Barrow (Ditch barrow), Ballynamona, Co. Limerick

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Barrow (Ditch barrow), Ballynamona, Co. Limerick

A field in County Limerick holds a prehistoric cemetery that has almost entirely vanished from view.

What was once a cluster of nine burial mounds, spread across a narrow corridor of wet pasture roughly 240 metres long and 50 metres wide, now leaves virtually no trace on the surface. Satellite imagery captured between 2011 and 2013 shows nothing where the barrows once stood, and more recent aerial photography confirms the same. The landscape has simply absorbed them.

A barrow is a raised earthen mound built over a burial, often ringed by a ditch, and they appear across Ireland in considerable numbers from the Bronze Age onwards. What makes the Ballynamona group significant is both its density and its documented excavation history. Six of the nine barrows were investigated in 1934 by Séan P. Ó Ríordáin, whose findings were published two years later. Ó Ríordáin was one of the foremost archaeologists of his generation in Ireland, and his methodical work across sites like this helped establish the frameworks through which Irish prehistoric burial practice is still understood today. The remaining barrow, recorded as site number VI in Field C, was left unexcavated. Whether that decision was practical or deliberate, the record does not say.

The site lies around 40 metres west of a stream, near the townland boundary with Lissard in Co. Limerick. Given that no surface remains are visible, a visit here is less about seeing something than understanding an absence. The wet pasture setting means the ground can be soft underfoot, particularly in the wetter months, so stout footwear is sensible. Those with a serious interest in the site would do well to consult Ó Ríordáin's 1936 publication alongside the location maps compiled by Martin Fitzpatrick and uploaded to the record in September 2021, as these give the clearest picture of where within the field the individual mounds once stood.

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