tombs ireland

Occupying a commanding hill-top overlooking islanded Lough Gill to the south and pretty Colgagh Lake to the west, this large and imposing monument is perhaps the best example of a centre court-tomb in the country. Its traditional name, by which it is still known hereabouts, is Leacht Con Mhic Ruis. The oval court, 50 feet in length with an entrance on the south side, has two segmented galleries at its east end and one at the west. In the last century all three galleries had large lintel stones...

A megalithic gallery-grave allied to the wedge-tombs; it consisted of a roughly rectangular chamber and a small ante-chamber set in an oval mound of stones, dating probably to the earlier part of the second millennium B.C. Later in the same millennium burials took place and a fireplace was constructed....

Improbable though it may seem, this interesting megalithic tomb was lived in by a family in the nineteenth century, a purpose to which its large interior was suited and possibly to some extent modified. Gaps between the side-stones were windproofed with turf and mud, and no doubt the resulting 'house' was as snug as some of the tiny cabins occupied around the time of the Great Famine. The presence of a horse in the photograph is a reminder too that these ancient structures not infrequently serv...

Easily accessible along pathways, the latter stands at an altitude of 720 ft in the clearing of a forestry plantation which provides a splendid view across undisturbed countryside towards a great table mountain to the south-west. The tomb consists of a burial gallery subdivided into four chambers flanked at each end by a roughly semicircular forecourt. Excavations in 1938 produced a combination of Stone and Bronze Age finds including pottery and flint, while the only bones which could be ident...

Queen Maeve, the famous and fiery legendary Queen of Connacht, is said to have been buried in this great mound of stones 35 feet high and 200 feet in diameter, which is situated on the top of a hill with a magnificent view all around Co. Sligo. The mound probably hides a Passage-tomb underneath. Nearby are a number of rather ruined 'satellite' tombs, like those in the Boyne Valley....

A Stone Age megalithic tomb built possibly around 3000 B.C. consisting of a 'court' at the eastern end and a burial chamber which is dived into four parts....

A magnificent, well presented full-court tomb, restored after excavation in 1935 and protected by a modern wall. One of the more accessible monuments of its type, it is situated at the rear of a cottage on the east side of the Bundoran-Sligo road, near the hamlet of Creevykeel. The long cairn is wedge-shaped and tapers sharply towards the west. The court, 50 feet in length, has straight sides and shallow curved ends. It is entered by an orthostat-lined passageway on the east. At the wes...

This well-preserved megalithic tomb lies in the saddle of two hilltops. The long passage of the tomb extends to a chamber that expands inwards. The way that the roof stones rise to the top of this chamber like stairs is similar to those built in Brittany. It is believed that a large mound of earth originally covered these graves....

A megalithic tomb consisting of a rectangular chamber and what seems like a forecourt. The forecourt wall is made of drystone walling. The unusual feature of this tomb is the stone blocking the entrance to the tomb, at the bottom of which is a 'port hole' - presumably to allow subsequent burials to take place. The whole is surrounded by the remains of a cairn 60 feet long, The tomb was excavated, but the results were never published....

A Neolithic court-tomb of c.3000 B.C. with a forecourt of low stones facing south-eastwards and giving access to a two-chambered gallery placed in an ill-defined oval mound. Local tradition explains it as the grave of Finn MacCumhaill's poet-warrior son Ossian (Oisin). His faked 'songs' as 'translated' by James MacPherson in 1762-3 led to the start of the romantic movement in literature when published in Scotland, which can suitably be seen in the distance from this evocative site in the Glens...