why leave these remains? The north-eastern stone is unsatisfyingly mis-aligned, if these are the remains of a ‘true’ stone circle.

And yet the stones retain a power. All are large, most bulky, except the one at the north-west, the most slab-like. Beside this is where the passage-like stones jut out at a tangent. Over to the east a low double wall runs roughly north-south inside the ‘circle’. It looks ancient. The south-eastern stone is eroding nicely with runnels and gullies that are beginning to fill with soil.

The stones are at the east end of a field that slopes down from the west. At the top of the field there is a large habitation site and over the field wall is the impressive bivallate rath in the neighbouring townland of Drumsawry or Summerbank. A small standing stone is about 200 metres south-west of the ‘circle’.

There are 10 standing stones listed in the SMR in Ballinvally townland. Seven of them are north of here, further distant from the Loughcrew hills. This one is just north of a small stream that runs south-west/northeast through the valley floor at the bottom of Carnbane East. It, and the other stones north of here, could be said to be part of the wider Loughcrew Complex. It’s about a metre-and-a-half tall and about 200 metres south-west of Ballinvally stone circle.

Marked as a ‘standing stone’ on the SMR, I reckon these are the very scant remains of a small megalithic tomb. In the Loughcrew hinterland about a mile north of the car-park between Carnbane East and West, there’s really not much to see. A low, chamber-sidestone-like orthostat is aligned roughly north-east/south-west. Parallel to it and half a metre away to the north is an even lower stone, slowly drowning in the eroded out pond that encircles the monument. Definitely one for the completists only.

I asked my friend Thomas, a local, if he knew of Culmullin. ‘Of course I do,’ says he, ‘it’s right beside me.’ Talk about hiding in plain sight – when we rounded the corner and I pointed to the barrow he exclaimed ‘That thing! Sure that’s that’s just a heap of dirt.’ Well, as we all know here, one man’s heap of dirt is another man’s prehistoric burial site.

It’s not huge on atmosphere even though it’s quite substantial – 18 metres north-south and nearly 3 metres tall at its highest point. It is, however, a small miracle, surviving as it does in a heavily farmed area, dodging, so far, the mechanical excavator’s bucket. And for that, we are grateful.

The trees have been felled around and on the monument and the views mostly opened up. On what was a rainy and overcast day I had about 5 minutes at the site before being drenched in a downpour.

It was a huge surprise and great to see that the monument has been opened up. It seems due care and attention was taken by the tree fellers to protect the integrity of the structure; there’s even a new, explanatory sign up on the path.

Weather and lighting conditions were not the best so another visit is planned soon.

This site is marked as a Megalithic Complex that includes a stone circle, an alignment and a cairn. It’s fairly typical of quite a few sites in this part of Tyrone – it was discovered after peat-cutting á la Beaghmore – but in its present, overgrown condition is hard to interpret and probably best bypassed on your way to the superb Creggandevesky court tomb.

What can be seen is a raised, roughly circular area about 20 metres in diameter, 1.5 metres or so above the surrounding terrain. On the southern flank of this is the alignment, the most visible of the monuments. It tangentially abuts the circle to its north. The 11 stones of the circle were barely visible on the day we were there, summer growth inundating them.

The terrain in the area is wild and rugged, a small outcrop of hilly rock immediately to the south. West of this is a small lake. 300 metres east-south-east is the aforementioned Creggandevesky court tomb.

After the disappointment over at Glenknock, this was more like it. Even though it’s very ruined, it still retains a lot of character, mainly due to the still-standing and enormous portals, both of which are over 2 metres tall.

The remains are located two fields in, behind an old but not fully abandoned farmstead. We pulled up at the next field along to the south, just past the t-junction, traversed the edge of this field and hopped the fence once we’d come parallel to the site.

The tomb has been almost completely destroyed, except for the portals and a half-height doorstone. The entry at the NISMR says that there are three capstones but obviously it’s meant that there are three fragments of the one capstone (I hope). One of these fragments is abutting the rear of the gigantic northern portal and looked to me like a chamber sidestone. I’m still not totally convinced that I’m wrong.

Whatever was the original arrangement of the stones here, it can be safely said that this would have been an enormous portal tomb, one of the most impressive in the land. Alas, all we’ve got left are traces, and our own imaginings of what once was.

