Megalithic tomb - wedge tomb, Radeery, Co. Monaghan
Co. Monaghan |
Megalithic Tombs
On a narrow ridge in County Monaghan, a few carefully arranged stones mark what was once a place of the dead.
The structure at Radeery sits towards the south-eastern end of an east-west spur of land, with Anagose Lough visible to the south-west and a small valley opening out to the north. It is modest in scale and partly swallowed by a field bank, but the bones of something ancient are still legible in the landscape.
The monument is thought to be a wedge tomb, a type of megalithic burial structure that was built in Ireland during the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age, broadly between 2500 and 2000 BC. Wedge tombs take their name from their characteristic shape: wider and taller at the entrance end, tapering toward the back. At Radeery, a small chamber measuring roughly 1.9 metres long and 0.9 metres wide is defined by three side stones and a transversely placed stone that may indicate a portico, an enclosed ante-chamber at the entrance. Two roof stones survive, hinting at a gallery that would have extended around three metres to the east. A pair of stones near the chamber entrance may have served as façade stones, framing the opening, while three further stones, one of them tucked beneath the easternmost roof stone, may represent the outer walling of the structure. The whole is set within a cairn, a mound of stones rather than earth, measuring seven metres long and five metres wide. The south-western portion is partly obscured by a later field bank, which is both a complication for interpretation and a reminder of how continuously this land has been worked and modified over millennia. The east-west alignment of the chamber is consistent with patterns seen at other wedge tombs across Ireland, where orientation, whether toward the setting sun or prevailing light, appears to have been a deliberate choice by the people who built them.