turoe

Despite its somewhat prosaic surroundings and the modern iron grating to fend off grazing sheep, this unique and beautifully decorated monolith is one of the great treasures of Celtic La Tene art in Europe. The style of the carving, in its Irish context, is assignable to the last three centuries BC.

The Turoe Stone is a domed granite boulder a little over 3 feet high, artificially shaped and decorated by a technique known as picking, which sets the design out in relief against the background.

The abstract motifs comprise spirals, circles and curves, bounded by a band of simple step pattern carried round the lower part of the stone. The monument was removed to its present site from its place of discovery beside the Rath of Feerwore, an Iron Age ring-fort at Kiltuallagh, a few miles away. Its phallic shape can hardly be accidental and it may well represent a fertility cult.