There are a couple of relatively recent photos of this site on the NISMR that would lead you to believe it’s worth visiting. Alas, not anymore. After what is described as “agricultural reclamation close to the site”, anything that was in the past discernible as being the remains of a portal tomb is now an indistinguishable and overgrown mess of stones piled up against each other. I think I recognised a remaining socketed portal but who knows? A sad and sorry mess.

The A5 Great Northern Road to Derry becomes Beltany Road north of Omagh town. It bends to the east just south of Mountjoy village, which it bypasses, and almost follows the contours of the Shrule river valley, before straightening out once again, this time practically hugging the Shrule having passed the Ulster-American Folk Park. Two kilometres north of the park there is a chambered grave marked on the OS map, west of the road.

It’s not an easily accessible site. The A5 is a busy and fast road. Though it’s only 150 metres away from the road, over a gate and up a pasture field, I’d never seen nor heard of it anywhere else other than on the NISMR and it’s easy to see why. I’ve passed it maybe twenty times and never given it a second thought. And now, having visited it, I discover there’s a fairly intact wedge tomb not 100 metres to its north-west, incorporated into a field boundary. Ah well, the perils and joys of stone-hunting.

There is much to see here, even if the gallery is terribly ruined. Like a lot of Tyrone sites, much of the surrounding cairn remains, its frontal revetments in evidence. Or maybe I’m mistaken – I would have thought that the floor of the court and gallery would be level with the surrounding field, but no, like at Loughmacrory 16 kilometres or so to the east, both are raised about a metre above. Slightly puzzling, a trait I’ve found at many Tyrone sites.

There is very little of the court remaining, three stones on its east side. The gallery is smashed and the roofstones broken up and flung about. Some of the chamber sidestones are still there and some have been removed, conjuring up imaginings of the looters using measuring equipment to pick the choicest examples. There is one lintel/roofstone still in situ over the jambstones dividing the first and second chambers of the gallery. It gives the place some small bit of character.

I didn’t hang around – this was one of the first sites in a busy itinerary – but experienced enough to remain impressed. Set on a ridge of above the Shrule valley, the views east into the southern Sperrins were gorgeous in the September sunshine. It’s aligned roughly north-south, with the entrance at the south. The valley side continues to rise to the west up to the peak of Bessy Bell with its summit cairn, said to be a possible court tomb, at 450 metres. Another site for another day, and maybe that elusive wedge tomb too.

North of Loughmacrory town, and the lake itself, and along an accessible road that turns into a track, this is a mad arrangement of stones. 100 metres into the field from the gate it’s right beside the rock outcrop from whence it probably came.

It’s nearest comparison is the Labby Rock in Carrickglass in Sligo, another monster capstone over small supporting stones. It looks like it was a rush job but on closer inspection it’s quite cleverly arranged. The tallest of the supporting stones is the backstone, but this is tilted inwards into the chamber, lowering its peak and tilting the capstone from front to rear off the portals, neatly distributing the weight.

The outcrop is being colonised by gorse and the views front-on at the portals are disappearing. There was a large amount of cattle off in the distance in the large field that contains the tomb. On their approach we decided to leave a little sooner than we would have liked to.

This looks wonderful from over the fence, the mound/long cairn still remaining with an almost complete kerb/revetment, said to be several courses high in places. The court end, at the east and beside the road, is overgrown at this time of the year and we couldn’t explore more because of livestock in the field. Awesome looking monument.

There’s a farm track that heads west from the road to within 100 metres of this one. You then have to navigate 2 gates to get into the field with the tomb. I disturbed a grazing hare as I approached. I got as much a fright as he, but after a brief frozen second or so he scarpered off up the field, only to seek shelter in the chamber of my destination.

I arrived at the back, eastern end of the tomb and out he popped, legging it back in the direction from whence we came. I often meet wildlife on my travels but have yet to be quick enough to video the encounter. I stumbled to within touching distance of a sleeping fawn a while back in Glendalough. I’d taken my eye off it for a split second and by the time I’d got my phone out of my pocket it had legged it off up the river bank and away. I know I don’t pose any threat to the animals, but they don’t know that.

