tombs ireland

A large tomb of the enclosed, full-court type, with parallel twin galleries placed at the western end of the court, each divided into two chambers. One of the galleries is roofed with a heavy capstone. Two small unsegmented chambers at the eastern end of the court have entrance stones decorated with curvilinear motifs recalling the megalithic art of the passage-tombs, but prolonged weathering has almost obliterated the designs. The court is oval in plan and measures about 45 feet in lengt...

Clontygora court-tomb has a deep, almost V-shaped and originally paved forecourt, delimited by sometimes massive stones. One of these reaches a height of about 9ft, and stands near the entrance to a triple-chambered burial gallery with some capstones still in place. It is enclosed by a cairn so much disturbed that its original outline is difficult to assess. Excavations in 1937 produced the cremated remains of at least one individual, a quantity of Neolithic pottery sherds, some flint and a s...

The monument's true nature as a court-tomb of c.3500 B.C. was only revealed during excavations in 1979-82, which removed the peat that had helped to preserve what turned out to be one of the most complete examples of its kind, and ensured its survival. The trapezoidal stone cairn over 50 feet long has a semicircular forecourt at its eastern end, at the centre of which a portal covered by a mighty capstone gave access to a triple-chambered burial gallery which had originally been roofed with cor...

In this great mound about 40 feet high and 220 feet in diameter two great Passage-tombs were discovered in 1967 and 1968. One of the chambers is corbelled, like that at Newgrange, and is round and has side-chambers; the other has a flat roof and looks like little more than a widening of the passage. Both graves are richly decorated with megalithic art, as are also many of the kerbstones surrounding the base of the large mound. The entrances to the tombs were considerably disturbed in the Earl...

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....

The surviving burial chamber, roughly pentagonal in shape, would have been approached originally through a passage, of which little remains. Four of the upright stones of the chamber bear decorative motifs, including concentric circles, lozenges, zigzags and triangles, which resemble those found in the passage-tombs on the Loughcrew Hills in Co. Meath. Like them Knockmany probably dates from around 3000-2500 B.C. The chamber is now protected and locked within the (reconstructed) earthen mound...

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

Sadly, land clearance in the 18 or 19th century removed the northern half of the monument, roughly down its central axis, and what can be made out from the obscuring clutter of field-wall stones is the southern half of the eastern forecourt and its accompanying double-chambered gallery, as well as the southern part of the forecourt of the western tomb. Excavations in 1937 revealed a black layer in the eastern forecourt containing burnt bone and pottery sherds, and covering further Neolithic pot...

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...

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....