IrishGenius Home
Court-tombs = Portal-tombs = Wedge-tombs = Passage-tombs = Stone Circles France




county list


Armagh

Carlow

Cavan

Clare

Cork

Derry

Donegal

Down

Dublin

Fermanagh

Galway

Kerry

Kildare

Kilkenny

Laois

Leitrim

Limerick

Londonderry

Longford

Louth

Mayo

Meath

Monaghan

Offaly

Roscommon

Sligo

Tipperary

Tyrone

Waterford

Westmeath

Wexford

Wicklow

 

 

 

 



feedback

 


GAZETTEER of

IRISH PREHISTORIC MONUMENTS





 
 

SELECTED MONUMENTS IN 
COUNTY ANTRIM

Place-names in italics refer to listed entries.



 
 

Altagore: Stone fort
D 248 348 
Sheet 5 

click on the thumbnail for a larger picture

Picturesquely visible 300 metres W of the coast road from Cushendun to Ballycastle via Torr Head, about 2 km N of Cushendun, the wall of the cashel (derived from the same Latin word as castle ) survives to a height of 3 metres, and the internal diameter is 15 metres. There are traces of steps leading up to remains of a terrace.

~ 10 km SSW at Tievebulliagh (D 193 268) is a neolithic axe-factory.Three small outcrops of porcellanite can be seen on the higher SE slope of this conspicuous peak. Rejects, flakes and part-finished axe-heads may still be found round about and on the hilltop - but no finished ones. It was here that the axe-heads were roughed out before being finished at the seashore at Whitepark Bay, and exported all over the British Isles. The cairn on top of Tievebulliagh is probably of Bronze Age date.

~ 4.4 km WNW are Ballyvennaght portal-tombs. 


Ballygilbert: Standing-stone
D 334 104 
Sheet 9

Near the top of Ballygilbert Hill (300 metres), and offering fine views over the North Channel to Scotland, close to the "Ulster Way" footpath, this small (1.5 metres high) but well-sited Cloughogan is remarkable for its unmistakeably phallic form.



~ 3.8 km WNW is Goakstown wedge-tomb, half-way up and to the left of a farm-lane running E of the Carncastle-Glenarm road is a well-preserved wedge-tomb (D 316 107) which still retains over 25 stones of its kerb, some of its cairn, and one large roofstone. A slab about 120 cms high broken - probably intentionally - at one corner, divides the rectangular portico from the main chamber. 


Ballymacaldrack: Court Tomb
D 021 183 
Sheet 8

Situated 1.2 km SSE of Dunloy, Doey's Cairn has a fine and almost intact forecourt post-dating the rest of the sepulchre by some 500 years and thus, perhaps, providing some evidence for the gradual development of court-tombs in Ireland. Between the large orthostats of the court, small filling-stones may be seen. The egg-shaped cairn is bounded by a kerb of low boulders, and has a single chamber facing, unusually, SW. Beyond the chamber is a passage which was used as a cremation chamber: the burnt bones of at least 5 adults were placed in one of 3 pits dug in the otherwise paved floor. The tomb is spoilt by an ugly government-erected fence set too close. 

click here for a high-resolution picture

~ 4.4 kms WSW is 'The Broad Stone' at Craigs .


Ballyvennaght: Portal-tombs
D 202 364 
Sheet 5

5.6 km NW of Cushendun, a pair of portal-tombs lie about 20 metres apart. The westernmost tomb ( Cloughananca ) is a fine example, with a large capstone about 3 metres across. and a sill-stone. One side-stone is missing. The portal stones are 1.5 metres high. Between this tomb and the second, which has collapsed under the weight of its capstone, traces of the cairn which contained them both can still be seen. 

click here for a high-resolution picture

About 500 metres ESE is another, smaller, portal-tomb almost buried in bog. The capstone is 2.1 metres across and 1.5 metres thick, and just 60 cms of the portal-stones are visible. 

~ 500 metres S of Loughaveema (The Vanishing Lake) and 50 m E of the main road, are the remains of a wedge-tomb whose cairn measures roughly 8 by 10 metres and which faces SW. The chamber is 3 x 0.9 metres and has a septal slab. There may be remains of an antechamber. 

~ 2 km NE is Carnanmore hilltop passage-tomb. 

~ Included in the itinerary of Ballypatrick Forest Drive, 2 km WSW of Loughaveema, In Glenmakeerin townland, are the remains of a double-court tomb (signposted). 

~ 4.4 km ESE is Altagore cashel (stone fort).