There is much of this smallish tomb left. The chamber is complete and still has its roofstones. However, the western portico is wrecked, its collapsed roofstone resting on a southern entrance upright. The stones are all granite and bulkier that is normal in wedge tombs. The roofstone over the back of the chamber seems to be upside-down, its flat, worked side facing up.

The field is low-quality pastureage and the area around the tomb is well-trodden. Some of the stones in the vicinity look to be dumped field-clearance. It’s still worth a look in this megalith-rich area.

It’s about 30 kilometres from Omagh to Cookstown. Packed between the two towns either side of the A505, throughout the south Sperrins, there is one of the densest collections of megalithics in Ireland. Many are marked on the OS maps, many are not. This one is and it’s right beside the road.

It’s rare to see such a complete wedge tomb. Aghamore in Leitrim is one but what a trek that was. This was easy. Judging by the previous photos here, the thorn tree that is now colonising the bank between the northern outer-walling and the chamber walling seems to be collapsing under its own weight after a few years of vigorous growth. It’s also affecting the tomb structure but I can’t see anyone doing anything about that.

Both sides of the tomb retain their double walling. Most of the roofstones remain. The tomb is embedded in much of its surrounding cairn. It’s not very tall, the height from the floor of the western portico to its roof little over a metre. However, there does seem to be an amount of rubble that has fallen in here. The floor of the sealed chamber seems to be a little lower than that of the portico but still above the ground level of the surrounding field.

I could have stayed here a lot longer than I did. It’s a fascinating and beautiful site on the north-western slopes of Loughmacrory Hill, the views north-west to the higher hills of the western Sperrins quite beautiful.

Parking on the Brennanstown road is now impossible and I hadn’t felt like asking at Dolmen House for permission to park the car AND go through their garden, so I was left to wonder and research an alternative route. There has been a fair bit of development in the area since I was last here 14 years ago. A friend who grew up in the locality gave me a few hints, but none came to fruition – he hasn’t lived there for years. So with a bit of time and google maps I took a risk and leaped another field gate, south-east of the site at Lehaunstown Lane.

The dolmen is well known and marked on google maps so I was able to trek through the field in its general direction before picking up a track that leads north, down into the valley. You must pass through another old gate, into the broadleaf forest and onto a pathway that runs down to the stream and then west alongside the southern edge of the stream. Ignore the bridge you encounter on reaching the valley floor – there is no way through from there. Pass further along for about 200 metres until you reach a fairly obvious ford in the stream. Cross here.

The dolmen was still not in sight yet but the anticipation was rising. The track from the stream to the tomb is well-used and we surmounted the fallen tree and rounded the bend and there it is. Even LM was impressed. The capstone immediately draws your attention. The flat plane of the north-west corner is striking. The whole of the capstone has been obviously sculpted, its underside completely flat. Estimated at 60 tons, the mind boggles at the effort to first sculpt and then raise it.

Knowing that it remains standing by the grace of some serious reinforcing concrete doesn’t detract from its magnificence. The portals support the heavier end and are taller than they look from first glance – the ground level of the chamber is well below the field level and both stones are well embedded. The southern sidestone is collapsing into the chamber, rescued from inundation and possible obliteration by the concrete. Both it and its northern counterpart are immense. The concrete reinforcing abuts the northern sidestone and takes the weight of the capstone here, the stepped sculpting of the sidestone visible.

We’re not supposed to climb these monuments, but Glendruid is irresistible. The turtle-backed capstone has a curved runnel that goes from corner to corner and may have been carved to let water run off the sides, away from the rear of the chamber. The slope from back to front is quite steep, mild vertigo kicking in for me and reminding me I’m not as young as I used to be. The dimensions of the stone are 5.1 metres long by 4.5 metres wide and the almost square plan of the thing is apparent from a few angles and especially so from on top of its front end.

We stayed a while here today in the heat of a mid-September Indian summer, undisturbed and carefree. The depths of the steep-sided valley floor shield you from the wiles of the suburbs for a while and you can imagine a time before complication, sheltered by the sturdiness of Glendruid’s accomplishment. But then you have to ascend, the pull of an ice-cream on an 11-year-old mind irresistible.

Having been spoiled earlier in the day with some almost intact tombs, this was a bit of a let-down, especially when it has its own name marked on most maps instead of the usual ‘chambered grave’.

