Road - road/trackway, Drumcliff Glebe, Co. Sligo

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Roads & Tracks

Road – road/trackway, Drumcliff Glebe, Co. Sligo

In the townland of Drumcliff Glebe, in the shadow of Ben Bulben and close to one of the most visited churchyards in County Sligo, there is a recorded road or trackway old enough to have been classified as an archaeological monument.

That designation alone sets it apart from the country lanes and farm tracks that crisscross the area today. Ancient roads and trackways in Ireland range from the wooden togher, a type of timber causeway laid across boggy ground, to worn hollow ways ground into hillsides by centuries of foot and hoof traffic. Whatever form this particular feature takes, its presence in Drumcliff Glebe suggests movement through this landscape long before the modern road network was laid down.

Drumcliff itself has been a place of significance for well over a millennium. The monastery founded there by Saint Colmcille in the sixth century drew people to this flat ground between the Garavogue estuary and the slopes of Ben Bulben, and the area remained an important ecclesiastical and agricultural centre through the medieval period. The term glebe, attached to this townland, refers to land historically held by the Church of Ireland for the maintenance of a local clergyman, which points to continued institutional use of the land into the post-Reformation era. A trackway running through such a townland could reflect any number of periods of use, from early medieval pilgrimage or monastic traffic to later agricultural routines. Without more detailed survey information currently available for this particular monument, its precise age and character remain difficult to pin down.

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Pete F
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