Belfast: Court-tomb 
J 335 725 
Sheet 15 

A 4-chambered tomb, originally from Ballintaggart in county Armagh, with a shallow forecourt of 4 orthostats with a good part of the cairn and kerb surviving, has been erected on the far side of the Ulster Museum (just beyond the Queen's University and overlooking the Botanic Gardens). A good overhead view of the tomb may be had from the museum's cafeteria.

click here for a high-resolution picture

 
~ 6 km N is "The Giant's Ring", Ballynahatty in county Down.


Carnanmore: Passage-tomb
D 218 388 
Sheet 5 

A circular hilltop-cairn offering splendid views and containing a good deal of quartz (typical of passage-tombs) surrounds a rectangular, corbel-roofed chamber, approached by a short passage from the SW. A basalt corbel near the capstone has faint decoration in the style of passage-tomb art, including a snake-like line, 3 horseshoe shapes and two groups of concentric circles, one of which may be a spiral.

~ 2 km SW are the portal-tombs of Ballyvennaght.


Craigarogan: Passage-tomb
J 270 842 
Sheet 5 

Granny's Grave (which is a corruption of "Grania's Grave" which is a translation of Carn Greine, Cairn of the Sun, pronounced locally as 'Carngraney') is a shamelessly-neglected and overgrown, low, megalithic passage still roofed, 9 metres long, at the SW end of which is a sealed polygonal chamber which is roofed by a single stone 1.8 metres across. It seems that the tomb was surrounded by a circular kerb, indicating that it is a hybrid or variant form of passage-tomb in an area where there were other passage-tombs (now destroyed) built by the intruding late-Neolithic "Beaker People" from Britain. 

click here for a high-resolution picture


~ Just over 7 km NW is the Holed Stone at Doagh.


Craigs: Court-tomb and Passage-tomb 
C 978 175 
Sheet 8 

At a height of 200 metres on Long Mountain, this reconstructed tomb has a large capstone over the entrance and first chamber of the gallery - probably not the original. The almost semicircular forecourt faces SE. Known as The Broad Stone , it was once a popular place of assembly. 

~ 800 metres SW on the other side of the road is a small denuded passage-tomb, whose seven close,tall uprights support a flat roofstone some 2 by 1.6 metres. Two fallen stones by the opening on the SW side may be remains of a short passage. 

~ 4.4 km ENE is the fine court-tomb at Ballymacaldrack. 


Doagh: Holed Stone 
J 242 907 
Sheet 14 

This fine slab, situated on a rocky outcrop to the SE of Holestone Road, 2 km WNW of Doagh village, commands wide views. A circular, chamfered hole some 10 cms in diameter at groin height was made by boring from both sides of the slab, as is usual in such monuments. In a significant degeneration of early progenerative practices lovers plighted their troth by passing a white handkerchief through the hole. This stone is echoed by another, larger slab with a similar groin-height hole, straight across the North Channel at Crows in Galloway. 


click on the picture for a closer view

~ 2.4 km SE and visible SE of the road from Parkgate to Doagh is the impressive Moyadam Standing-stone, almost 2 metres high with a curious "feminising" groove at the top. 

~ 7.2 km SE is 'Carn Greine', Craigarogan


Goakstown: Wedge-tomb
D 316 107 
Sheet 9 

Half-way up and to the left of a farm-lane running E of the Carncastle-Glenarm road, this fairly well-preserved wedge-tomb still has over 25 stones of its kerb, some of its cairn, and one large roofstone. A slab about 120 cms high broken - probably intentionally - at one corner, divides the rectangular portico from the main chamber.

~ 3.8 km ESE is the phallic standing-stone at Ballygilbert.


Lough-na-Cranagh: Crannóg
D 178 427
Sheet 5

Near the summit of Fair Head, this picturesque crannóg or artificial lake-refuge is oval in shape and, unusually, contained by a dry-stone wall. Fair Head is accessible by car as far as the clachan or house-cluster to the S of the Lough where a car park is provided by the National Trust. There is a spectacular view from the top of the sheer, fissured cliffs beyond the Lough, to Rathlin Island and, visibility permitting, the Mull of Kintyre.


Ticloy: Portal-tomb
D 232 127
Sheet 9

In a field 8 km SW of Carnlough "The Stone House" has been thought to be half-way between a court-tomb and a portal-tomb. At the E end of what was once a long cairn is a small chamber up to 1.8 metres high, roofed with 2 capstones and flanked by 5 orthostats forming a forecourt.
 

click here for a high-resolution picture




 

Archæologists are the latest looters...

...Are they the last ?