It’s about 15 metres above the road and visible from the field gate. Most of the stones are low lying, except the one in the adjoining field, but that may not be part of the tomb.

The remains of a court are to the east, with a fine backstone to the west delineating the extent of its footprint. Very little of the chamber/s still exists. However, there are stones further to the west in the adjoining field that may have been part of the original tomb or may have been extensions. One in particular seem to be the capstone of a cist, or could be a displaced roofstone.

Another one for the completists unless you are driving and have time to spare.

There’s much to see in Broughderg townland, Dun Ruadh is close by, but this was the last site of a busy day. We’d been at Cloghmore down the road by the time we arrived at this roadside tomb and it was only as we passed by that we realised it was there. It’s marked on some maps and there’s another, seemingly finer tomb just 400 metres north-west up the road.

But here we were, once again leaping a fence, and not too sure what we were looking at. It turns out that this is probably the remains of a dual-court tomb. It’s now being inundated by the surrounding bog. The stones nearest the road are the remains of an eastern court but you’d never tell with most of them drowning in the rushes. The same goes for the western court.

There are said to be some stones remaining from the chambers but I didn’t feel up to rooting around in the mulch. The wildness of the locality here in the south Sperrins shows much promise for the more isolated places further north. I’ll be back.

Not much to say about this small wedge tomb, placed about 100 metres west of the small road. Horseshoe-shaped remains rising to about a metre above ground level. The mouth of the remains faces west. There are 2 stones visible on the inner side of the northern arm and, supposedly, one on the southern side, but I didn’t see that. Probably one you could miss if you’re visiting the area for Knockmany or Sess Kilgreen.

So another 7 years has passed since I last visited Seefin. I truly hadn’t believed it was that long – it’s so close to where I live and I see it so often from various angles as I explore the north Wicklow hills that I take it for granted. There was a break in the weather that coincided with a break in my schedule so I decided to head up. Recent reports of vandalism at upland sites had me wondering.

I parked in the forestry entrance just at the end of the army rifle range. It’s wide enough for a few cars to park and still have ample room for emergency services etc. There seemed to be some sort of hill-walking jamboree on in the area – or at least it was finishing by the time I arrived around 3pm. There’s a quite vigorous loop walk that you can attempt – Seahan (with its cairn and passage graves) to Corrig to Seefingan (with its unopened cairn) and on to Seefin and down and then back up the road. I’ve been to all save megalithicly barren Corrig and have never attempted the loop, which one could say takes in the whole of the ‘Kilbride passage grave cemetery’.

The ascent is a trudge for us mere mortals. There were rain clouds threatening all the while so I wasn’t waiting around. The hill starts to steepen once you pass the bracken fields and gain the heather line. There’s a well-worn track here but you’re clambering more than hill-walking. About 150 metres below the cairn I came across a dressed stone that has a very bullaun-like hollow. I can’t say I’m 100% sure of it. It’s splayed right across the track and stepped over or around by all those ascending and descending by this route. I’m tempted to add it here but maybe not.

The approach to the cairn here is from the north-west. It starts to appear on the summit horizon line when you’re about 30 metres below and 200 metres away from it. It looks just like any other mountain-top cairn from here, a pile of granite rubble – but looks can be deceiving. Were you blissfully ignorant you would be in for a major surprise. You might begin to suspect something greater is happening if, like I did, you skirt around the cairn anti-clockwise and begin to see the collapsing kerbstones on the west and southern arcs. Unlike at the north and east of the cairn, the hill here falls away steeply and the resultant pressure on the kerbstones has taken its toll.

Moving around to the east the kerbing continues, but further out from the cairn, showing that even at this height cairn material robbing has occurred. And then you reach the entrance to the passage, aligned almost due north onto the cairn and passage grave on Seahan. I used to be able to glide through the labial portal stones but daren’t risk it these days. The small forecourt in front of the entrance is intriguing – was it filled and sealed after a certain period of use? Is the drystone walling of its sides original? There is an entrance type sillstone/kerbstone about three metres in front of the entrance, but in front of it is a higher but narrower slab and then, in turn, cairn rubble in front of that.

