Barrow (Ring Barrow), Teergonean, Co. Clare

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Barrows

Barrow (Ring Barrow), Teergonean, Co. Clare

A low mound barely rising above the pasture, partly swallowed by gorse, and bisected by a farm boundary that simply erases roughly a third of it: the ring barrow at Teergonean is easy to overlook and easier still to misread as natural undulation.

Yet the geometry, once you know what to look for, is deliberate. A ring barrow is a prehistoric burial monument, typically consisting of a central mound surrounded by a circular ditch and outer bank, and the one here measures some 18.5 metres across its widest axis. The enclosing fosse and bank survive on the south-east to north-north-west arc, while the east-south-east side preserves only a slight scarp where the ground steps down by about 20 centimetres. The central mound itself, around 15 metres in diameter, tilts gently towards the south-east and has an undulating surface, suggesting that whatever lies beneath has shifted or settled over the centuries.

The monument sits near the top of an east-facing slope in County Clare, open to wide views in most directions, though higher ground to the north-west closes off the horizon there. It was recorded on Ordnance Survey six-inch maps in both 1842 and 1920, marked with the hachuring surveyors used to indicate earthworks, which means it was recognisable and considered worth noting across nearly a century of mapping. At some point between those surveys and today, a field boundary was constructed running north-west to south-east directly across the north-east portion of the monument. The bank cuts cleanly through both the enclosing elements and the mound, and there is no trace of the ring barrow continuing on the far side, suggesting the field-building either destroyed or buried that section entirely. About 14 metres to the south, a second ring barrow occupies the same slope, the two monuments close enough to suggest this part of Teergonean held some deliberate significance in the prehistoric landscape.

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