tombs ireland

A large well-preserved court-tomb with a more than semicircular forecourt formed of large boulders, and located on a ridge 700 feet high with a fine view ofer the Bann valley. Behind the forecourt is a broad burial-gallery of two separate chambers, with one set of jambs immediately inside the portal stones and a further set dividing the gallery which still carry their ponderous capstone. The kerb of the mound is still well defined by upright stones, and within it - and behind the chamber - is...

A Passage-tomb under a mound of stones. The chamber is approached with two stones bearing concentric diamond-like motifs resembling the human face. The burial chamber has two side-chambers on each side and one at the back. One roof stone of the chamber near the entrance bears a decoration consisting of five lines. The corbelled roof of the chamber is incomplete, and entrance is most commonly effected through a hole in the top of it. The grave has probably been open for a long time, as an Ear...

The tombs at Fahan in Donegal have been accorded the status of National Monuments and as such their future is secure....

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....

A wedge-shaped megalithic tomb with a rectangular chamber divided into three unequal parts, and set into a wedge-shaped cairn bounded by standing stones, and the whole placed in a double-walled U-shaped setting of large stones.
Cremated bone and pottery were found inside. The date of the tomb has been assigned to the Early Bronze Age (c.1700 B. C)....

One of a small group of portal tombs which have two capstones 9others include Knockeen in Waterford, Kilmogue in Kilkenny and the Kempe Stones in Down). Like many 'dolmens' it stands in a hollow, so that the visitor's initial view of it is from above. The main capstone is 9 feet long and rests at the front on the single remaining portal stone, 6 feet high, on which a small Christian cross has been inscribed, apparently recently. The lower capstone is supported on the chamber uprights and, as i...

One of the great wonders of the ancient world, Newgrange is older than Stonehenge, Mycenae or even the pyramids in Egypt. Brú na Bóinne Visitor Centre is the starting point for a tour of Newgrange....

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....

Hugh stones of a Neolithic passage tomb inscribed with fascinating designs of early art. Superb view....

One of the most aesthetically satisfying megalithic structures of the Irish countryside, a 4,000 year-old Neolithic tomb that might equally be a work of modern sculpture. If proof were needed that Stone Age man built his monuments to impress as well as to last, then here it is. Its rugged geometry has long been admired, and illustrations of it have appeared in innumerable publications as well as in television commercials promoting tourism and butter. It was Fergusson who coined the term 'tripo...