I didn’t venture into the passage from either end today, but did guiltily climb down into the chamber through the hole in the roof. The corbelling of the remains of the roof is still impressive, leading one to wonder how magnificent it was when originally built. Macalister’s 1932 ‘excavation’ report (really just a survey) only runs to 5 pages and some of it is worth quoting. He says: “The chamber lay partly roofless, and had apparently been rifled and left derelict centuries ago. It was almost full of stones, thrown into it, as we were informed, by the soldiers in the camp [Kilbride] for a pastime.” Nowhere in the report does he mention the trig-point-like stone with it’s concrete skirt I identified on this visit. He goes on to muse that it was early Christians that broke into the roof, speculating that the carving of a cross into the uppermost remaining stone of the roof as evidence that they may have “cut the cross as a barrier between themselves and the possible vengeance of the plundered ghosts.” Hmmmm.

Macalister only emptied out the smaller stones from the chamber and a lot of stones have fallen back in since 1931 to join the large boulders from the roof. People come here regularly as it’s on that popular loop mentioned above. I’ve usually met people here on previous visits and today was no different. Nosing my way around among the rubble on the floor of the main chamber and into the recesses I heard voices above my head and resented the intrusion. My best interactions with the stones are usually an intimate and solitary pursuit so the arrival of outsiders broke the spell. The stones around the lip of the hole in the roof are not overly stable so I felt just a tad vulnerable and emerged from the chamber before I’d wanted to.

The rain clouds were gathering to the south as I sat in the sunshine and pondered all this. The chamber and recesses at Seefin have more secrets to reveal and the next time I come I must give myself more time to explore, especially at the neck of the passage where it joins the chamber. The complexity of the construction here is fascinating, as it opens out into the chamber and soars up to the roof. The five recesses and one mini-recess would all bear further investigation too and a better camera than my camera-phone. I love Seefin and was happy to see that the spate of vandalism that has occurred at other upland cairns hasn’t occurred here; which is not to say that it’s not vulnerable. It remains so and I’m hoping that the amount of water in the passage is only a sign of the very wet, late summer we’ve had and not something more sinister.

This was my fourth visit to Annaghmare court tomb. It really is a stunner and has so much going for it – ample parking space, a nice short walk through a pine plantation, it’s regularly tended to, I’ve never met anyone else here on my four trips and it’s a superb example of this type of tomb with most of its structure still in situ except for its roofstones and some of the covering cairn. Some might balk at its location in so-called bandit country, but as any local will tell you, the bandits left a while ago and to paraphrase the great Elvis, “and I would rather [not] be anywhere else but here today.”

So you pull into the driveway about a quarter of a kilometre south-west of the site and head off up the track. It really is nowheresville but not as isolated as it feels and the modernish pine plantation is entirely inoffensive. And then the tomb emerges at the bottom of the track, perched on its little knoll behind a gate, its surrounding lawn recently mowed and the more violent vegetation trimmed back, more of which anon.

The tomb is built on the contours and the slope of the hillock. The ground rises by close to 2 metres from the bottom of the of the last stone of the arm of the western horn of the court to the bottom of the western jambstone/portal marking the entrance into the three-chambered gallery. This gallery, seven metres long, lines the top ridge of the hillock. Its construction and segmentation are superb, always imperfect in that neolithic groove, but joyfully solid and skilfully finished. The ground of the two subsidiary chambers at the back of the cairn is maybe a metre and a half below the ground of the main gallery and offers a proto-symmetry. The cairn spills satisfactorily away from the sides of the gallery to both the east and west, but more so the east.

The remains of the cairn, for it must have been higher to cover the missing roofstones, is now being colonised by various plants. This adds to the ambience of the whole place, but may be not sustainable when the roots of pines and ash start to disturb the structure. And yet you’d miss the Rose Bay Willow Herb and various wildflowers – with a bit of sun, this burial place is a sleepy backwater, buzzing with life and vibrant with energy. This last visit was the longest yet, my companion this time happy to lie in the court and drink it all in while I did my usual clambering and photographing.

