Megalithic tomb - court tomb, Carrowmore, Co. Sligo
Co. Sligo |
Megalithic Tombs
On a quiet stretch of level pasture near the Sligo-Leitrim border, an oval earthen mound barely three-quarters of a metre high conceals the partial remains of a Neolithic court tomb, a monument type distinguished by a roofless forecourt area, typically semicircular or full-oval in plan, that opened onto a covered gallery used for burial.
What survives here is fragmentary but legible enough to read: a low mound measuring some 21 metres east to west and up to 13.5 metres north to south, with the stony bones of a collapsed funerary structure still visible within it.
The remains consist of a gallery running roughly east to west, preceded on the eastern end by the partial arc of an open court. Of that court, only the southern arm survives intact, represented by four upright stones connecting to two further stones that once formed a flat facade. A single stone on the opposite side of the gallery entrance, known as a courtstone, is all that remains of the northern arm. Two jambs mark the entrance to the gallery itself, though a stone wedged between them has shifted from its original position. Along the northern side of the gallery, an irregular line of stones extends 5.5 metres westward; three stones on the southern side indicate the gallery once continued at least a further metre in the same direction. The description is drawn from Seán Ó Nualláin's survey of megalithic tombs in County Sligo, published in 1989, which catalogues this structure as number 94 in his county-wide inventory.
A modern fence cuts across the northern side of the mound, running in from both east and west, which gives some sense of how thoroughly the agricultural landscape has grown up around the site. The mound sits on the lower western-facing slopes of a hill-range, and the surrounding pasture gives the monument an unassuming profile; nothing announces it from a distance. For anyone with an interest in Neolithic funerary architecture, the value lies in tracing what remains, stone by stone, and understanding how a once-functional ceremonial structure has slowly dissolved back into the hillside over several millennia.