Cave, Eyrecourt Demesne, Co. Galway

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Settlement Sites

Cave, Eyrecourt Demesne, Co. Galway

On the 1838 edition of the Ordnance Survey six-inch map, a single word appears in Roman script on the grounds of Eyrecourt Demesne in east Galway: "Cave".

It sits roughly fifty metres to the north-east of Eyrecourt House, marked with the same quiet confidence as a road or a field boundary. Today, nothing on the surface confirms it was ever there.

What exactly the mapmakers recorded is uncertain. The site may have been a souterrain, an underground passage or chamber typically constructed during the early medieval period, often used for storage or refuge, and frequently built from dry-laid stone beneath a mound or farmstead. Alternatively, it could have been a natural cave. No visible trace survives above ground, so neither possibility has been ruled out. A second feature of similar ambiguity lies roughly seventy-five metres further to the north-east, raising the quiet suggestion that this corner of the demesne may once have held more beneath it than the landscape now reveals. The proximity of both features to Eyrecourt House, a substantial country house in its own right, adds a layer of interest, though whether any connection exists between the underground features and the wider history of the estate remains an open question.

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