I focussed a bit on the subsidiary chambers at the back of the tomb this time. On their own, either of these two constructions would merit a visit. Attached to the back, northern end of the cairn, in what the excavation report says were later additions, they are a bonus. The flair of the orthostat/dry-walling combination witnessed in the court and the main chamber continues in the northern side of the western chamber. The southern wall of the eastern chamber is thought to borrow and incorporate the stones of the kerb of the rear of the main tomb/cairn before it was extended. Given that court tombs are said to be the earliest in the Irish series, this monument shows remarkable skill and ingenuity. The back-to-back backstones of the subsidiaries again speak of a symmetry.

The excavation was conducted in 1963 and 1964 before the trees were planted and the report speaks of extensive views almost all around, with the passage grave on Gullion visible from here. Alas not now – views are completely blocked by the pines, but with a respectable amount of breathing space for the tomb. This obscuring and hiding just adds to the intimacy of Annaghmare – not having seen it any other way I find it hard to imagine what it would be like opened up.

This is the tomb marked on the OS map. It’s in the second field in from the road and would have been quite a corker, were it still standing. I found it hard to interpret. Of the five remaining stones only two remain upright. These look like a portal at the north-east and a low sidetone. The collapsing stone at the south-west looks like the second portal but is too far away from the upright one to make a tomb entrance, and the intervening stone looks way out of place to have been a doorstone.

Having said all that, it would be hard to say that this is not a portal tomb. The large capstone and the positioning of the tomb beside a vigorous stream would lead one to that conclusion. The capstone has a natural mini-bullaun at its eastern end. The position of the tomb on a steepish slope is a bit strange, but the views to the west and south are impressive. Mullyash mountain is two kilometres to the south. The views to the east are blocked by the slope of the hill.

Visible from the road, not marked on the OS map, this obvious megalithic tomb defies classification. It was a bonus to find it – we actually thought it was the tomb that is marked on the OS map, but no, it’s a separate, unclassified megalithic tomb in the same townland.

The Northern Ireland Sites & Monuments Record has this to say: “6 large-ish stones remain in situ & there are several smaller stones which may be in their original positions. 3 other large stones lie within the area of the site but seem to be displaced. The stones in situ seem to form an enclosure or kerb defining an area 2.75m NW-SE x 4m NE-SW, raised 0.4m above the surrounding ground. 2 large stones 1m apart & 1.04m high mark the SW end. The other stones decrease in height to NE end which is marked by a single stone 0.15m high.”

Reading further, there is mention of carved stones at the site, none of which are visible now. Initially I said wedge tomb, but those carvings say passage tomb, and it could also fit as a court tomb. I was surprised at how close to the road the tomb was. The map shows it quite a distance away from the road so I was puzzled and unconvinced. Then we spied the obvious tomb in the next field to the south.

North of Cullyhanna in an area called Cooey’s Hill, is this small standing stone. It’s in a roadside field and is leaning (tipping?) to the south. It’s nearly a metre and a half tall and there’s not much more to say about it except that when I asked permission to visit it from the neighbouring house, the man said that it wasn’t his field but was very curious as to how I knew the stone was there. I just said it’s on the map and left it at that before leaping the fence and firing off a few quick shots with my camera-phone.

With three names – Cloghfinn, Calliagh Berra’s stone and the White stone of the Watching – and prominently located on the crest of a hill that also contains the most obvious section of the Dorsey embankments, I had to return here and investigate. It’s mentioned in Noreen Cunningham and Pat McGinn’s book, The Gap of the North – the archaeology and folklore of Armagh, Down, Louth and Monaghan.

I’d been here a couple of years ago to visit the Dorsey entrenchment but didn’t know about the stone. It’s now sadly fallen and the woman of the house where we asked permission to visit it apologised for its condition and that it hadn’t been re-erected. Ah bless.

On examination it appears that the stone stood in a very shallow socket with some packing stones and was easily pushed over by cattle. It does have ongoing importance in the area down through the ages, but a lot of the folklore is from more modern times. The beautiful views across South Armagh towards Slieve Gullion explain the Calliagh Berra reference and Cloghfinn comes from the fact that old Finn MacCool threw the stone from there. He was a good shot was Finn.

The neighbouring Ballykeel dolmen is the glamour site in this area. There’s a quite fast-flowing stream north of it at Ballykeel bridge that has an old disused corn mill and hydroelectric plant. Above the mill the river has been split in two with various sluices and channels still very much in evidence. It’s all quite fascinating but isn’t the reason why we came here today.

