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The megalithic cemetery at Carrowmore is part of an extensive
megalithic landscape located close to Sligo town on the Cúil Irra
peninsula which is dominated by the cairn of warrior Queen Maeve (Misgán
Méadbha) on the summit of Knocknarea Mountain, near Strandhill, County
Sligo.
Situated in a dramatic setting overlooking Sligo Harbour and
Ballisodare Bay, Carrowmore Cemetery is the largest of the most
important Megalithic Sites in Europe with a variety of chambered cairns,
passage mounds, dolmens, standing stones and stone circles.
Description
Distributed
over many acres and extending into adjoining townlands, Carrowmore
represents the largest grouping of megalithic monuments in Ireland, and
immense Neolithic burial ground where once there may have been more than
a hundred tombs. Casual exploration in the last century and present day
gravel quarrying in the vicinity have devalued the archaeological
potential of the site; but it is still a rewarding place to visit,
steeped in atmosphere and evoking a sense of the past. The surviving
monuments, some much more despoiled than others, comprise truncated
passage tombs whose megalithic character derives from the huge
ice-transported erratics used in the construction of the chambers. The
equally massive kerbs of vanished cairns are sometimes mistaken for
ritual stone circles, which they resemble. A number of the tombs here
have lately been the subject of controversial dating by a team of
Swedish archaeologists, whose findings suggest that they may have been
built before 400 BC. To the north-west of The Carrowmore group rises the
prominent hump of Knocknarea (1,014 feet), a cairn-crowned hill
traditionally held to be the burial place of Queen Maeve of Connacht.
The colossal cairn, 35 feet high and 200 feet across at the base, is
much before her assigned period in the annals and illustrates the way in
which folklore compresses time to accord with legend. Its setting and
general appearance indicate a passage-tomb, though it has never been
opened. To appreciate what Carrowmore may have looked like originally,
one must visualise this undulating countryside without modern houses,
field-fences, roads and the pock-marks of gravel workings. The hundred
or so monuments dotted over this green landscape would have been more
conspicuous then, many of them clearly seen from a single viewpoint as
they were doubtless intended to be, a great necropolis spread out below
Knocknarea, whose elevated cairn perhaps provided a focus for the tomb
builders.
Location
Situated 5km southwest of Sligo Town Centre.
Opening Times
May - September: 09.30 - 18.30 hrs daily Last admission 45
minutes before closing.
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