Megalithic structure, Glanmore, Co. Kerry
Co. Kerry |
Megalithic Tombs
On the flat valley floor of the Glanmore River in south-west Kerry, a small group of ancient stone slabs lean against one another in a configuration that defies easy classification.
Three large slabs, set at right angles to each other, prop themselves up against a fourth, smaller slab that lies nearly flat beneath them. A fifth slab lies prostrate a little to the north-west, half-buried under gorse-covered sod. Miscellaneous smaller stones are scattered and embedded around the immediate area. Whatever this arrangement once was, it no longer fits neatly into the usual categories of megalithic monument, and that ambiguity is precisely what makes it worth pausing over.
Megalithic structures is something of a catch-all term for prehistoric stone monuments, broadly from the Neolithic and Bronze Age periods, and the label here reflects genuine uncertainty about what this grouping originally represented. It may be the collapsed and displaced remains of a portal tomb, a wedge tomb, or some other funerary or ritual structure whose original form has been lost to time, settlement, or agricultural disturbance. The three main slabs measure between roughly 87 centimetres and just over two metres in their longest dimension, substantial stones by any measure, and their right-angle arrangement hints at something once intentional and structural. A standing stone lies approximately two and a half metres to the south-east, which may or may not be related, though its proximity is suggestive. The valley is overlooked by mountains on all sides, placing these stones within a landscape that would have carried considerable significance to the people who placed them here thousands of years ago.