In the next field along to the north and behind the mill is this strange arrangement of stones. The note at the Northern Ireland Sites & Monuments Record says this: “A group of 3 stones remains in situ incorporated into a recent field wall. One slab 2.2m long has been set on edge & stands 0.9m high & on W side of this are 2 pillar like stones, one at each end. The S stone is 1.6m high & the N is a little lower. Paterson recorded a “2nd chamber in the next field” which could mean this was a court tomb, with the N stone as the back stone of a gallery & the S as one of a pair of dividing jambs. It may also however have been a portal tomb & classification remains uncertain. Topsoil stripping on a area c.100m SW of this site was carried out under archaeological supervision, prior to development. No archaeological deposits or artefacts were identified on the development site [F.MacM., 22/05/06].”

Whether it was a court or portal tomb is hard to figure, but it could be said that it was massive, if it was either. The slab to the north doesn’t really look like the portal stone of a portal tomb and the massive recumbent is quite low to be a doorstone of the same. So my best guess would be a court tomb, which again begs the question, why leave the three stones behind? Why not destroy the whole thing altogether? Maybe the landowner thought it a convenient arrangement to incorporate into his field fence, but the north and south stones are set transversely and jut out into the field considerably to the point where it would be just as easy to remove them. So maybe, excepting Paterson’s second chamber, it’s not the remains of a tomb at all.

It reminded me of the remains at Aghmakane not even a mile north-east up the road to Camlough – like it, probably one best left to the completists and total nerds.

Nestled within the Slieve Gullion caldera, along a road running north-north-west/south-south-east, are three tombs within a kilometre of each other, Latbirget, Ballykeel and Aughadanove. There was a possible fourth 600 metres further south, but nothing remains of that. All three remaining could be said to be the ruins of portal tombs but Ballykeel stands out.

Denuded of its cairn and the sidetones of the chamber, the large capstone rests on the two tall portals and the now shattering backstone. If you look at the point where the capstone rests on the eastern portal, it’s not much more than a fingernail in size. Gravitational forces persist and that backstone may need extra support in the future.

It’s a pity that the authorities didn’t buy the whole field in which the tomb sits. The dolmen is fenced in and it feels that way, no room around the remains of the cairn, but that’s quite a small gripe. At least it’s looked after regularly and access is straightforward and there’s a bit of parking around. I always swing by if I’m in the area, but today was mainly about other places so we didn’t stay too long. A happy place and well worth checking out.

I’ve been in this area before so many times and not got to the tomb that I was almost ready to give up yet again. We’d met a couple of local farmers in one of the adjacent fields but they had misunderstood us and directed us to the owner of the field that contains a large rath. Actually, I knew where the tomb is and knew how to get to it, but was too intimidated by the large farmyard and its occupants to ask. Not my buddy Thomas, good country lad that he is.

“Sure why would I stop ye?” asked the lady at the house, “Off ye go.” So off we set, through the farmyard and up the track and over a farm gate and into the field.

I knew it was ruined but I didn’t expect there to be as much left as there actually is. The mound is placed at the top of a hillock and to the east side of a pasture field. The Rock of Curry dominates the north-western skyline. Views to the east are blocked by a fence and hedging, otherwise the views all around are clear. It’s aligned NNE-SSW with the entrance at the SSW. The slope of the mound is very pronounced towards the western section.

Two stones remain of the outer walling on the eastern side and there may be some chamber orthostats but they are covered by what seem to be displaced roofstones and a summer’s worth of nettles. There were various other stones around the chamber but I couldn’t really inspect them as I was too tired for a nettle war.

The main sense I got here was, not unusually, puzzlement – if you’re going to wreck a tomb and use the stones elsewhere, why leave what’s left? Why not destroy it altogether? I guess the answer to that will remain unknown and I should be glad that the tomb wreckers left what they did. And, in the end, I am.

This one nearly did me in. We started at the car-park in Newcastle like Thelonious below. I knew it would be strenuous before we set out and I’d been talking to a mate who’s local and he’d warned me about a spike in Covid in the area due to all the staycations, but here we were. It’s a popular spot and there were many on the trail.

The Glen river eases the first part of the ascent, with rock pools and mini-waterfalls along the way. The day was overcast and clammy and I was hoping that at some point the cloud would clear and the mountain would open up. We weren’t even halfway there when the moaning teens started. The sooner the schools re-open the better, my coaxing and cajoling skills having hit their limit.

We reached the Mourne wall after about 2 hours. Our perspectives had shortened the higher we’d climbed. Cloud had fallen along with spirits. Distances narrowed. Enthusiasm, never strong, flagged and lagged as the 200 metres or more of the hardest ascent remained. How long is there left? Why are we doing this? Questions I barely had the answers to myself as gravity almost pulled me backwards.

And then Commedagh appeared out of the clouds and over our shoulders like a giant spaceship, hovering enormously, and the perspective change was almost horrendous in its vertiginous magnificence. The kids were as stunned as we, but soon familiarity took over and they lapsed into are-we-nearly-there-ness again. I felt no little sense of glee in telling them that Donard was higher than Commedagh towering above and that there were many false summit-horizons ahead.

We reached the summit in brilliant summer sunshine – so this is what’s been happening all the while we’ve been under the cloud these last few weeks. The relief at having gained the top was palpable. We didn’t have it to ourselves and the views were blocked by the clouds but we’d done Donard. The ‘greater’ cairn swarmed with verminous flies and midges. Lots of people bring memorials up here for a friends or relatives who’ve passed, something I haven’t seen before. The cairn is a bit of a mess, well trundled over and probably not its original shape or size.

The northern, ‘lesser’ cairn is more interesting, but no less messed about with. The ground starts to descend towards the lesser cairn until, not too far beyond, drops precipitously to the north-east. There are many shelters built from the cairn material in the vicinity and there seems to be a lot of cairn slippage, especially to the east. The greater cairn is said to be a passage grave, destroyed by the sappers who built the trig station beside it. The lesser is called a multiple-cist cairn and was well messed up by the time Harris had visited it in 1744.

We lazed in the sun around the two cairns for a while and then headed back. The descent is a lot more dangerous, naturally, with lots of gravel kicked up onto the flagstones of the crude stairway/path, so extra caution was needed. We had left the car-park at 1pm and arrived back at the car about 7.30pm.

Slievefoore (An Sliabh Fuar – the cold mountain) is a small hill, 414 metres above sea level on the eastern side of a small range that culminates in the pinnacle of Croghan Mountain (606 metres) straddling the Wicklow/Wexford border. The hills are southern outliers from the main Wicklow range. There are no antiquities marked on the OS map in the range. However, on archaeology.ie there is a cairn marked on Slievefoore. A friend recently moved into the area and on a visit I got curious and decided to investigate.

Most of the Croghan area is forested and is now peppered with the turbines of a large windfarm. The entrance to the forestry has a couple of information signs and the area around it is known locally as White Heaps “due to the cairns of quartz which may have marked prehistoric burial mounds”. Cairns? Intriguing. The cairn is actually a kilometre from here so a bit more investigation is needed.

The walk north to the cairn from the entrance was relatively easy, up through the forestry and over a couple of farm gates. Eventually you’re left about 50 metres below the summit of Slievefoore in a heathery, boggy field. The top is easily reached but was still quite wet after the poor summer we’ve been having.

The cairn sits at the north end of what is an elongated summit which is aligned roughly north south. The hill starts to gently but obviously descend from the northern tip of the cairn and the views north are extensive. The cairn is low and flat, almost like an artificial, ceremonial platform. It’s mainly grass covered, but where the cairn stones do protrude, they are mainly quartz. There are 2 quartz boulders loose on the cairn and another boulder has quartz encrustation.

The very visible kerb consists of 28 stones, some of which are orthostatic but most are just lying on the ground. Tara Hill (253 metres) to the south-east with its own cairn draws the eye. The views all around are magnificent, except to the south where they’re blocked by forestry. I spent quite a while here, drinking in the views with a soundtrack of the whoosh of the large turbines to the west. I found the ‘cairn’ quite puzzling. Is it actually a cairn? Why are most of the ‘kerbstones’ loose on the ground? It’s obviously ancient, but there does seem to have been modern interference. The sense I got was that this was a place of ceremony rather than of burial.